At the beginning of 2020, COVID-19 became a global problem. Despite all the efforts to emphasize the relevance of preventive measures, not everyone adhered to them. Thus, learning more about the characteristics determining attitudinal and behavioral responses to the pandemic is crucial to improving future interventions. In this study, we applied machine learning on the multi-national data collected by the International Collaboration on the Social and Moral Psychology of COVID-19 (N = 51,404) to test the predictive efficacy of constructs from (...) social, moral, cognitive, and personality psychology, as well as socio-demographic factors, in the attitudinal and behavioral responses to the pandemic. The results point to several valuable insights. Internalized moral identity provided the most consistent predictive contribution—individuals perceiving moral traits as central to their self-concept reported higher adherence to preventive measures. Similar was found for morality as cooperation, symbolized moral identity, self-control, open-mindedness, collective narcissism, while the inverse relationship was evident for the endorsement of conspiracy theories. However, we also found a non-negligible variability in the explained variance and predictive contributions with respect to macro-level factors such as the pandemic stage or cultural region. Overall, the results underscore the importance of morality-related and contextual factors in understanding adherence to public health recommendations during the pandemic. (shrink)

The article reviews the book Granice pojęciowe metafizyki [The Conceptual Boundaries of Metaphysics], by Sebastian Tomasz Kołodziejczyk.

Author: Dalke Jarosław Title: PHILOSOPHICAL ARGUMENTS FOR THE IDEA OF UNIVERSAL SALVATION IN THOMAS TALBOTT’S APPROACH (Argumenty filozoficzne za koncepcją uniwersalizmu zbawienia w ujęciu Thomasa Talbotta) Source: Filo-Sofija year: 2010, vol:.10, number: 2010/1, pages: 107-122 Keywords: IDEA OF UNIVERSAL SALVATION, THOMAS TALBOTT, GOD Discipline: PHILOSOPHY Language: POLISH Document type: ARTICLE Publication order reference (Primary author’s office address): E-mail: www:This paper presents philosophical arguments for the idea of universal salvation proposed by Thomas Talbott. He argues that in the afterlife everyone will (...) be finally reconciled to God, because the existence of hell, understood as state of endless suffering, is logically inconsistent with God’s love and omnipotence. Nonetheless, the critical analysis of Talbott’s reasoning doesn’t show that his universalism is sufficiently justifiable position. Although the emptiness of hell is logically possible, Talbott’s argumentation requires accepting more assumptions and resolving additional difficulties. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In this article the development of the thought of two important twentieth-century legal theorists is compared. Although Hans Kelsen is primarily known for his Pure theory of law and Hermann Kantorowicz is one of the founders of the Free law movement, the article will revolve around their respective proposals for the post-War restoration of the international legal order. It is argued that these are based on their respective conceptions of ‘law’ and ‘the state’. By virtue of this comparison, (...) it is possible to shed light on the basic thinking behind their complex ideas, as well as show how these were formulated and influenced by the political circumstances of their times. Lastly, the article shall concern the concrete post-War influence of Kantorowicz and Kelsen, as a result of the shared and different philosophical, methodological and scientific convictions of both scholars. (shrink)

Gertrud KantorowiczKantorowicz, Gertrud wird am 9. Oktober 1876 in Posen als Tochter eines Likör-Fabrikanten geboren und besucht dort die Königliche Luisenschule von 1883 bis 1992, bevor sie sich privatim auf das Studium vorbereitet. Zum Studium der Kunstgeschichte, Archäologie und Philosophie geht sie im Jahr 1898 nach Berlin, später nach München und Zürich. In Zürich schließt sie ihr Studium mit einer kunsthistorischen Dissertation ab.

