Time travel and superluminal travel are two of mankind's dreams. They inspire our imagination and provide material for bizarre stories. -/- A work on the subject of time travel and superluminal travel forces us to re-examine our concept of "time". The complexity and the contradictory nature this subject makes it difficult to be more precise about "time". On its deepest subjective side, time is a means of perception, a biological rhythm, a social phenomenon in terms of our collective understanding of (...) time. But it is also a physical parameter. -/- Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity revolutionised our idea of space and time by freeing us from the Newtonian concept of absolute space and absolute time. The "problem of time travel", a subject that Herbert George Wells wrote about just ten years before as mere fiction, was now a discussion worthy of physics. Albert Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity (1905), by predicting the effects of time dilation, allowed for "travels into the future" and Albert Einstein's Theory of Gravity used closed time-like lines for solutions to calculations about time travel (for example, the Gödel Universe and the Anti-de Sitter Universe). However, a trip to a time warp would immediately involve a whole set of paradoxes (for example, the grandfather paradox and the information paradox) and semantic inconsistencies. -/- Surprisingly, the fundamental laws of physics (apart from extremely rare and non-emergent macroscopic quantum mechanical effects) are not violated by the concept of time reversal. Yet, in nature, there still seems to be a fundamental prohibition against time travel to the past. Physicist Dieter Zeh, whose position is more closely presented in the final chapter of this work, supports the view that science fiction literature on the subject of "time travel" is overwhelmingly based on simple conceptual errors. The processes used in this literature, which are based on the General Theory of Relativity, at best, are just as "theoretically possible" as a gas which gathers itself into the corner of a container. -/- This work discusses approaches for "time machines" and superluminal travel which are consistent with modern physics. Some of the discussions that will be presented are the tachyon hypothesis, Frank J. Tipler's rotating cylinder, the Gödel Universe, the Anti-de Sitter Universe, so-called "wormholes" and the Alcubierre-metric. At the same time, approaches will be presented (for example, Eternalism, the Many-Worlds Interpretation and the Consistent Histories Approach) that will provide attempts to find a solution for paradoxes regarding time travel to the past. -/- Questions about time travel to the past and superluminal travel are like the questions asked on Radio Yerevan. The answer is always, "In principle yes, but…" But the fascination about time travel will continue to provide material for "fiction". (shrink)

