One of the prominent debates of post-Tridentine scholasticism addressed probability, often expressed by the term “moral” (or adverbially, “morally”), originally motivated by the epistemology of decision-making and the debates on predestination and “middle knowledge”. Puente (or Pedro) Hurtado de Mendoza (1578–1641), an Iberian Jesuit and the author of one of the earliest Jesuit philosophy courses, entered this debate in the early-seventeenth century. This paper presents his 1610s and 1620s analyses of different forms or degrees of evidence, certainty, and (...) necessity or impossibility, addressing the commonly-used trichotomy of the “metaphysical”, “physical”, and “moral”, in which “moral” is the weakest form of a modality, together with the paradigmatic examples and interesting applications of the framework. (shrink)

The article analyses the explication of the infinity in the philosophical courses taught at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy at the 17th and 18th centuries. It examines 12 philosophical courses – since 1645 (the course by Inokentii Gizel) until 1751 (the course by Georgii Konyskyi). It shows how the infinity was defined and in which kinds it was divided in different courses. In general, all the professors, as well as other scholastic philosophers, agree that categorematic infinity exists only in God, but syncategorematic is (...) present in the created world. Regarding the question whether God, being omnipotent, can create a categorematic infinity in the world, the Mogilyans are divided into several camps: (1) Inokentii Gizel, Stefan Yavorskyi, Inokentii Popovskyi, Sylvestr Pinovskyi, Platon Malynovskyi gave a positive answer to the question; (2) Yosyf Volchanskyi, Ilarion Levytskyi, Amvrosii Dubnevych, Sylvestr Kulabka believed that this kind of infinity is in principle impossible, hence God cannot create it; (3) Teofan Prokopovych and Georgii Konyskyi took a sceptical stand and consider that the human mind as such could not solve this problem. The article analyses which arguments were offered by each camp, and gives suggestions what influenced the position of certain Mohylian professors. Most probably, Mohylian philosophers who supported the possibility of actual infinity in the created world were influenced by nominalistically oriented Jesuit philosophers, like Pedro Hurtando de Mendoza and Rodrigo Arriaga. The other Mohylians backed a more traditional idea, supported by Thomas Aquinas, that only one actual infinity can exist and it is God. (shrink)

El presente trabajo aborda de forma introductoria la exploración y explotación minera en la región de Cuyo y el norte neuquino durante las primeras décadas del siglo XIX. Para esto se analizarán las campañas militares de José Félix Aldao y Pedro Pascual Segura hacia “tierra adentro” y sus vínculos tanto con el contexto político y económico de Mendoza como con la situación de las relaciones interétnicas en la frontera sur de dicha provincia. La hipótesis de la que parte (...) el trabajo es que la crisis económica vivida en Mendoza —la cual estuvo acrecentada por los conflictos político y el deterioro de las relaciones diplomáticas con los principales líderes indígenas— llevó a que se impulsen ambas campañas militares con el fin tanto de eliminar a las parcialidades que no eran aliadas como de explorar y adquirir nuevos recursos económicos, entre ellos nuevos yacimientos mineros situados en territorios indígenas. Metodológicamente, se parte principalmente del análisis de fuentes documentales éditas, de las cuales se obtuvieron los datos con los cuales se llevó adelante el presente estudio. (shrink)

