Fumiko Kaneko was a female anarchist philosopher born in Japan in 1903. With her Korean partner Pak Yol, she founded the anarchist collective “Futei-sha” which published many articles arguing for anarchism and direct action (“Futei-sha” is named after “Futei-Senjin”, a government term for malcontent Koreans). Both Fumiko and Pak were pre-emptively detained during the major earthquake in 1923. During the detention, they testified that they had plotted to bomb the emperor’s son, which resulted in a death sentence for them. Though (...) they were pardoned, Fumiko refused the pardon and killed herself in prison at the age of 23. Her life is candidly written in her autobiography which has been translated into English (Kaneko 1991). In this book, we can see her powerful ego which was developed throughout her extremely oppressed life. Her philosophy is more explicitly expressed in her testimony at her trial. Also, I must note that there is a fantastic Korean film on Fumiko and Pak called Anarchist from Colony in which Korean actress Choi Hee-seo fabulously portrayed Fumiko, expressing Fumiko’s joyful aspect. -/- This article will examine her life story as well as her anarchist philosophy which I will refer to as the anarchism of truthfulness. -/- . (shrink)

This research discusses Bernard Williams' critique of utilitarianism. I will address Williams' well-known “Integrity Objection” and clarify where his main issue with utilitarianism lies. Through this, I will demonstrate that the separation of the two viewpoints – the “inside viewpoint” and the “impartial viewpoint” - is the issue, as the utilitarian impartial viewpoint does not capture the value of ethical deliberations based on our inside viewpoint in which we presuppose our personal projects. Furthermore, I will argue that this interpretation enables (...) us to place the objection in the context of the critique of impartiality which is one of the central themes of Williams’ ethics. (shrink)

This essay is part of a doctoral dissertation presented to the Department of Philosophy, University of São Paulo, in 1993, named 'Genealogy of the Real' . Its core idea is a Nietzschean approach to a masterpiece among philosophical inspired movies, namely, Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon, which surely touches deep groundings of the concept of truth and reality.

This paper wants to commemorate Akira Toriyama after his death by analyzing his major work, Dragon Ball. In the work, I tried to point out some of the most important characteristics of the series so to understand its success and influence in the mass culture: I found irony to be constitutive as a refined device that broadens the intended audience and, on the other hand, I detected social interests, specifically Japanese complexities, to be structural for the morality of the (...) series. (shrink)

According to Satosi Watanabe's "theorem of the ugly duckling", the number of predicates satisfied by any two different particulars is a constant, which does not depend on the choice of the two particulars. If the number of predicates satisfied by two particulars is their number of properties in common, and the degree of resemblance between two particulars is a function of their number of properties in common, then it follows that the degree of resemblance between any two different particulars (...) is also constant, which is absurd. Avoiding this absurd conclusion requires questioning assumptions about infinity in the proof or interpretation of the theorem, adopting a sparse conception of properties, or denying degree of resemblance is a function of number of properties in common. After arguing against both the first two options, this paper argues for a version of the third which analyses degree of resemblance as a function of properties in common, but weighted by their degree of naturalness or importance. (shrink)

The elimination of ambiguity and redundancy are unquestioned goals in the exact sciences, and yet, as this paper shows, there are inescapable lower bounds that constrain our wish to eliminate them. The author discusses contributions by Richard Hamming (inventor of the Hamming code) and Satosi Watanabe (originator of the Theorems of the Ugly Duckling). Utilizing certain of their results, the author leads readers to recognize the unavoidable, central roles in effective communication, of redundancy, and of ambiguity of meaning, reference, (...) and identification. (shrink)

Physicists routinely claim that the fundamental laws of physics are 'time symmetric' or 'time reversal invariant' or 'reversible'. In particular, it is claimed that the theory of quantum mechanics is time symmetric. But it is shown in this paper that the orthodox analysis suffers from a fatal conceptual error, because the logical criterion for judging the time symmetry of probabilistic theories has been incorrectly formulated. The correct criterion requires symmetry between future-directed laws and past-directed laws. This criterion is formulated and (...) proved in detail. The orthodox claim that quantum mechanics is reversible is re-evaluated. The property demonstrated in the orthodox analysis is shown to be quite distinct from time reversal invariance. The view of Satosi Watanabe that quantum mechanics is time asymmetric is verified, as well as his view that this feature does not merely show a de facto or 'contingent' asymmetry, as commonly supposed, but implies a genuine failure of time reversal invariance of the laws of quantum mechanics. The laws of quantum mechanics would be incompatible with a time-reversed version of our universe. (shrink)

Taking as starting point Akira Kurosawa’s film, I analyse the tension between the reconstructive nature of memory and the possibility of knowing truths from the past, and I explore if the tendency to align our personal memories to our present interests necessarily leads to an sceptic and relativistic vision of the knowledge from the past.

