In this paper, we will focus on the implications of, and relationships between, the concepts of mediation and media. We will focus in particular on the notion of body and linguistic practice as complex actors of mediation between the world and subjective engagements. In the post-phenomenological traditions, the critical theory of Harmut Rosa, and Citton's media studies, it has been pointed out that body and language represent the very prototypes of the construction of media as sensible, affective and formal environments. (...) Thus, the body and language as mediums obey two criteria that seem typical of any anthropologically located technology: they are prostheses that amplify experience and, at the same time, create specific environments which inaugurate ecological diversification. (shrink)

Selection of Salazar Bondy's works with new critical materials.

The aim of this paper is to adapt Miranda Fricker’s concept of testimonial injustice to cases of what I call “argumentative injustice”: those cases where an arguer’s social identity brings listeners to place too much or little credibility in an argument. My recommendation is to adopt a stance of “metadistrust”—we ought to distrust our inclinations to trust or distrust members of stereotyped groups.

The aim of this book is to answer two important questions about the issue of normativity in epistemology: Why are epistemic reasons evidential, and what makes epistemic reasons and rationality normative? Bondy's argument proceeds on the assumption that epistemic rationality goes hand in hand with basing beliefs on good evidence. The opening chapters defend a mental-state ontology of reasons, a deflationary account of how kinds of reasons are distinguished, and a deliberative guidance constraint on normative reasons. They also argue in (...) favor of doxastic voluntarism—the view that beliefs are subject to our direct voluntary control—and embrace the controversial view that voluntarism bears directly on the question of what kinds of things count as reasons for believing. The final three chapters of the book feature a noteworthy critique of the instrumental conception of the nature of epistemic rationality, as well as a defense of the instrumental normativity of epistemic rationality. The final chapter defends the view that epistemic reasons and rationality are normative for us when we have normative reason to get to the truth with respect to some proposition, and it provides a response to the swamping problem for monistic accounts of value. (shrink)

Esta obra permanece aún como la primera y la más brillante demostración ñdespués de Marxñ de que la agricultura no puede producir por sí misma los elementos que ne cesita para llegar al socialismo, es decir que íla industria somete a la agricultura de modo que el desarrollo industrial determina siempre más la ley del desarrollo agrarioî. íY en esto ñdice Kautskyñ, en haber evidenciado la industrialización de la agricultura, es donde yo veo la idea central de mi libro.î La (...) introducción se dedica a analizar la figura de Kautsky y las discusiones que el presente libro provocó en el seno de la socialdemocracia alemana. (shrink)

This special issue on network ethics offers 15 scholarly articles from a variety of disciplines and fields of study, all aimed at exploring some important aspect of how networks develop, enact, and enforce ethical norms. The articles are ordered according to the levels of analysis each deals with, ranging from the cognitive/intra-personal to the systemic/societal. Taken together, these articles provide a fresh look at how networks are changing the way business is done and the way we think about ethics.

This article presents the results of the longitudinal study of Addiopizzo, a successful anti-bribery organization founded in Sicily in 2004. It analyzes how this organization has used information disclosure as a strategy to fight adverse environmental conditions and the immoral activities of the Sicilian Mafia. This article extends the business ethics and corporate social responsibility literature by showing how multi-level strategic information disclosure processes can help gain organizational legitimacy in adverse social environments and successfully fight against social resistance to change, (...) low levels of moral imagination and attacks from criminal organizations. This article provides an additional contribution to the literature by linking the three research streams on corporate transparency, the fight against corruption, and organizational legitimacy. The results of this research also contribute to the special issue of the EBEN AC 2010, “Which values for which organizations”, since it provides a unique example of an organization capable of spreading the values of social justice and honesty in a difficult social environment plagued by Mafia. (shrink)