The article analyses the explication of the infinity in the philosophical courses taught at Kyiv- Mohyla Academy at the 17th and 18th centuries. It examines 12 philosophical courses – since 1645 until 1751. In general, all the professors, as well as other scholastic philosophers, agree that categorematic infinity exists only in God, but syncategorematic is present in the created world. Regarding the question of whether God, being omnipotent, can create a categorematic infinity in the world, the Mogilyans are divided into (...) several camps: Inokentii Gizel, Stefan Yavorskyi, Inokentii Popovskyi, Sylvestr Pinovskyi, Platon Malynovskyi gave a positive answer to the question; Yosyf Volchanskyi, Ilarion Levyt-skyi, Amvrosii Dubnevych, Sylvestr Kulabka believed that this kind of infinity is in principle im-possible, hence God cannot create it; Theophan Prokopovych and Georgii Konyskyi took a skeptical stand and considered that the human mind as such could not solve this problem. The article analyses which arguments were offered by each camp, and gives essential suggestion: most probably, Mohylian philosophers who supported the possibility of actual infinity in the created world were influenced by nominalistically oriented Jesuit philosophers, like Pedro Hurtado de Mendoza and Rodrigo Arriaga. The other Mohylians backed a more traditional idea, supported by Thomas Aquinas, that only one actual infinity can exist and it is God. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine a neglected debate between Francisco Suárez and Pedro Hurtado de Mendoza about the unity of composite substances. There was a consensus among the Jesuits on the fact that the per se unity of composite substances requires something in addition to matter and form. Like most Jesuits, Suárez and Hurtado further agree on the fact that this additional ingredient is not a full-blown thing, but a “mode of union.” However, while Suárez claims that the (...) union is achieved through a single mode, Hurtado maintains that it is necessary to postulate two distinct modes of union, one modifying form and another modifying matter. I argue that this disagreement actually reflects an important ontological debate about the nature of the items that serve as the cement of things and that it eventually leads later Jesuits like Rodrigo de Arriaga to conceive of union as a polyadic or “straddling” mode. (shrink)

The paper deals with the theory of universals of Sebastian Izquierdo (1601–1681), a Spanish Jesuit author working in Rome, as he formulated and defended it in Disputation 17 of his major philosophical work The Lighthouse of Sciences (Pharus scientiarum), published in Lyon in 1659. Izquierdo’s discussion centers around three questions: What is universality? Is there some intellect-independent universality? What is the nature of the intellect-dependent universality? Izquierdo’s approach may be seen as a search for the third way between the (moderate) (...) realism of the Thomists and the Scotists and the (conceptualist) nominalism of some Jesuits such as Pedro Hurtado de Mendoza (1578–1641). (shrink)

The purpose of the present study is to examine the attitudes of Portuguese chartered accountants with respect to questions of ethical nature that can arise in their professional activity. Respondents were asked to respond to the Ethics Position Questionnaire developed by Forsyth (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 39(1), 175–184, 1980), in order to determine their idealism and relativism levels. Subsequently, they answered questions about five scenarios related to accounting practices, with the objective of measuring their ethical judgments. Based on (...) the idealism and relativism levels of our respondents, they were classified into one of four groups, representing different ethical ideologies (absolutism, exceptionism, subjectivism, and situationism). The results indicated that age was the major determinant of relativism. Contrary to previous research, older respondents revealed themselves significantly more relativistic than younger ones. Gender seems to be the most important determinant of ethical judgments; against expectations, men evidenced significantly stricter judgments than women in two of the five scenarios. Findings also indicated that respondents’ ethical judgments did not differ significantly based on their ethical ideology, supporting the idea that ethical ideology is not an important determinant of ethical judgments. (shrink)

In Baroque scholasticism the medieval semantic theory of connotation as a property of terms, originally elaborated by Ockham and others, received an ontological application or re-interpretation in the context of the theory of relations. The main proponent of this ontologized “doctrina de connotatis” seems to have been Suárez. Subsequently, this doctrine was severely criticised by the Jesuits Pedro Hurtado de Mendoza and Rodrigo de Arriaga, but also by the “princeps Scotistarum” Bartholomeo Mastri; whereas another Scotist, John Punch, adopted (...) a theory of relations close to this doctrine. The fates of the original semantic theory of connotation, the ontologized “doctrina de connotatis” and the broader context of the relevant discussions (especially the new res–modus ontology established around 1600) document the complexity of the history of scholastic ideas, irreducible to any simple paradigm (like that of the realism–nominalism strife). (shrink)