This book is a collection of all the papers published in the special issue “Philosophy and Meaning in Life Vol.4: Selected Papers from the Pretoria Conference,” Journal of Philosophy of Life, Vol.12, No.1, 2022, pp.1-115. -/- Theorizing About Meaning in Life Cheshire Calhoun -/- Is It Possible to Say ‘Yes’ to Traumatic Experiences?: A Philosophical Approach to Human Suffering Masahiro Morioka -/- Why Beauvoir Is Not a Subjectivist about Meaning in Life Kiki Berk -/- Axiological Values Grounded in Basic Motivational (...) Dispositions: How to Be a Subjectivist about Meaning in Life Frank Martela -/- Pessimism, Political Critique, and the Contingently Bad Life Patrick O’Donnell -/- Reason, Luck, and Meaning: A Critique of the Moralist View of Meaning in Life Kazuki Watanabe. (shrink)

In this eleventh book of scilogs – called in-turns and out-turns –, one may find new and old questions and solutions, referring mostly to topics on Neutrosophy, but also Multispace, with miscellaneous addition of topics on Physics, Mathematics, or Sociology – email messages to research colleagues, or replies, notes about authors, articles, or books, spontaneous ideas, and so on. -/- Exchanging ideas with Prem Kumar Singh, Feng Liu, Nicolae Bălașa, Jimmy Quellet, Minodora Rușchița, Frank Gelli, A. R. Vătuiu, Victor Christianto, (...) Vladimir I. Rogozhin, Robert Neil Boyd, Akira Kanda, Stefan Spaarmann, Oliver Consa, Yabin Shao, Junle Zhuo, Nivetha Martin, Said Broumi, Jean Dezert, Erick González, Tomasz Witczak, B. De Baets, I. Couso, D. Dubois, L. Good, Mihaela Colhon, Atiqe Ur Rahman, Muhammad Saeed, Muhammad Ihsan, Edeline Nancy, Shawkat Alkhazaleh, Shazia Rana, Vasantha Kandasamy, Santanu Acharjee, Mohamed Al-Shmrani, Parimala Manie, Mehmet Unver, Murat Olgun, Adel Aleidhri, Akira Kanda, Ilanthenral Kandasamy, Mircea Zărnescu, R. Tayebi Khorami, Arsham Borumand Saeid, Maisam Jdid, M. Abobala, Riad Hamido, Rafael Rojas, Esmaeil Zarei, Faisal Khan, Rouzbeh Abbassi, Adel Al-Odhari, Henry Garrett, Ackbar Rezaei, Saeid Jafari, Karthika Muthusamy, Harish Garg, Huda E. Khalid, Gonca D. Güngör, Muslim A. Noah Zainal, Fakhry Asad Agusfrianto, Madeleine Al-Tahan, Mariam Hariri, Yudi Mahatma, Masoud Ghods, Marco Brigliadori, Luis Enrique Aponte Pérez, Amr Mohammed, M. Aslam (in order of reference in the book). (shrink)

A fundamental problem in understanding the nature of time is explaining its directionality. This 1990 PhD thesis re-examines the concepts of time flow, the physical directionality of time, and the semantics of tensed language. Several novel results are argued for that contradict the orthodox anti-realist views still dominant in the subject. Specifically, the concept of "metaphysical time flow" is supported as a valid scientific concept, and argued to be intrinsic to the directionality of objective probabilities in quantum mechanics; the common (...) claims that quantum probability theory is time reversible is shown to be based on an analytic error, stemming from a false choice for the criterion for reversibility of probabilistic theories (recognized by Satosi Watanabe in the 1950s but ignored in all philosophical discussions); and a consistent semantics for tensed language (adapted from the tree model of Storrs McCall) is constructed, showing that the common rejection of "time flow" as having no meaningful semantics is false. These debates are still ongoing in almost exactly the same state they were pre-1990, and there is appears to be no visible progress in the subject. Critical points made against errors in the orthodox account (which has been sustained for 70 years by the anti-realist philosophy of time, typified by the "Pittsburg School" of Grunbaum-Earman-Norton-Roberts), are still not recognized in the philosophy of time or physics. Some key technical proofs in this thesis have been published in physics proper. See p.ii-iii for full original abstract. (This pdf is uploaded from the Massey University archive.). (shrink)

Nella sua riflessione filosofica sull’immagine filmica Gilles Deleuze sembra aver tradotto nella maniera più immediata, ancorché insolubilmente problematica, la presenza di uno spazio e di un tempo che giocano il proprio ruolo su di una forma passiva di soggettività: è proprio ne L’image- mouvement, infatti, che Deleuze mostra come uno dei passaggi più proficui delle sue osservazioni sul cinema sia proprio la crisi di ciò che egli definisce immagine-azione, a favore, invece, di un’immagine-tempo, o situazione ottica e sonora pura. Per (...) quanto attiene specificamente lo statuto filosofico dell’immagine, si può dire che sia proprio questo passaggio che consente a Deleuze stesso di modulare la sua riflessione riponendo maggiore attenzione all’elemento temporale rispetto invece al movimento — concetto dal quale, ciononostante, l’indagine sul cinema aveva preso abbrivio. (shrink)