This article offers an analysis of the Spanish derivative morphology potential for graduating attitudinal meanings regarding the expression of political crisis and of contested meanings of human rights violations in the discourse of recent Chilean History. This study is framed in the typological principles of Systemic Functional Linguistics and in the appraisal system, particularly in the sub-system of graduation. The analysis demonstrates on one hand the productive role of the suffixes -ada and -azo when graduating attitudinal meanings regarding the expression (...) of social and political crisis in the discourse of history. These suffixes can graduate at the rank of the morpheme, word and group and also be involved in an inter-stratal tension that is functioning as an experiential grammatical metaphor that works in combination with a lexical metaphor intensifying time and events in an incongruent manner. On the other hand, the analysis shows that when dealing with traumatic and argued meanings of state terror, extreme degree suffixes -ísimo/a/s play a critical role in the intensification of qualities and in the quantification as amount and extent in a congruent manner. Spanish suffixes can graduate by sub-modification in the lower rank of a word structure instead of at the group structure contributing to the building of constellation of patterns of evoked and inscribed interpersonal meanings in the discourse. (shrink)

If Unamuno had been able to choose how to be remembered, he would have wanted him to be a poet. This book wants to do justice to that happy possibility. But above all because Unamuno was a poet in the highest sense: he was while writing the same essay as a novel, or theater, letter or verse, and he was also a poet when he passionately lived all the facets of his intense existence. His intellectual work was poetic and his (...) personal relationships, as well as his political activity, also responded to that peculiar Unamunian aesthetic in which the vital horizon is inescapably confused with the tasks of thought." --Translated from back cover. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Queering Buen AmorGregory S. Hutcheson (bio)The naturalization of both heterosexuality and masculine sexual agency are discursive constructions nowhere accounted for but everywhere assumed....—Judith Butler, Gender TroubleAmérico Castro’s España en su historia: Cristianos, moros y judíos (1948) not only instigated the “culture wars” that rocked Hispanism in the mid-twentieth century, but also made the fourteenth-century Libro de buen amor a centerpiece of debate.1 In a crucial chapter of his (...) study, Castro tackles head-on Eurocentric readings of the Libro de buen amor by arguing for its cultural hybridity, or in more extreme terms, its fixedness in the cultural prerogatives of Arabic-speaking al-Andalus. “Los métodos usados para entender la poesía románico-cristiana fallan,” he affirms in an opening salvo, “porque el Libro de Buen Amor es un reflejo castellano de modelos árabes [The methods used to comprehend Romance-Christian poetry are doomed to failure because the Libro de buen amor is a Castilian reflection of Arabic models]...” [España en su historia 355]. By relocating the author’s poetic impulse in the Arab world, Castro seeks to explain not only the Libro de buen amor’s open, “arabesque” structure—its spontaneous gliding from holy to profane, serious to comical, generic-abstract to concrete-sensible—but also the ambiguous nature of buen amor. For Castro, buen amor is the simultaneous compulsion toward spiritual transcendence and sexual fulfillment, best understood within the context of an Islamic theological system in which sexual desire is not categorically opposed to godliness.Not surprisingly, Castro’s scholarship was judged harshly by his critics as historical revisionism of the most pernicious sort, a deliberate erosion of those values and certainties that make it possible to read Spain as a full player in the march of Western civilization. Most vehement in his attack was Claudio Sánchez-Albornoz, who authored the two volumes of his España: Un enigma histórico (1956) as both an explicit defense against the “magnetic seduction” [1: 9] of Castro’s prose and a reaffirmation of national consciousness. Sánchez-Albornoz’s take on the Libro de buen amor falls neatly in line with the thinly disguised nationalism of his opus as a whole. He rejects soundly Castro’s claims of cultural hybridity in favor of a Libro de buen amor located safely on this side of the cultural “abyss” between Latin Christendom and the Islamic world. What is more, he resists the queernesses that spin out of Castro’s scholarship, the threat of contamination of the national character in unspeakable ways. If Spain had been exposed to the cultural proclivities of al-Andalus, Sánchez-Albornoz argues, so too would it have been exposed to al-Andalus’s “ambiguous” notion of love, a love “que no excluía las ‘amistades particulares,’ ni la sentimental inclinación, e incluso la pasión carnal, de varón a varón [that did not exclude ‘special friendships,’ nor sentimental inclination–and even carnal passion [End Page 104] –between one man and another]” [458].2 Here Sánchez-Albornoz slams the closet door shut by constructing Spain as the bastion of straight desire and Juan Ruiz as its virtual posterboy: “En el clérigo de Hita triunfaba la robusta, natural y simplista concepción heterosexual del amor de la Castilla de su época [There triumphed in the cleric of Hita a robust, natural, uncomplicated heterosexual concept of love characteristic of the Castile of his period]” [458–59].I begin with the Castro/Sánchez-Albornoz polemic because it exposes the presence and functions of “normativity” in Libro de buen amor studies throughout much of the twentieth century. With few exceptions, readings prior to Castro’s overlooked what was odd about the Libro de buen amor in order to engage in an obsessive archaeology of sameness, a plotting of conventional values and meanings that served to render the work as familiar, if not necessarily equal to other master works of the Western canon. Félix Lecoy emerged as the doyen of this critical school, publishing in 1938 an excruciatingly detailed study of the work’s language, structure, and sources whose primary objective was... (shrink)

