Uniquely among contemporary philosophies, Roy Bhaskar’s system of critical realism attempts to sublate (draw out the real strengths of and surpass) the philosophical discourse of modernity considered as a dialectically developing totality. This paper systematically expounds and comments on Bhaskar’s metacritique of that discourse and situates it briefly in relation to Jürgen Habermas’s earlier critique.

In this paper, elementary but hitherto overlooked connections are established between Wittgenstein's remarks on mathematics, written during his transitional period, and free-variable finitism. After giving a brief description of theTractatus Logico-Philosophicus on quantifiers and generality, I present in the first section Wittgenstein's rejection of quantification theory and his account of general arithmetical propositions, to use modern jargon, as claims (as opposed to statements). As in Skolem's primitive recursive arithmetic and Goodstein's equational calculus, Wittgenstein represented generality by the use of free (...) variables. This has the effect that negation of unbounded universal and existential propositions cannot be expressed. This is claimed in the second section to be the basis for Wittgenstein's criticism of the universal validity of the law of excluded middle. In the last section, there is a brief discussion of Wittgenstein's remarks on real numbers. These show a preference, in line with finitism, for a recursive version of the continuum. (shrink)

Although it is conceded that distinct knowledge domains do presentparticular problems of coming to know, in thispaper it is argued that it is possible to construct a domain independent modelof the processes of coming to know, one inwhich observers share understandings and do soin agreed ways. The model in question is partof the conversation theory of Gordon Pask. CT, as a theory of theory construction andcommunication, has particular relevance forfoundational issues in science and scienceeducation. CT explicitly propounds a ``radicalconstructivist'' epistemology. (...) A briefaccount is given of the main tenets of RC andCT's place in that tradition and the traditionsof cybernetics. The paper presents a briefnon-technical account of the main concepts ofCT including elaborations by Laurillard andHarri-Augstein and Thomas. As part of CT, Pask also elaborated a methodology – knowledgeand task analysis – for analysing the structureof different knowledge domains; thismethodology is sketched in outline. (shrink)

The author- following his own research on the subject- argues that Wittgenstein ignores argumentation theory and in general, the problems of rhetoric and argumentation. From this point of view, he frames Stephen Toulmin’s reading of Wittgenstein, arguing that the British philosopher- who was a student of the Austrian- advocates precisely the same thesis. He explains that this happens in a very peculiar (rhetorical) context on Toulmin’s part; a context in which, in essence, Wittgenstein’s philosophy is being rehabilitated.

The aim of this paper is to assess the central role the imagination acquires in Pierre Gassendi’s logic. I trace the structuring scheme of the three acts of the mind—common to a good number of late scholastic and early modern logics—to the Thomistic notion of the movement of reasoning in knowledge and argue that Gassendi revisits this notion in his logic. The three acts scheme is from the beginning a bridge between logic and the natural philosophical treatment of the soul. (...) I show how Gassendi’s take on the three acts is similarly poised between his Logic and his Physics and I discuss the rationale, sources and consequences of his attribution of the three acts to the imagination. I argue for the following points: Gassendi’s conception of the logical role of the imagination answers to his empiricist epistemology, his naturalized view of the mind and his notion of a natural logic; it is also operative in his pairing of the formal mechanism of logical operations with a progressive mechanism of the operations of the mind; and it serves as a counterpart to his experimental understanding of the progress of knowledge.1. (shrink)

In the aftermath of the modern science world scientists are still searching for some kind of ontological and epistemological common ground. In this paper I try to show that we, by the aid of Michael Polanyi’s concepts of knowledge, of personal as well as objective knowledge, and his descriptions of the tacit dimensions in the process of knowing, can take some substantial steps toward a better understanding of the contemporary scientific conduct.

From an early age Jonathan Edwards became intellectually equipped for the task of defining theology of the revival movements of North America. As a revivalist Edwards came from a Calvinistic theological tradition and moved along the plane of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Puritan theology. Through his studies and meditations on God’s Word Edwards realised that the great need of his time was for a change in the way the old doctrine of sovereignty needed to be understood. The realisation of this fact (...) led him to produce an explicitly and consistently Calvinistic theology of revival. For Edwards revival times represented unusual and extraordinary times. In his eyes, revival is a glorious and wonderful working of God when the Spirit of God is poured out in a far greater and more glorious measure. (shrink)

ABSTRACTWe examine Marx's critiques of language, politics, and capitalist political economy and show how these anticipated critical discourse and argumentation analysis and ‘cultural political economy’. Marx studied philology and rhetoric at university and applied their lessons critically. We illustrate this from three texts. The German Ideology critically explores language as practical consciousness, the division of manual and mental labor, the state, hegemony, intellectuals, and specific ideologies. The Eighteenth Brumaire studies the semantics and pragmatics of political language and how it represents (...) the class content of politics and contributes to social transformation. Capital deconstructs the categories of classical political economy and their constitutive role in capitalist social relations. This is one aspect of CPE. Capital also highlights the structural and agential aspects of these relations, their contradictory dynamic, and their crisis-prone character. We comment on this aspect too. This said, Marx held that social transformation is mediated through political imaginaries and highlighted the need for the proletariat to develop a ‘poetry’ of the future. We then consider the misleading ‘base-superstructure’ metaphor and note how, against the thrust of Marx's work, it tends to reify culture. The article concludes that Marx contributed to the critique of semiotic as well as political economy. (shrink)