Author: Boruszewski Jarosław Title: MACHINES AND SYMBOLS (I) – SEMANTIC ASPECTS OF CYBERNETICS AND AUTOMATION (Maszyny i symbole (I) – semantyczne aspekty cybernetyki i automatyzacji) Source: Filo-Sofija year: 2011, vol:.12, number: 2011/1, pages: 397-425 Keywords: MACHINES, SYMBOLS, SEMANTIC, CYBERNETICS, AUTOMATION Discipline: PHILOSOPHY Language: POLISH Document type: ARTICLE Publication order reference (Primary author’s office address): E-mail: www:This article is the first part of the cycle titled “Machines and symbols”. The main issue of this cycle may be formulated as a question: can (...) machines and technical devices operate with symbols? A very important problem raised in this essay is the difference between symbols and signals. The concept of signal is also broadly discussed in the paper, because there are many different definitions of this concept. The present text contains semantic and philosophical considerations concerning cybernetics, mathematical theory of communication, industrial semiotics and semio-technics. In these theories, terms “symbol” and “signal” are often used interchangeably which leads to misconceptions. One of the most frequent misconceptions is confusing discrete signals with symbols. The author focused on communication systems where machines are senders and humans are receivers, because descriptions of these systems tend towards anthropomorphization of a machine-sender. This tendency makes signals sent out by machines treated as symbols comprehensible by a human-receiver. Another interesting aspect of machine-human communication systems is the treatment of a human-receiver as some kind of machine. Such an idea is called “mechanomorphism”. (shrink)

Khoryev regards Petersburg, a collection of essays by Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, published in 1976, as a windup of the writer’s complex ties with Russian culture and literature, which he was widely known to have loved and known in depth. It is a book where, through the legendary city on the river Neva, Iwaszkiewicz takes a look at a number of essential issues of Russian history and its ties with the history of Poland and the Polish people. Iwaszkiewicz avoids unequivocal judgments, noticing (...) the antinomian nature of St. Petersburg, seen as a being full of contrast but at the same time the center of revolutions and despotism, a manifestation of imperial power and the highest achievements of sophisticated art. These contrasts reveal, in Khoryev’s opinion, the multi-faceted and fullest picture of St. Petersburg and its individuality: so mysterious, overpowering and unique. (shrink)

Khoryev regards Petersburg, a collection of essays by Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, published in 1976, as a windup of the writer’s complex ties with Russian culture and literature, which he was widely known to have loved and known in depth. It is a book where, through the legendary city on the river Neva, Iwaszkiewicz takes a look at a number of essential issues of Russian history and its ties with the history of Poland and the Polish people. Iwaszkiewicz avoids unequivocal judgments, noticing (...) the antinomian nature of St. Petersburg, seen as a being full of contrast but at the same time the center of revolutions and despotism, a manifestation of imperial power and the highest achievements of sophisticated art. These contrasts reveal, in Khoryev’s opinion, the multi-faceted and fullest picture of St. Petersburg and its individuality: so mysterious, overpowering and unique. (shrink)

Journal of Philosophy of Education, EarlyView.

ABSTRACTThe purpose of my paper is to determine the consequences of including an education for forgiveness in the context of developing prudence. I aim to answer two questions: what is prudent forgiveness; what constitutes education for prudent forgiveness? I present my analyses in six parts. After introduction, I point to the advantages and doubts concerning forgiveness. Then, I present prudence as a basic virtue guiding human actions. I draw mainly on the approach proposed by Thomas Aquinas, who argued that prudence (...) refers to the perfection of the command. The fourth part addresses the question of the mechanisms of prudent forgiveness. I note that a decision to forgive cannot be made in haste; that it is a decision concerning some good that the victim wants to attain in the future; finally, that forgiveness is prudent in its achievement. In the last part, I transfer prior analyses to the pedagogical level. (shrink)

The direct reference point for these analyses is the process of making moral decisions, but a particular point of interest is the difficulty associated with making decisions when acting subjects are aware that their choice of moral good can lead to the breakdown of relationships with those close to them or to their exclusion from the group that have been most important to them so far in their lives, consequently causing them to experience loneliness. This difficulty is a challenge for (...) education, which in supporting the moral development of a maturing person should prepare her/him for choosing moral good even if this requires personal sacrifices. In these analyses, assuming that knowledge of moral good is not sufficient for morally good actions, I refer mainly to the virtues of character that facilitate making morally good decisions and I seek the answer to the question: what character traits should be shaped in maturing persons, so that as adults they can resist moral evil, even when this will clearly lead to the experience of loneliness? I propose these character traits as expressing moral virtues—especially the cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, temperance and fortitude. In this way, I join in the discussion relating to the teleology of education. I do not touch on the methodology of education, however. The argument is presented in two parts. In the first, I introduce the problem of decision-making implying consent to loneliness. In the second, I reflect on the characteristics of a person who is capable of making such a decision. (shrink)

