The text deals with the emergence of a specific Jewish counterculture in the wake of the civil rights movement and the anti-war movement in the USA in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Martin Buber’s philosophy of dialogue, Erich Fromm’s humanism and the religious existentialism of Abraham Joshua Heschel had a significant impact on the ideas of the young Jewish generation and influenced their striving for a renewal of Jewish life. Although the three Jewish thinkers differed in their forms of (...) expression, they had in common a relentless critique of existing state of affairs and fought for a just society. Whether it be Buber’s communitarian society, Fromm’s humanist socialism or Heschel’s free society imbued with religion – they offered answers to the frustrated young generation and pointed the way to the “spiritual revolution” they longed for. Thus they became prophets for them. (shrink)

The paper presents an overview of critical approaches in contemporary French philosophy, focusing on Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s geophilosophy (What is Geophilosophy?) in the influential study on What is Philosophy?, as a possible new source for criticism and engaged philosophy. It starts with Alain Badiou’s well-known presentation of the three significant moments in philosophy’s history of philosophy, Ancient Greek philosophy, German idealism, and finally, the “Adventure of French philosophy”, presented in Badiou as Hegelian philosophical ‘concrete universals’. The paper then (...) relates them to more concrete, environmentally based, and socially constructed ‘geophilosophical’ questioning, as it could first appear in the Greek polis and its embeddedness in the material production of the time. The paper aims to proceed from the prevailing ‘Greek-German-French’ explanations – and exclusions – of geophilosophy to what Badiou himself called ‘the French-Slovene moment’ in contemporary philosophy and to shed new light on the development of Marxist philosophy in ex-Yugoslavia in its relation to the political situation before and after the fall of the Berlin wall. Deleuze’s and Guattari’s materialist questioning about ‘Why philosophy in Ancient Greece at that moment?’, also related to the question of ‘Why capitalism in England and not in China?’, etc., have been re-actualized by putting it in the context of what might be called ‘Yugoslav geophilosophy’ with the prominent role of Slavoj Žižek and his philosophical, psychoanalytic turn, along with its ‘discovery’ of sexual difference and its possibility to reach beyond the ‘arrogance’ of the established philosophy, as well as the presumably ‘engaged’ feminist philosophical critique. (shrink)

In the art of radical Informel, we encounter works with emphasised non-pictoriality, non-semantics and non-referentiality, as well as a tendency towards entropy, layering and the disintegration of form through destructive processes such as deformation, perforation, incision, scratching, the accumulation of structures and masses, fragmentation, stripping and burning. In this paper, theoretical models of interpretation for the art of radical Informel are pointed out through the concepts of the aesthetics of ugliness, i.e. brutal aesthetics, such as (1) deformation, (2) disfiguration, (3) (...) formlessness and (4) entropy – using the example of the informal works of Croatian authors Ivo Gattin, Eugen Feller and Marijan Jevšovar, which result from their attitude towards art and painting. The artists have deliberately created paintings that are not “beautiful” by opposing the classical values of art and beauty through oppositional and negative approaches, nihilism, destruction, deformation and the abolition of the surface of the painting as forms of anti-aesthetics. (shrink)

In modern academic article repositories, we find many papers on what Heidegger thought, but few papers that attempt to decipher how Heidegger thought. This article purports to show one aspect of the “how?” question of Heidegger’s thought. In the works of interpreters, historians of philosophy and thinkers, the prevailing view is that the question of being is the central question of the “what?” of Heidegger’s thought. Since the question of “how?” is more original than the question of “what?”, and since (...) the history of thought indicates that the content of thought is always thought according to a given system of thought, this paper aims to prove the hypothesis of a more original, primal, present, and continuous phenomenon than the question of being in Heidegger’s work; a phenomenon on which the question of battle itself is based. We can call this phenomenon “the dialectic of confrontations”. The task is to prove that the answer to the question “How?” is given by Heidegger’s thought in the dialectic of confrontation, by which the “shepherd of being” becomes the “shepherd of confrontations”. (shrink)

The article critically analyses the recent discourse on “post-truth” and addresses the long-term current efforts to determine the epistemic and social status of truth. The first part of the article attempts to define the reason for the appearance and scope of conceptual intervention of the recently popular term “post-truth”. The second part of the paper is devoted to the “prehistory of post-truth” and the introduction of the concept of one authoritative truth in the monotheism of early Judaism. The author then (...) presents contemporary critiques of the fixation of thinking on truth and proposals for a “different thinking”. In the last part of the paper, the author points out the contradiction of situating truth between the extremes of its absolutisation and relativisation, and the necessity of philosophy to dwell in it. (shrink)

This article develops a feminist critique of liberalism through analyses of the liberal private-public dichotomy, the concept of the individual and liberal individualism, the concept of formal equality, abstract models as the basis of political theory, and through analyses of the liberal neglect of ethics and the practice of care. These analyses show why feminist philosophy usually presents liberalism as a gendered and patriarchal tradition. On the other hand, the article aims to highlight some of the feminist responses to the (...) feminist critique of liberalism in order to present the tradition as heterogeneous and one that has the potential to develop the radical feminist political programme. The concepts that are the subject of analysis in this article are precisely those that demonstrate the possibility or impossibility of adopting or redefining liberal ideas in feminist philosophy and commitment to social change, but also those that represent the limits of liberal discourse in any feminist attempt to adopt and/or redefine key concepts and ideas from liberal theories. (shrink)

