El artículo examina el papel de Crescas y Spinoza en la transición de la concepción medieval a la concepción moderna del universo. Crescas es presentado como ejemplo ilustrativo de la tensión entre aristotelismo y religión revelada y de cómo esta última provoca la disolución del aquel, allanando así el camino a la concepción moderna del universo. A continuación, se muestra cómo la concepción moderna se plasma en el pensamiento de Spinoza, el cual radicaliza algunos de sus rasgos definitorios. Esta radicalización (...) socava la noción tradicional del _Deus absconditus_ y conduce en Spinoza al remplazo de la religión por la filosofía como auténtica revelación divina. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that the certainty about the wrongness of killing must not be considered as a universal, but as a local one. Initially, I show that there exist communities in which the wrongness of killing innocents is not a moral certainty and that this kind of case cannot be justified by arguing that such people are psychopaths. Lastly, I argue that universal certainties do not admit of exceptions: thus, the fact that some exceptional cases affect the certainty (...) that killing innocents is wrong, leads me to conclude that it is a local certainty. (shrink)

El articulo examina la aparente discrepancia en el pensamiento de Spinoza entre su teocentrismo epistemológico, según el cual todo es dudoso mientras desconocemos la existencia de Dios, y el principio verum index sui et falsi, según el cual la mera posesión de ideas verdaderas excluye toda incertidumbre. Lejos de contradecirse, estas dos afirmaciones constituyen en Spinoza dos aspectos correlativos del mismo planteamiento gnoseólogico. Se muestra así que la naturaleza divina no es ajena al intelecto humano y que este es capaz (...) de contemplar la realidad desde una perspectiva omnímoda, idéntica a la de Dios. (shrink)

While in his late works Walter Benjamin seems to employ painting in an accessory way —either as an auratic counterfigure, or as a propitiatory victim of the technical image—, the allusions to the medium that guide his trajectory show its importance in the whole of his aesthetic reflection and even in the development of his theory of language. Especially relevant to understanding the general features of his idea of painting is the unpublished youth essay “On Painting, or Sign and Mark”, (...) as well as other writings of the same period that, although address the matter tangentially, shape it to a greater or lesser degree and determine its general scope. (shrink)

En este artículo se muestra que la locura, dentro del contexto de la obra tardía de Wittgenstein, no ha de ser confundida con el hueco gramatical que se abre cuando tiene lugar una reacción que no tiene cabida dentro del juego de lenguaje que se esté jugando en cierto momento. Además, y teniendo en cuenta que en muchas ocasiones no se puede apreciar y valorar algo en su justa medida hasta que se carece de ello, se señala que es precisamente (...) en el loco, entendiendo por tal el sujeto que se halla gramaticalmente aislado, en quien más claramente podemos apreciar el acuerdo en la forma de vida sobre el que se cimenta la obra tardía de Wittgenstein. In this paper I show that madness, in the context of Wittgenstein's later work, should not be mistaken for the grammatical gap which is opened when a reaction takes place, which has no place in the language-game played in that very moment. Besides, and bearing in mind that we often do not place worth on something until we miss it, it is emphasized that it is in the madman, taken as a grammatically isolated individual, with whom, we are best able to appreciate agreement in form of life on which Wittgenstein's later work is based. (shrink)

Han sido numerosas las ocasiones en que se ha tratado de condensar en una definición la concepción que Wittgenstein tenía de los problemas filosóficos. En este artículo pretendo demostrar que semejante pretensión va en contra del talante mismo de la obra de Wittgenstein por basarse aquella en una orientación esencialista totalmente opuesta a la actitud preconizada por el pensador austriaco, actitud que no era otra que la de atender a los usos del lenguaje para aclarar meras confusiones en las que (...) incurrimos al utilizar un concepto: el término "problema" invita a pensar en la correspondiente "solución", pero Wittgenstein no pretende ofrecer soluciones o explicaciones sino mostrar un modus operandi filosófico comparable a una labor tan simple como la de desatar nudos. (shrink)

