In this issue of Studies in Transcendental Philosophy five scholars enquire about the theoretical aspects of Kant’s transcendental philosophy related to the notions of subject, self-consciousness, and self-knowledge. Andrew Brook examines Kant’s views on transcendental apperception at the end of the Critical Period, focusing on Opus Postumum which contains some of Kant’s most important reflections on the subjective dimension. As is known, the self-conscious act designated by the proposition ‘I think’ is an act of spontaneity, and this spontaneity is the (...) reason that the subject calls itself an intelligence. In his article Addison Ellis examines the theoretical and practical dimension of spontaneity, calling into question the distinction between a merely ‘relative’ spontaneity and one that is ‘absolute’. Luca Forgione points to two forms of self-consciousness introduced by Kant: inner sense, based on a sensory form of self-awareness, and transcendental apperception. Through the notion of inner sense, Kant also allows for an introspective account of self-awareness; nonetheless, Kant holds an utterly sophisticated notion of basic self-consciousness provided for by the notion of transcendental apperception. Roberto Horácio de Sá Pereira’s article presents a systematic and a historical approach, linking the contemporary debate on transcendental argument to Kant’s philosophy. It addresses both Stroud’s objection and Strawson’s perspective on transcendental argument and introduces a new reconstruction of Kant’s Refutation as successful truth-directed transcendental argument. In contrast to the contemporary movement of transhumanism and its claims that creatures like us can exist independently of our bodies, Robert Hanna develops a generalist perspective on the subjective dimension, according to which all rational human creature are synthetic a priori necessarily, essentially embodied Kantian selves. I would like to thank the authors for participating in this issue and for helping to make it really special. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to address the semantic issue of the nature of the representation I and of the transcendental designation, i.e., the self-referential apparatus involved in transcendental apperception. The I think, the bare or empty representation I, is the representational vehicle of the concept of transcendental subject; as such, it is a simple representation. The awareness of oneself as thinking is only expressed by the I: the intellectual representation which performs a referential function of the spontaneity of (...) a thinking subject. To begin with, what exactly does Kant mean when he states that I is a simple and empty representation? Secondly, can the features of the representation I and the correlative transcendental designation explain the indexical nature of the I? Thirdly, do the Kantian considerations on indexicality anticipate any of the semantic elements or, if nothing else, the spirit of the direct reference theory? (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to focus on certain characterizations of “I think” and the “transcendental subject” in an attempt to verify a connection with certain metaphysical characterizations of the thinking subject that Kant introduced in the critical period. Most importantly, two distinct meanings of “I think” need be distinguished: (1) in the Transcendental Deduction “I think” is the act of apperception; (2) in the Transcendental Deduction and in the section of Paralogisms “I think” is taken in its representational (...) nature. It proves helpful to interpret the “transcendental subject” in formal terms as a concept that, mutatis mutandis, has the same function of the concept of the “transcendental object.”. (shrink)

In recent years non-conceptual content theorists have taken Kant as a reference point on account of his notion of intuition (§§ 1-2). The present work aims at exploring several complementary issues intertwined with the notion of non-conceptual content: of these, the first concerns the role of the intuition as an indexical representation (§ 3), whereas the second applies to the presence of a few epistemic features articulated according to the distinction between knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description (§ 4). (...) This work intends to dismiss the possibility that intuition may have an autonomous function of de re knowledge in support of an interpretative reading which can be labelled as weak conceptualism. To this end, the exploration will be conducted from a strictly transcendental perspective – i.e., by referring to the so called theory of the “concept of a transcendental object”. (shrink)

This book addresses the problem of self-knowledge in Kant’s philosophy. As Kant writes in his major works of the critical period, it is due to the simple and empty representation ‘I think’ that the subject’s capacity for self-consciousness enables the subject to represent its own mental dimension. This book articulates Kant’s theory of self-knowledge on the basis of the following three philosophical problems: 1) a semantic problem regarding the type of reference of the representation ‘I’; 2) an epistemic problem regarding (...) the type of knowledge relative to the thinking subject produced by the representation ‘I think’; and 3) a strictly metaphysical problem regarding the features assigned to the thinking subject’s nature. The author connects the relevant scholarly literature on Kant with contemporary debates on the huge philosophical field of self-knowledge. He develops a formal reading according to which the unity of self-consciousness does not presuppose the identity of a real subject, but a formal identity based on the representation ‘I think’. (shrink)

