The central theme of my dissertation is Husserl’s phenomenological analysis of how we experience images. The aim of my dissertation is twofold: 1) to offer a contribution to the understanding of Husserl’s theory of image consciousness, aesthetic consciousness and art, and 2) to find out whether Husserl’s theory of the experience of images is applicable to modern and contemporary art, particularly to strongly site-specific art, unaided ready-mades, and contemporary films and theatre plays in which actors play (...) themselves. Husserl’s commentators and followers interested in his theory of the experience of images have mostly focused on the concept of “phantasy” [Phantasie] or “imagination.” Accordingly, the main interest is in the notion of the “image object” [Bildobjekt] and in the question of how something absent can appear in an image. In my dissertation, the central concept is “image consciousness” [Bildbewusstsein] which is a unique kind of experience: it involves both perception and imaging. I want to show that Husserl’s early theory of depictive image consciousness and his later theory of the experience of images can both be subsumed under the term “image consciousness”. I want to point out that Husserl’s revision of his earlier theory of image consciousness results in the distinction between depictive and non-depictive image consciousness, and that revision did not amount to an abandoning of the theory of “image consciousness.” In addition, Husserl divides depictive consciousness into positing and non-positing depictive consciousness. In my dissertation, I take the theory of image consciousness as the basis for explaining the experience of images, including the experience of visual works of art. In Husserl’s definition of art: “Without an image, there is no fine art”. The theory of image consciousness also plays an important role in explaining aesthetic consciousness since the focus is on “the How of the image object’s depicting”. My aim is to accentuate the subject in image consciousness, rather than the image object. I want to show that whether the subject is involved in image consciousness or not makes the difference if we have a two-fold or three-fold experience of seeing-in. In this way, I can also compare Husserl and Wollheim’s theories of seeing-in: a comparison that has received minimal attention in the literature of pictorial experience until now. In addition, I aim to show that according to Husserl’s theory, the image subject is involved only in depictive image consciousness. Moreover, I try to show that it is more difficult to define the image subject than the image object for the subject cannot be equated with the referent. Lastly, I will point out that Husserl mentions the possibility that it is the appearance of the subject rather than the image object appearance that we are focused on in aesthetic consciousness. Another topic that has received minimal attention until now is Husserl’s idea that depiction is involved in the experience of theatrical performance. The latter is primarily used by Husserl as an example of non-depictive image consciousness. I will examine how depiction can be involved in the experience of a theatre play in the case of actors playing themselves onstage. I will show that, in light of this example, either Husserl’s theory of depiction need to be revised or we cannot say that depiction is involved when an actor plays a real life person. Again, the key issue is how the subject appears. Thus, I will try to apply Husserl’s theory of depiction in explaining our experience of theatrical performances. I will also try to use his theory of aesthetic consciousness in describing the experience of strongly site-specific art and point out what the difficulties are of using the idea of the limited synthetic unity of the aesthetic object in the case of strongly site-specific art which seems to have no prescribed margins that could correspond to the limitedness. In addition, I will show how Husserl’s phenomenology, especially the notion of horizon, can be used to define visual art. I will defend the view that an object of art can be defined as art through an external co-determining horizon – the artworld. My dissertation is divided into four parts. In the first part, I give an overview of the development of Husserl’s philosophy from the period 1989 – 1920s with a special focus on the development of the theory of image consciousness. In that part, I introduce the notions of depictive and non-depictive image consciousness. In the second part, special focus is on the depictive image consciousness or the theory of depiction. I will first explain the phenomenological approach to the experience of images and what the difference and similarities are between Husserl and Wollheim’s theory of seeing-in. Then I give more detailed description of the three objects or objectivities in image consciousness with the emphases on the image subject. Also, how the objects are related to each other: the necessary conflicts and a resemblance in image consciousness. Lastly, I will analyse Husserl’s claim that depiction might be involved in the experience of theatrical performances and I will show what the difficulties are of applying this idea in the case of a theatre play in which actors play themselves. In the third part, I examine Husserl’s theory of aesthetic consciousness. I will first point out how the notion of “aesthetic object” is equated with that of “work of art” by Husserl. Then I will show the similarities between the aesthetic attitude and phenomenological attitude in general, and how aesthetic consciousness differs from image consciousness according to Husserl. In this vein, I will point out the difficulty of defining whether, following Husserl’s texts, we are directed to image object appearance or the appearance of the image subject in aesthetic consciousness. Lastly, I will analyse Husserl’s idea of the limited synthetic unity of the aesthetic object and whether this theory holds in the case of the experience of strongly site-specific art. In the fourth part, I will give an overview of Husserl’s notes on art and his attempt to define art. The question whether every visual work of art must be an image is also addressed. The fourth part is divided into two sections. Firstly, I will show how some of Husserl’s commentators analyse artworks as analogues to or illustrations for Husserl’s phenomenology: how some works of art are doing phenomenology. Secondly, how Husserl’s phenomenology can be used to analyse our experience of artworks. In this section, I will examine Husserl’s claim that all works of visual art are images. Also, I will show how Husserl’s notion of the external co-determining horizon can be used to define art. Some material used in my dissertation has been published in the following journals: Proceedings of the European Society for Aesthetics, South African Journal of Philosophy, 2013), Kunstiteaduslikke Uurimusi, 2014), Postgraduate Journal of Aesthetics Spring 2014). (shrink)