Tras describir a grandes rasgos los sistemas de creencias propuestos por Quine y Wittgenstein, en este artículo hago referencia a las similitudes y diferencias que Pieranna Garavaso y Danièle Moyal Sharrock advierten entre ambos sistemas. Partiendo de la crítica de estas interpretaciones, llamaré la atención sobre un aspecto del sistema wittgensteiniano de creencias que, desde mi punto de vista, es de la mayor importancia. Concretamente, me refiero a la posibilidad de revisar incluso las creencias más básicas de este sistema. El (...) análisis de este problema me llevará a tratar otra cuestión no menos importante: ¿supondría la revisión de nuestras creencias más fundamentales que el concepto mismo de humanidad dejara de tener sentido? After describing the main lines of the systems of beliefs Quine and Wittgenstein expounded, I make reference in this paper to the similarities and differences Pieranna Garavaso and Danièle Moyal-Sharrock find between both systems. Through the critique of these interpretations, I will place emphasis on one aspect of the Wittgensteinian system of beliefs which, from my point of view, is of highest importance. I am referring specifically to the possibility of revising even the most basic beliefs of this system. The analysis of this problem will lead me to approach another very important question, i. e.: would the revision of our most fundamental beliefs mean that the concept of humanity itself lose all sense? (shrink)

Neste livro, o autor busca mostrar que a espacialidade está presente, por intermédio de processos, funções, formas e representações, no campo e na cidade, nas favelas e condomínios exclusivos, nas fábricas e shopping centers, nas ruas e no recinto domiciliar, nos templos e prostíbulos, nos deslocamentos de pessoas, mercadorias, informações e capital, enfim, em toda parte. Ela se faz presente nas diferentes temporalidades, de modo sincrônico e diacrônico, caracterizando-se ainda pela continuidade ou descontinuidade espacial e justapondo-se ou superpondo-se conforme as (...) diferentes ações humanas. (shrink)

Literature on indoctrination has focused on imparting and revising beliefs, but it has hardly considered the way of teaching and acquiring certainties—in Wittgenstein’s sense. Therefore, the role played by rationality in the acquisition of our linguistic practices has been overestimated. Furthermore, analyses of the relationship between certainty and indoctrination contain major errors. In this paper, the clarification of the aforementioned issues leads me to suggest the avoidance of the term ‘indoctrination’ so as to avoid focusing on the suitability of the (...) case to the concept rather than on the analysis of the case itself. This should facilitate that the process of helping children to acquire a world-picture—by teaching them to ignore alternatives to certainties—is definitely accepted as normal and natural, for many beliefs are expected to end up becoming ungrounded certainties not only in the medium or long term, but also, and above all, in the short term. (shrink)

After describing Wittgenstein's notion of ‘certainty’, in this article I provide four arguments to demonstrate that no certainty can be acquired at will. Specifically, I argue that, in order to assimilate a certainty, it is irrelevant whether the individual concerned has found a ground that seemingly justifies that certainty; has a given mental state; is willing to accept the certainty on the proposal of a persuader; or tries to act according to the certainty involved. Lastly, I analyse how each of (...) these arguments is reflected in the way children acquire certainties. (shrink)

Major depression etiopathogenesis is related to a wide variety of genetics, demographic and psychosocial factors, as well as to environmental factors. The objective of this study is to analyze sociodemographic and environmental variables that are related to the prevalence of depression through correlation analysis and to develop a regression model that explains the behavior of this disease from an ecological perspective. This is an ecological, retrospective, cross-sectional study. The target population was 1,148,430 individuals over the age of 16 who were (...) registered in Aragon (Spain) during 2010, with electronic medical records in the community’s primary health care centers. The spatial unit was the Basic Health Area (BHA). The dependent variable was the diagnosis of Depression and the ecological independent variables were: Demographic variables (gender and age), population distribution, typology of the entity, population structure by sex and age, by nationality, by education, by work, by salary, by marital status, structure of the household by number of members, and state of the buildings. The results show moderate and positive correlations appear with higher rates of depression in areas having a higher femininity index, higher population density, areas with a higher unemployment rate and higher average salary. The results of the linear regression show that aging +75 and rural entities act as protective factors for depression, while urban areas and deficient buildings act as risk factors. In conclusion, the ecological methodology may be a useful tool which, together with the statistical epidemiological analysis, can help in the political decision making process. (shrink)

In this paper I will argue that when Aristotle uses the word ‘ἀρχή’ he is often referring to what we call a condition, whether necessary, sufficient or necessary and sufficient. To this end I will discuss how conditions for being, change, and knowledge, as identified by Aristotle, can be equated to ontological, physical and noetic principles, respectively.