Tematem artykułu jest filozofia miłości rozwijana przez dwóch wybitnych fenomenologów wymienionych w tytule: Dietricha von Hildebranda i Karola Wojtyłę. Obydwaj korzystali w swoich badaniach z metody fenomenologicznej; celem artykułu jest pokazanie, że w obydwu wypadkach metoda ta prowadziła do podobnych rezultatów. Autor czyni to w trzech krokach. Po pierwsze, pokazuje, że miłość pojętą w sensie ogólnym obydwaj autorzy rozumieją jako odpowiedź na wartość osoby. W Lubelskiej Szkole Personalizmu zasada miłości została wyrażona w formule: persona est affirmanda propter seipsam, a treścią (...) afirmacji, która jest należna osobie, jest miłość. W kategoriach von Hildebranda zasada ta wyrażona jest w sposób następujący: dobro osoby afirmowane jest poprzez obiektywne dobra dla osoby, które stanowią właściwą treść miłości. Po drugie, obydwaj autorzy wiele uwagi poświęcają tej specyficznej formie miłości, jaką jest miłość małżeńska. Podczas gdy mińość w sensie ogólnym stanowi odpowiedź na wyjątkową wartość osoby w stosunku do świata pozaosobowego, to miłość małżeńska jest odpowiedzią na wyjątkową wartość jednej osoby pośród wszystkich innych osób doświadczaną przez osobę płci przeciwnej. W tym sensie miłość małżeńska jest również specyficzną odpowiedzią na wartość. Po trzecie, doświadczenie miłości małżeńskiej pokazuje, że nie istnieje sprzeczność między wolnością a wzajemną przynależnością, co von Hildebrand wyraził w pojciu intentio unionis. (shrink)

This project envisages a study of Eric Voegelin (1901-1985) and of the role played by metaxy in his vision of political philosophy. Metaxy already defined by Plato as the "in-between" matrix of the human condition is for Voegelin a powerful notion that symbolizes the intermediate state in which man experiences diverse and opposing tensions such as the ones between immanence and transcendence or mortality and immortality. The metaxy constitutes the realm of the divine-human mutual participation (methexis), and its locus resides (...) in human consciousness (nous), there where the divine reality manifests itself as the origin of being. Being the field of intermediation between opposing forces, man has to keep the balance of consciousness in order to differentiate the noetic and pneumatic dimensions and so attune his life to the divine ground of being. This project claims that for Voegelin metaxy shapes the possibility of the philosophical, historical, political and religious orientation in life. Indeed, Voegelin's approach deserves recognition as an option adequate for addressing the intellectual challenges engendered by modern and postmodern philosophies. (shrink)

It, is shown that Birkhoff –von Neumann quantum logic (i.e., an orthomodular lattice or poset) possessing an ordering set of probability measures S can be isomorphically represented as a family of fuzzy subsets of S or, equivalently, as a family of propositional functions with arguments ranging over S and belonging to the domain of infinite-valued Łukasiewicz logic. This representation endows BvN quantum logic with a new pair of partially defined binary operations, different from the order-theoretic ones: Łukasiewicz intersection and union (...) of fuzzy sets in the first case and Łukasiewicz conjunction and disjunction in the second. Relations between old and new operations are studied and it is shown that although they coincide whenever new operations are defined, they are not identical in general. The hypothesis that quantum-logical conjunction and disjunction should be represented by Łukasiewicz operations, not by order-theoretic join and meet is formulated and some of its possible consequences are considered. (shrink)