In this paper, the author approaches the question of why one should study philosophy from an affirmative point of view and argues pro philosophia, i.e. he justifies and promotes the possible taking up of the study of philosophy in the present day by considering its extra philosophical benefits. Thus, the author speaks from a particular perspective, looking at the study of philosophy from an opportunistic and instrumentalised angle. Namely, he does not consider the study as such, its philosophical justification and (...) quality, but looks for its potential in and for today’s world. That is, not for professions such as philosophy teachers or academic philosophers, but actually for almost everyone else. In this sense, the author elaborates ten possible benefits of studying philosophy: (1) Developing critical, logical and reflective, (2) careful and (3) creative thinking; (4) Identifying and formulating (essential) questions; (5) Making quality decisions (‘decision making’); (6) Developing problem-solving skills; (7) Enabling ethical reflection; (8) Identifying life values; (9) Human flourishing and the search for meaning; (10) Preparing for a range of possible professions outside the philosophical professions. (shrink)

Hier wird die folgende Frage gestellt: gibt es überhaupt irgendeine unengagierte Philosophie? Nämlich, jede Philosophie, die überhaupt als echte Philosophie bewertbar ist, und nicht etwa als Ideologie, Dophistik oder Schwindel, sollte als Denken, das der Wahrheit treu bleibt, beschrieben werden, d. h. als eine im Dienst der Wahrheit engagierte Philosophie. Dagegen, diejenige Philosophie, die im Dienst einer weltlicher oder jenseitiger Macht antritt, darf man keineswegs als eine Philosophie bewerten. Doch, es wird noch eine Frage gestellt: Wäre es erlaubt, eine Parallele (...) mit der sog. engagierte Kunst zu stellen? Die Antwort wird ermöglicht durch die Definition der Philosophie als die Tätigkeit des unnachsichtigen Dienstes zur Wahrheit. (shrink)

The answer to the question of whether there is a tension between the insight that the concept of dispositif reveals to us the variability of objective reality and the theory that the design of an architectural object depends on the various elements captured by the concept of dispositif The primary thesis of this paper is that the application of dispositifs in the field of architecture helps us to better understand this concept – from Michel Foucault to Gilles Deleuze to Giorgio (...) Agamben. In other words, the paper presents arguments that the unstable philosophical concept of dispositif can be made more precise through the experiences of architectural practice and theory. On this occasion, I would like to show not only why architects need philosophy, but also, conversely, how an architect and his practice can help philosophers. (shrink)

In this paper, I address the question of engaged philosophy with an emphasis on aesthetics and the philosophy of art. Referring to some specific problems discussed in these areas – in particular climate change, ecological crisis and immoral art – I demonstrate that philosophy can be engaged in two ways: (i) in its aspiration to question social reality, culture, human experience and the strategies for making sense of and finding value in that experience; (ii) in the aspiration to contribute to (...) the well-being of individuals and society through its contribution to understanding that reality and experience. First, I point to the connection between the philosophical questions and the fundamental intellectual aspirations of human beings as social and cultural beings, but also as autonomous knowers and valuers. Second, I respond to two objections that can be directed against engaged philosophy: (i) one that points to a lack of consensus among philosophical responses (the problem of disagreement), and (ii) one that highlights the irrelevance of philosophical debates to our social practice. (shrink)

This paper discusses the classification of antifeminism presented in the book The High Forehead by the philosopher Gordana Bosanac. In this book, which is entirely dedicated to antifeminism, Gordana Bosanac points out the connection between feminism and antifeminism, where antifeminism is determined by the conservative reception of feminist values and the reaction of basically primitive consciousness. Bosanac determines feminism to be a humanistic and the broadest democratic movement based on tolerance but also on broader world ideas aiming at peace and (...) nature’s right to live. The classification of antifeminism in this paper is contextualized with regard to the emergence of new types of antifeminism and its forms in modern societies, especially in the world of the Internet. The paper concludes that the classification is an extremely valuable and stimulating framework for further research, both theoretical and empirical. Reality did not deny the classification; it remained open to new phenomena of antifeminism and the connection that antifeminism has with the new right and right-wing social movements. (shrink)

There is no clear answer as to why there are more employed male philosophers than female philosophers in most universities. The first part analyses the problem of the historical under-education of women – which may be a simple explanation for the absence of women in the history of philosophy. Today, however, the situation in the humanities, including philosophy, is different, as there are often more female than male students, but this does not lead to a significant balance of men and (...) women in higher academic positions. Therefore, the first part of the paper also discusses fifteen hypotheses about the causes of this state of affairs, some of which have been rejected, some of which are highly probable, while further research is needed to confirm or reject some. The second part addresses the problem of the idea that traditional philosophy needs “the feminine” as “the other”, which it defines negatively. This position can be rejected with similar arguments that can also be used to reject essentialism. (shrink)

In this paper, implicitly starting from the neuralgic epistemological point caused by Kostas Axelos’ question to Gordana Bosanac: “Will a woman manage to think?”, we will analyse The Second Sex (Le Deuxième sexe, 1949) by Simone de Beauvoir, to deliberately dissolve the irony of Axelos’s question by reading and talking to the text of one of the most important woman philosophers in the history of philosophy. We will interpret The Second Sex as a report on the phenomenology of the relationship (...) between the gendered self and the gender-marked world, in which the social ideals of the feminine shape the experience of the female self and the processes of becoming a woman. The paper is structured into three sections. After the introductory notes, in the first section, entitled “Ad feminam criticism and controversies”, we will present only a few paradigmatic examples of controversies and negative reactions that followed the publication of The Second Sex. In the “Phenomenology of Gender”, the second and key section of the paper, we will pay attention to the original reading of The Second Sex, mapping the existentialist-phenomenological theses on gender in the book. Finally, in the concluding remarks, we will only sketch a few more recent readings of The Second Sex, to point out the current and very engaged affirmations and additions to the ideas that Simone de Beauvoir announced with that philosophical classic. (shrink)

