En este artículo, se desarrolla un análisis de la obra de Epicuro y se señalan las equivocaciones que por lo general se han establecido sobre ella. Se considera su concepto de la naturaleza, de los dioses y de la religión. Se hace especial referencia al tema de la virtud y de la filosofía como los caminos que llevan a la felicidad, sus definiciones de placer y de dolor, y las diferencias de sus planteos con respecto a las escuelas de Platón (...) y de Aristóteles. También se analizan sus métodos de investigación filosófica y las valoraciones sobre su obra a través de los siglos. (shrink)

Hannah Arendt estudió en su tesis doctoral el amor en Agustín de Hipona. El obispo argelino destacó el amor al prójimo como vía de encuentro con Dios, ya que el anhelo del pensador cristiano era la civitate Dei. Arendt, quince siglos después, secularizó el concepto y elaboró una teoría política basada en el amor al mundo, a la vida y a los hombres. Para ello desarrolló diversos conceptos, entre los que se encuentran la acción, la natalidad y la política, que (...) simultáneamente requieren elementos como la pluralidad, la novedad o la libertad. Por ello, el amor es un concepto clave en su obra, a pesar de que insistiera en que se trata de una fuerza apolítica y antipolítica. (shrink)

La anomalía de la uniformidad plantea la forma como el poder que constituyen el saber y las prácticas sociales dan lugar a una serie de formas de vida habituales que, de ser violadas o transgredidas, dan paso a diversas formas de la monstruosidad. El monstruo es, más que una entidad, un operador conceptual que pone en evidencia las categorías, los cánones y formas habituales de la vida que una sociedad exige, forma, interioriza y difunde entre sus individuos a través de (...) sus visiones del mundo. A partir del siglo XVIII estos hechos dieron paso a una gran preocupación por lo anormal expresada en diversos estudios de la biología, la psiquiatría, la medicina y la política. Este artículo sugiere cómo las concepciones desarrolladas por Michel Foucault acerca del poder, la dominación y la criminalidad explican cómo se construyeron nuestras concepciones de la monstruosidad y la anormalidad. En un desarrollo futuro la presente investigación se pondrá en relación con algunas de las principales novelas góticas. (shrink)

Este artículo tiene por propósito analizar el poder en Michel Foucault, entendiendo por este un concepto operativo, esto es no temático, irreductible a una mera teoría. Propongo leer el poder en términos de un caleidoscopio que en el autor francés es un dispositivo móvil en el que el cuerpo y la ley, la vida y la muerte, entran en una oscilación o pendularidad incesante. Por lo tanto, cuando se afirma que el poder es un «caleidoscopio magnífico» no es en tanto (...) forma de representación, pues ello supondría una concepción sustancialista del mismo, sino en su “funcionamiento real”. Para llevar esto a buen puerto, establezco dos momentos: en el primero, presento las concepciones tradicionales del poder a las que el filósofo francés asesta un fuerte golpe. En el segundo, planteo, al hilo de entender el poder como caleidoscopio, cinco notas características de éste. (shrink)

The concept of economic rent is among the oldest in political economy. This reflects the fact that economies have always included parties whose income appears more parasitic than productive. The concept of rent-seeking refers to the efforts of parties seeking to secure such income by way of gaining influence over economic regulation or otherwise gaining favors from government. In spite of its intuitiveness, however, it has proven difficult to precisely distinguish rent from other categories of income. This chapter seeks to (...) acquaint readers with this problem. The privatization of incarceration is then supplied as an important case study in current rent-seeking behavior. (shrink)

This volume of essays by internationally prominent scholars interprets the full range of Heidegger's thought and major critical interpretations of it. It explores such central themes as hermeneutics, facticity and Ereignis, conscience in Being and Time, freedom in the writings of his period of transition from fundamental ontology, and his mature criticisms of metaphysics and ontotheology. The volume also examines Heidegger's interpretations of other authors, the philosophers Aristotle, Kant and Nietzsche and the poets Rilke, Trakl and George. A final group (...) of essays interprets the critical reception of Heidegger's thought, both in the analytic tradition (Ryle, Carnap, Rorty and Dreyfus) and in France (Derrida and Lv̌inas). This rich and wide-ranging collection will appeal to all who are interested in the themes, the development and the context of Heidegger's philosophical thought. (shrink)

This major study of Heidegger is the first to examine in detail the concept of existential truth that he developed in the 1920s. Daniel O. Dahlstrom critically examines the genesis, nature and validity of Heidegger's radical attempt to rethink truth as the disclosure of time, a disclosure allegedly more basic than truths formulated in scientific judgements. The book has several distinctive and innovative features. First, it is the only study that attempts to understand the logical dimension of Heidegger's thought (...) in its historical context. Second, no other book-length treatment explores the breadth and depth of Heidegger's confrontation with Husserl, his erstwhile mentor. Third, the book demonstrates that Heidegger's deconstruction of Western thinking occurs on three interconnected fronts: truth, being and time. Dealing with a crucial aspect of the philosophy of one of the great thinkers of the twentieth century, this book will be important to all scholars and students of Heidegger, whether in philosophy, theology or literary studies. (shrink)

In 1929, after rejecting the suggestion that contemporary Christians may be expected to feel "threatened" by Kierkegaard's criticisms, the Protestant theologian Gerhardt Kuhlmann remarks.