The analysis of the structure of the I-thoughts is intertwined with several epistemic and metaphysical questions. The aim of this paper is to highlight that the absence of an identification component does not imply that the “I" doesn’t perform a referential function, nor that it necessarily involves a specific metaphysical thesis on the nature of the self-conscious subject. Particularly, as far as the Cartesian illusion concerning the thinking subject’s immaterial nature is concerned, Kant and Wittgenstein seem to share the same (...) philosophical concerns and focus on the same type of reference involved in the “I", obviously via different philosophical paths and antipodal metaphysical assumptions. (shrink)

Since the classic works by Castañeda, Perry and Lewis, de se thoughts have been described as thoughts about oneself ‘as oneself’. In recent years, various theoretical perspectives have gained ground, and even if the transcendental system does not seem to contemplate an explicit articulation of de se thoughts, apparently a few features of transcendental apperception and I think do anticipate a few points in Perry and Recanati’s claims on the so-called implicit de se thoughts in the specific terms of Transcendentalism.

As is well known, the linguistic/philosophical reflection on natural kind terms has undergone a remarkable development in the early seventies with Putnam and Kripke’s essentialist approaches, touching upon different aspects of Kan’s slant. Preliminarily, however, it might be useful to review some of the theoretical stages in Locke and Leibniz’s approaches on natural kind terms in the light of contemporary reflections, to eventually pinpoint Kant’s contribution and see how some commentators have placed it within the theory of direct reference. Starting (...) with textual evidence even from the logical corpus, in the present essay I will attempt to discuss some of the arguments dismissing Kant’s adherence to this view. These assume that in his approach to the semantics of natural kind Kant appears to be still holding on to a nominalist/conceptualist position, though he seems to be well aware of a few key issues for the theorists of direct reference. (shrink)

In recent years, nonconceptual content theories have seen Kant as a reference point for his notion of intuition (§§ 1-3). This work aims to dismiss the possibility that intuition is provided with an autonomous function of de re knowledge. To this end, it will explore certain epistemological points that emerge from Garroni’s reading of the Third Critique in the conviction that they provide a suitable context to verify the presence of autonomous, epistemically nonconceptual content in the transcendental system (§§ 4-5). (...) It is here, in fact, that Kant discusses those cases where intuition is given without bringing into play the conceptual component. As Garroni posits, in this frame of reference, such content cannot subsist without the interplay between aesthetic and conceptual dimensions (§§ 6-7). Long before the development of the debate on Kantian nonconceptualism, and during the period in which the Kantian debate on the epistemic considerations contained in the Third Critique was developing deeply for the first time, Garroni had already identified a theoretical position on these issues, which can be labelled aesthetic conceptualism, thanks to his fundamentally epistemological reading of the Third Critique. (shrink)

Ever since Strawson’s The Bounds of Sense, the transcendental apperception device has become a theoretical reference point to shed light on the criterionless selfascription form of mental states, reformulating a contemporary theoretical place tackled for the first time in explicit terms by Wittgenstein’s Blue Book. By investigating thoroughly some elements of the critical system the issue of the identification of the transcendental subject with reference to the I think will be singled out. In this respect, the debate presents at least (...) two diametrically opposed attitudes: the first – exemplified in the works by Hacker, Becker, Sturma and McDowell – considers the features of the I think according to Wittgenstein’s approach to the I as subject while the second, exemplified by Kitcher and Carl, criticizes the various commentators who turn to Wittgenstein in order to interpret Kant’s I think. The hypothesis that I will attempt at articulating in this paper starts off not only from the transcendental apperception form, but also from the characterizations of empirical apperception. It may be assumed that Kant’s reflection on the problem of self-identification lies right here, truly prefiguring some features of Wittgenstein’s uses of I, albeit from different metaphysical assumptions and philosophical horizons. (shrink)

Self-consciousness can be understood as the ability to think I-thou-ghts which can be described as thoughts about oneself ‘as oneself’. Self-consciousness possesses two specific correlated features: the first regards the fact that it is grounded on a first-person perspective, whereas the second concerns the fact that it should be considered a consciousness of the self as subject rather than a consciousness of the self as object. The aim of this paper is to analyse a few considerations about Descartes and Hume’s (...) approaches to self-consciousness, as both philosophers introduce a first-personal method of accessing the subjective dimension through an introspective account. Descartes’s view on self-consciousness seems incapable of conceiving and recognizing herself as herself, while Hume’s seems to lack those features assigned to the consciousness of self-as-subject. (shrink)