The paper deals with Gordana Bosanac’s theoretical insights on feminism and the key reasons for its reflection, advocacy and implementation. In the problem-analytical interpretive key associated with her biographical feminist narrative, the author’s key views on antifeminism, patriarchal domination and the relationship between feminism and freedom are articulated. These are the content matrices of the three sub-chapters of this article. In addition to unravelling a number of misogynistic patriarchal assumptions in philosophy and the public sphere, as well as asymmetrical dichotomies (...) that verify and self-renew them, which are the subject of analysis, special attention is paid to the deconstruction of identity sexual politics in favour of a universalised sexuality, i.e. sexuality as “general substantiality” and humanisation of society. The utopian virtue of the project of human emancipation is embodied in the concept of feminist humanism, which is the author’s theoretical novelty in terms of content and mode of interpretation and thus her contribution to feminism. (shrink)

In this paper, we will try to present the problems of education as they were seen by the Croatian philosopher Gordana Bosanac (Varaždin, 1936 – Zagreb, 2019). Although these problems do not fall within the narrowest circle of her interests, the author has been intensively engaged with them throughout her life and has left a significant impact on thinking about the key aspects and scope of the issues we find in the philosophy of education. The central thesis of the article (...) is as follows: G. Bosanac’s thinking is still very relevant today from at least two perspectives. Firstly, as a chronology of various interventions in the education system, and secondly, as an expression of innovative thinking about education that focuses on the individual and his or her intellectual capacities rather than on any social or productive purpose or requirement. We will present some lines of thought of G. Bosanac together with the most important biographical data. First, we will discuss the general content of the subject of education, with particular reference to the relationship between the individual and the social in education. Then, following the thoughts of G. Bosanac, we will rethink the issue of labour, with a special effort to rethink the content of education as labour. In the third part, with significant consideration of the thoughts of G. Bosanac, we will deal with the question of ideology and its negative effects on the education system and especially on the actors of this system. Ultimately, or as the key task of the paper, we will try to answer the question of why education is a fundamental social activity. (shrink)

In this paper, the author aims to show how various implications of poststructuralist theories on the notion of subjectivity can be treated through the so-called “narrative method”. The said narrative method is profiled precisely through the poststructuralist theoretical framework that highlights the elusive character of subjectivity. This insight is used to draw attention to the realm of language, which is a crucial factor in the emergence of any utterance about the structure of our reality. This way of speaking is recognised (...) as essentially narrative, which means that the story must be used as the fundamental unit of language. The narrative method can also be used to intervene in the field that makes its existence possible in the first place. This paper will therefore first analyse texts by Gayatri Spivak, Roberto Calasso and Michel Foucault. These texts will be interpreted from the point of view of the philosophy of stories, which first emerged with the writings of Wilhelm Schapp. It will turn out that these stories bring language closer to its authentic understanding – namely, as a pure multiplicity of contingent stories. To achieve this, we need to apply our narrative method. (shrink)

The issue of responsibility is directly linked to the notion of causation because asserting legal and moral qualifications is dependent on it. The problem arises when negative events are introduced into the consideration of causation because they are part of structuring statements that speak to omission, inaction, or prevention. Hence, the question of can negative events represent a cause and/or effect is extremely important. Although negative events are most commonly treated in analogy with positive events and brought under genuine causation, (...) this placement is unjustified because – unlike positive events – negative events are causally inert. This explanation reflects unfavourably on the practice of forming singular statements on causal connections to negative events. Despite this being the case, it does not render meaningless the common practice of formulating legitimate causal explanations that serve as grounds for statements on omission, inaction, or prevention. (shrink)

In this article, I give an overview of the Croatian philosopher Gordana Bosanac’s (Varaždin, 1936 – Zagreb, 2019) understanding of utopia. She deals with the topic of utopia in two of her books, Utopia and the Inaugural Paradox. A Contribution to the Philosophical-Political Debate (2005) and The Name of Utopia. Yugoslav Self-Government as a Played Out Project of Emancipation (2015). The second book can be considered a continuation of the first. For better understanding and review, I first present the theses (...) from Bosanac’s first book and then those from the second. Apart from dealing with the concept of utopia in her books, Bosanac deals equally thoroughly with the concepts of inauguration, inauguration paradox, socialism, communism and self-management. Beginning with the concept of utopia itself, she takes the reader from Thomas More through other Renaissance utopians, then Marx, Engels, and Bloch, to anti-utopianism. (shrink)

In the paper, the author deals with the history of attempts to defame integrative bioethics by a group of Croatian philosophers and incidental media appearances in which the tendency was to slander the long-standing research concept of the Zagreb bioethics school. In the introduction, a historical overview of the basic qualitative and quantitative results of integrative bioethics in the Croatian and European context is given. This is followed by an analysis of the context of defamation of integrative bioethics and the (...) actors of defamation, separated according to “scientific” and media content. Finally, the attempt to compromise and profane integrative bioethics is interpreted as part of the destrolution phenomenon, the theory of post-communist chaos and the production of fake envy. (shrink)

This article discusses some possible issues and tasks that are particularly important for information and communication sciences. It deals with ethical and technological issues, the role and responsibility of information and communication intellectuals, anthropological issues in information and communication sciences, political economy, propaganda and public relations, corporations and post-politics, practical foundations of information and communication sciences, creation, the utopian dimension of information and communication sciences, libraries and the market, challenges in the education of information and communication experts, and a look (...) into the future. Deliberations about questions and tasks of information and communication sciences emphasise the need for their humanisation. This means that information and communication sciences should refrain from an uncritical adoption of affirmative discourses on the information society and adopt a truly critical relationship to life and society as a whole. (shrink)