En el presente trabajo abordamos actuaciones administrativas enmarcadas en la Dirección de Espectáculos Públicos (DEP) de la Municipalidad de Córdoba. Particularmente, nos preguntamos por los sujetos encargados de implementar las políticas de esta dirección (inspectores) y la formación que adquieren para el ejercicio de prácticas administrativas de control y fiscalización de “casas de fiestas infantiles” y locales de diversión nocturna (bares, discotecas, bailes). Las preguntas que guían el análisis son las siguientes: ¿Cómo se adquieren los conocimientos necesarios para “ser inspector (...) municipal” y cuáles son los escenarios y modalidades de transmisión? ¿Cuáles son los saberes que circulan, se movilizan y son (re)apropiados en esos espacios? Y, finalmente, ¿qué sujetos se construyen en estos procesos (“inspectores”, “especialistas”, “capacitadores”)? Como fuente de reflexión empírica, consideramos actuaciones administrativas que tienen lugar en la DEP, junto con los cursos de capacitación en “Inspectoría General” ofrecidos a los agentes municipales que se desempeñan en aquella Dirección. Los materiales utilizados en el análisis provienen de registros de observaciones participantes realizadas en la DEP, en un curso de capacitación, y entrevistas a funcionarios e inspectores municipales. Las argumentaciones vertidas a lo largo del artículo pretenden contribuir al estudio de los procesos de formación continua del Estado municipal cordobés, a partir de una indagación etnográfica en torno a actuaciones administrativas y formas de transmisión de conocimientos para determinados ejercicios de poder estatal. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Queering Buen AmorGregory S. Hutcheson (bio)The naturalization of both heterosexuality and masculine sexual agency are discursive constructions nowhere accounted for but everywhere assumed....—Judith Butler, Gender TroubleAmérico Castro’s España en su historia: Cristianos, moros y judíos (1948) not only instigated the “culture wars” that rocked Hispanism in the mid-twentieth century, but also made the fourteenth-century Libro de buen amor a centerpiece of debate.1 In a crucial chapter of his (...) study, Castro tackles head-on Eurocentric readings of the Libro de buen amor by arguing for its cultural hybridity, or in more extreme terms, its fixedness in the cultural prerogatives of Arabic-speaking al-Andalus. “Los métodos usados para entender la poesía románico-cristiana fallan,” he affirms in an opening salvo, “porque el Libro de Buen Amor es un reflejo castellano de modelos árabes [The methods used to comprehend Romance-Christian poetry are doomed to failure because the Libro de buen amor is a Castilian reflection of Arabic models]...” [España en su historia 355]. By relocating the author’s poetic impulse in the Arab world, Castro seeks to explain not only the Libro de buen amor’s open, “arabesque” structure—its spontaneous gliding from holy to profane, serious to comical, generic-abstract to concrete-sensible—but also the ambiguous nature of buen amor. For Castro, buen amor is the simultaneous compulsion toward spiritual transcendence and sexual fulfillment, best understood within the context of an Islamic theological system in which sexual desire is not categorically opposed to godliness.Not surprisingly, Castro’s scholarship was judged harshly by his critics as historical revisionism of the most pernicious sort, a deliberate erosion of those values and certainties that make it possible to read Spain as a full player in the march of Western civilization. Most vehement in his attack was Claudio Sánchez-Albornoz, who authored the two volumes of his España: Un enigma histórico (1956) as both an explicit defense against the “magnetic seduction” [1: 9] of Castro’s prose and a reaffirmation of national consciousness. Sánchez-Albornoz’s take on the Libro de buen amor falls neatly in line with the thinly disguised nationalism of his opus as a whole. He rejects soundly Castro’s claims of cultural hybridity in favor of a Libro de buen amor located safely on this side of the cultural “abyss” between Latin Christendom and the Islamic world. What is more, he resists the queernesses that spin out of Castro’s scholarship, the threat of contamination of the national character in unspeakable ways. If Spain had been exposed to the cultural proclivities of al-Andalus, Sánchez-Albornoz argues, so too would it have been exposed to al-Andalus’s “ambiguous” notion of love, a love “que no excluía las ‘amistades particulares,’ ni la sentimental inclinación, e incluso la pasión carnal, de varón a varón [that did not exclude ‘special friendships,’ nor sentimental inclination–and even carnal passion [End Page 104] –between one man and another]” [458].2 Here Sánchez-Albornoz slams the closet door shut by constructing Spain as the bastion of straight desire and Juan Ruiz as its virtual posterboy: “En el clérigo de Hita triunfaba la robusta, natural y simplista concepción heterosexual del amor de la Castilla de su época [There triumphed in the cleric of Hita a robust, natural, uncomplicated heterosexual concept of love characteristic of the Castile of his period]” [458–59].I begin with the Castro/Sánchez-Albornoz polemic because it exposes the presence and functions of “normativity” in Libro de buen amor studies throughout much of the twentieth century. With few exceptions, readings prior to Castro’s overlooked what was odd about the Libro de buen amor in order to engage in an obsessive archaeology of sameness, a plotting of conventional values and meanings that served to render the work as familiar, if not necessarily equal to other master works of the Western canon. Félix Lecoy emerged as the doyen of this critical school, publishing in 1938 an excruciatingly detailed study of the work’s language, structure, and sources whose primary objective was... (shrink)