In 1632 Rodrigo de Arriaga, an important Baroque scholastic thinker, published a textbook in philosophy, of which the last revised and extended edition was published in 1669. Arriaga develops in it a peculiar theory of beings of reason, drawing on Pedro Hurtado de Mendoza, according to which beings of reason are that which is expressed by false judgments. It is a theory quite different from the classical theories held by Francisco Suárez, the Thomists and the majority of Scotists (...) on the one hand, and reductive theories held by Richard Lynch and a growing number of later Baroque authors on the other. In this paper I analyse Arriaga’s theory and deal with the topics of nature, existence, causes, and division of beings of reason. (shrink)

Previous studies making use of indirect processing measures have shown that perceptual grouping can occur outside the focus of attention. However, no previous study has examined the possibility of subliminal processing of perceptual grouping. The present work steps forward in the study of perceptual organization, reporting direct evidence of subliminal processing of Gestalt patterns. In two masked priming experiments, Gestalt patterns grouped by proximity or similarity that induced either a horizontal or vertical global orientation of the stimuli were presented as (...) masked primes and followed by visible targets that could be congruent or incongruent with the orientation of the primes. The results showed a reliable priming effect in the complete absence of prime awareness for both proximity and similarity grouping principles. These findings suggest that a phenomenal report of the Gestalt pattern is not mandatory to observe an effect on the response based on the global properties of Gestalt stimuli. (shrink)

We explore Peirce’s pragmatic conception of sign action, as a distributed and emergent view of cognition and exemplify with the emergence of classical ballet. In our approach, semiosis is a temporally distributed process in which a regular tendency towards certain future outcomes emerges out of a history of sign actions. Semiosis self-organizes in time, in a process that continuously entails the production of more signs. Emergence is a ubiquitous condition in this process: the translation of signs into signs cannot be (...) inferred from the properties of the components of a semiotic triad alone, but has to take into account a complex interaction between a micro-semiotic and macro-semiotic level of description. This interaction can be understood as an interplay of potentialities and tendencies, or upward constitutive determinative relations and downward selective determinative relations. According to this view, emergence is a central defining condition of processes of meaning. Ballet is a sign in action. The emergence of classical ballet is a self-regulatory process, in which a system of different kinds of cognitive artifacts (musical, bodily/motor, spatial/architectonic) and agents obtained a stable semiotic relation throughout many phases of development between the 16th and the 19th Century. One case is the development of the verticality of dance in classical ballet as a semiotic relation connecting proscenium arch stages, dancing bodies, and audiences. This development is micro-semiotically determined by the spatial constraints of the proscenium arch stage, and macro-semiotically determined by a historical construction of the dancing body as a sign within a network of semiotic chains, such as the intersemiotic regulation of body of the dancer by principles coming from painting. This is not only the emergence of actual meaning, but also the emergence of an open-ended field of potential and general meanings, an autonomous tendency of development. To say that ballet, as sign action, emerges, is to say that cognitive artifacts such as dancer’s bodies, stages and audience’s point of view, musical compositions, costumes, all sorts of supporting institutions, etc, constitute a niche for sign action, interacting according to tendencies of development that didn’t exist before. (shrink)

Journal Name: Semiotica Issue: Ahead of print.

This study aims to present a comparative analysis of philosophical theories of universals espoused by the foremost representatives of the three main schools of early modern scholastic thought. The book introduces the doctrines of Francisco Suárez, S.J. (1548-1617), the Thomist John of St. Thomas, O.P. (1589-1644), and the Scotists Bartolomeo Mastri da Meldola, O.F.M. Conv. (1602-1673) and Bonaventura Belluto, O.F.M. Conv. (1600-1676). The author examines in detail their mutual doctrinal delineation as well as the conceptualist tenet of the Jesuit (...) class='Hi'>Pedro Hurtado de Mendoza (1578-1641), whose thought constitutes an important systematic point of comparison especially with Suárez's doctrine. The book offers the first comparative elaboration of the issue of universals, in both its metaphysical and its epistemological aspects, in the era of second scholasticism. (shrink)