Time travel is one of mankind's most ancient dreams. It inspires our imagination and provides material for bizarre stories. H. G. Wells' novel, "The Time Machine" (1895), marks the beginning of a long history of science fiction literature devoted to the subject of time travel. -/- A work on the subject of time travel forces us to re-examine our concept of "time". The complexity and the contradictory nature this subject makes it difficult to be more precise about "time". On its (...) deepest subjective side, time is a means of perception, a biological rhythm, a social phenomenon in terms of our collective understanding of time. But it is also a physical parameter. -/- Einstein's Theory of Relativity revolutionised our idea of space and time by freeing us from the Newtonian concept of absolute space and absolute time. The "problem of time travel", a subject that Wells wrote about just ten years before as mere fiction, was now a discussion worthy of physics. Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity (1905), by predicting the effects of time dilation, allowed for "travels into the future" and Einstein's Theory of Gravity used closed time-like lines for solutions to calculations about time travel (for example, the Gödel Universe and the Anti-de Sitter Universe). However, a trip to a time warp would immediately involve a whole set of paradoxes (for example, the grandfather paradox and the information paradox) and semantic inconsistencies. -/- This work discusses approaches for "time machines" which are consistent with modern physics. Some of the discussions that will be presented are the tachyon hypothesis, Tipler's rotating cylinder, the Gödel Universe, the Anti-de Sitter Universe and so-called "wormholes". At the same time, approaches will be presented (for example, Eternalism, the Many-Worlds Interpretation and the Consistent Histories Approach) that will provide attempts to find a solution for paradoxes regarding time travel to the past. -/- Surprisingly, the fundamental laws of physics (apart from extremely rare and non-emergent macroscopic quantum mechanical effects) are not violated by the concept of time reversal. Yet, in nature, there still seems to be a fundamental prohibition against time travel to the past. Physicist Dieter Zeh, whose position is more closely presented in the final chapter of this work, supports the view that science fiction literature on the subject of "time travel" is overwhelmingly based on simple conceptual errors. The processes used in this literature, which are based on the General Theory of Relativity, at best, are just as "theoretically possible" as a gas which gathers itself into the corner of a container. -/- Questions about time travel to the past are like the questions asked on Radio Yerevan. The answer is always, "In principle yes, but…" But the fascination about time travel will continue to provide material for "fiction". // -/- Zeitreisen sind ein alter Menschheitstraum; sie beflügeln die Fantasie und bieten Stoff für skurrile Geschichten. Wells’ Roman „Die Zeitmaschine (1895)“ steht am Anfang einer Fülle von Science-Fiction-Literatur, die sich dem Thema der Zeitreisen widmet. -/- Eine Arbeit zum Thema Zeitreisen zwingt zu einer Auseinandersetzung mit dem Begriff der „Zeit“. Die Vielschichtigkeit und der antinomische Charakter dieses Begriffes machen es schwer, „Zeit“ genauer zu fassen. Zeit tritt uns entgegen als Form der Wahrnehmung in ihrer zutiefst subjektiven Seite, als biologischer Rhythmus, als soziales Phänomen im Sinne einer kollektiven Zeitbestimmung, aber eben auch als physikalischer Parameter. -/- Einsteins Relativitätstheorie revolutioniert unsere Vorstellungen von Raum und Zeit, indem sie sich vom newtonsch-mechanischen Konzept des absoluten Raumes und der absoluten Zeit löst. Sie macht aber das, was bei Wells zehn Jahre vorher noch reine Fiktion war, zu einem für die Physik diskussionswürdigen Thema, nämlich das „Problem der Zeitreisen“. Einsteins Spezielle Relativitätstheorie (1905) erlaubt durch den von ihr vorhergesagten Effekt der Zeitdilatation „Reisen in die Zukunft“ und die Einsteinsche Gravitationstheorie lässt geschlossene zeitartige Linien als Lösungen ihrer Gleichungen zu (z. B. Gödel-Kosmos, Anti-de-Sitter-Kosmos). Allerdings würde eine Reise auf einer Zeitschleife sofort ein ganzes Bündel von Paradoxien (z.B. Großvater-Paradoxon, Informationsparadoxon) und semantischen Inkonsistenzen nach sich ziehen. -/- Die vorliegende Arbeit erörtert Ansätze für „Zeitmaschinen“, die in Einklang mit der modernen Physik stehen. Besprochen werden u. a. die Tachyonen-Hypothese, Tiplers rotierender Zylinder, der Gödel-Kosmos, der Anti-de-Sitter-Kosmos und die sogenannten „Wurmlöcher“. Zugleich sollen Ansätze vorgestellt werden (z. B. Eternalismus, Viele-Welten-Modell, Prinzip der konsistenten Geschichte), die Lösungsversuche für die Paradoxien von Vergangenheitsreisen bieten. -/- Obwohl erstaunlicherweise die fundamentalen Gesetze der Physik (abgesehen von extrem seltenen und makroskopisch nicht in Erscheinung tretenden quantenmechanischen Effekten) bei einer Zeitumkehr nicht verletzt sind, scheint es in der Natur doch ein grundsätzliches Verbot von Vergangenheitsreisen zu geben. Der Physiker Dieter Zeh, dessen Position im Schlusskapitel der Arbeit näher beleuchtet wird, vertritt die Auffassung, dass die Science-Fiction-Literatur zum Thema „Zeitreisen“ überwiegend auf einfachen begrifflichen Fehlern beruhe. Die in Anlehnung an die Allgemeine Relativitätstheorie konstruierten Vorgänge seien bestenfalls genauso „theoretisch möglich“ wie ein Gas, das sich von selbst in einer Ecke des Gefäßes versammelt. -/- Um die Reisen in die Vergangenheit scheint es zu stehen wie mit einer Anfrage an Radio Jerewan; die Antwort lautet stets: „Im Prinzip ja, aber …“ Doch die Faszination dieser Idee wird weiterhin Stoff für die „Fiction“ liefern. (shrink)