From the perspective of the political theory such is the one in Tractatus Theologico-Politicus by Benedictus Spinoza, the purpose of the state as a legal order is the establishment of the permanent condition of security and preservation of the people’s liberty. This also presumes instrumental-functional purposefulness of the state apparatus, which reflects in the combination of protection and obedience. Such a legislative establishment has its real and abstract dimension. Ideally, the latter is in service of the former. Problems that occur (...) in practice as a challenge to the legal order are states of emergency, which are directly confronting security and freedom thus making them mutually exclusive. From that angle, legal-political thought is in need of a clear and distinct understanding of the concepts of freedom and servitude in the context of submission to the autonomous legislation of mind. (shrink)

The paper begins with analysing Schmitt’s essential work Political Theology, 100 years after its publication. In it, the German legal philosopher formulated the concept of political theology, which indicates the relationship between the state of exception and decisionism as a form of legal-political thinking. The contribution of the paper is reflected in its emphasis on the importance of a twofold understanding of the concept of the state of exception: in the first place, as a notion of the exception that funds (...) the philosophy of law and legal theory, and in the second as the state of exception that marks the constitutional category of the state of emergency. Schmitt will insist that the question of the state of exception is not a question of a mere state of necessity or emergency but a broader philosophical-legal concept based on the metaphysical origin of voluntary decision. The sovereign is not the one who decides “in” but “on” the state of exception, which means that, according to the decisionist model, he is just establishing it. Schmitt’s controversial book rarely left anyone indifferent, so it was supported by both right-wing and left-wing political theorists and philosophers, and it must be reconsidered today as a warning about the danger of the concept of the state of exception (state of emergency), which is increasingly becoming a political issue. (shrink)

There are many examples of human speciesism prejudice toward their specie and neglect toward members of other species. This article will consider one example of speciesism, the keeping of animals in captivity in ZOOs. Legal norms concerning animal protection in ZOOs are described, emphasising criminal and misdemeanour charges brought up for animal negligence and/or animal torture and their euthanasia. Although the ZOO establishment and functioning, as well as animal protection within ZOO, is legally prescribed, the article affirmed Visković’s thought that (...) not even in the most prosperous societies “there is no real moral or legal discipline in keeping and exhibiting captive fauna”. Speciesism believes justifying ZOO existence will be morally and ethically reexamined. Speciesism could be found in malicious language constructions affirmed in semantical field zoological garden in the Croatian language. (shrink)

José Ortega y Gasset studied painting in depth from the standpoint he called ratio-vitalism or the philosophy of vital reason. This paper explores whether the term živopis corresponds more to ratio-vitalist philosophy than the term pintura used by the Spanish philosopher. In other words, the question is whether the translation, in this case, is better than the original. Following Ortega’s thesis on the historicity of human creations, we will look for the origin of the word živopis, which contributes to the (...) consideration of whether it is an appropriate word for the art of painting from the perspective of the philosophy of life. (shrink)

This paper examines the social theory of Lester Frank Ward, one of the most significant representatives of early American social theory, with particular attention to his conception of the state, which can be described as Hegelian. The first part of the paper gives a brief overview of early American social theory: its basic features, the issues that were the focus of attention during this period in the development of sociology in the US, and its most significant representatives. The basic features (...) of Ward’s social theory are then presented and examined in more detail. It is pointed out that it is: conceptual and essentially based on the natural sciences; based on the distinction between pure and applied sociology; systematic; supportive of progressive and pro-social reforms. It was directed against the individualist tradition. His theory was based on the belief that the human mind can direct social progress and that the order based on social inequalities, which is a product of the laissez-faire doctrine, cannot guarantee freedom and prosperity. The fundamental institution capable of doing so is the state. Therefore, the central part of this paper is devoted to his conception of the state and makes a comparison with Hegel’s theory of the ethical state contained in Hegel’s philosophy of objective spirit – philosophy of law and philosophy of history. It concludes by pointing out that Ward’s theory indicated the general direction of development of social circumstances towards the era of collectivism, and was also atypical of American social theory in some of its features. (shrink)

The importance of philosophy in understanding madness is promoted, and the importance of the patient’s existential philosophical stance in creating and overcoming the psychotic experience is particularly emphasised. In contrast to the factographic approaches characteristic of the empirical knowledge of the relevant special sciences, the spiritual meta-instance of selfovercoming is clarified by developing the thesis of the irreducibility and irreplaceability of human self-consciousness in both the deterioration and improvement of mental health. The meaning of the right attitude towards transcendence is (...) explained, which implies the awareness of the limited knowledge of absolute reality, but not the loss of hope in its sanative manifestations. The main criteria for inadequate self-awareness of madness are the lack of a harmonised autobiographical narrative and incompatibility with the transcendent and universal order of values. (shrink)

Based on the notion of the world as a whole, as formulated by Kant and Hegel, it is possible to articulate a dynamic vision of the world in which the interrelationships between various factors are adequately represented. In this way, each side of the “calculus” would be problematised in the face of the problems of mainstream bioethics in a complex context of mutual conditionality. The dialectical idea of the world as a whole would help bioethics gain insight into the way (...) its principles are mediated with the principles of other orders of human action, an attempt to theoretically support bioethicists’ awareness of the need for a global approach to their subject. By formulating its principles in the light of a much-needed global approach, for example, concerning a global environmental catastrophe, it is more likely that it will be able to become one mechanism for radically changing our daily lives. (shrink)