Kant’s distinction between intuitions and concepts attracts perennial interpretive interest. To the extent that they discuss the imagination at all, most Kant scholars maintain that the imagination’s primary role is to generate intuitions. This dissertation argues that “image” (Bild, Einbildung) is an overlooked technical term in Kant’s work and that images—and not intuitions—are products of the imagination. The project explains how, for Kant, the imagination (as image-maker) and the senses (as intuition-maker) make distinct but essential contributions to cognition and (...) perception. I begin by showing that “image” is a terminologically marked notion in Kant, and that the imagination is responsible for generating images (chapter 1). I call these claims the Image Thesis. I then show that for Kant, intuitions are representations that depend only on the senses for their essential features (chapter 2). I call this the Strong Independence Thesis. -/- How should we understand Kant’s ubiquitous references to the imagination, then? I argue that we should understand the imagination’s activities as image-producing activities (chapter 3). I argue that images and intuitions are fundamentally distinct representations, which I label the Distinctness Thesis. Though intuitions and images are had by both rational and non-rational beings, the capacity for consciousness or apperception found in rational beings makes a difference in the structure of images but not the structure of intuitions (chapter 4). I call this the penetration view of the imagination. With this account of images in hand, I indicate why images are a necessary ingredient in theoretical cognition for Kant (chapter 5). I call this the Image-Centric Cognition Thesis. The result is a novel account of sensibility—the counterpart of the understanding—that recognizes Kant’s systematic discussion of mental imagery. (shrink)

Theory of the Image offers a new and systematic philosophy of art and aesthetics from the perspective of movement.

My aim in this paper is to offer a systematic analysis of a feature of Kant’s theory of perception that tends to be overlooked, viz., his account of how the imagination forms images in perception. Although Kant emphasizes the centrality of this feature of perception, indeed, calling it a ‘necessary ingredient’ of perception, commentators have instead focused primarily on his account of sensibility and intuitions on the one hand, and understanding and concepts on the other. However, I show (...) that careful attention to what he says about the nature of images, their connection to the imagination, and their role in perception in his Metaphysics Lectures, as well as in the Deduction and Schematism chapters of the first Critique reveals that Kant is working with a richer, more nuanced framework for perception than is often attributed to him. I contend that it is only once we have a revised framework for Kant’s theory of perception in place that we will be able to make further headway in debates, e.g., about whether or not he is a conceptualist about perception. (shrink)

As a means of overcoming the "Third Man" argument, several commentators have developed an influential theory of the relationship between Platonic Forms and particulars based on Plato's use of "image" analogies. This essay explores the viability of this "image-analogy" hypothesis and, in particular, examines an important, but neglected, argument advanced by R. E. Allen intent on establishing an ontological distinction between an image and its object-source.