The of aim of this paper is to enquire about some theoretical aspects of Kant’s philosophy that are connected to the representation ‘I’ and the question of self-identification in self-consciousness. The subjective capacity to represent itself through the representation ‘I’ will be articulated on the basis of the structure the so-called de se or I-thoughts developed by Perry and Recanati. In this regard, a contrast between Longuenesse’s view and my approach on self-identification and the different uses of I as subject (...) will be considered. (shrink)

Presupponendo l’influenza di alcune tesi dell’idealismo di Kant su alcune tesi di Wittgenstein non solo attraverso la lettura di Schopenhauer, questo contributo prova a ripercorrere alcune contiguità e differenze tra il dispositivo autoreferenziale dell’appercezione trascendentale e certi aspetti emersi dal dibattito contemporaneo sul carattere irriducibile dell’autoascrizione dei pensieri che contengono un riferimento in prima persona, i cosiddetti I-thoughts, dibattito ispirato da Wittgenstein e dalla sua analisi filosofico-linguistica della grammatica del termine “Io”.

Approfondendo lo schema dell’immaginazione, introdotto da Kant nella Critica della Ragione Pura per risolvere l’applicazione tra concetti e intuizioni, diversi commentatori hanno individuato alcuni legami con l’impostazione di Wittgenstein, soprattutto con le nozioni di immagine del Tractatus logico-philosophicus e di regola delle Ricerche filosofiche. Partendo da una prospettiva filosofico-linguistica, in particolare dalla questione della denominazione, questo saggio prova a ripercorrere alcuni punti critici che emergono dal tale confronto (§ 1),affrontando sia le difficoltà epistemiche interne alla riflessione kantiana sia gli aspetti (...) che caratterizzano il suo paradigma procedurale (§ 2e § 3), per individuare un accostamento plausibile all’impresa filosofica di Wittgenstein (§ 4 e § 5). (shrink)

In the last few years, various Kantian commentators have drawn attention on a number of features in the self-reference device of transcendental apperception having emerged from the contemporary debate on the irreducibility of self-ascription of thoughts in the first person. Known as I-thoughts, these have suggested a connection between some aspects of Kant’s philosophy and Wittgenstein’s philosophico-linguistic analysis of the grammatical rule of the term I. This paper would like to review some of such correspondences (§§ 1-3), avoiding any mechanical (...) association between Kant and an elusive reading of the I think, e.g. as suggested mutatis mutandis by McDowell and Kitcher (§§ 4-7). (shrink)

The controversy that between 1908 and 1912 saw Benedetto Croce and Giovanni Gentile opposed, on one side, and Federigo Enriques, on the other, did not actually have a conclusive episode, but its end was perceived, for its results on culture, on society and teaching in Italy, as a "defeat" of Enriques. A more careful examination of the events and of the historical context in which it took place seems, however, to clearly demonstrate that we can speak not of a personal (...) defeat of the great mathematician from Livorno, but rather of a defeat of the commendable attempts at cultural and social modernization of Italy in an international perspective, of which Enriques was not the only actor but certainly the most exposed. Such intentions were crushed by the myopic provincial conservatism of the Italian neo-idealism, favored by the fascist regime, concerned only with affirming in the world an alleged autarkic national cultural superiority, based on the traditional literary-humanistic culture, ignoring the progress of the new technical-scientific thought, placed in an international context. Sunto_ La polemica che dal 1908 al 1912 vide contrapposti da una parte Benedetto Croce e Giovanni Gentile e dall’altra Federigo Enriques non ebbe, in realtà, un episodio conclusivo, ma la sua fine è stata percepita, per i suoi esiti sulla cultura, sulla società e sull’insegnamento in Italia, come una “sconfitta” dell’Enriques. Un esame più attento delle vicende e del contesto storico nel quale si svolse sembra, invece, dimostrare chiaramente di poter parlare non di una sconfitta personale del grande matematico livornese, quanto piuttosto di una sconfitta dei lodevoli tentativi di ammodernamento culturale e sociale dell’Italia in una prospettiva internazionale, di cui Enriques non fu l’unico attore ma sicuramente quello più esposto. Tali propositi furono schiacciati dal miope conservatorismo provinciale del neoidealismo italiano, favorito dal regime fascista, preoccupato unicamente di affermare nel mondo una pretesa superiorità culturale nazionale autarchica, basata sulla tradizionale cultura letterario-umanistica, ignorando il progresso del nuovo pensiero tecnico-scientifico, per sua natura, invece, inserito in un contesto internazionale. (shrink)