El análisis detenido del pensamiento teológico-musical de Isidoro de Sevilla ha sido repetidamente ignorado por la crítica, hecho que ha provocado que el estado de la cuestión sobre la materia sea prácticamente inexistente. Debido a ello, este trabajo tiene un cuádruple objetivo. En primer lugar, fijar con precisión el citado estado de la cuestión. En segundo lugar, sistematizar el estudio del pensamiento teológico-musical isidoriano dentro de la totalidad de su pensamiento musical para que el primero pueda ser estudiado exhaustivamente y (...) de manera generalizada en el futuro. En tercer lugar, localizar, clasificar e introducir por primera vez todos los textos litúrgico-musicales de Isidoro de Sevilla de cara a su posterior estudio en futuras publicaciones. En cuarto lugar, exponer, también por primera vez, algunas de las ideas más relevantes del pensamiento teológico-musical isidoriano como ejemplo de la sistematización propuesta y como punto de partida para el establecimiento de futuras líneas de investigación. (shrink)

Aunque política y ciencia constituyen hoy en día ramas casi antagónicas del conocimiento humano -acaso combinables en ámbitos ficcionales como el cine y la literatura-, la relación entre filosofía política y astronomía es una constante histórica que alcanza especial fuerza en el pensamiento emancipatorio del siglo xix. El presente artículo sitúa en ese marco La eternidad por los astros y, asimismo, somete a contraste la peculiaridad retórica e ideológica de esta obra, en donde Louis-Auguste Blanqui propone una contigüidad entre orbe (...) celeste y sociedades humanas, basada en su análogo funcionamiento y su común atavismo. (shrink)

It is expected that children increasingly learn to identify errors throughout their schooling process and even before it. As a further step, however, some scholars have suggested how a culture of error should be implemented in the classroom for the student to be able not only to locate errors but also, and above all, to learn from them. Yet the various proposals aimed at generating a culture of error in the classroom keep regarding error as all those responses and reactions (...) that are not considered as true or correct in each specific case, thereby not realizing that many of these alleged errors are really anomalies with very different characteristics and consequences despite their seeming resemblance. In this paper, I rely on Ludwig Wittgenstein’s On Certainty to clarify the difference between errors and anomalies. Subsequently, I provide guidelines that may be adapted by each teacher to her students’ needs and development level in order to foster a culture of error that begins by distinguishing er... (shrink)

Algunos autores han intentado considerar los delirios como certezas –entendidas en el sentido de Wittgenstein– debido a las similitudes que parecen existir entre sus respectivos estatus epistemológicos. Sin embargo, dicho intento ha sido criticado con agudeza, entre otras razones, porque el contenido de los delirios choca frontalmente con el contenido de las certezas, por lo que los delirios no pueden ser comprendidos debido a los cambios en las relaciones de significado. Pero es evidente que, aunque los delirios no se puedan (...) contemplar como certezas, muchos delirios afectan de un modo u otro al sistema de certezas del paciente. Partiendo de esta base, no es descabellado pensar que dicha influencia pudiera ser también recíproca: en otras palabras, parece sumamente recomendable analizar si algunos delirios se podrían contemplar como el resultado de variaciones en certezas. En este artículo llevo a cabo dicho análisis al intentar mostrar que el origen de algunos delirios pedestres y severos puede ser hallado en lo que llamaré “ceguera a posibilidades” e “incertidumbre”, términos que he desarrollado teniendo en cuenta la obra del filósofo Ludwig Wittgenstein. (shrink)

El objetivo del presente trabajo es especular sobre los factores que pueden llevar a un posible retorno del Estado en general y del Estado de Bienestar en particular, después de la etapa neoliberal que podría haberse cerrado con las crisis contemporáneas. Se trata de ver si la tendencia hacia el “Estado mínimo” se ha revertido, cosa que ya pudo haberse iniciado a finales del siglo XX, e incluso si el conjunto de crisis mundiales acaecidas a principios del XXI no habrán (...) acelerado tal tendencia. De todos modos, podría darse el caso de un retorno del Estado pero con un planteamiento sobre el Estado de Bienestar bien diferente del que tuvieron los que, a finales del siglo XIX y principios del XX, comenzaron a implantarlo en países centrales. (shrink)

No debe exagerarse la intensidad del poder a escala mundial. El presente trabajo explora las limitaciones del poder mundial tanto en el sentido de estar detentado por una potencia hegemónica, es decir, los Estados Unidos de América, como en el sentido de países centrales en cuanto opuestos a los periféricos. En el caso de los Estados Unidos, se presentan algunas debilidades que se derivan de sus aparentes fortalezas, en especial en el campo militar, económico, político y cultural, haciendo énfasis en (...) las limitaciones que resultan de su enorme capacidad de acumular información. Se citan otros autores que anuncian la decadencia de esa hegemonía. Por otro lado, se discute el carácter más pluralista del poder mundial en contra de las visiones derivadas de la consideración de la hegemonía o el imperio. El hecho es que hay otros estados que detentan poder a escala mundial junto a multinacionales y, especialmente, las clases sociales a escala mundial. En este último caso, la “clase alta” está relativamente bien organizada a escala mundial, aunque de manera contradictoria mientras que la “clase baja” está claramente desorganizada al tiempo que inclinada a los sentimientos nacionalistas o locales. Como conclusión, se presenta una visión más “taoísta” del poder mundial. (shrink)

