This volume gathers papers, which were read at the congress held at the University of Castilla-La Mancha in Toledo (Spain), in September 2007, under the general subject of phenomenology. The book is devoted to Wittgenstein s thoughts on phenomenology. One of its aims is to consider and examine the lasting importance of phenomenology for philosophic discussion. For E. Husserl phenomenology was a discipline that endeavoured to describe how the world is constituted and experienced through a series of conscious acts. His (...) fundamental concept was that of intentional consciousness. What did drag Wittgenstein into working on phenomenology? In his 'middle period' work, Wittgenstein used the headline 'Phenomenology is Grammar'. These cornerstones can be signalled by notions like language, grammar, rule, visual space versus Euclidean space, minima visibilia and colours. L. Wittgenstein s main interest takes the form of a research on language.". (shrink)

A new English translation of the founding text of the Madhyamaka (Middle Way) school of Buddhism, with the Tibetan version of the text included. The Root Stanzas holds an honored place in all branches of Tibetan Buddhism, as well as in the Buddhist traditions found in China, Japan, and Korea, because of the way it develops the seminal view of emptiness (shunyata), which is crucial to understanding Mahayana Buddhism and central to its practice. It is prized for its pithy and (...) pointed arguments that show that things lack intrinsic being and thus are “empty” (shunya). They abide in the Middle Way, free from the extremes of permanence and annihilation. (shrink)

This book introduces a new form of argumentative analysis: rhetorical heuremes. The method applies the concepts of heuristic thinking, probability, and contingency in order to develop a better understanding of complex arguments in classical oratory. A new theory is required because Greek and Roman rhetoric cannot provide detailed answers to problems of strategic argumentation in the analysis of speeches. Building on scholarship in Ciceronian oratory, this book moves beyond the extant terminology and employs a concept of heuristic reasoning derived from (...) the psychology of decision making and mathematical problem solving. The author analyses selected passages from Cicero's forensic speeches where arguments of probability are deployed, and shows that the Sophistic concept of probability can link ancient rhetoric and modern theories of argumentation. Six groups of heuremes are identified, each of which represents a form of probabilistic reasoning by which the orator plays upon the perception of the jurors. (shrink)

Why is a red face not really red? How do we decide that this book is a textbook or not? Conceptual spaces provide the medium on which these computations are performed, but an additional operation is needed: Contrast. By contrasting a reddish face with a prototypical face, one gets a prototypical ‘red’. By contrasting this book with a prototypical textbook, the lack of exercises may pop out. Dynamic contrasting is an essential operation for converting perceptions into predicates. The existence of (...) dynamic contrasting may contribute to explaining why lexical meanings correspond to convex regions of conceptual spaces. But it also explains why predication is most of the time opportunistic, depending on context. While off-line conceptual similarity is a holistic operation, the contrast operation provides a context-dependent distance that creates ephemeral predicative judgments that are essential for interfacing conceptual spaces with natural language and with reasoning. (shrink)

La antropología filosófica de L. Wittgenstein está siendo discutida intensamente desde diferentes puntos de vista. El libro reflexiona alrededor de la propuesta de P. M. S. Hacker de su trabajo ‘El enfoque antropológico y etnológico de Wittgenstein’. El autor se interroga si cuando adoptamos una visión antropológica ubicamos nuestra posición externamente, para ver las cosas objetivamente. Para ello, se analiza el problema vinculado a la gramática y su constitución conceptual. Plantea hasta que punto compartimos los conceptos que usamos en nuestro (...) enfoque antropológico. V. Sanfélix entiende que L. Wittgenstein ha ido desarrollando un historicismo sin historia y una etnología sin etnografía e indica que la utilidad de esta “etnología fantástica” ayuda a ganar una visión sinóptica de la gramática de nuestros conceptos. A. Tomasini Bassols reflexiona alrededor la plataforma sobre la que elabora la antropología filosófica y si se puede sostenerse que la obra de Wittgenstein contiene una antropología filosófica. L. Hertzberg examina el modo como Hacker analiza los conceptos. Repasa la distinción “analítico/sintético” y el “historicismo sin historia”. M. Holguín razona acerca de la “historia natural”. Desde su punto de vista, Hacker justifica los calificativos de aproximación “antropológica” o “etnológica” con el fin de describir una nueva perspectiva que le permite abordar los problemas conceptuales. W. Jacorzynski reconsidera el enfoque etnológico de Wittgenstein y se para a considerar el análisis conductual, la regularidad/uniformidad, la historicidad (“sin historia”), la autonomía y la arbitrariedad de la gramática. J. Sádaba profundiza acerca del esquema general desde donde se interpreta nuestra actividad existencial sin que por ello se proponga describir historiográficamente los recorridos de la humanidad. J. Padilla Gálvez ubica el programa antropológico en una fenomenología epistemológica que se caracteriza por el estudio del análisis del lenguaje usado y conjetura que el proyecto fenomenológico quedaría corto si analiza exclusivamente la gramática ya que esta carece de perspicuidad. Por esta razón, el programa requiere de un análisis amplio cuyo proyecto se complemente con la “representación perspicua”. (shrink)

Study of Parāśaragītā, portion of Śāntiparva of Mahābhārata; includes Sanskrit text with Hindi translation.

Small treatise on Kâṇâda's Vaisesika school of philosophy.

Although Plotinus’ two treatises on beauty could be taken to reflect an evolution in his thought, a careful examination shows that he consistently argues for a conception of beauty as the illuminated unity in multiplicity of the Intellect.

This volume gathers papers, which were read at the congress held at the University of Castilla-La Mancha in Toledo (Spain), in September 2007, under the general subject of phenomenology. The book is devoted to Wittgenstein’s thoughts on phenomenology. One of its aims is to consider and examine the lasting importance of phenomenology for philosophic discussion. For E. Husserl phenomenology was a discipline that endeavoured to describe how the world is constituted and experienced through a series of conscious acts. His fundamental (...) concept was that of intentional consciousness. What did drag Wittgenstein into working on phenomenology? In his 'middle period' work, Wittgenstein used the headline 'Phenomenology is Grammar'. These cornerstones can be signalled by notions like language, grammar, rule, visual space versus Euclidean space, minima visibilia and colours. L. Wittgenstein’s main interest takes the form of a research on language. (shrink)