Review of: Theory of the Image, Thomas Nail (2019)New York: Oxford University, 432 pp.,ISBN 978-0-19005-008-5, p/bk, £19.99.

We show that in the language of {≤}, the Π₃-fragment of the first order theory of the $\Sigma _{2}^{0}$-enumeration degrees is undecidable. We then extend this result to show that the Π₃-theory of any substructure of the enumeration degrees which contains the $\Delta _{2}^{0}$-degrees is undecidable.

Edmund Husserl has famously declared that “Without an image, there is no fine art.” The aim of the article is to find out whether conceptual art can be experienced as image as well. It will be shown that Joseph Kosuth’s conceptual artwork One and Three Chairs (1965) perfectly illustrates Husserl’s theory of image consciousness and the concept of “image.” Thus, Husserl’s theory makes a valuable contribution in understanding conceptual (and contemporary) art.

This chapter provides an overview of cognitive theory of the moving image, considering it as an approach rather than a methodology. It traces the history and institutional affiliations of cognitive theory, then focuses on the kinds of experiences the moving image media afford viewers, and the design elements that foster those experiences. It distinguishes between “cold” and “hot” cognition and discusses the sense in which cognitive theory can be said to be naturalistic. The chapter goes on to (...) discuss narrative comprehension, cognition and embodiment, character engagement, mood and emotion, and finishes with a discussion of new directions for cognitive theory. Along the way, the chapter also discusses objections to the approach. (shrink)

As a means of overcoming the "Third Man" argument, several commentators have developed an influential theory of the relationship between Platonic Forms and particulars based on Plato's use of "image" analogies. This essay explores the viability of this "image-analogy" hypothesis and, in particular, examines an important, but neglected, argument advanced by R. E. Allen intent on establishing an ontological distinction between an image and its object-source.

A unifying theory of general anesthetic-induced unconsciousness must explain the common mechanism through which various anesthetic agents produce unconsciousness. Functional-brain-imaging data obtained from 11 volunteers during general anesthesia showed specific suppression of regional thalamic and midbrain reticular formation activity across two different commonly used volatile agents. These findings are discussed in relation to findings from sleep neurophysiology and the implications of this work for consciousness research. It is hypothesized that the essential common neurophysiologic mechanism underlying anesthetic-induced unconsciousness is, as (...) with sleep-induced unconsciousness, a hyperpolarization block of thalamocortical neurons. A model of anesthetic-induced unconsciousness is introduced to explain how the plethora of effects anesthetics have on cellular functioning ultimately all converge on a single neuroanatomic/neurophysiologic system, thus providing for a unitary physiologic theory of narcosis related to consciousness. (shrink)

Los estudios recientes sobre Hobbes han puesto una gran atención en el uso de las imágenes. Permanece, sin embargo, una objeción seria y factible: se podría argumentar que Hobbes no relaciona su producción de imágenes, ni a su política, ni a su teoría de la percepción y que, por tanto, no tenemos razón para creer que sus imágenes son una aplicación de esta doctrina. El propósito de este trabajo es mostrar que Hobbes de hecho sí vincula — de un modo (...) implícito — la construcción de imágenes y su teoría psicológica al orden político. Primero, el artículo reconstruye la teoría hobbesiana de la percepción y sus implicaciones. Segundo, se muestra que el Leviathan establece encubiertamente el vínculo entre la teoría de las imágenes y las imágenes políticas, incluyendo, por consiguiente, las creadas por el propio Hobbes. Tercero, se muestra que el Leviatán de Hobbes rara vez descubre su rol como dispositivo para ver, para hacer que el lector vea imágenes que él considera necesarias. Finalmente, se discuten las consecuencias de este descubrimiento para nuestra comprensión de Hobbes y de la visualidad y las imágenes en el pensamiento político. (shrink)