En el presente texto se intenta presentar una visión ordenada de la evolución de la pregunta de si es España una nación, y en caso de ser la respuesta afirmativa, si ha sido una nación normal y si es su historia la historia de una decadencia. La preocupación por el tema de “España como problema” se remonta al siglo XVII y llega a nuestros días. Nos detendremos especialmente en las tesis al respecto de Ortega y Gasset y su discípulo Julián (...) Marías. (shrink)

Los recientes movimientos sociales (desde las “primaveras árabes” a Occupy Wall Street, pasando por los “indignados” europeos o los estudiantes latinoamericanos) pueden entenderse mejor, sin negar sus componentes locales, si se perciben como alternativas producidas dentro de la lógica del sistema capitalista. A ello se añade la actual coyuntura de inseguridades producidas por la crisis visible desde 2008, que agudiza los motivos de protesta. Ésta, sin embargo, no es mayoritaria, y sus integrantes se plantean -con dificultad- objetivos y medios, al (...) tiempo que oscilan entre la búsqueda de cambios en el sistema y su generalización hacia un cambio de sistema. (shrink)

El autor realiza una lectura de las Enéadas de Plotino partiendo de la noción de procesión, pieza clave para comprender la arquitectura del universo plotiniana ordenado jerárquicamente alrededor del Uno-Bien.Del primer principio proceden todos los seres y en él convergen. Cuatro son fundamentalmente los aspectos tratados: 1) El axiomade la procesión. 2) Los dos momentos de la procesión: el ascendente y el descendente. 3) Las imágenes de la procesión.4) Dentro de estas metáforas, privilegia el centro y el círculo, núcleo en (...) el análisis de la noción de procesión. (shrink)

Wide analysis of "María Teresa López de la Vieja, La pendiente resbaladiza. La práctica de la argumentación moral . Madrid y México, D.F.: Plaza y Valdés, 2010, 288 páginas.".

Resumen: En las Disputationes Metaphysicae XIII, X-XIV Francisco Suárez expone su parecer sobre la incorruptibilidad de los cielos. Particularmente, la sección XI, 13-34 reviste capital importancia de acuerdo con un tópico contextual: la incipiente revolución copernicana y el quebrantamiento de las tesis fundamentales aristotélicas. Su confutación, ubicada principalmente en las D.M. XIII, XI, 13, constituye la piedra angular que le permitirá al Dr. Eximio continuar sosteniendo una posición metafísica-cosmológica de cuño aristotelizante.

The Gelman case entails the conviction of Uruguay for violation of the rights to recognition of legal personality, to life, to personal integrity and to personal liberty; to the family, to the name, to the rights of children and to nationality, to the protection of the family, to judicial guarantees and judicial protection and has failed to comply with the obligation to adapt its domestic law to the American Convention on Human Rights. Protected by the democratic legitimacy of the referendums (...) that validated the Expiry Law, Uruguay has extended impunity for the crimes of the dictatorship by not executing the sentence. The author criticizes the validity of these exculpatory arguments based on various reasons. (shrink)

This paper presents the concept of ‘religious certainty’ I have developed by drawing inspiration from Wittgenstein’s notion of ‘certainty’. After describing the particular traits of religious certainty, this paper addresses two difficulties derived from this concept. On the one hand, it explains why religious certainty functions as such even though all its consequences are far from being absolutely clear; on the other hand, it clarifies why, unlike the rest of certainties, the loss of religious certainty does not result in the (...) collapse of the world-picture made up of all certainties. Subsequently, it analyzes to what extent the teacher can teach religious certainty by acting as a facilitator for its acquisition–if desired—particularly bearing in mind that religious certainty cannot be attained at will. These basic teaching guidelines have several advantages. First, they make it possible to know the nature of religious certainty even better. Second, and most importantly, the fact of having adopted the perspective of a teacher who tries inculcating a religious certainty contributes to detecting and preventing forms of indoctrination that, arguably, might go unnoticed even when attempting to properly present religious certainty—or rather, this way of being religious—in current schools to foster understanding thereof. (shrink)