The main purpose of this work is to provide a semiotic ontology for redescription of active cognitive externalism, recently developed by the paradigm 4E (embodied, embedded, enactive, extended cognition). In our approach, distributed cognitive systems (DCSs) are described as semiosis, signs in action. We explored the relationship between semiosis and cognition, as conceived by C. S. Peirce, in association with the notion of distributed cognitive system (DCS). We introduce Peircean externalist approach with an emphasis on the notion of temporal distribution (...) of semiosis, and describe DCSs, and their elements, as “sign in action”. To develop this argument, we describe an example of DCS -- verbal-musical improvisation of repente, repentismo, or viola singing. It is a phenomenon of verbal-musical improvisation that takes the form of a challenge in versified oral poetry. We describe the phenomenon as the embodiment of the formal structure of a cognitive task and an inferential process. This embodiment corresponds to a semiotization of the repente performances as DCSs. The temporally distributed tendency of repentismo organizes the DCS as a system that performs metasemiotic experiments on the action of signs. (shrink)

Alternative cleavage and polyadenylation (APA) can diversify coding and non‐coding regions, but has particular impact on increasing 3′ UTR diversity. Through the gain or loss of regulatory elements such as RNA binding protein and microRNA sites, APA can influence transcript stability, localization, and translational efficiency. Strikingly, the central nervous systems of invertebrate and vertebrate species express a broad range of transcript isoforms bearing extended 3′ UTRs. The molecular mechanism that permits proximal 3′ end bypass in neurons is mysterious, and only (...) beginning to be elucidated. This landscape of neural 3′ UTR extensions, many reaching unprecedented lengths, may help service the unique post‐transcriptional regulatory needs of neurons. A combination of approaches, including transcriptome‐wide profiling, genetic screening to identify APA factors, biochemical dissection of alternative 3′ end formation, and manipulation of individual neural APA targets, will be necessary to gain fuller perspectives on the mechanism and biology of neural‐specific 3′ UTR lengthening. (shrink)

Serene J. Khader’s Decolonizing Universalism presents a vision for how feminism might be decolonized for transnational work by doing without traditional Western feminist values and focusing instead on opposing sexist oppression. This paper presents a challenge to the idea that feminism consists in opposing sexist oppression, claiming that it instead consists in opposing gender oppression, where that includes combating cissexism and heterosexism. More specifically, it argues that critiquing cissexist criteria within gender categories as well as critiquing harms that follow from (...) having a queer sexual identity are decidedly feminist tasks. Furthermore, cases of these harms where group identities cannot arise in the social ontology due to a lack of hermeneutical resources challenge the idea that feminism is concerned only with oppression. The second half of the paper extends Khader’s critique of the Western liberal moral vocabulary of feminism by proposing a radical decolonization of the feminist canon as it is usually conceived in the global North. (shrink)

En este documento, debato ampliamente sobre la fenomenología de la intersubjetividad presentada por Husserl y por Sartre, centrándome en los conceptos de empatía y ser-para-otros. Contrariamente a la opinión más común, rechazo la objeción de solipsista dirigida a Husserl y sostengo que es la descripción de Sartre la que da lugar a esa objeción, en la medida en que él describe la conciencia de otro sujeto como una forma de autoconocimiento como un "objeto" (para "otros"). Termino señalando algunas directrices para (...) convertir el análisis de Husserl de la aprehensión de otros sujetos en una fenomenología de la comunicación del más alto nivel. (shrink)

La información se ha convertido en el nuevo valor fundamental. Resulta indispensable disponer de contenidos actualizados, tanto para empresas y entidades como para personas. Así sucede en todos los ámbitos: culturales y profesionales, sociales y económicos... Si saber es poder, los ciudadanos de hoy somos los más poderosos de toda la historia pues podemos conocer casi cuanto queramos gracias a los medios de comunicación, vía Internet.Pero no todo son ventajas. Han surgido nuevos elementos, como la Inteligencia Artificial, que pueden remplazar (...) a los profesionales. Tristemente, la tecnología que en su día pareció suponer una gran ayuda para la prensa ha estado casi a punto de aniquilarla. (shrink)