ABSTRACT (ITA) Un’idea emerge, si sviluppa, guadagna consenso, muta, talvolta scompare per poi risorgere. Questo è anche stato il destino dell’idea di evoluzione, il cui lungo cammino viene ricostruito in questo saggio, dai Greci fino ai nostri giorni. A partire dal diciassettesimo secolo questa nozione assume sempre più rilevanza nello studio della natura. In ciascun pensatore l’idea di un’evoluzione delle specie viventi è stata accompagnata da una teoria volta a spiegare le cause e il meccanismo del mutamento. Questo saggio racconta (...) non soltanto la genesi e lo sviluppo dell’idea tout court che la natura in qualche modo si trasformi, ma anche la storia delle teorie che, assumendo come reale questa trasformazione, ne postulano una spiegazione. Particolare attenzione viene data ad alcuni aspetti spesso trascurati che hanno reso possibile il concetto di evoluzione del mondo vivente come la conosciamo adesso, di cui se ne mostra la rilevanza, già a partire dal pensiero greco. -/- ABSTRACT (ENG) An idea emerges, develops, gains consensus, evolves, sometimes disappears and then rises again. This was also the fate of the idea of evolution, whose long journey is reconstructed in this essay, from the Greeks to the present day. Since the seventeenth century, this idea has become more and more relevant in the study of nature. In each thinker the idea of an evolution of living species has been accompanied by a theory aimed at explaining the causes and the mechanism of change. This essay tells not only the genesis and development of the idea that nature somehow transforms itself, but also the history of the theories which, assuming this transformation as real, postulate an explanation. Particular emphasis is given to some often overlooked aspects that made possible the concept of evolution of the living world as we know it now, whose full relevance is shown, starting from Greek thought. Keywords: evolution, natural selection, Charles Darwin, history of ideas, history of science. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to focus on Arne Nass’s phenomenological method and some of its anthropological and cosmological implications. Nass’s Ecology, Community and Lifestyle, in fact, can be fruitfully read as an example of phenomenological inquiry, in which the notion of “spontaneous experience” plays a fundamental role. This method leads Nass to develop a “relational ontology,” in which the “ecological self” is seen as a “relational junction within the total field.” In addition, I show how Tymieniecka’s philosophical thought (...) can offer us the proper eco-phenomenological perspective to better understand Nass’s Ecosophy T. (shrink)

Paul Feyerabend, one of the most original and nonconformist epistemologists of the 20th century, is known for describing science as an essentially anarchic enterprise characterized by different, sometimes contradictory, methods, approaches and ways of reasoning. But it was through his reflections on art and myth that he developed an even more radical view: there are different forms of human thought, each characterized by a different rationality and reality, and science is only one of them. And in intellectual history there is (...) only change, but not progress. (shrink)

Charlotte Witt's finely crafted book offers an original and powerful account of social role normativity––the normativity of norms associated with social ro.

The assumption that coercion is largely responsible for our legal systems’ efficacy is a common one. I argue that this assumption is false. But I do so indirectly, by objecting to a thesis I call “(Compliance)”, which holds that most citizens comply with most legal mandates most of the time at least partly in virtue of being motivated by legal systems’ threats of sanctions and other unwelcome consequences. The relationship between (Compliance) and the efficacy of legal systems is explained in (...) section 1. There I also show that (Compliance) must be rejected for it relies on unsubstantiated empirical assumptions. In section 2, I claim that an alternative, and more refined, formulation of (Compliance) also lacks adequate support. I conclude with a few general remarks about the centrality of coercion in our thought and talk about legal systems. (shrink)