How can firms support their customers' collaborative, social responsibility initiatives — and especially pro-environmental, firm—customer collaborations? Does corporate transparency affect customers' willingness to undertake pro-environmental collaborative programs? This study addresses these questions in relation to the US residential electricity market. It focuses on the impact of customers' perceptions of the utility's degree of transparency and on the willingness to engage in proenvironmental behavior related to electricity consumption. The responses of 1257 interviewees from US households to questions related to their electricity (...) suppliers are analyzed through structural equation models (SEMs) using latent variables. Results show that customers' perceptions of an electricity utility's transparency affect their willingness to collaborate in environmental programs, and that the degree of perceived transparency of the utility is related to customers' environmental awareness. (shrink)

Both the global workspace theory and Block’s distinction between phenomenal and access consciousness, are central in the current debates about consciousness and the neural correlates of consciousness. In this article, a unifying global workspace model for phenomenal and access consciousness is proposed. In the model, recurrent neural interactions take place in distinct yet interacting access and phenomenal brain loops. The effectiveness of feedback signaling onto sensory cortical maps is emphasized for the neural correlates of phenomenal consciousness. Two forms of top-down (...) attention, attention for perception and attention for access, play differential roles for phenomenal and access consciousness. The model is implemented in a neural network form, with the simulation of single and multiple visual object processing, and of the attentional blink. (shrink)

Descartes’ demon is a deceiver: the demon makes things appear to you other than as they really are. However, as Descartes famously pointed out in the Second Meditation, not all knowledge is imperilled by this kind of deception. You still know you are a thinking thing. Perhaps, though, there is a more virulent demon in epistemic hell, one from which none of our knowledge is safe. Jonathan Schaffer thinks so. The “Debasing Demon” he imagines threatens knowledge not via the truth (...) condition on knowledge, but via the basing condition. This demon can cause any belief to seem like it’s held on a good basis, when it’s really held on a bad basis. Several recent critics, Conee, Ballantyne & Evans ) grant Schaffer the possibility of such a debasing demon, and argue that the skeptical conclusion doesn’t follow. By contrast, we argue that on any plausible account of the epistemic basing relation, the “debasing demon” is impossible. Our argument for why this is so gestures, more generally, to the importance of avoiding common traps by embracing mistaken assumptions about what it takes for a belief to be based on a reason. (shrink)

. Each predicate of the Aristotelian square of opposition includes the word “is”. Through a twofold interpretation of this word the square includes both classical logic and non-classical logic. All theses embodied by the square of opposition are preserved by the new interpretation, except for contradictories, which are substituted by incommensurabilities. Indeed, the new interpretation of the square of opposition concerns the relationships among entire theories, each represented by means of a characteristic predicate. A generalization of the square of opposition (...) is achieved by not adjoining, according to two Leibniz’ suggestions about human mind, one more choice about the kind of infinity; i.e., a choice which was unknown by Greek’s culture, but which played a decisive role for the birth and then the development of modern science. This essential innovation of modern scientific culture explains why in modern times the Aristotelian square of opposition was disregarded. (shrink)

This article is about the epistemic basing relation, which is the relation that obtains between beliefs and the reasons for which they are held. We need an adequate account of the basing relation if we want to have a satisfactory account of doxastic justification, which we should want to have. To that end, this article aims to achieve two goals. The first is to show that a plausible account of the basing relation must invoke counterfactual concepts. The second is to (...) set out two related analyses of the basing relation, each of which seems quite plausible. (shrink)

Epistemic Value Epistemic value is a kind of value which attaches to cognitive successes such as true beliefs, justified beliefs, knowledge, and understanding. These kinds of cognitive success do of course often have practical value. True beliefs about local geography help us get to work on time; knowledge of mechanics allows us to build vehicles; … Continue reading Value, Epistemic →.