In a provocative, yet scarcely discussed, argument at the end of Knowing Full Well, Ernest Sosa has attempted to determine what kind of evidence we possess in support of the belief that our cognitive capacities as human beings are reliable. According to Sosa, we can appeal to considerations of coherence to prove that such capacities are reliable. However, Sosa also declares that such considerations are not “determinative, ultima facie” reasons−which is to say, they are to be regarded as defeasible. As (...) we will try to point out, this overall strategy is ultimately incoherent. Furthermore, as we will argue, Sosa fails in attempting to provide us with an analogy between the case of doubting the reliability of the cognitive faculties of an individual and doubting such reliability in the case of the species. (shrink)

In the present essay, I argue that the current EU governance reflects a contradiction between the presumption of a European constitutional framework based on human rights, democracy and the rule of law and the recently adopted economic stability governance defined outside the horizon of the EU treaties. I propose to understand this scenario through the prism of two distinct and context-specific assumptions: a political-sociological hypothesis for which internal contradictions of capitalism are thought to be capable of ‘self-displacing’ to other societal (...) sectors and a political-philosophical thesis for which EU governance is connected to a decrease in democratic legitimacy and right-standards due to hegemonic control by economic powers. Both hypotheses testify to the lowering of the standards of protection of fundamental rights and member states’ regulatory capacities as well as to an overall de-constitutionalization of the EU architecture. (shrink)

A patient’s age serves as a very useful guide to physicians in deciding what disease manifestations to anticipate, what treatment to offer for certain conditions, and how to prepare for possible emergencies. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, determining treatment options on the basis of a patient’s chronological age can easily give rise to unjustified discrimination. This is of particular significance in situations where the allocation of scarce critical care resources could have a direct impact on who will live (...) and who will die. This paper examines the fairness of recommendations contained in resource allocation guidelines in the Philippines that have implications for the way elderly patients could be treated or excluded from some forms of critical care treatment in the context of the ongoing Corona virus emergency. (shrink)

In this paper, I propose and defend an account of the nature and the epistemology of religious beliefs loosely inspired by Wittgenstein´s remarks on the structure of reason and on the nature of religious beliefs. I argue that following and developing his account we can not only make a strong case for the prima facie rationality of religious beliefs but also, and more importantly, cast new light on the epistemology of religious disagreement. Keywords: Wittgenstein. Hinges. Epistemic warrant. Religious disagreement.