In May 1909, Lenin published Materialism and empiriocriticism, a polemical assault on forms of positivistic empiricism popular among members of the Bolshevik intelligentsia, especially his political rival Alexander Bogdanov. After expounding the core claims on both sides of the debate, this essay considers the relation of the philosophical issues at stake to the political stances of their proponents. I maintain that Lenin’s use of philosophical argument was not purely opportunistic, and I contest the view that his defence of realism was (...) designed as a philosophical rationale for revolutionary vanguardism, arguing instead that Lenin primarily saw himself as defending the world-view of ordinary rank-and-file Marxists against varieties of philosophical obscurantism. Although of marginal influence at the time of its first publication, Materialism and empiriocriticism was later celebrated as a model of philosophical excellence, as the cult of Lenin was fashioned by Stalin. As a result of the text’s subsequent prominence, Lenin’s manner of philosophizing, with its vitriol and abuse, had a disastrous influence on the subsequent course of Soviet philosophical culture. (shrink)

The paper concentrates on two questions: first, the problem of how to introduce students to philosophical argument in a contextualised and pluralist manner; and, second, the question of what kind of texts such a pedagogy requires at its disposal. The two questions are of course intimately related, as the dominance of the single-aim present-centred approach brings with it a highly selective publication of the archive, in editions typically suited to the aims of rational reconstruction rather than historical investigation.

“The question of finding a merciful God. Understanding Martin Luther’s relation to metaphysics and ontology” Myrén, Anna. 2017, Master’s Thesis, 30 credits. E-mail: [email protected] The Department of Theology, Uppsala University, Engelska Parken, Thunbergsv. 3B, Box 511, SE-751 20 UPPSALA, Sweden, [email protected] This thesis examines arguments and premises for understanding Luther’s relationship to metaphysics and ontology. The main theoretical sources are firstly research that, on the one hand argue that Luther’s doctrine of justification has ontological structures and on the other treat (...) his relation to metaphysics, and secondly sources that treat Luther’s development of theological themes and issues from a history of ideas perspective. The thesis concludes that the arguments of Finnish Luther scholars Tuomo Mannermaa and Sammeli Juntunen are helpful for understanding the relationship between Luther, metaphysics and ontology. Their conclusions display different levels of structures in his doctrine; thematic as well as re-oriented structures of thought, showing that Luther is occupied with metaphysical and ontology and presenting strong arguments for his doctrine of justification as ontological. Luther’s doctrinal development can be understood both as a result of criticism of substance-metaphysics, as well as itself ultimately displaying metaphysical and ontological issues. Such contents in his theology should be viewed in the larger perspective of forming theology, a history of ideas context that broadens the question to one of structures of thought, involving themes, issues, forming of doctrine as processual development. However, their thematic, doctrinal focus risks not giving full account for understanding Luther’s relation to metaphysical and ontological issues. An intricacy of the question is displayed and possible to trace when Luther’s theology is addressed from systematical as well as historical perspectives. The thesis finally argues with the help of a history of ideas perspective that the theologia crucis - specifically with its concept of the hidden God, the deus absconditus – is a resource for further inquiry of Luther and metaphysics, in understanding his theology as describing reality. Keywords: Luther, metaphysics, ontology, doctrine of justification, Mannermaa, Juntunen, themes, structures of thought, theologia crucis, deus absconditus. (shrink)

This paper offers an account of how to engage one phenomenologically orientated version of relational research based on ideas from existential phenomenological philosophy as well as Gestalt theory, relational psychoanalysis, intersubjectivity theory and feminist methodology. Relational dynamics (both conscious and unconscious) between researcher and co-researcher are explored reflexively using illustrations from various phenomenological projects in which the author has been involved. The relational approach to phenomenology described involves attending to four interlinked dimensions: open presence, embodied intersubjectivity, dialogic co-creation and entangled (...) selves. The paper aims to show the importance of retaining an open, empathic, embodied presence to another's personhood while acknowledging the power of dialogue to bring to life new realities. Data is seen to emerge out of the researcher/co-researcher relationship and is mutually co-created in this encounter as each touches and impacts on the other. What we can learn and know about another arises within the intersubjective space between. In this zone of ambiguity and uncertainty, the unforeseen hovers and layered meanings invite discovery. (shrink)

Jean van Heijenoort was best known for his editorial work in the history of mathematical logic. I survey his contributions to model-theoretic proof theory, and in particular to the falsifiability tree method. This work of van Heijenoort’s is not widely known, and much of it remains unpublished. A complete list of van Heijenoort’s unpublished writings on tableaux methods and related work in proof theory is appended.

The German philosopher Max Scheler defines the human person as a value-oriented act structure. Since a person is ideally a free being with open possibilities, the aim of education is to help human beings develop their potential in various directions. At the centre of Scheler's educational philosophy is the idea of all-round education, which aims towards a developed capacity for assessment, an ability to make choices and an ability to focus on the objective nature of things.

This article tries to create a bridge of understanding between cognitive scientists and phenomenologists who work on attention. In light of a phenomenology of attention and current psychological and neuropsychological literature on attention, I translate and interpret into phenomenological terms 20 key cognitive science concepts as examined in the laboratory and used in leading journals. As a preface to the lexicon, I outline a phenomenology of attention, especially as a dynamic three-part structure, which I have freely amended from the work (...) of phenomenologist and Gestalt philosopher Aron Gurwitsch (1901–1973). As a conclusion, I discuss the nature of subjectivity in attention and attention research, and whether attention might be the same as consciousness. (shrink)