Mindfulness can be understood as the mental ability to focus on the direct and immediate perception or monitoring of the present moment with a state of open and nonjudgmental awareness. Descriptions of mindfulness and methods for cultivating it originated in eastern spiritual traditions. These suggest that mindfulness can be developed through meditation practice to increase positive qualities such as awareness, insight, wisdom, and compassion. In this article we focus on the relationships between mindfulness, with associated meditation practices, and the cognitive (...) neuroscience of attention and awareness. Mindful awareness is related to distributed attention, phenomenal consciousness, and momentary self-awareness, as characterized by recent findings in cognitive psychology and neuroscience as well as in influential consciousness models. Finally, we outline an integrated neurocognitive model of mindfulness, attention, and awareness, with a key role of prefrontal cortex. (shrink)

European Journal of Philosophy, Volume 29, Issue 4, Page 795-810, December 2021.

In the Consolation of Ontology, Czech poet-philosopher Egon Bondy examines the substantial model of reality — the notion that there is some sort of substance, some "thing", idea, being, or principle that creates, underlies, transcends, or gives meaning to the universe in which we live. He shows how the substantial model, in both its theistic and mechanical materialist versions, is logically untenable and dangerous in its consequences. From there, Bondy shows how the nonsubstantial alternative — prefigured in the thinking of (...) cultures that developed independently of Greece — is simpler and more logically consistent. More importantly, it is free from the negative consequences of the substantial model and instead opens the way toward genuine human freedom, creativity, and responsibility, toward a corresponding and supportive form of social organization, and toward an unclouded understanding of ontological reality. Previously untranslated, the book asks that we leave behind comfortable assumptions and understand how the struggles for a genuinely human future and for ontological clarity presuppose each other and are mutually interdependent. (shrink)

Over the years, research in the field of narratological studies has converged towards a unitary vision of narrativity, which is based on a shared interpretation of Aristotle's Poetics. The object of this article is to describe the main characteristics of an alternative model of narrativity, which I propose to call “Nietzschean narratology”. In particular, I emphasize the role that the notion of melancholy plays within the model of aesthetic experience of The Birth of Tragedy. I wish to show that, in (...) this work, Nietzsche criticizes the artificiality of the Aristotelian catharsis, by opposing to it the naturalness of the “Dionysiac melancholy” which, according to him, vivifies the Attic drama. (shrink)

Epistemically circular arguments have been receiving quite a bit of attention in the literature for the past decade or so. Often the goal is to determine whether reliabilists (or other foundationalists) are committed to the legitimacy of epistemically circular arguments. It is often assumed that epistemic circularity is objectionable, though sometimes reliabilists accept that their position entails the legitimacy of some epistemically circular arguments, and then go on to affirm that such arguments really are good ones. My goal in this (...) paper is to argue against the legitimacy of epistemically circular arguments. My strategy is to give a direct argument against the legitimacy of epistemically circular arguments, which rests on a principle of basis-relative safety, and then to argue that reliabilists do not have the resources to resist the argument. I argue that even if the premises of an epistemically circular argument enjoy reliabilist justification, the argument does not transmit that justification to its conclusion. The main goal of my argument is to show that epistemic circularity is always a bad thing, but it also has the positive consequence that reliabilists are freed from an awkward commitment to the legitimacy of some intuitively bad arguments. (shrink)

The paper discusses the identity-building power and motivational force of patriotism. The basic idea underlying the discussion is that far from being a mere irrational and destructive force, patriotism is an expression of ‘existing human social identity.’ Thus, it argues that rather than dismissing patriotism altogether as an undesirable and/or irrational phenomenon, we need to understand how to discriminate between alternative forms of patriotism while investigating what constitutional reforms might be required to support those forms of patriotic identification that are (...) morally desirable. I argue that to flourish, desirable forms of patriotism (what I call Ethical Patriotism) require a political milieu where forms of subsidiarity, functional representation and local participation combine to produce a more democratic and decentralized system of governance. Applied to a post-national polity like the EU, this conclusion invites to rethink the European constitutional project so as to make it less elitist and more open to influence and participation from below. Keywords: cosmopolitanism; communitarianism; identity; nationalism; governance; Europe (Published: 4 December 2009) Citation: Ethics & Global Politics, Vol. 2, No. 4, 2009, pp. 321–348. DOI: 10.3402/egp.v2i4.2002. (shrink)

