C. P. Snow’s “The Two Cultures” controversially contrasted science and literature, suggesting that neither scientists nor literary intellectuals have much in common with, and seldom bother speaking to, the other. Responding to Snow, Michael Polanyi argued that specialization has made modern culture, not twofold but manifold. In his major work, Personal Knowledge, Polanyi explained that branches of modern culture have personal knowing and knowledge in common, and there is extensive cross-pollination of ideas. He also, in this book, saw the branches (...) of culture as disparate intellectual frameworks that are divorced from one another. (shrink)

Michael Polanyi argues in Personal Knowledge (1958) that conceptual frameworks involved in major scientific controversies are separated by a `logical gap'. Such frameworks, according to Polanyi (1958: 151), are logically disconnected: their protagonists think differently, use different languages and occupy different worlds. Relinquishing one framework and adopting another, Polanyi's scientist undergoes a `conversion' to a new `faith'. Polanyi, in other words, presaged Kuhn and Feyerabend's concept of incommensurability. To what influences was Polanyi subject as he developed his concept of the (...) logical gap? The answer, as unfolded in this article, is twofold: Evans-Pritchard's Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande and the Confessions of St Augustine. (shrink)

The aim of this work is to illustrate the psychological contributions of Pragmatism and of the Original Institutional Economics (also referred to as OIE or institutionalism), and their relevance for improving the process of social valuing and, as a consequence, the effectiveness of policy action. As a matter of fact, both institutionalist and pragmatist theories were well acquainted with various strands of psychology, and some of them also provided relevant contributions in this respect. Moreover, these theories reveal, along with various (...) differences, significant complementarities, both between themselves and with important concepts of social psychology and psychoanalysis. The work will address the following aspects: (I) The main characteristics of pragmatist psychology with particular attention to their social implications. For space reasons, we will focus attention on the contributions of authors – John Dewey, William James and George Herbert Mead – more oriented to social sciences. (II) The psychological contributions of institutionalism. We will pay particular attention to Thorstein Veblen's theory of instincts and John Rogers Commons' theory of negotiational psychology. We highlight that these theories present, despite a number of differences, relevant complementarities. (shrink)

The present book addresses the background, rationale, general structure, and particular aims and arguments characterizing our third and last volume about "humor" and "cruelty". A guiding foray is provided into the vast expert literature that can be retrieved in the Western humanities and social sciences on these two terms. Pivotal thinkers and crucial notions are duly identified, highlighted, and examined. Apposite subsidiary references are also included, especially with regard to psychodynamics and clinical psychology, existentialism, feminism, liberalism, Marxism, and representative recent (...) studies in the philosophy of humor and its cognates. The stage is thus set for the exploration and assessment of the conflicts between humor and cruelty unfolding in Part 2 of Volume 3. Being the philosophical terminus of our entire research project, Volume 3 counterbalances, complements, and, occasionally, complexifies the numerous forms of mutual cooperation between humor and cruelty that the preceding Volume 2 had unearthed and discussed. (shrink)

This article investigates the changing justifications of one of the hallmarks of orthodox psychoanalytic practice, the neutral and abstinent stance of the psychoanalyst, during the middle decades of the 20th century. To call attention to the shifting rationales behind a supposedly cold, detached style of treatment still today associated with psychoanalysis, explanations of the clinical utility of neutrality and abstinence by ‘classical’ psychoanalysts in the United States are contrasted with how intellectuals and cultural critics understood the significance of psychoanalytic abstinence. (...) As early as the 1930s, members of the Frankfurt School discussed the cultural and social implications of psychoanalytic practices. Only in the 1960s and 1970s, however, did psychoanalytic abstinence become a topic within broader intellectual debates about American social character and the burgeoning ‘therapy culture’ in the USA. The shift from professional and epistemological concerns to cultural and political ones is indicative of the changing appreciation of psychoanalysis as a clinical discipline: for psychoanalysts as well as cultural critics, I argue, changing social mores and the professional decline of psychoanalysis infused the image of the abstinent psychoanalyst with nostalgic longing, making it a symbol of resistance against a culture seen to be in decline. (shrink)

Part 2 of Volume 3 addresses in detail the conflicts between humor and cruelty, i.e., how cruelty can be unleashed against humor and, conversely, humor can be utilized against cruelty. Potent enmities to mirth and jollity are retrieved from a variety of socio-historical contexts, ranging from Europe’s medieval monasteries to the 2015 Charlie Hebdo massacre. Special attention is paid to the cruel humor and humorous cruelty arising thereof, insofar as such phenomena can reveal critical aspects of today’s neoliberal socio-economic order. (...) In parallel, settings where humor has been used as an instrument to cope with suffered cruelty, whether natural or human in origin, are also retrieved and discussed. These also vary greatly and encompass domains such as hospital wards, 20th-century Jewish ghettoes, and contemporary funeral homes. A set of concluding reflections is then offered on the psychological, theological, ethical, and metaphysical roots of humor—and its cruel rejection. (shrink)

John Dewey es una de las figuras más representativas de la filosofía pragmatista, enfoque este que aplicó sistemáticamente al estudio de la estructura social y cultural. En este artículo el foco de análisis se concentrará en los aspectos principales del enfoque de Dewey al estudio de los aspectos que constituyen la “naturaleza humana” y en cómo ellos interactúan con las características del contexto cultural. Se ilustrará cómo los conceptos elaborados por Dewey pueden contribuir al análisis heterodoxo de una serie de (...) asuntos económicos y sociales. Dewey subraya el papel crucial de las políticas públicas para facilitar el desarrollo de asociaciones voluntarias en todas las áreas de la estructura social. En el análisis de estos aspectos la contribución central de Dewey radica en cambiar los conceptos de democracia y participación del limbo de la abstracción en la que tienden a ser confinados por los enfoques anteriores, y en conectarlos con la evolución de las formas sociales económicas y sociales. (shrink)