Norm theory (Kahneman & Miller, 1986) described a tendency for people to associate stronger regret with a negative outcome when it is a result of an exception (abnormal behavior) compared to when it is a result of routine (normal behavior). In two pre-registered studies, we conducted a replication and extension of three classic experiments on past behavior exception/routine contrasts (N = 684). We successfully replicated Kahneman and Miller’s (1986) experiments with the classic hitchhiker-scenario (Part 1) and car accident-scenario (Part 2). (...) In both cases, participants examined negative outcomes and tended to indicate a protagonist who deviated from own past behavior as more regretful than another who followed routine. Pre-registered extensions also showed effects for ratings of social norms, negative affect, and perceived luck. We did not find support for the Miller and McFarland (1986) experiment robbery scenario (Part 3) using a compensation measure, in that compensation to a victim of a robbery was not significantly different comparing exceptional and routine circumstances. However, a pre-registered extension showed that robbery under exceptional circumstances was regretted more than robbery under routine circumstances. We discuss implications for current and future research. (shrink)

Crispin Wright maintains that the architecture of perceptual justification is such that we can acquire justification for our perceptual beliefs only if we have antecedent justification for ruling out any sceptical alternative. Wright contends that this principle doesn’t elicit scepticism, for we are non-evidentially entitled to accept the negation of any sceptical alternative. Sebastiano Moruzzi has challenged Wright’s contention by arguing that since our non-evidential entitlements don’t remove the epistemic risk of our perceptual beliefs, they don’t actually enable us to (...) acquire justification for these beliefs. In this paper I show that Wright’s responses to Moruzzi are ineffective and that Moruzzi’s argument is validated by probabilistic reasoning. I also suggest that Wright cannot answer Moruzzi’s challenge without weakening the support available for his conception of the architecture of perceptual justification. (shrink)

In this chapter I shall address the question as to whether there exists a universal and atemporal justification for the claims made by a community that adopts a particular style of reasoning. I shall present a case study in which a claim made in the laboratory style of reasoning has no universal and atemporal justification. As I shall explain, Hacking justifies his belief that unobservable entities exist on the ground that they can be regularly manipulated by experimenters in order to (...) find out and produce various phenomena (experimental realism); he also maintains that no belief that our theories are true is required in order to be realist about unobservable entities. I shall argue that his justification is relative to the laboratory style of reasoning. Ultimately, from this case study I shall draw the important conclusion that the styles of reasoning project implies epistemic relativism. In the first part of this chapter, I shall analyse Hacking’s experimental realism in the light of the styles of reasoning project. I shall start by making these points: Hacking’s theory anti-realism denies the possibility of ranking styles of reasoning in terms of their capacity to explain phenomena; furthermore, Hacking is not successful in showing that his entity realism is justified for a community that does not adopt the laboratory style of reasoning. It will follow that the styles of reasoning project is in conflict with the claim that we know about unobservable entities. (shrink)

In this contribution, I explore the possibility of characterizing the emergence of time in causal set theory (CST) in terms of the growing block universe (GBU) metaphysics. I show that although GBU seems to be the most intuitive time metaphysics for CST, it leaves us with a number of interpretation problems, independently of which dynamics we choose to favor for the theory —here I shall consider the Classical Sequential Growth and the Covariant model. Discrete general covariance of the CSG dynamics (...) does not allow us to individuate a single history of the universe (defined by a causal history of different causal sets), thereby making the claim that ‘the past exists’ at best problematic. In addition, because the evolution of the universe in CSG dynamics leads to an outward branching causal tree, it becomes impossible to determine a proper ‘line of becoming’, thereby blurring the presentists’ claim that only the present exists. Similarly, the covariant approach runs into the same, if not even more severe problems, since each configuration of the universe would amount to a set of possible causal sets, thereby making the individuation of a single configuration of the universe —and thus the physical interpretation of the theory— implausible. (shrink)

Commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics Lambda. It accompanies the translation of Aristotle's Metaphysics Lambda into Portuguese in the same volume of the journal.

This paper discusses the contrast between scientific knowledge and opinion as it is presented by Aristotle in Posterior Analytics A.33. Aristotle's contrast is formulated in terms of understanding or not understanding some "necessary items". I claim that the contrast can only be understood in terms of explanatory relevance. The "necessary items" are middle terms (or explanatory factors) that are necessary for the fully appropriate explanation. This approach gives a coherent interpretation of each step in the chapter.

Translation of Aristotle's Physics I-II into Portuguese, with commentaries. Tradução para o português dos livros I e II da Física de Aristóteles, com comentários.