Despite the importance that Heidegger assigns to affectivity structurally in Being and Time, accounts of the relevant sorts of affectivity are frequently and, in some cases, perhaps even egregiously missing from existential analyses that form the centerpiece of the work. The aim of this chapter is to demonstrate as much. After recounting the considerable insights of Heidegger’s general account of disposedness and affectivity and the fundamental status he assigns to them, the focus of the chapter turns to the secondary status (...) often accorded them in the first half of Being and Time and the seemingly crucial absence of an adequate account of the affective dimension of authentic existence, in the second half of the work. After making the argument that, according to Heidegger’s own criterion, the adequate rootedness of the existential analysis demands a more robust account of the affective character of existing authentically, the chapter concludes with an open question about the mood of undertaking the existential analysis itself. (shrink)

The process of constructing a social reality where “difference” becomes a social asset rather than a monster that threatens peace and progress must commence with a phenomenological understanding of social interactions within and among human societies. In my opinion, Hegel, more than any other thinker, has constructed a phenomenological framework that adequately captures and represents the nature of group interactions within human societies. This paper explores the Hegelian phenomenon of social identity, and, especially, characterizes the interactions between and among various (...) social identities. It is a modest effort to contribute theoretically to the available discourse on the management of “difference” in multi-ethnic societies. (shrink)

In North America, across the political spectrum, we have a strong tendency to reduce religion to nothing more than a tool to promote our own socio-political views. This is a natural consequence of our hyper-polarized culture and our impoverished view of “religion.” It is also, however, a problem—particularly for those inspired by the call to renewal through an integration of the quest for social justice and the pursuit of the spiritual life. By focusing on the value of participating in religious (...) liturgy, I show how a renewed respect for religion can help the proponents of social justice fulfil some of the foundational desires of the original movement and, thereby, to bring to fruition some of its dormant promise. This includes, in particular, the desire for social harmony and the desire to pay greater attention to our concrete reality. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Nothing and Negativity from a Logical Point of View Hegel's Conceptions of Nothing and Negativity Heidegger's Criticism Conclusion.

: Whereas research on Moses Mendelssohn’s Morning Hours has largely focused on the proofs for the existence of God and the elaboration of a purified pantheism in the Second Part of the text, scholars have paid far less attention to the First Part where Mendelssohn details his mature epistemology and conceptions of truth. In an attempt to contribute to remedying this situation, the present article critically examines his account, in the First Part, of different types of truth, different types of (...) knowledge, and the case against idealism. The examination stresses potential but overlooked strengths of his account, questions of ambiguity if not inconsistency in his concepts of existence and substance, and the potential import of these questions for the role he assigns to common sense. (shrink)

A concise and accessible dictionary of the key terms used in Heidegger's philosophy, his major works and philosophical influences.

Another possible source of this neglect in the United States is the work of Mark Okrent. In Heidegger's Pragmatism Okrent does, indeed, take seriously the importance of the account of temporality for the project of Sein und Zeit, as originally conceived by Heidegger. However, like Dreyfus, Okrent is so taken by the pragmatic character of the analyses in Division I that he ignores Heidegger's analysis of authentic existence and thereby any bearing that this analysis might have on the account of (...) temporality; in addition, he eschews Heidegger's extensive talk of "'ecstases' of temporality and their 'horizonal schemata'" as inappropriate, picture-thinking holdovers from Husserl. Perhaps even more significant for contemporary assessments of Heidegger's account of temporality as the meaning of 'to be' is Okrent's contention that the account is basically aporetic. Okrent fails to find in Sein und Zeit "the conceptual resources" for distinguishing between "'presence' in the sense of presentability and presence as the ground of presentability." As a result, he concludes, Heidegger's argument is transcendental and thus verificationist, implying a kind of metaphysical pragmatism, ultimately distasteful to Heidegger and a prime source of the Kehre. (shrink)

Hegel’s account of conscience at the conclusion to the chapter on morality in the Philosophy of Right has had more than its share of detractors. Theunissen tries to explain why the account is “so meager,” Findlay deems it “thoroughly scandalous,” and Tugendhat goes so far as to label it the pinnacle of a “no longer merely conceptual, but rather moral perversion.” Even commentators committed to rescuing Hegel’s discussion of conscience from such extreme reproaches agree that it is “one-sided” and “problematic.” (...) The source of this widespread conclusion about Hegel’s political incorrectness is not difficult to discern. In the wake of the nationalistic excesses and horrors of the last two centuries, there is an understandable suspicion about the motivations underlying claims that “the state cannot recognize conscience in its distinctive. form, that is, as subjective knowing”. When Hegel declares that the “formal subjectivity” of conscience, as the final achievement of morality, is “on the verge of turning into something evil”, he seems clearly out of step with the reigning liberal political traditions, traditions that regard the individual’s freedom to abide by his or her conscience as both an unassailable right and an inherent good. (shrink)