The author analyses normative acts regulating the protection of animals, both at the national level (especially in the Republic of Serbia) and at the level of supranational organisations and state unions (the Council of Europe and the European Union), but also attempts to conceptualise the terms used in the documents observing the protection of animals. From the practical and philosophical perspective, this paper considers the terms (I) “animal” (“any vertebrate animal capable of experiencing pain, suffering, fear and stress”), (II) “welfare” (...) (“the provision of conditions in which animals can exercise their physiological and other species-specific needs”), (III) “abuse” (“any treatment or disregard of animals, that causes pain, suffering, fear, stress, injury, damages the genetic integrity of the animal and causes death intentionally or through negligence”), and other terms relevant to understanding the prevailing anthropocentric approach to animals. The paper also examines the difficulties in implementing the adopted legislation on the protection and welfare of animals caused by an insufficiently internalised sensitivity of official institutions as well as citizens towards so-called non-human living beings. In the author’s view, it is important that they do not fall below the achieved civilisational standards of ethical and moral culture in their cognitions and insights, and that they consider various topics related to animals with due caution and awareness of the dilemmas they may encounter in their professional work and lives. An appropriate pluriperspective approach and a consciousness of responsibility should eventually lead to a more sensitive attitude of said subjects towards the non-human part of the animal creation. (shrink)

The “Lošinj Declaration on Biotic Sovereignty” is a novelty in the consideration of the environment and life in general and a unique document on a global scale. Until the advent of the Declaration, the environment was usually considered in an instrumentalist way, following the prevailing techno-scientific paradigm. The Declaration introduces biotic sovereignty as the starting point for the debate on GMOs, from which the harmfulness or potential benefits of genetic engineering can be assessed. The protection of biotic sovereignty should be (...) one of the crucial values that European and Croatian citizens should defend in the upcoming struggle to change and probably drastically reduce the regulatory regime for genetically modified crops in the European Union and thus also in Croatia. In this paper, we highlight the importance of the “Lošinj Declaration on Biotic Sovereignty” in the context of the emergence of new gene regulation techniques that are becoming a threat to biotic sovereignty. We analyse the lobbying process against the ruling C-528/16 using the example of the scientists united in the network EU-SAGE. The central part of the paper analyses the controversy over a new European Commission study on new genetic techniques and the political context of the conflict between the European Commission and the European Parliament over the authorisation of new seed varieties of genetically modified crops. (shrink)

This paper examines the intertextual relations between Bertolucci’s film The Conformist and Plato’s allegory of the cave. The importance of interpretation for the Plato’s allegory is emphasized: it is central in the thematic, in its form, and in the way it is communicated. The interpretation of the world is inseparable from self-interpretation. By using elements from Plato’s allegory of the cave, Bertolucci’s film becomes the interpretation of Plato. At the same time, the reality of the film is interpreted in Plato’s (...) terms and images. The concepts of conformism, knowledge and liberation are explored. (shrink)

One of the fundamental questions of legal philosophy and theory is what it means to have a legal right, i.e. who can be considered a legal right holder. With the parallel development of bioethical doctrine, this question about rights holders is becoming increasingly relevant, raising the question of whether rights holders can be animals, trees, foetuses, future generations or machines (artificial intelligence). This question also applies to the dead, where the difficult question of the end of life and the final (...) occurrence of death also arises. By critically elaborating the positions of contemporary legal theorists in the context of two key theories of rights, the Will Theory and the Interest Theory and their mutual differences, the paper attempts to offer an account of the dead as potential right holders. In this context, the above legal theory elaboration is reflectively considered in the context of civil law doctrine of legal rights, as one of the fundamental areas within the general part of civil law. The legal subjectivity of the deceased is also observed in the field of (post-mortem protection) personality rights, but also in a pragmatic way in relation to recent domestic case law practice, as well as the case law practice of the European Court of Human Rights, where interesting legal issues have arisen that imply the question of the deceased as legal right holders. (shrink)

The topic of the impact of artificial intelligence on law, the legal profession and legal culture, in general, has not yet been sufficiently discussed in the Croatian scientific community. This paper aims to encourage a more comprehensive analysis of the relationship between the increasing use of artificial intelligence in our daily lives and the specifics of practising the legal profession in such an environment. Artificial intelligence is still a broad and heterogeneous field. It is therefore justified to ask the question: (...) Which of the many technologies currently being developed can be applied in the field of law? Which legal matters can be “entrusted” to the new technologies? To answer such and similar questions, it is necessary to have an excellent knowledge of both artificial intelligence and the law, as well as the areas in which they intersect. We have chosen criminal law, which is a part of public law and the ultimate social mechanism for responding to undesirable behaviour, as our object of study. We pay particular attention to its two important aspects: the element of culpability in a criminal offence and the possibility of autonomous decision-making in criminal law. The reflections have shown that Croatian criminal law may have the ability and potential to adapt to the challenges of artificial intelligence when it comes to culpability. On the other hand, the necessity and value of artificially intelligent decisions are questionable given the fundamental characteristics of criminal law. In conclusion, the authors express a departure from views of artificial intelligence as a decision-making substitute in criminal law but support the view that artificially intelligent legal technologies are an aid to decision-making. (shrink)

The analysis of cognitive-ontological and especially ethical concepts in Nietzscheʼs philosophy shows deprivation as an important component that compromises their status. The emptiness, in the form of purity, inevitably appears during the decomposition of Nietzsche’s thought. Under the influence of perspectivism, epistemology, along with the question of truth, have undergone radical deconstruction. The results significantly affect the existence of morality, values and the notion of good in general. Deprivation appears in values, which leads to pessimism. Pessimistic values move away from (...) the intensity of life instinct. As a reflection of life, man strives and destroys the aspirations for life. The whole reality, on the other hand, is in opposition and thus, necessarily, in dialectic and conflict. Nietzsche, however, does not strive for reconciliation opposites, but requires their enduring, which is, at the same time, overcoming. Conflict between pessimistic and life valuesinevitably arises. Pessimism precedes nihilism, which alternates the notion of truth, meaning, and foundation. In the concluding analysis, it becomes clear how the value creator is placed in relation to the concept of eternal return and overcoming nihilism. Emptiness and lack of sense are replaced by a dynamic and conflicting conception of life, i.e. existence, where the dynamics of life must not be understood in an organic or other bio-morphological sense, but in relation to the individual and his creative potential only in the form of change and reestablishment of reality. This, in turn, means that, ultimately, the focus is on the subject, man as will and his existential acts. (shrink)