Paul Ricoeur uncovered the creative aspect of language in his theory of metaphor. The metaphor is a special combination of words that as a clash of distant semantic fields forces the reader to interpret the sentence in a new way and see things in a new light. It is a process in which the imagination plays an important role. Ricoeur compares the metaphor to the Kantian schema which is a procedure to provide an image to a concept. The image (...) helps in the process of assimilating distant elements and thus to achieve a new interpretation. To change perspective the suspension of reference is also needed. The aim of this essay is to analyze the imaginative functions which are operative in the metaphor and look for an answer to the question about the role of the imagination as a productive power as well as a power of internal intuitions. (shrink)

The aim of this essay is to explore a field of studies that until now has not gained the attention of the Hegelian scholars: the relationship between the Hegelian Philosophy and the philosophies of the Late Antiquity. The paper is divided in two parts, following what I consider the change of paradigm in image theories, during the passage from the Pagan to the Christian world. In the first part I consider Hegel’s thesis on what we could call the Greek image (...) theory, defined by the rationality of the human figure, until its slow decay. Such a decay will not be a simple disappearance but a transformation to what would later be the new principle for a Christian image theory: the speculative likeness. At the end of this essay, I will try to highlight the principle that undergoes the whole Hegelian treatment and that corresponds not to historical or empirical facts, but to his gnoseological theory, developed in the section of the Subjective Spirit in his Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences. The whole essay should be considered as a brief contribution to the construction of what is aimed to be a Hegelian theory of images and particularly to what I call “endogenous iconoclasm of the image”. Key words: Hegel – Late Antiquity – Image Theory – Endogenous Iconoclasm – Subjective Spirit.Resumen: El objetivo de este ensayo es explorar un campo de estudio que hasta ahora no ha llamado la atención de los especialistas: la relación entre la filosofía hegeliana y las filosofías de la Tardoantigüedad. El siguiente trabajo está dividido en dos partes, siguiendo lo que considero el cambio de paradigma en las teorías de la imagen durante el pasaje del paganismo al mundo cristiano. En la primera parte se examina la tesis de Hegel que podríamos llamar la teoría griega de la imagen, definida por la racionalidad de la figura humana, hasta su lento declive. Tal declive no será una simple desaparición, sino una transformación de lo que más tarde será un nuevo principio para una teoría cristiana de la imagen: la semejanza especulativa. Al final de este ensayo, trataré de evidenciar el principio que subyace en toda la doctrina hegeliana y que no corresponde a hechos históricos o empíricos, sino a su teoría del conocimiento, desarrollada en la sección del Espíritu Subjetivo en su Enciclopedia de las Ciencias Filosóficas. El ensayo en su totalidad debería ser considerado una breve contribución a la construcción de lo que estará destinado a convertirse en una teoría de la imagen hegeliana y espe- cíficamente en el desarrollo de lo que considero una “iconoclasia endógena de la imagen”.Palabras Clave: Hegel - Tardoantigüedad - teoría de la Imagen - iconoclasia endógena - Espíritu Subjetivo. (shrink)