In this paper, I describe the main lines of modern error theory, a systemic theory which regards errors not as the results of someone’s negligence, but as parts of a complex system. Bearing in mind that errors must be considered as such by an observer or attributor, I expose Wittgenstein’s conception of the attributor responsible for discerning if a strange event constitutes an error or an anomaly. Subsequently, I illustrate this conception of the attributor by describing some traits of the (...) role played by many attributors in business organizations, specifically in the production line of a car manufacturer’s plant, when carrying out the rootcause analysis of problems that arise in the plant. Finally, I reveal a paradox whereby if the attributor denies the possibility that anomalies may happen without being able to explain their source within the system that he or she takes as reference, then the very idea of system no longer makes sense. (shrink)

Wittgenstein’s conception of ‘persuasion’, understood as the persuader’s attempt to modify the persuadee’s certainties, has been recently misinterpreted by some scholars. For Persichetti has overlooked the fact that one cannot persuade unintentionally, while Marconi and Perissinotto have not only taken for granted that persuasion consists in the mere transfer of a world-picture or set of certainties to an individual even when she has not alternative or different certainties, but also that education is restricted to persuading or transmitting certainties. After clarifying (...) these misinterpretations, among others, I argue that persuasion is not used for teaching certainties at the outset, but for modifying them when they do not fit the ones expected by the persuader. If it is agreed that education partly consists in transmitting a world-picture, then persuasion constitutes a necessary resource for educators. Lastly, I provide a set of guidelines for teachers to draw attention to the basic aspects of persuasion that they should consider in the classroom. (shrink)

Among the elements which have gradually been complicating the countless representations of the Virgin Mary throughout history, this paper seeks to highlight and interpret conceptually one of special doctrinal significance in some Marian images during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries: the temple, in whose interior some artists place some actual or symbolic episodes of Mary, from her birth or her Annunciation to the Sacra Conversazione, to give a few examples. Even though at first sight it looks as a mere scenographic (...) or ornamental ingredient, without iconographic value, this precise shape of temple reveals in fact some profound Mariological and Christological meanings. In that order of ideas, this essay is based on a double methodological strategy: first and foremost, to analyze some Marian images which include in the aforementioned period the shape of a temple, in order to see what kind of role such a religious building plays in them; secondly, to discover the relevant keys for interpreting such images, by analyzing some specific texts of the Church Fathers and medieval theologians who identify with Mary the figure of the «temple of God». For this reason, after a brief introduction to the problem, the present study is structured into three main parts inextricably intertwined: in the first we comparatively analyze twelve Marian paintings of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in which the Virgin appears inside a temple; in the second we explain the many exegesis that, in a consistent and strong patristic and theological tradition, identify the analogy of the templum Dei directly with the Virgin Mary, or indirectly with the Christ’s human body conceived in her womb; on the basis of this double analysis of images and exegetical writings, the third part of the paper states as a synthetic conclusion that the artistic representation of a temple or a church building in some Marian images of this period offers a compelling plastic metaphor of Mary and, ultimately, of her virginal divine motherhood. (shrink)

Wittgenstein scholars have tended to interpret the acquisition of certainties, and by extension, of a world-picture, as the achievement of a state in which these certainties are assimilated in a seemingly unconscious way as one masters language-games. However, it has not been stressed that the attainment of this state often involves facing a series of challenges or difficulties which must be overcome for the development of the world-picture and therefore the socialization process to be achieved. After showing, on the one (...) hand, how a world-picture is usually developed, and on the other hand, why a child who seemingly found itself trapped in a precocious skepticism might have serious problems in assimilating certainties, in this paper, I describe some of the challenges children often meet as they acquire a world-picture. Since the overcoming of these challenges is often needed for children to develop a world-picture, I aim at raising the awareness of the necessity of ‘learning to believe’, that is, of developing a series of skills that allow children to undertake the challenges described in this paper. (shrink)

Raimundo Lulio contempla el derecho, como toda otra realidad del mundo creado, desde una filosofía de fe, de fe cristiana, o sea, desde una forma de razonar en servicio de la teología, en cuanto que de ese razonamiento recaba los argumentos demostrativos de la fe cristiana. El derecho es una ciencia confusa, necesaria a los hombres por la ausencia de caridad. La actividad jurídica, que Raimundo Lulio demuestra conocer bien, le parece prolija y compleja en demasía: por ello, a través (...) de su "Arte", propone una metodología, un sistema simplificado y mecánico para aplicar el derecho y hacer justicia, fundamentado en principios teológicos y de derecho natural. Raimundo Lulio juega, en fin, a la utopía. (shrink)