In 2020, Daniele Molinini published a paper outlining two types of mathematical objectivity. One could say that with this paper Molinini not only separated two mathematical concepts in terms of terminology and content, but also contrasted two mathematical-philosophical contexts, the traditional-idealistic and the modern-practical. Since the first context was the theoretical basis for a large number of analyses that we find in the framework of the philosophy of mathematics, the space was now offered to re-examine such analyses in the second (...) context. More specifically, with respect to the second context, we will analyse the strength of one of the few explicit Platonic arguments that seeks to justify the ontological status of mathematical objects and the central claim of mathematical Platonism about the existence of mathematical objects. (shrink)

Trafficking in human body parts is one of the most severe form of crime in modern times. The topicality of this phenomenon reinforces the fact that it is intertwined with organised crime and human despair. The resulting repercussions are dangerous for the “donor”, prosperous for the “intermediaries”, and vital for the “recipient”. The paper analyses the phenomenon of trafficking in human body parts, which is directly related to the development of transplant medicine and surgery. Human organ transplantation is moving toward (...) indicative ethics, as ethics of responsibility, and is gradually moving beyond imperative ethics, emphasising duty. Human organ donation is an act of self-sacrifice. Therefore, from an ethical and moral perspective, the commercialization or trafficking of human organs is unacceptable because it violates human dignity. In addition to the ethical implications, the paper analyses international documents on this topic and the Croatian normative regulations on this issue. Finally, bioethical and criminal law answers to this question are given. (shrink)

In the 21st century, we live in what can be called a “new normal” when we view law through the prism of digital technology. Technology has greatly impacted the traditional parts of civil law, such as law of ownership, inheritance and contracts. Technology is bringing civil law into a new, digital environment where it is necessary to consider the specifics of that environment. The freedom of contract is the basic principle of civil law, which is mainly applied in the law (...) of obligations, in the part concerning contracts. In contrast, adhesion contracts are contracts in which the terms are dictated by one party, while the other party can only accept or reject them – take it or leave it. In the context of adhesion contracts, it is clear that freedom of contract can be violated in certain cases. Nowadays, a large number of such contracts are concluded online. Every user of a website must agree to these contracts in order to use that website. The problem of the lack of choice of the person who agrees to the pre-announced conditions in such adhesion contracts may be more pronounced online than in classical adhesion contracts. Due to certain characteristics of such contracts, users are sometimes not even aware that by their mere behaviour they have agreed to the terms and conditions of the Internet service provider to which the website belongs. As a result, these users do not know what they have agreed to until problems arise between them and an ISP. The behaviour of the contracting parties certainly contributes to this problem. ISPs sometimes try to turn most of the provisions of the contract in their favour and diminish their importance, while users ignore this and agree to everything that is offered to them, sometimes not even knowing that they have given their consent. (shrink)

This paper is about women’s complicity or women’s involvement in actions that directly or indirectly lead to the restriction of other women’s freedoms and rights. Among the first to mention women’s complicity was Simone de Beauvoir, who in her book The Second Sex described the phenomenon of women’s participation in unjust patriarchal practices, suggesting the existence of passive and active complicity. Using Christopher Kutz’s theory of collective complicity and its extension by Brian Lawson, the validity of the notion of female (...) complicity is examined through selected examples of anti-female practice mentioned in the works of feminist theorists. Although feminists spoke of women’s complicity in the context of women’s self-objectification, domestic work, and political activity on the right, the conclusion of this paper is that only in the latter case can we speak of active and then only of feminist and politically relevant female complicity. (shrink)

An important subject of bioethical and legal considerations is the relations and manifestations of what happens in current biomedical practice regarding the practice of activities and the provision of health care services. This is particularly important when it comes to disagreements, collisions, and conflicting rules, the ethical and legal origins of different norms, and medical decision making. An appropriate analytical and methodological approach through interpretation and comparison is needed to uncover shortcomings that often remain on the surface, invisible, due to (...) the lack of dialogue. This paper aims to shed light on the fundamentals of bioethical principles on the one hand and the legal-logical system of norms in biomedicine on the other. The conclusion emphasises the elimination of the contradictory elements of the relationship and the affirmation of helpful and complementary aspects with the opening of parallel perspectives and intersections in the service of promoting the legality of the work, the development of good medical practice and respect for human rights in the field of health. (shrink)

Not the least noticeable is the fact that the ancient Greek compound euthanasia, formed by Francis Bacon, has retained its original terminological form since it was first used in the 17th century. Among all other controversial ethical issues, however, the conceptual notion of euthanasia categorically evokes rather important controversies. The questions that arise in this context are whether there is a definition, or at least a determination, of the term euthanasia and whether we are aware of its use in scientific (...) discourse, what exactly is euthanasia. The paper offers a terminological elaboration of the term euthanasia in a linguistic, but mainly legal and medical-procedural context, in order to examine the coherence in defining the term between these categories and, consequently, to determine the key determinants of euthanasia according to categorical sections. The key facts stated are the primary determination or the possible definition of the term for any further scientific study of euthanasia as one of the most controversial issues within bioethical doctrine. (shrink)