Public participation in scientific research has gained prominence in many scientific fields, but the theory of participatory research is still limited. In this paper, we suggest that the divergence of values and goals between academic researchers and public participants in research is key to analyzing the different forms this research takes. We examine two existing characterizations of participatory research: one in terms of public participants' role in the research, the other in terms of the virtues of the research. In our (...) view, each of these captures an important feature of participatory research but is, on its own, limited in what features it takes into account. We introduce an expanded conception of norms of collaboration that extends to both academic researchers and public participants. We suggest that satisfying these norms requires consideration of the two groups' possibly divergent values and goals, and that a broad characterization of participatory research that starts from participants' values and goals can motivate both public participants’ role in the research and the virtues of the research. The resulting framework clarifies the similarities and differences among participatory projects and can help guide the responsible design of such projects. (shrink)

We present epistemic multilateral logic, a general logical framework for reasoning involving epistemic modality. Standard bilateral systems use propositional formulae marked with signs for assertion and rejection. Epistemic multilateral logic extends standard bilateral systems with a sign for the speech act of weak assertion (Incurvati and Schlöder 2019) and an operator for epistemic modality. We prove that epistemic multilateral logic is sound and complete with respect to the modal logic S5 modulo an appropriate translation. The logical framework developed provides the (...) basis for a novel, proof-theoretic approach to the study of epistemic modality. To demonstrate the fruitfulness of the approach, we show how the framework allows us to reconcile classical logic with the contradictoriness of so-called Yalcin sentences and to distinguish between various inference patterns on the basis of the epistemic properties they preserve. (shrink)

A subject S's belief that Q is well-grounded if and only if it is based on a reason of S that gives S propositional justification for Q. Depending on the nature of S's reason, the process whereby S bases her belief that Q on it can vary. If S's reason is non-doxastic––like an experience that Q or a testimony that Q––S will need to form the belief that Q as a spontaneous and immediate response to that reason. If S's reason (...) is doxastic––like a belief that P––S will need to infer her belief that Q from it. The distinction between these two ways in which S's beliefs can be based on S's reasons is widely presupposed in current epistemology but––we argue in this paper––is not exhaustive. We give examples of quite ordinary situations in which a well-grounded belief of S appears to be based on S's reasons in neither of the ways described above. To accommodate these recalcitrant cases, we introduce the notion of enthymematic inference and defend the thesis that S can base a belief that Q on doxastic reasons P1, P2, …, Pn via inferring enthymematically Q from P1, P2, …, Pn. (shrink)

I discuss Aristotle's anomalous terminology in Physics A.1 (involving "universals" and "particulars") and its coherence with Aristotle's notion of scientific demonstration.

ABSTRACTLinguistic evidence supports the claim that certain, weak rejections are less specific than assertions. On the basis of this evidence, it has been argued that rejected sentences cannot be premisses and conclusions in inferences. We give examples of inferences with weakly rejected sentences as premisses and conclusions. We then propose a logic of weak rejection which accounts for the relevant phenomena and is motivated by principles of coherence in dialogue. We give a semantics for which this logic is sound and (...) complete, show that it axiomatizes the modal logic KD45 and prove that it still derives classical logic on its asserted fragment. Finally, we defend previous logics of strong rejection as being about the linguistically preferred interpretations of weak rejections. (shrink)

In this paper we focus on transmission and failure of transmission of warrant. We identify three individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for transmission of warrant, and we show that their satisfaction grounds a number of interesting epistemic phenomena that have not been sufficiently appreciated in the literature. We then scrutinise Wright’s analysis of transmission failure and improve on extant readings of it. Nonetheless, we present a Bayesian counterexample that shows that Wright’s analysis is partially incoherent with our analysis of (...) warrant transmission and prima facie defective. We conclude exploring three alternative lines of reply: developing a more satisfactory account of transmission failure, which we outline; dismissing the Bayesian counterexample by rejecting some of its assumptions; reinterpreting Wright’s analysis to make it immune to the counterexample. (shrink)

Many approaches to quantum gravity -the theory that should account for quantum and gravitational phenomena under the same theoretical umbrella- seem to point at some form of spacetime emergence, i.e., the fact that spacetime is not a fundamental entity of our physical world. This tenet has sparked many philosophical discussions: from the so-called empirical incoherence problem to different accounts of emergence and mechanisms thereof. In this contribution, I focus on the partial order relation of causal set theory and argue that (...) causation can be characterized as an a-temporal constraint over the kinematic space defined by the theory. The relation constrains the growth of a new element/event with respect to the other elements/events of a given set. Therefrom, the flow of time emerges from the collection of the possible growths of the given set, where each possibility is characterized by a classical probability assigned by the dynamics of the theory. (shrink)