This volume identifies and develops how philosophy of mind and phenomenology interact in both conceptual and empirically-informed ways. The objective is to demonstrate that phenomenology, as the first-personal study of the contents and structures of our mentality, can provide us with insights into the understanding of the mind and can complement strictly analytical or empirically informed approaches to the study of the mind. Insofar as phenomenology, as the study or science of phenomena, allows the mind to appear, this collection shows (...) how the mind can reappear through a constructive dialogue between different ways—phenomenological, analytical, and empirical—of understanding mentality. (shrink)

To criticize a philosopher’s views properly a primary requirement is an accurate understanding of the questions he raises, the problems he acknowledges, and the procedures he follows. In the following study I attempt to identify the specific question of truth which Hegel addresses, the basis of the sort of skepticism posing a serious threat to its resolution, and finally a strategy he adopts. The specific question of truth for Hegel is a question of metaphysical truth or, in the Cartesian terms (...) which Hegel willingly employed, the question of the objectivity of thoughts. The sort of skepticism he has in mind is one which, based on certain purported conditions of human knowing, rejects the possibility of metaphysical truth. While Hegel’s strategy is to analyze those various conditions in an encyclopedic fashion, my concern in this paper is his analysis of the logical conditions of human knowing. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: The First Phase: Fichte's “Metaphysics of Dasein” and Its Systemic Betrayal The Second Phase: Onto‐theo‐ego‐logy and the Question of Infinity at a “Crossroads” with Hegel The Third Phase: Schelling on the Basic Distinction, the Primal Being of the Will, and the Existence of Evil The Fourth Phase: Hegel's Completion of Western Philosophy and “Getting over” Metaphysics by Thinking Its Forgotten Ground.

To criticize a philosopher’s views properly a primary requirement is an accurate understanding of the questions he raises, the problems he acknowledges, and the procedures he follows. In the following study I attempt to identify the specific question of truth which Hegel addresses, the basis of the sort of skepticism posing a serious threat to its resolution, and finally a strategy he adopts. The specific question of truth for Hegel is a question of metaphysical truth or, in the Cartesian terms (...) which Hegel willingly employed, the question of the objectivity of thoughts. The sort of skepticism he has in mind is one which, based on certain purported conditions of human knowing, rejects the possibility of metaphysical truth. While Hegel’s strategy is to analyze those various conditions in an encyclopedic fashion, my concern in this paper is his analysis of the logical conditions of human knowing. (shrink)

Over a hundred scholars from as far away as Tokyo, New York, and Buenos Aires, participated in the twentieth congress of the Internationale Hegel-Gesellschaft held in Debrecen and Budapest, Hungary, from August 24 to August 28, 1994, on the theme: Vernunft in der Geschichte? Among those addressing the Debrecen portion of the congress were Agnes Heller, Manfred Riedel, Shlomo Avineri, Walter Jaeschke, and Ludwig Siep. Howard Kainz of Marquette University also gave a well received paper in Debrecen on “Hegel’s Philosophy (...) of History and Providence.”. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Evidence, Idealism, and Common Sense The Aesthetics of “Mixed Feelings” Socrates and Rational Psychology in Mendelssohn's Phaedo Religious Tolerance and a Philosophy of Judaism “Refined Spinozism,” the Pantheism Controversy, and Morning Hours The Only Possible Bases of Natural Theology.

After reviewing basic features of language, this paper reviews a central debate among twentieth-century philosophers over the proper analysis of linguisticmeaning. While some center the analysis of meaning in language’s capacity to be true, others locate meaning in the communicative intentions of the users of thelanguage. As a means of addressing this impasse and suggesting its unfounded character, the paper draws on recent studies of language acquisition and relates them to existential dimensions of language.

This paper elaborates four asymmetrical, developmental stages of the phenomenon of human freedom, starting with a rudimentary sort of freedom, thebasic experience of a relatively unencumbered power to act in alternative ways. The paper argues that structural elements of this rudimentary form of freedomare demonstrable in three distinct, supervening forms of freedom: instrumental freedom, the experience of the self-reflective ability to pursue certain aims, perfectionist freedom, the experience of the capacity to master oneself according to some ideal, and, finally, interpersonal (...) freedom, the experience of empowerment and alternatives only available through commitments to others. (shrink)

Proceedings of the Fifty-sixth Annual Meeting of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, held in Houston, Tex., Apr. 16-18, 1982. Includes bibliographical references.

This paper concerns Hegel’s much-neglected discussion of the rational observation of nature in the first part of the chapter on reason in the Phenomenology of Spirit. The paper focuses, in particular, on the themes of nature’s inexhaustibilit y, animal life’s holistic character, and the earth’s individual distinctiveness insofar as Hegel appeals to them to challenge a certain kind of self-understanding of what it means to observe nature rationally. In addition to examining the significance and trenchancy of this challenge, the paper (...) inquires whether these same themes have implications for Hegel’s own philosophical understanding of reason as spirit. (shrink)