In this paper, the authors first emphasise the connection that exists between bioethics and law. However, special attention is given to the link between bioethics and human rights, which share the idea of protecting similar values, especially the protection of life and human dignity. Identifying the interdependence and interrelation of these concepts is a prerequisite for further exploration of how and in what context the European Court of Human Rights decides on bioethical issues it encounters when ruling on classical human (...) rights guaranteed by the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Once the important features that determine the relationship between bioethics and human rights are identified, these features will be practically examined through the group of cases in which the Court has addressed the issue of mandatory vaccination, which has been in the public spotlight in recent years. (shrink)

Hate speech is interpreted in various ways. It is always analysed in the context of the relationship between freedom of speech and the possible lack of freedom caused by legal regulation and sanctioning of hate speech. In this paper we want to start from the consideration of hate itself and in this way consider it in its biological and cultural dimensions. Using specific examples of hate speech, we aim to show the intertwining of the biological and the intellectual, the cultural (...) and the physical, the ideological and the emotional. The analysis of some cases of hate speech and the passion of individuals involved in this psychological and intellectual immaturity makes clear how important it is for philosophy to lunge into this poor reality – steps taken to give philosophical views on these phenomena, but also basic criteria for possible orientation in other scientific research. (shrink)

Our main goal is to describe the structure of engaged acts and compassion and their constitutive interrelation to explicate the key role of engaged and compassionate acts for group constitution. In the first part of the paper, we formulate our guiding idea: the key to understanding compassion lies in understanding engagement and vice versa. We then consider the problematic nature of engaged acts: On the one hand, they do not meet the conditions to be attributed to the plural subject; on (...) the other hand, they cannot be understood without presupposing the plural subject. To understand this, we rely primarily on Helm’s theory of emotions and the classical phenomenological analyses of the constitution of the plural subject, but we also point out the limitations of the latter. In the last two sections, we build on Nussbaum’s theory of compassion to describe the parallelism in the structure of compassion and engagement and to show their constitutive connection. Finally, we examine the specific way in which engaged acts “place burden” and transform a group into an institution. (shrink)

This paper deals with an aspect of John Philoponus’ psychology, a 6th century Byzantine writer, which marks the early phase of his philosophical career. It is the ochēma/pneûma theory, which in Philoponus’ case represents an unusual fusion of Aristotelian, Platonic, and Stoic philosophy with Galenic physiology and anatomy. In this paper, we examine how this Christian Neoplatonist attempts to assimilate elements of two ancient traditions – philosophical and medical – into a peculiar psychological concept.

The prevailing economic ideologies that have entered higher education in recent decades have disrupted the long tradition of humanistic ideals and values. This has led to a paradigm shift from learning per se to learning for the labour market, emphasising the technical-functional dimension of higher education and marginalising the role of education for human self-realisation. While many European universities embrace the neoliberal paradigm in teaching and learning, there is a growing literature in Southeast Asia on the revival of Confucian values (...) in response to the hyper-specialisation of higher education. In an attempt to explore the relationship between humanistic and neoliberal approaches in the university, this paper will focus on the European and Asian educational traditions, their similarities and differences, and how they have been institutionalised to highlight the importance of restoring humanistic values in education in a neoliberal-oriented world. (shrink)

This paper discusses the relationship between rational thought and rational action, between philosophy and politics, in a perspective in which this relationship, if properly understood, turns out to be decisive for the repoliticisation process that seems to impose itself as an urgent obligation of our time. It will be shown that the ancient Greek experience of understanding philosophy and politics, transformed in modernity in a certain way, is also relevant to the contemporary emancipation of our rational life. And in this (...) context of rational life, it is shown that thought is always a political act and politics, in turn, always presents specific thought. (shrink)

This paper presents a historical-philosophical reconstruction of Leibniz’s theory of education. In the introduction, I point out the exegetical problems involved in locating Leibniz’s “philosophy of education” within the broader corpus of his works and in uncovering an appropriate theoretical framework within which it is possible to contextualise and reconstruct Leibniz’s thought on education. It is then shown that this framework is provided by Leibniz’s practical philosophy, i.e. his ideas about the optimal state and the common good. I analyse the (...) key theses of Leibniz’s ethics and political philosophy to uncover the background of the idea of the respublica optima and explain how education, in Leibniz’s view, should enable the perfection of the individual and society and contribute to the realisation of the common good. Finally, it is argued that in his educational project Leibniz articulated an idea of the Enlightenment that is far more progressive than the educational ideas of the philosophers we usually associate with the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. (shrink)