Constitutivism argues that the source of the categorical force of the norms of rationality and morality lies in the constitutive features of agency. A systematic failure to be guided by these norms would amount to a loss or lack of agency. Since we cannot but be agents, we cannot but be unconditionally guided by these norms. The constitutivist strategy has been challenged by David Enoch. He argues that our participation in agency is optional and thus cannot be a source of (...) categorical demands. In this paper, I defend the viability of constitutivism by showing that agency is indeed a special ‘inescapable’ enterprise. Agency has the largest jurisdiction, and it is closed under rational assessment. This inescapability does not exempt constitutivism from raising the question whether agents have reason to be agents, but this question has to be taken up within agency. If this question is answered affirmatively, then—I argue—the criteria of practical correctness are self-ratifying in a non-circular way. This is sufficient to show the viability of the constitutivist strategy. Whether agents have conclusive reasons to be agents, however, is a matter to be addressed in the terms of particular versions of constitutivism. (shrink)

We discuss a well-known puzzle about the lexicalization of logical operators in natural language, in particular connectives and quantifiers. Of the many logically possible operators, only few appear in the lexicon of natural languages: the connectives in English, for example, are conjunction _and_, disjunction _or_, and negated disjunction _nor_; the lexical quantifiers are _all, some_ and _no_. The logically possible nand (negated conjunction) and Nall (negated universal) are not expressed by lexical entries in English, nor in any natural language. Moreover, (...) the lexicalized operators are all upward or downward monotone, an observation known as the Monotonicity Universal. We propose a logical explanation of lexical gaps and of the Monotonicity Universal, based on the dynamic behaviour of connectives and quantifiers. We define update potentials for logical operators as procedures to modify the context, under the assumption that an update by \( \phi \) depends on the logical form of \( \phi \) and on the speech act performed: assertion or rejection. We conjecture that the adequacy of update potentials determines the limits of lexicalizability for logical operators in natural language. Finally, we show that on this framework the Monotonicity Universal follows from the logical properties of the updates that correspond to each operator. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to clarify under what conditions a philosophical problem arises. I will describe two ways in which we might perceive a question as a problem. First, when we fnd ourselves inclined to believe in propositions that appear incompatible with each other. Second, when we fnd ourselves inclined to believe in propositions that seem incompatible with our desires. I will discuss both of these cases and articulate a didactic strategy – the Clash Strategy – which can (...) be used in order to plan and facilitate dialogic inquiry in the classroom. This strategy suggests introducing stimuli that will help students appreciate the clash that drives the philosophical question to be explored during the dialogue. In summary, this paper aims to ofer insights to all teachers interested in promoting dialogic inquiry, whether philosophical or otherwise, in education. (shrink)

Translation of Aristotle's Posterior Analytics I into Portuguese, with a few notes, experimental glossary and introduction. The translation, which was made at 2003/4, was preliminary and its publication was intended to provide a didactic tool for courses as well as a provisional resource in research seminars. It needs some revision. I am currently working (slowly...) on the revision of the translation and a new revised one will surely appear at some point.

This paper considers two novel Bayesian responses to a well-known skeptical paradox. The paradox consists of three intuitions: first, given appropriate sense experience, we have justification for accepting the relevant proposition about the external world; second, we have justification for expanding the body of accepted propositions through known entailment; third, we do not have justification for accepting that we are not disembodied souls in an immaterial world deceived by an evil demon. The first response we consider rejects the third intuition (...) and proposes an explanation of why we have a faulty intuition. The second response, which we favor, accommodates all three intuitions; it reconciles the first and the third intuition by the dual component model of justification, and defends the second intuition by distinguishing two principles of epistemic closure. (shrink)

Translation of Aristotle's Metaphysics IV and VI, with notes. The translation is preliminary and intended as a provisional teaching tool to be also used in seminars and discussions with peers in order to reach a more elaborated version.