A timeless critique holds that the radical is animated by a deep sense of certainty that leads to the worst excesses. By distinguishing essentialist and non-essentialist forms of radicalism, Ernesto Laclau offers a “coalitional” form of radicalism that, in effect, responds to this critique. Laclau deconstructs classical forms of radicalism, such as Marxism, to show how one can use some of their formal components, such as dichotomic rhetoric and a notion of utopia, without assuming that their particular content (e.g., the (...) figure of the proletarian or the socialist utopia) entails the permanent abolition of oppression. Laclau’s radicalism enables political actors to build their own radical front by politicizing and creating linkages between issues. Laclau thus avoids the epistemic certainty of classical radicalisms. However, in the interest of politically effective radicalism, he deploys a localized form of certainty that has an ambivalent potential for intolerance and violence. (shrink)

No artigo A Negação Fregeana do Número 2 (2008), Greimann argumenta que a negação fregeana do número 2, presente no final do sexto parágrafo de Grundgesetze (1893, 1903), não envolve nenhum absurdo ainda que, segundo ele, seja uma negação do número 2 como um termo singular. Meu ponto aqui é mostrar que, na passagem em questão, Frege não necessariamente nega o número 2 como um termo singular, mas apenas exemplifica a possibilidade de se negar o emprego do número 2 como (...) uma classificação de outro objeto numa sentença falsa. (shrink)

Nesta resenha são apresentados alguns pontos fundamentais do livro de Tracie Matysik When Spinoza Met Marx: Experiments in Nonhumanist Activity. Na obra, a autora analisa detidamente alguns pensadores ligados à tradição alemã pós-Hegel: Heinrich Heine, Berthlod Auerbach, Moses Hess, Karl Marx, Johann Jacoby, Jakob Stern e Gueorgui Plekhanov. Seu foco é o modo como todos esses utilizaram o pensamento de Espinosa para compreender a noção de atividade e a possibilidade de transformação social. Espinosa era fundamental para o tema, pois seu (...) pensamento permitiria unir a ação humana à sua completa determinação frente à necessidade presente na natureza, duas ideias indispensáveis para um século no qual a ciência se desenvolvia rapidamente e para um país que acabara de presenciar as revoluções nas terras vizinhas. Matysik, então, nos oferece a oportunidade de entender a riqueza do espinosismo, dadas as inúmeras possibilidades de interpretação das obras do filósofo neerlandês, utilizadas tanto para fins revolucionários quanto reformistas. Além disso, a partir da segunda metade do livro, a autora nos convoca para discutir as relações entre a filosofia da completa determinação e os movimentos com raízes no socialismo marxista, apresentando os principais problemas que surgiam - e ainda surgem - para os autores que buscavam traçar tal conexão. (shrink)

El cambio climático es uno de los mayores desafíos a los que nos enfrentamos en el siglo XXI. Los niños, niñas y adolescentes son especialmente vulnerables a sus efectos y han levantado su voz exigiendo justicia climática y un mayor reconocimiento en esta lucha ante la falta de atención de los estados. Aunque se han mejorado sus derechos para participar en la toma de decisiones, todavía no se han visto acciones concretas, especialmente en el sur global. En este artículo se (...) propone el concepto de «reconocimiento recíproco de capacidades» como una manera de empoderar a los niños, niñas y adolescentes. Se concluye que es fundamental abordar este reconocimiento a nivel micropolítico. (shrink)

Nesta obra, Patrick J. Geary, professor emérito de História na Universidade da Califórnia, que dedicou a sua vida académica ao estudo da História Medieval, apresenta-nos as suas “reflexões sobre a relação entre os mitos dos povos europeus e as realidades do nacionalismo contemporâneo” (p. 7). A narrativa que Patrick J. Geary nos oferece tem um objectivo claro e assumido: desmontar os mitos nacionalistas e contribuir para a prevenção do seu reaparecimento e/ou fortalecimento. Esta obra acaba p...