Eine der grundlegenden menschlichen Bestimmungen ist die, dass der Mensch ein sich bildendes Wesen ist. Den Grund dafür findet die philosophische Tradition in seiner geistigen Seele. Für Humboldt und seine Universität beispielsweise, ist die Seele der Grund dieses Prozesses. Die zeitgenössische Bildungsphilosophie, namentlich die Pädagogik und die ihr verwandten Wissenschaften, vermeiden jedoch die Rede über die Seele hinsichtlich der Erziehung und besonders hinsichtlich der Bildung. Dies führt bereits zur zentralen These des Artikels, welche wie folgt zusammengefasst werden kann: Bildung kann (...) und darf nicht auf die Rezeption von Wissen und Fähigkeiten bzw. Fertigkeiten im Sinne bloßer Qualifizierung reduziert werden, sondern muss zu ihren tiefsten Grundlagen zurückkehren, welche sich gleichzeitig als grundlegende Bestimmungen bzw. Perspektiven der Bildung überhaupt darstellen: Mit der Öffnung zur Ganzheit der Welt kommt die Seele innerhalb der Bildung bei sich selbst an. Hiermit aber führt sich die Bildung nicht ausschließlich auf die theoretisch-spekulative Art der Annahme und der „Prozessierung“ des Wissens zurück oder zielt ausschließlich auf den moralisch-sittlichen Aspekt; vielmehr wird darauf verwiesen, dass der Mensch in seiner Gesamtheit und Eigenart in ihren Mittelpunkt gestellt wird. Die zentrale These des Aufsatzes wird durch vier tragende Kapitel entfaltet: Im ersten, welches zudem als Ausgangspunkt gilt, wird die griechisch-platonische Denktradition im Hinblick auf die Bildung erörtet, indem dabei die Zwei entscheidenden Begriffe, imago und imitatio, hervorgehoben werden. Im zweiten beziehen wir uns auf zwei – unserer Ansicht nach – Schlüsseltheoretiker, W. v. Humboldt und G. F. W. Hegel, die, jeder auf seine Weise, die „Seele“ der Bildung durch die Begriffe der Universalität in Form der Losreißung vom Partikularen und der Freiheit in Form der Einsamkeit oder Losreißung von der Menge beobachten. Die vorgestellten Darstellungen heben auf keinen Fall eines der wichtigen Merkmale der Bildung auf, die Ausbildung, die im dritten Kapitel erörtert wird, wobei man zur Kenntnis geben möchte, dass sie, wenn sie authentisch sein soll, auch die „Ankunft der Seele bei sich selbst“ berücksichtigen muss. Die abschließenden Ausführungen im vierten Kapitel schildern die Situation derzeitiger Bildung, beispielsweise das Abgleiten in den Funktionalismus und in die reine Praxis sowie das Ausbleiben jeglicher Idee davon, was im Endeffekt die Folge der „Vertreibung des Geistes aus der Bildung“ ist. (shrink)

Analysis starts from Rawls’s disposition that in a liberal society autonomous persons should have two moral powers – the capacity for a sense of justice and the capacity to establish, pursue and revise the concept of the good. Political or neutral liberalism advocates the justification of state intervention to improve the first type of capacity while declaring the interference with the second capacity illegitimate. The critique of this disposition is done by analysing the perspectives of Jonathan Quong and Martha Nussbaum, (...) showing that they lead to allowing irrational and authoritarian perspectives in education, that is, neglecting the development of valuable capacities. Although institutional influence can be biased and paternalistic, in some cases it may be legitimate for the institution to create conditions that enhance people’s ability to evaluate, reevaluate, and revise their conceptions of the good. (shrink)

The topicality of Friedrich Nietzsche’s thought is reflected in his critique of mass culture, society and the state, and scientific methods, which later had a significant impact on modern discourse. Mass culture is the foundation of modern social reality as a force of decadence and nihilism that degrades the authentic and creates a mediocre culture. Nietzsche opposed a “culture” that implies a transcendence and sublimation of “nature” into the forms of “moral” ideals, and he called for a natural life without (...) harmful cultural influences that are an obstacle to a healthy human life. The idea of nihilism present in culture is relevant to our time because it manifests as a loss of depth or meaning in life itself, which, like nature, is chaos, without structure or empirical evidence. To understand the scientific revolution and its impressively devastating pace in the high-tech laboratories of our global research ecosystem, relevant is Nietzsche’s perspective aimed at demystifying science, especially positivism and naturalism, which seek to impose truth based on scientifically verified knowledge. Scientific interpretations and constructions are efforts to control and “humanise” nature by adapting chaos to our anthropomorphic expectations, needs, and concerns and making chaotic nature predictable. The paper shows that Nietzsche’s critique of culturalism and naturalism is based on the vision of the life of the “last man human” who rejects the culture of self-overcoming and dismantles reduces the fear of the uncertain and sudden and lives enframed in reality as presented by the scientific community. In the life of the contemporary human being, the will to live is merely maintained because he lacks the will to power. (shrink)

Unter dem Begriff Biologismus verstehen wir die Anwendung strikter wissenschaftlicher biologischer Maßstäbe und Begriffe auf die Gebiete, die nicht durch die Dominanz biologischer Verhältnisse bezeichnet werden. Die Annahme des biologistischen Determinismus resultiert notwendigerweise mit der Auffassung, dass die Kultur durch die biologischen Gesetze determiniert wird. Als Antithese zu einem solchen Reduktionismus stellt sich der Kulturalismus heraus, d. h. die Betonung des Vorrangs kultureller Determinanten im Prozess der Bildung der Kultur und der menschlichen Welt überhaupt. In diesem Beitrag wird bewiesen, dass (...) ein solcher Kulturalismus nur die falsche Alternative zum Biologismus ist. Die menschliche Welt kann auf angemessene Weise nur dann begriffen werden, wenn alle relevanten Dimensionen ihrer Gestaltung in Betracht gezogen werden. Die Voraussetzung dafür ist die Befreiung von allen reduktionistischen Versuchungen. (shrink)

he paper highlights the formal aspects of the educational process that are structurally ignored by contemporary pedagogical ideology. Pedagogy as the endeavour to realise certain specific goals through formation has become the constitutive essence of social reality. Yet, in the same sense that we are unknowingly embedded in ideological reality through shared social practises, we are also blind to the formal aspect of our conscious educational activities, regardless of their actuality. While we strive to establish order, logic, and meaning, we (...) simultaneously recognise the reason, which does not lead to adequate knowledge of content, but to what the cognising subject does not know. It arises only through the realisation of the unsuccessful search for knowledge and truth, which is precisely what the formal aspect of pedagogy fails at. Genuine self-reflection, therefore, can be neither the starting point nor the goal since it occurs rather incidentally in the shaping of the individual. Hegel’s contribution to pedagogy is not that he imparted true knowledge or an appropriate way of teaching, but that his commitment to reason gave prominence to this unreflected ideological core of the contemporary social arrangement. (shrink)