Carnap, Quine, and Putnam on Methods of Inquiry (2017) es el último libro publicado por Gary Ebbs, profesor titular de filosofía en la Universidad de Indiana. Ebbs ha dedicado su carrera al estudio de la metodología de la investigación racional, tratando temas como la verdad, la verdad lógica, el seguimiento de reglas o el anti-individualismo semántico. Como el propio título indica, el libro aquí reseñado se centra en los métodos de investigación de tres autores: Carnap, Quine y Putnam.

In this paper, we make a proposal for addressing the cosmological constant problem. Our approach will be based on a reinterpretation of two non-standard de Sitter solutions given by the Einstein vacuum equations with Λ>0. As a first result, we derive an uncertainty principle for both variants of the de Sitter space (Theorem). Subsequently, a decomposition of the cosmological constant in a pair of time-dependent pieces is introduced (Corollary). The time-dependence of the corresponding energy and dark energy density (...) is discussed and especially matched at the Planck scale. Furthermore, we show that for every instant of cosmic time this approach can be revealed in terms of a Schwarzschild-Anti-de Sitter cosmology with Λ>0. The corresponding field equations are provided. (shrink)

The purpose of this note is to show how an 'AB-series' interpretation of time, given in a companion paper, leads, surprisingly, directly to the physicists' important AdS5 geometry. This is not a theory of 2 time dimensions. Rather, it is a theory of 1 time dimension that has both B-series and A-series characteristics. -/- To summarize the result, a spacetime in terms of 1. the earlier-to-later aspect of time, and 2. the related future-present-past aspect of time, and 3. 3-d space, (...) automatically gives us AdS_5. (shrink)

Why does ‘ethnic cleansing’ occur? Why does the rise of nationalist feeling in Europe and of Black separatist movements in the United States often go hand in hand with an upsurge of anti-Semitism? Why do some mixings of distinct religious and ethnic groups succeed, where others (for example in Northern Ireland, or in Bosnia) fail so catastrophically? Why do phrases like ‘balkanisation’, ‘dismemberment’, ‘mutilation’, ‘violation of the motherland’ occur so often in warmongering rhetoric? All of these questions are, it (...) will turn out, connected. To understand how they are connected we we will need to examine how human beings acquire a relationship to specific chunks of land, a relationship that is emotionally so strong that they are prepared to die – or kill – to protect that land for themselves or to win it back from others. Territoriality, the biologically rooted predisposition to defend core areas of home ranges against intruders, is a near-universal phenomenon amongst animals of all species. But the ways in which defended territories are conceived and demarcated differ widely from species to species and from group to group. By coming to an understanding of the geometry of these differences we can come to understand also some of the factors which give rise to interethnic conflict. (shrink)

The paper introduces Vailati’s life and works, investigating Vailati’s education, the relation to Peano and his school, and the interest for pragmatism and modernism. A detailed analysis of Vailati’s scientific and didactic activities, shows that he held, like Peano, a a strong interest for the history of science and a pluralist, anti-dogmatic and anti-foundationalist conception of definitions in mathematics, logic and philosophy of language. Vailati’s understanding of mathematical logic as a form of pragmatism is not a faithful interpretation (...) of Peano’s conception, but it is essential to understand the relations of Peano’s logic with other philosophical traditions and some epistemological aspects of Peano’s perspective, such as the search for a universal language. (shrink)