In this paper I intend to argue that Prince Andrei Bolkonsky, one of the lead characters of the novel War and Peace, by Leo Tolstoy, can be taken as a Schopenhauerian hero.

A review of Alejandro Llano's book, Sueño y vigilia de la razón, is attempted on this article. To this aim it presents five main ideas from which it is possible to go beyond modernity limits to reach a new realistic philosophical framework.

Se plantea un trabajo de problematización socio-filosófica de la dimensión mediática de nuestros modos contemporáneos de coexistencia que retoma la perspectiva analítico-crítica formulada por Michel Foucault. En primer lugar, se considera la problematicidad de la ausencia de una indagación en profundidad al respecto en su obra; y se enfocan los escasos lugares en los que él mismo se refirió a la temática, especialmente sus indicaciones relativas a la emergencia de la noción de “público” como una dimensión particular de la población. (...) En segundo lugar, se abordan los modos en que su pensamiento ha sido retomado por pensadores contemporáneos que han situado la centralidad de las técnicas comunicacionales de poder, como Maurizio Lazzarato y Byung-Chul Han, y que se han planteado la necesidad de avanzar más allá sirviéndose en ambos casos de las propuestas de Gilles Deleuze sobre las sociedades de control. En particular, se sitúa cómo los conceptos de “biopolítica” y “biopoder” de Foucault son reformulados para construir nociones, tales como las de “noopolítica” y “psicopolítica”, que buscan dar cuenta de las formas de poder que se ejercen ya no sobre los cuerpos sino primariamente sobre la mente o la psique. (shrink)

Prólogo de José Luis L. Aranguren. Destacados profesores universitarios españoles abordan desde la autoridad de su formación, investigación y actividad académica, y a través de distintas ópticas y posiciones, la polémica cuestión de "Heidegger y la política".

In this paper, I examine phenomenologically the structure of the normative noema, which I call the “nomothetic noema.” I distinguish the meaning content, its normative characters, which I call “ductive forces”, and its modes of givenness. Next, I introduce the traditional difference between modalities de re and de dicto. I argue that the current tendency, in deontic logic, to treat deontic expressions as operators over sentences induces, at least on the syntactic surface, a de dicto reading. I then discuss some (...) of the theoretical decisions that underlie deontic logic, starting from two basic asymmetries between modal alethic logic and deontic logic. The decisive point is to recover a strong sense of permission that I equate with the factor of free agency, which is difficult to formalize. Finally, I return to the analysis of the nomothetic noema and try to show how a de re reading is better suited to account for normative intentionality. I simultaneously introduce the concept of status-imposing norms, which must be formulated with a normative use of the copulas “is” and “has.” I conclude that the treatment of normative expressions is more appropriate when they are understood as complex copulas, irreducible to assertive sentences, rather than as operators over whole sentences. I emphasize on this occasion that, from a phenomenological point of view and within the framework of genetic analysis, the primitive basic datum is the freedom of agency, on which the normative domain of assigning statuses to agents, obligations, and prohibitions is built. (shrink)

Resumen: Con el hilo conductor de la pregunta «¿Estuviste en la Jornada Mundial de la Juventud?» se presenta un testimonio sobre la JMJ en Roma en el año 2000 y una reflexión sobre la JMJ en general. A pesar de su carácter de mega-concentración, la JMJ tiene elementos suficientes para proporcionar una experiencia personalizada de fe. Todo depende, al final, de la disposición interna del participante. En la JMJ la fe es presentada no solo de un modo racional, sino apelando (...) a la afectividad, la imaginación y los sentidos. -/- // Abstract: The question «Did you go to World Youth Day?» is used as a line of reflection about the WYD in Rome in the year 2000 and about WYD in general. Despite being a mega-concentration of people, WYD has sufficient elements to provide a personalized experience of faith. Everything depends, in the end, on the internal disposition of the participant. In WYD faith is presented not only in its rational aspect, but also in a way that appeals to affectivity, the imagination and the senses. (shrink)