This article summarizes recent work by epistemologists on four related problems. (1) The value of knowledge. Briefly, the problem is to explain why knowledge is, or at least appears to be, more valuable than any proper subset of its parts, such as true belief. (2) The value of understanding. The task here is to explain why understanding appears to be more valuable than any epistemic status that falls short of understanding, such as having knowledge without understanding. (3) Truth and epistemic (...) value. The arguments considered in this section have to do with whether truth is epistemically valuable at all, and whether it is the fundamental epistemic value. (4) Intrumentalism and the epistemic goal. This final section considers the instrumentalist view of epistemic reasons and rationality, and explains why instrumentalists formulate the epistemic goal in the ways they do. (shrink)

The following claims are independently plausible but jointly inconsistent: (1) epistemic deontologism is correct (i.e., there are some beliefs we ought to have, and some beliefs we ought not to have); (2) we have no voluntary control over our beliefs; (3) S’s lack of control over whether she φs implies that S has no obligation to φ or to not φ (i.e., ought-implies-can). The point of this paper is to argue that there are active and passive aspects of belief, which (...) can come apart, and to argue that deontological epistemic evaluations apply to the active aspect of belief. (shrink)

The environmental crisis is undoubtedly one of the most critical and urgent problems of our times. Many people are raising their voices in support of nature to build a better future for humanity and for our planet. In this article, the authors explore the specific contribution that Christianity and Islam can offer in this debate and how religions can help bring back into the ecological discourse the element of the sacred that abandoned the reflection about nature since the advent of (...) the Enlightenment. Moving from the spiritual dimension of nature in the light of Pope Francis’s 2015 encyclical on ecology Laudato Si’, the authors argue that the current ecological crisis can represent an opportunity for a renewed encounter among religions, bringing together the ethical and the spiritual, recovering the element of communion between human beings and nature that points to something beyond themselves. The authors present the Laudato Si’ as a universal invitation and a space for encounter between world religions that puts at its heart love as a guiding principle and animating force of a much-needed ecological, spiritual and anthropological conversion. Contribution: This article focuses on the spiritual dimension of nature in Pope Francis’s 2015 encyclical letter Laudato Si ’. The authors argue that the document with its emphasis on love represents a platform for dialogue between Christianity and Islam by bringing back the element of the sacred in the current ecological debate. (shrink)

Interessato in esaminare il rapporto tra Lukàcs e la filosofia clàssica, questo saggio vuole mostrare che il filosofo ungherese ha trovato nella categoria del lavoro una sintesi tra soggetto e oggetto, restando cosi in condizioni di riproporre alcune delle questioni fondamentali delia filosofia: il ruolo del filosofo nella società, il rapporto tra filosofia e politica, la definizione di una nuova etica. Dimenticate dalla filosofia contemporânea, queste questioni sono tornate oggi al centro del dibattito filosòfico, spingendo i filosofi a riflettere sul (...) fondamento dello stesso pensiero e della realtà storica che essi vivono. Ed è alia luce di esse che il saggio pretende interpretare la categoria lukàcsiana dei lavoro.Interessado em examinar as relações entre Lukács e a filosofia clàssica, o presente ensaio procura demonstrar que o filósofo húngaro encontrou na categoria do trabalho uma sìntese entre sujeito e objeto, ficando assim em condições de repropor algumas das questões fundamentais da filosofia: o papel do filósofo na sociedade, a relação entre filosofia e política, a definição de uma nova ética. Esquecidas por boa parte da filosofia contemporânea, tais questões retornam hoje ao centro do debate filosófico, impelindo os filósofos a refletir sobre o fundamento do próprio pensamento e da realidade histórica em que vivem. E é a partir delas que o ensaio pretende interpretar a categoria lukacsiana do trabalho. (shrink)