Experiences like pains, pleasures, and emotions have affective phenomenal character: they feel pleasant or unpleasant. Imperativism proposes to explain affective phenomenal character by appeal to imperative content, a kind of intentional content that directs rather than describes. We argue that imperativism is on the right track, but has been developed in the wrong way. There are two varieties of imperativism on the market: first-order and higher-order. We show that neither is successful, and offer in their place a new theory: reflexive (...) imperativism. Our proposal is that an experience P feels pleasant in virtue of being constituted by a Command with reflexive imperative content, while an experience U feels unpleasant in virtue of being constituted by a Command with reflexive imperative content : More of P!Less of U! If you need a slogan: experiences have affective phenomenal character in virtue of commanding us Get more of me! Get less of me! (shrink)

Tradução preliminar em pré-print. A Tradução definitiva é a de 2009.

In Posterior Analytics 71b9 12, we find Aristotle’s definition of scientific knowledge. The definiens is taken to have only two informative parts: scientific knowledge must be knowledge of the cause and its object must be necessary. However, there is also a contrast between the definiendum and a sophistic way of knowing, which is marked by the expression “kata sumbebekos”. Not much attention has been paid to this contrast. In this paper, I discuss Aristotle’s definition paying due attention to this contrast (...) and to the way it interacts with the two conditions presented in the definiens. I claim that the “necessity” condition ammounts to explanatory appropriateness of the cause. (shrink)

This is an introductory handbook for some of the main themes around the notion of predication in Aristotle. It does not aim at being exhaustive, but only sketches some important lines about the subject; it contains an introductory essay, besides the translation (into Portuguese) and commentary of basic texts (such as Posterior Analytics I-22, Categories 1-5, Interpretation 1-6 etc.).

We present an inferentialist account of the epistemic modal operator might. Our starting point is the bilateralist programme. A bilateralist explains the operator not in terms of the speech act of rejection ; we explain the operator might in terms of weak assertion, a speech act whose existence we argue for on the basis of linguistic evidence. We show that our account of might provides a solution to certain well-known puzzles about the semantics of modal vocabulary whilst retaining classical logic. (...) This demonstrates that an inferentialist approach to meaning can be successfully extended beyond the core logical constants. (shrink)

With the present paper I maintain that the group field theory (GFT) approach to quantum gravity can help us clarify and distinguish the problems of spacetime emergence from the questions about the nature of the quanta of space. I will show that the mechanism of phase transition suggests a form of indifference between scales (or phases) and that such an indifference allows us to black-box questions about the nature of the ontology of the fundamental levels of the theory. I consider (...) the GFT approach to quantum gravity which derives spacetime as an emergent property from abstract non-geometrical tetrahedra through a processes of phase transition. Because the physical interpretation of the tetrahedra is problematic in view of their (non)-spatiotemporal nature, I will apply the considerations about phase transitions to GFT and conclude that the fundamental ontology of the theory and the mechanism of spacetime emergence can and should be treated separately. (shrink)

Translation of Aristotle's Metaphysics I-III into Portuguese, with a few notes and introduction. The translation, which was made at 2007, is preliminary and its publication was intended to provide a didactic tool for courses as well as a provisional resource in research seminars. It needs some revision. I am currently working (slowly...) on the revision of the translation and a new revised one will surely appear at some point.

I discuss in this paper the six requirements Aristotle advances at Posterior Analytics A-2, 71b20-33, for the premisses of a scientific demonstration. I argue that the six requirements give no support for an intepretation in terms of “axiomatization”. Quite on the contrary, the six requirements can be consistently understood in a very different picture, according to which the most basic feature of a scientific demonstration is to explain a given proposition by its appropriate cause.

In this paper, I present an interpretation of Wittgenstein's remarks on the experience of wonder at the existence of the world. According to this interpretation, Wittgenstein's feeling of wonder stems from perceiving the existence of the world as an absolute miracle, that is, as a fact that is in principle beyond explanation. Based on this analysis, I will suggest that Wittgenstein's experience is akin to what has been described by other authors such as Coleridge, Pessoa, Heidegger, Scheler, Sartre, and Hadot, (...) among many others. Through a comparison between Wittgenstein and Coleridge on the experience of existence, I shall highlight some core features of this experience, chief among them the use of the notion of nothingness in clarifying what is understood in the experience, the role of intuition, and the presence of a specific pathos. As a whole, this paper aims to provide a contribution to the project of a phenomenology of the experience of existence and intends to create a bridge for a dialogue between Wittgenstein and the phenomenological tradition on the enigma of existence. (shrink)