Résumé Comment peut-on être occidental? Les Amérindiens ne connaissent pas notre dualisme nature-culture, et ils s’en passent fort bien. Ils pensent et vivent la continuité.

El presente artículo es el resultado de reflexiones teóricas-metodológicas alrededor del estudio del fenómeno religioso, específicamente el que concierne al de sistemas religiosos de inspiración afro en Colombia entre 2003-2023. El objetivo es analizar las problemáticas de la investigación sobre estos sistemas religiosos en diáspora dentro del contexto nacional. La discusión señala una serie de tensiones y contradicciones teóricas-metodológicas en las que se ven involucradas/os las/os investigadoras/es insertas/os en el mundo académico, las cuales inician desde el momento mismo en que (...) seleccionan su tema de investigación, los referentes teóricos-metodológicos, conceptuales y el tipo de escritura que habrán de emplear a lo largo de los distintos estudios. Así, quienes investigan sobre fenómenos religiosos son vistos con suspicacia dentro de la academia, una que persiste en oponer asuntos tales como objetividad/subjetividad, outsider/insider, ciencia/religión o verdad/creencia. Finalmente, estas discusiones devienen en cuestionamientos éticos del modo como se hace investigación sobre estas dinámicas socioculturales que adquieren relevancia en Colombia y el mundo contemporáneo. (shrink)

In this analysis of St. Augustine’s concept of natural law, the focus will be on the way he presents, in a continuous development, the ideas of moral compulsion and personal growth. In Augustine’s interpretation of the biblical text, the foundations of natural law are provided, such that morality is not simply the fruit of consensus. Man is seen not only as a product of history, even though he cannot be understood outside of it. The natural order and the supernatural order (...) are this way tied together. (shrink)

El desplazamiento del mito de la cultura ofrece alternativas (ciencia, historia, política) que corren el riesgo de reproducir planteamientos irracionales que, en el seno de aquella forma, se encuentran superados. El pensamiento mítico ofrece soluciones novedosas para ciertos problemas actuales.

Nuestro trabajo se propone presentar el pensamiento paulino trabajado por Alain Badiou en San Pablo: La fundación del universalismo. Intentaremos clarificar las posiciones que toma Badiou en torno a la figura del apóstol. Consideramos que, explicitando las lecturas del autor en cuestión, es posible tejer puentes para la discusión en el campo de la teología política. Entendemos la lectura de Badiou como una lectura filosófica política, que busca dialogar con una comunidad política. Pablo, en Badiou, es presentado como «un teórico (...) antifilosófico de la universalidad» y el fundador del universalismo cristiano. A partir de esta interpretación la tarea de Badiou es buscar lo universal en lo particular. (shrink)

O ensaio procura investigar a ideia de educação moral defendida por Jean Piaget em sua conferência intitulada “Os procedimentos de educação moral”, proferida em Paris, no ano de 1930. Concentra-se em reconstruir o núcleo central apresentado pelo autor, ou seja, a tensão entre a dupla moralidade e a ambiguidade entre heteronomia e autonomia que constitui a moralidade infantil e que se alicerça em sentimentos de respeito opostos, de unilateralidade e de reciprocidade. Ocupa-se também em confrontar os procedimentos típicos da educação (...) tradicional com os procedimentos próprios da educação progressiva que impulsionam a posição ativa do educando para a construção dos aspectos da internalização da lei e da possibilidade das relações de cooperação e respeito pelo outro nos grupos de convivência, especialmente no período da infância. Destaca a necessária presença do adulto, como aquele que exerce o papel de mediação na relação entre ele, a criança e o mundo, principalmente do professor na educação infantil pela compreensão do domínio psicológico da infância, para pensarmos por que a criança age, como ela age e de que forma age. Por fim, conclui procurando mostrar a atualidade desta reflexão do jovem Piaget para os nossos dias, mesmo se passando quase um século, revelando a importância da releitura dos clássicos para a reflexão, compreensão e intervenção em problemáticas educacionais atuais. Sua crítica ao autoritarismo inerente à determinada concepção de educação moral serve ainda como resistência ao conservadorismo autoritário atual e, ao mesmo tempo, para reestabelecer os laços cooperativos e solidários proporcionados pela ampla tradição da educação moral autônoma, oferecendo as condições intelectuais e psicológicas necessárias para o desenvolvimento saudável e o ingresso autônomo na sociedade adulta. (shrink)

Develops a "global theory" on the nature of philosophy.