A musical phrase, or, for that matter, a musical unit of any size or shape, becomes an image whenever we imagine it to be invested with a content whose origins lie outside music. Such a content, according to the theory developed here, constitutes the image's conventional significance; it accounts for whatever strikes us about the image as having a common and familiar ring. That being so, the origins in question must be coincident with the fundamental ideas--the archetypes--that have been (...) traditionally represented as underlying and unifying Western culture. As the theoretical constructs they are, arehctypes are never encountered directly. It is in the form of their local variants that we make contact with the archetypes, and it is at this local level that the present book sets its sights: style, the typical or shared element in the musical imagery of a time and place, is studies as a function of Zeitgeist, the complex of beliefs, values, and ideals of a community. The approach is both thematic and historical, in keeping with a key objective of archetypal criticism. Far from repudiating the popular notion that music expresses the human emotions, this study attempts to recast emotion theory by examining musical images for kinds of behavior from which we may infer not only emotion (pathos, effectus) but also personality (ethos). Ethical and affective distinctions are very sharply drawn, in an effort to clarify and widen the vocabulary of musical commentary, as well as to provide cultural and historical backing for contents long considered the cliches of musical expression. (shrink)

Annotation A challenge to our perception of how cultures and ideals are formed, this book shows that while structural ideals allow people to co-operate as they work toward goals - their own or those of their community - these images of perfection, so easily accepted as the unalterable structure of our society, can be changed, and are changed by individuals.

This essay is an analysis of conscious perception and conscious memory. It tries to show that percepts and mental images (roughly, experientially, the same as Hume's "impressions and ideas") are sets of particles at the perceived stimulus objects and at the remembered stimulus objects. It is thus a theory of direct perception and direct memory, and a materialism but not a central state materialism. The percept (we claim) is an "appearance" of the stimulus object particles (perceived object particles) (...) which is due to the way the particles at the perceived object are interconnected (interrelated) by the networks of stimuli-plus-neuron-impulses starting from them. The same is true of the mental image. This essay is primarily an analysis of such networks--to show, we claim, how they make the sets of object particles seem to have sense qualities and gestalts and other properties of percepts and mental images. (shrink)

The paper aims to clarify Ratnākaraśānti?s epistemological theory that mental images in a cognition are false (*alīkākāravāda) in comparison with Śāntarakṣita?s criticism of the Yogācāra position. Although Ratnākaraśānti frequently uses the neither-one-nor-many argument for explaining his Yogācāra position, the argument, unlike Śāntarakṣita?s original one, does not function for refuting the existence of awareness itself as the basis of mental images. This point is examined in the first two sections of this paper by analyzing Ratnākaraśānti?s proof of the (...) selflessness of entities (dharmanairātmya) and his application of the neither-one-nor-many argument for demonstrating the falsehood of mental images. On the other hand, the last section investigates into his defense of the alīkākāravāda against Śāntarakṣita?s severe criticism of it. Here, too, we can find his tactical usage of the neither-one-nor-many argument, or more precisely, one of its variants: the neither-identical-nor-different argument. Through the above procedure, we can see how Yogācāra philosophy survived in the late period of Indian Buddhism by blending the Madhyamaka opponent?s argument with its own thought. (shrink)

Preparing words in speech production is normally a fast and accurate process. We generate them two or three per second in fluent conversation; and overtly naming a clear picture of an object can easily be initiated within 600 msec after picture onset. The underlying process, however, is exceedingly complex. The theory reviewed in this target article analyzes this process as staged and feedforward. After a first stage of conceptual preparation, word generation proceeds through lexical selection, morphological and phonological encoding, (...) phonetic encoding, and articulation itself. In addition, the speaker exerts some degree of output control, by monitoring of self-produced internal and overt speech. The core of the theory, ranging from lexical selection to the initiation of phonetic encoding, is captured in a computational model, called WEAVER++. Both the theory and the computational model have been developed in interaction with reaction time experiments, particularly in picture naming or related word production paradigms, with the aim of accounting for the real-time processing in normal word production. A comprehensive review of theory, model, and experiments is presented. The model can handle some of the main observations in the domain of speech errors (the major empirical domain for most other theories of lexical access), and the theory opens new ways of approaching the cerebral organization of speech production by way of high-temporal-resolution imaging. (shrink)