At the turn of 1960s and 1970s, Stanisław Lem devoted some of his non-fiction writing to a discussion and considerations of semiotics. Most of them were expressions of a critical approach mainly directed against structuralism. However, Lem also formulated some positive statements although they were not developed systematically. The article offers an analysis of Lem’s semiotic ideas from the perspective of semiotic functionalism of Jerzy Pelc, mainly considering its two main components: contextualism and typological approach. Special attention is paid to (...) the latter because both Pelc and Lem proposed some original solutions in this respect. What is meant here is the multidimensional typology of symbolic uses of signs developed by Pelc and Lem’s multidimensional typology of the situations of the reception of texts. Although they are independent form each other, these proposals show some convergence both in their ways of construction and roles they are supposed to perform. Henceforth, one can say that Lem was a crypto-functionalist. (shrink)

Rev. Professor Stanislaw Kowalczyk ist the head of the Social Philosophy Department at The Social Studies Faculty of the Catholic University of Lublin. He is a philosopher with a wide variety of interests and the author of many books. Philosophical Ideas of Postmodernism is his newest work. Kowalczyk does not present his own definition of postmodernism. He compares the most important philosophers of this trend and critically analyses their ideas from the point of view of classical philosophy.

The subject of this abstract is the description of professional ethics of a damage adjuster in an insurance company. The work of a damage adjuster in a financial institution is more than looking after the profit of the company which goes to the company shareholders. The job is very often regarded as a position of public trust. When the aggrieved parties report a damage to an insurance company they not only entrust their personal data, which are protected by law, but (...) they also reveal confidential information like medical records, their income and important personal documentation. Reporting a damage, the aggrieved party has to be sure that the entrusted information will be only used for the purpose of the liquidation of damages. On the other hand, the damage adjuster is supposed to know that when contacting the aggrieved party, who is not an expert in insurance, should never use the professional knowledge to make decisions which are not in favour of the party. In this case the damage adjuster has two roles; not only is he a professional who is responsible for the liquidation of the damage but he is also a representative of a financial institution to the aggrieved party. Therefore there are also some marketing aspects involved in the process because quick and accurate handling of the liquidation process can convince the aggrieved party to choose the insurance company’s offer. In my paper I am going to focus on ethical issues of the profession of a damage adjuster both when interacting with clients and decision taking. I will try to show what ethical and moral standards a person working as a damage adjuster should follow. These being especially important for the profession of a personal damage adjuster. The role of a damage adjuster is not only the liquidation of the damage following procedures but also help and support for the aggrieved party by explaining the procedures, existing rights and claims. (shrink)

In the paper it is shown that every physically sound Birkhoff – von Neumann quantum logic, i.e., an orthomodular partially ordered set with an ordering set of probability measures can be treated as partial infinite-valued Łukasiewicz logic, which unifies two competing approaches: the many-valued, and the two-valued but non-distributive, which have co-existed in the quantum logic theory since its very beginning.

Thomas Hobbes bequeathed to us a comprehensive system, the interpretation of which remains a matter of disagreement even today. In his political theory, he pays most attention to the state community. He deliberates over the reasons for its origin, its decline and fall. Among the more detailed issues dealt within his reflections, the more important ones are the following: the concept of the state of nature, human motivation, the state of war and peace, as well as considerations concerning the social (...) contract. In order to be consistent in his argument, Hobbes also deals with the analysis of the structures of the state, the division of power and with the functions a state should perform. Due to these deliberations, he finally arrives at the secret of the state’s durability. Though it is certainly the case that, since his times, the socio-political situation and circumstances have changed, many of the solutions postulated by Hobbes have not lost their value. (shrink)

Jubilees induce one to reflect, to look back. It is a good opportunity to make some summaries, one ponders over the achievements of the past. It is also a good moment to express one's appreciation and gratitude. Such an expression of appreciation and a form of gratitude is the book Philosophy Leaning Towards Man, dedicated to Rev. Stanisław Kowalczyk, a professor of philosophy on the occasion of forty years of his scientific work at the Catholic University of Lublin and the (...) fiftieth anniversary of his ordination. This joint publication, dedicated to Prof. Kowalczyk and edited by Edward Balawajder, Arkadiusz Jabłoński and Jan Szymczyk, comprises numerous studies by his associates, colleagues and students. The whole work is thematically organized into three parts. The first part contains texts that raise anthropological issues, the second - social issues, and the third - issues concentrated around the relation between God and religion. This organization perfectly reflects the spectrum of the interests of Prof. Kowalczyk. (shrink)