Neste trabalho, a autor expõe o argumento apresentado por Adorno e Horkheimer na Dialética do esclarecimento, considerando decisiva a identificação feita por eles entre esclarecimento e racionalidade instrumental. Em seguida, em forma de excurso, recorre a Kant para demonstrar os limites do argumento daqueles dois autores. Por último, apresenta o argumento de Habermas sobre a racionalidade comunicativa e, a partir dele, busca evidenciar aspectos fundamentais de sua crítica a Adorno e Horkheimer. O trabalho assume, como fio condutor, o tema da (...) modernidade. (shrink)

Filosofia da educação e pesquisa educacional: fragilidade teórica na investigação educacional Resumo: O ensaio trata do problema da fragilidade teórica do campo investigativo educacional brasileiro e desenvolve a hipótese de que tal fragilidade deve-se ao fato da pesquisa educacional ter-se esquecido da pergunta pela validade de seu próprio conhecimento à medida que abandonou o diálogo crítico e criativo com a tradição. O texto apresenta, inicialmente, com base em Gatti, um diagnóstico da fragilidade teórica da pesquisa educacional brasileira. Na sequência, elenca (...) e interpreta quatro fatores principais da fragilidade teórica e da frouxidão conceitual das pesquisas educacionais: o filosófico, o epistemológico, o político e o pedagógico. Por fim, problematiza o estatuto e a finalidade da filosofia da educação, concebendo o diálogo crítico com a tradição intelectual como uma das formas mais genuínas de sua contribuição à pesquisa educacional. Palavras-chave: Educação; Pesquisa Educacional; Filosofia da Educação; Conhecimento. Philosophy of education and educational research: theoretical fragility in educational research: The essay deals with the problem of the theoretical fragility of the Brazilian educational research field and develops the hypothesis that such fragility is due to the fact that educational research has forgotten the issue of the validity of its own knowledge as it abandoned the critical and creative dialogue with tradition. Based on Gatti, the text presents, initially, a diagnosis of the theoretical fragility of Brazilian educational research. In the sequence, it compares and interprets four main factors of the theoretical fragility and the conceptual laxity of the educational research: philosophical, epistemological, political and pedagogical. Finally, the essay problematizes the status and purpose of the philosophy of education by conceiving critical dialogue with the intellectual tradition as one of the most genuine forms of contribution to the educational research. Keywords: Education; Educational Research; Philosophy of Education; Knowledge. Filosofía de la educación e investigación educativa: fragilidad teórica en la investigación educativa Resumen: Este ensayo aborda el problema de la fragilidad teórica del campo de la investigación educativa brasileña y desarrolla la hipótesis de que tal fragilidad se debe al hecho de que la investigación ha olvidado la cuestión de la validez de su propio conocimiento al abandonar el diálogo crítico y creativo con tradición. El texto presenta, inicialmente, basado en Gatti, un diagnóstico de la fragilidad teórica de la investigación educativa brasileña. En la secuencia, compara e interpreta cuatro factores principales de la fragilidad teórica y la laxitud conceptual de las investigaciones educativas: la filosófica, la epistemológica, la política y la pedagógica. Finalmente, problematiza el estado y el propósito de la filosofía de la educación al concebir el diálogo crítico con la tradición intelectual como una de las formas más genuinas de su contribución a la investigación educativa. Palabras-clave: Educación; Investigación educativa; Filosofía de la educación; Conocimiento. Data de registro: 16/07/2019 Data de aceite: 30/10/2019. (shrink)