This article examines a changing global reality that manifests itself in new forms of social activism. The struggle of the multitude challenges political representation and contemporary art seems to corroborate this observation. Becoming a form of social intervention, it turns into an active force and leaves behind the need to double action with representation, representational practices being the hallmark of classical art. A new theory of the image would have to incorporate this dynamic: it would have to treat and (...) develop the basic categories of action and relation. There are few philosophies of the act, and the existing semiotic models mostly deal with dual structures (signifier/signified; sign/meaning; image/referent, and so on). It is necessary to sketch out a dynamic theory of the image that would: (1) reveal the limitations of the concept of representation; (2) conceive of the image as a set of multiple changing relations. The image would thus be seen as a necessary part of the relations governing the world in its entirety, that is, as part of the movement of matter itself. Which is another way of saying that those relations are actualized, or expressed, in the image. (shrink)

It is all the rage today to speak about the “power" of images. Yet while it seems hardly disputable that images generate fascination or repulsion and that they provoke laughter, tears or delight, it is by no means clear what it entails to grant them an agency of their own. The article sets out to chart the current literature on the topic, and to indicate why it is not the same to ask what it means for images (...) to do things to us and what it means do things with images. While the former question often leads, under a disguise of object-oriented thinking, to reintroduce mentalism, the latter gets caught up in inextricable problems that Austin’s speech act theory already had to struggle with. In the last section, at alternative account is proposed: the performance of image is not an event of causation, it is a process of visualization that lets appear what can only appear in images. (shrink)

Theory of mind” consists in the ability to use concepts of intentional mental states, such as beliefs, emotions, intentions, goals, and perceptual states, in order to predict and interpret behavior. Functional magnetic resonance imaging studies have revealed a distinctive network of neural regions that is active during theory-of-mind tasks, including the temporal-parietal junction, the posterior superior temporal sulcus, the medial prefrontal cortex, the precuneus, and the temporal poles (Van Overwalle 2009). Deficits in theory-of-mind abilities, which are common (...) in autism spectrum disorder (Tager-Flusberg 2007), typically correlate with broader difficulties in social understanding. -/- Many scholars have suggested that theory of mind is an innate adaptation for social cognition, emerging very early in development and playing a crucial role in social learning and the acquisition of language (Baron-Cohen 1997). However, others have argued that theory of mind is the product of largely domain-general learning processes and is acquired gradually over the course development through social experience (Wellman 2014). A third view argues that humans possess two systems for theory of mind: an innate, domain-specific “implicit” system and a learned, domain-general “explicit” system (Apperly and Butterfill 2009). (shrink)

Economic theory teaches that it is in every country’s interest to trade. Trade is a voluntary activity among consenting parties. On this view, considerations of justice have little bearing on trade, and political philosophers concerned with global justice should stay largely silent on trade. According to a very different view that has recently gained prominence, international trade can only occur before the background of an international market reliance practice shaped by states. Trade is a shared activity among states, and (...) all participating states have in principle equal claims to gains from trade. Trade then becomes a central topic for political philosophers. Both views are problematic. A third view about the role of trade in a theory of global justice is then presented, which gives pride of place to a notion of exploitation. The other two views should be abandoned. (shrink)

On the path from myth to logos Greek culture, which grasped the meaning of this path, formulated the concepts of episteme and theoria, which are connected today with the image of science. They contain many connotations that they partly lost later on . Becoming a term of both ordinary and specialized scientific-philosophical language, theoria preserved also the wider, more general cultural meaning that emphasizes the complexity and contradictoriness of the cognitive process and the problematical character as well as the great (...) value of knowledge in general. Theory, which was first embodied in ancient astronomy, expressed, among other things, the essence of man, which lies in man's mediating position between the heavens and the earth: standing on Earth, he raises his eyes to the heavens. (shrink)