Resumo O ensaio reconstrói, na primeira parte, o conceito de descontinuidade da infância como condição ontológica da existência humana, amparando-se na definição desenvolvida por Walter Kohan, em seu livro Infância. Entre educação e filosofia. Procura mostrar, brevemente, o vínculo dessa tese, por um lado, com a noção heideggeriana de ontologia e, por outro, com a concepção foucaultiana de ontologia do presente. No que se refere à Heidegger, retém a noção de temporalização do Dasein como crítica à tradição metafísica ocidental. Essa (...) noção será decisiva à historicização foucaultiana do sujeito e o tratamento que esse pensador oferece da atualidade como forma de pensamento sobre nós mesmos. Nesse sentido, temporalização do Dasein e historicização do sujeito estão na base da noção de infância como descontinuidade, destacando o aspecto indeterminado da condição humana e, com ele, a possibilidade de criação inerente à ação humana. Contudo, o ensaio se esforça também, na segunda parte, para evidenciar o quanto a noção de descontinuidade da infância lança raízes no discurso filosófico moderno, encontrando guarida na noção rousseauniana de perfectibilité. Tal noção antecipa, ainda no início da modernidade, a dimensão flexível e indeterminada da condição humana, exigindo que o amplo processo educacional e formativo do ser humano, esboçado por Rousseau no Émile, por meio de seu educando fictício, seja aberto e plural. O ensaio foca sua análise na imbricação entre a noção aberta e indeterminada da condição humana, assegurada pela perfectibilidade, e o processo formativo que pressupõe a própria descontinuidade da infância. Nesse contexto, a descontinuidade é compreendida como espontaneidade e criatividade da ação, intrínsecas à capacidade que cada criança e educando possuem para fazer suas próprias experiências. Por defender essa ideia em seu projeto educacional, o Émile de Rousseau torna-se uma obra indispensável para pensar de modo criativo problemas de fronteira entre filosofia e educação, tomando inclusive a própria noção de infância como mediadora da relação entre reflexão filosófica e práxis pedagógica. (shrink)

The offer of the fast food company gives rise to suspicion. This seems to be based on unfounded stereotypes, however. This paper argues that we need to preserve choices in taking particular courses of action. There is nothing inherently wrong in fast food consumption so long as consumers are made aware of the importance of weight management and proper nutrition.

In Machiavelli’s Prince there appears to be a link between Chap.IX on the civil principality and the hope for a unification of Italy by a new prince – a theme presented in the final Exhortation. In both sections, Machiavelli’s unusual lack of historical illustrations suggests the hypothesis that the civil principality and the new prince play a symbolic function. The reading here proposed argues that there is an ideal relation between Machiavelli’s Prince and the Discourses on Livy regarding the opportunity (...) of a regime change from popular principality to Republic. The possibility to switch from one form of government to the other is due to Machiavelli’s idealizations of the civil principality and the new prince. Accordingly, it is argued that Machiavelli’s method follows a strategy of mythologizing realism. In the civil principality the tension between the new prince and his people is not resolved, nor that between the plebs and the nobles. The paper concludes that Machiavelli emphasis on ‘the solitude’ of the prince is what ultimately justifies a transition from the civil principality to the Republic. (shrink)

Resumen: Ofreceré un análisis de la célebre crítica de la fenomenología de Merleau-Ponty en términos de una presunta oscilación entre “positivismo” y “escatología”. Como intentaré demostrar, atribuir al fenomenólogo francés una reducción “positivista” de la epistemología equivaldría a pasar por alto su insistencia en que nos apartemos de la autocomprensión que las ciencias empíricas ofrecen de sus propios resultados; esto es, a pasar por alto sus objeciones fenomenológicas a los marcos ontológicos ingenuos del “pensamiento objetivo”. En cuanto al cargo de (...) “escatología”, al parecer en virtud de sus deudas con el pensamiento marxista, intentaré probar que, no se puede sostener una vez que se toma en consideración el carácter matizado de su aceptación de ciertos aspectos del materialismo histórico.: I will attempt to analyze Foucault’s famous critique of Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology in terms of an alleged oscillation between “positivism” and “eschatology”. As I will try to prove, attributing to Merleau-Ponty a “positivistic” reduction of epistemology would amount to overlooking his insistence on moving away from the self-interpretations that empirical sciences offer of their own results; that is to say, overlooking his phenomenological objections against the naïve ontological frames of “objective thinking”. As for the charge of “eschatology”, presumably applied to the phenomenologist by virtue of his debts to Marxist thought, I will try to show that -either understood in a strictly epistemological sense or in connection with an alleged Merleau-Pontyan adhesion to a philosophy of history- it proves untenable once we take into consideration the nuanced character of his acceptance of certain aspects of historical materialism. (shrink)