Without doubt, there is a great diversity of scientific images both with regard to their appearances and their functions. Diagrams, photographs, drawings, etc. serve as evidence in publications, as eye-catchers in presentations, as surrogates for the research object in scientific reasoning. This fact has been highlighted by Stephen M. Downes who takes this diversity as a reason to argue against a unifying representation-based account of how visualisations play their epistemic role in science. In the following paper, I will suggest (...) an alternative explanation of the diversity of scientific images. This account refers to processes which are caused by the social setting of science. What exactly is meant by this, I will spell out with the aid of Ludwik Fleck’s theory of the social mechanisms of scientific communication. (shrink)

This paper addresses Husserl’s theory of image consciousness and phantasy, which, along with remembering, constitute three kinds of presentification, a sort of intuitive intentional relational different from perception. In the second place, the paper tries to highlight the significance of «neutralizatiom> - as a means to access the world of phantasy - for the understanding of the origin of the aesthetic attitude. Finally, the paper discusses the kind of spacial relations that arise from «neutralizatiom>, in contrast with life-world experience (...) of space, and how those relations can be exemplified in Alfred Hitchcock’s The Rear Window. (shrink)

In times of transition and transformation, legal images metastasize. This idea can be usefully related both to Winnicott’s theory of transitional objects and Barthes’ theory of myth. But each tell only part of the full story. Barthes fails to fully account for the stabilizing effect of the reassuring signifier; Winnicott fails to fully account for the ideological adaptability—and implications—of the shifting signified. The legal image unites the iterability of the signifier and the polysemy of the signified, harnessing (...) the affective intensity of the former to the cultural mobility of the latter. In this article, I propose to illustrate this insight by reflecting on two notable images of law that appeared at a moment of profound legal transformation, at the dawn of the early modern era. The images of ‘blind justice’ and ‘sol justitiae’ which the article discusses are both ‘transitional myths’, facilitating through modes of affect a legal journey into uncharted territory. Paying attention to these images and above all to their transformation over time, we can observe not only the process of legal transition at work, but the function of the image in its authorization and modalization. (shrink)

Our modern scientific explanation of colour as a subjective impression has replaced a ‘pre-theoretical’ notion of colour as an intrinsic property of objects, which was mainstream in ancient thought. Why have we lost such pre-theoretical notion, and what have we lost by losing it? I argue that most ancient Greek philosophers exploited this pre-theoretical assumption – one that was obvious to them – in terms and ways that are still worthy of attention in the context of contemporary philosophy of colour. (...) I offer an in-depth analysis of the theories of a number of early Greek philosophers, as well as of Plato in the Timaeus, showing that they tend to share the idea that colour is an essential property of external bodies and therefore plays a causal role in perception. Then I focus on a comparison between Democritus’ stance and Aristotle’s in order to highlight a significant contrast between the two. Democritus' theory is an exception in ancient thought because it traces the colour phenomenon back to a refraction of atmospheric light through atomic aggregates. Aristotle, instead, posits the presence of colour and light in the bodies themselves. Finally, I interpret Aristotle's account as the most complex attempt in ancient thought to weld together what we call the ‘manifest image’ of colour and its ‘scientific image’. (shrink)

Charles S. Peirce's epistemological theory of mental diagrams forms the theoretical basis of his attempt to analyze diagrammatic reasoning. Two examples, one from science and another from art, are examined to test the scope of this theory. While the first example shows how scientific diagrams form part of translation processes, similar processes are demonstrated in how paintings are received. The article attempts to connect Peirce and A. J. Greimas's theory of narrative. Relating the two proves useful in (...) allowing Peirce's theory of the connection between the three normative sciences to be discussed on a new basis. (shrink)

Although most interpreters admit that Husserl was not guided by an interest in aesthetics when dealing with the various issues of image consciousness, his considerations are nevertheless usually interpreted in an aesthetic key. The article intends to challenge this line of interpretation by clearly separating between the neutrality of image consciousness, on one hand, and the disinterest of the aesthetic attitude towards reality, on the other hand, as well as by reviewing the elements in Husserl’s theory that led to (...) their association. (shrink)