Intentaremos completar el análisis de la relación entre Merleau-Ponty y distintas posiciones escépticas -típicamente restringido a textos más “canónicos” - a partir de su conferencia sobre Le primat de la perception. El fenomenólogo argumenta allí contra la “inducción pesimista” según la cual podemos, a la luz de la refutación de las hipótesis científicas pasadas, prever que las actuales son también falsas: invirtiendo la conclusión de esta inducción, afirma que las transformaciones de nuestro conocimiento son un proceso autocorrectivo, tal que ninguna (...) hipótesis es abandonada sino en la medida en que otra aparece como mejor. Esto nos hará problematizar la noción de refutación científica en Merleau-Ponty, quien ofrece como modelo del progreso epistémico la mutua sustitución de creencias perceptivas, que no involucra la consideración consciente de criterios racionales. Según señalaremos, este punto de partida no puede extrapolarse al caso de hipótesis sopesadas según sus respectivas virtudes. (shrink)

Analizaremos aquí el intento de Richard Rorty y Michel Foucault de sobrepujar, desde una concepción del conocimiento como un hecho, la noción de “crítica de la ideología”. Intentaremos demostrar que incurren en una incomprensión de la “filosofía del sujeto” que los hace ignorar antecedentes de sus propias tesis, y que el materialismo extrae, de esta conciencia de la facticidad del pensamiento, consecuencias críticas que —por el contrario— en Foucault sucumben ante la indiferenciación total producida cuando se identifican facticidad y validez, (...) y en Rorty son invertidas en un dogmatismo que exime de crítica los presupuestos que encuentra en su pensamiento. (shrink)

Se busca establecer una relación, no satisfactoriamente explorada, entre la fenomenologia merleaupontiana del tiempo y un problema central de la "theory of time" analítica, la paradoja de McTaggart. Al clarificar, en polémica con Priest , el autêntico sentido del "subjetivismo" merleaupontiano con respecto al tiempo, se senala cómo establecer una confluencia entre el acercamiento fenomenológico y las tesis desarrolladas por Michael Dummett como respuesta a la mencionada paradoja. Con los senalamientos de Dummett y la interpretación de Bimbenet acerca del "perspectivismo" (...) merleaupontiano, se intenta una solución "situacional" a la paradoja. The article seeks to establish a relationship that has not yet been explored satisfactorily between Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology of time and a central issue of analytical "theory of time": McTaggart's paradox. By clarifying the authentic meaning of Merleau-Ponty's "subjectivism" regarding time, against Priest's interpretation , the article points out a convergence between the phenom-enological approach and Michael Dummett's theses developed in response to the abovementioned paradox. A "situational" solution to the paradox is attempted on the basis of Dummett's ideas and Bimbenet's interpretation of Merleau-Ponty's "perspectivism". Pretende-se estabelecer uma relação, não satisfatoriamente explorada, entre a fenomenologia merleau-pontiana do tempo e um problema central da "theory of time" analítica, o paradoxo de McTaggart. Ao esclarecer, em polémica com Priest , o autêntico sentido do "subjetivismo" merleau-pontiano a respeito do tempo, indica-se como estabelecer uma confluência entre a aproximação fenomenológica e as teses desenvolvidas por Michael Dummett como resposta ao mencionado paradoxo. Com as indicações de Dummett e a interpretação de Bimbenet sobre o "perspectivismo" merleau-pontiano, tenta-se uma solução "situacional" ao paradoxo. (shrink)

This contribution has two main goals which might be labelled for convenience as apars construensandpars denstruensreversing the usual order of these terms. The first aim is to offer an overview of the main tenets of the book, while the second aim is to raise some critical concerns while remaining sympathetic to the author’s overall project. With regard to the first point, I present the context of intellectual debate where Buchanan’s contribution fits comfortably: Darwin’s evolutionary theory, anthropology, psychology, moral analysis etc. (...) The target here is to show the internal complexity and different layers of analysis of the book. These initial reconstructions are, next, used to formulate some thoughts on what I consider possible problematic points in need of clarification. In particular, first, I hold that Buchanan presents too narrow oppositional views between intergroup relations whereupon the notion of “tribalism” is constructed. Such strong identitarian conception does not seem to depict adequately the sociological dynamics of intergroup relations. Second, I consider the terms in which it can be addressed the notion of the rise of the moral mind in evolutionary terms. The suggestion is to consider in a milder form the author’s key concept of a “Great Uncoupling” for the moral reason. (shrink)