This paper analyzes areas of convergence in the works of Amartya Sen and Slavoj Žižek in their criticisms of the multiculturalist approach to non-violence. First, Žižek’s characterization of the liberal discourse of guilt and fear is presented. Then, Sen’s key ideas on multiculturalism, tolerance, and rational critique are explicated. Next, a synthesis of Sen and Žižek’s notions of universality, freedom, and rationality, as well as of their critical conceptions of globalization and anti-globalization are discussed. Subsequently, Sen and Žižek’s divergences (...) on overcoming violence are examined. Lastly, from integrating Sen and Žižek’s thoughts, key theses are provided on the paradoxical character of the multiculturalist approach to non-violence and on how despite their divergences, both Sen and Žižek propose radical systematic changes and an alternative approach to non-violence characterized by the universals of rationality and genuine freedom. (shrink)

The concept of observability is of key importance for a consistent defense of Constructive Empiricism. This anti-realist position, originally presented in 1980 by Bas van Fraassen in his book The Scientific Image, crucially depends on the observable/unobservable dichotomy. Nevertheless, the question of what it means to observe has been faced in an unsatisfactory and inadequate manner by van Fraassen and this represents an important lacuna in his philosophical position. The aim of this work is to propose a characterization of (...) the act of observation able to give the necessary support to the ‘rough guide’ of ‘observable’ that can be found in the aforementioned book. Countering van Fraassen’s own statements, that observability is not a matter for philosophy, but for scientific inquiry only, we maintain that any attempt to deal with this subject by the philosophers is legitimate. We will show that van Fraassen ended up doing a philosophical analysis of observation himself, albeit in a fragmentary way. We believe that this question should be dealt with methodically, though, ‘following the rules’ of a ‘proper’ philosophical analysis, as we attempted to do in this work. We will propose a way of conceiving the act of observation, different from van Fraassen’s one, that can help not only to ground the distinction between observable and unobservable, upon which Constructive Empiricism rests, but to get this anti-realist position closer to scientific practice as well, which is one of its desiderata. Without neglecting the philosophical dimension of the issue, though. However, this proposal does not represent an ad hoc ‘solution’ for Constructive Empiricism, but a characterization aspiring to have a universal reach. (shrink)

The purpose of this yet-another version of this note is to make another attempt to show how an 'AB-series' interpretation of time, given in a companion paper, leads, surprisingly, apparently, to the signature of the physicists' important AdS^5 geometry. This is not a theory of 2 time dimensions. Rather, it is a theory of 1 time dimension that has both A-series and B-series characteristics.

The purpose of this note is to show how an 'AB-series' interpretation of time leads, surprisingly, apparently, to AdS_5 geometry. This is not a theory of 2 time dimensions. Rather, it is a theory of 1 time dimension that has both A-series and B-series characteristics. To summarize the result, a spacetime in terms of (1) the earlier-to-later aspect of time, and (2) the (related) future-present-past aspect of time, and (3) 3-d space, it would seem, gives us the AdS_5 geometry.

Thinking the Visual, Visualizing the Thought. A perceptual and Political Model of VisionMerleau-Ponty’s program of perceptivizing thought has depoliticizing effects that, though he does not recognize them, undermine his understanding of politics. These anti-political consequences, moreover, bring out the internal difficulties of his anti-intellectualist starting point. There are three areas in which Merleau-Ponty gave a thorough application, though with unequal success, of his perception-based model: the presentation of his own thought, in which his program of picturalization had a (...) striking success; the explanation of the historical process, in which his visualization model was only partly effective; and access to other people’s thought, in which his perceptivist views encountered an undeniable failure. Merleau-Ponty’s successive approaches to other people’s thought show, by two distinct paths, and beyond his own intentions, an unforeseen political defect. His perceptive model proves incompatible with his political ideas when it is applied in depth, and it thus breaks apart the cohesion of his thought. From a larger perspective, it disrupts reflective approaches to politics since it damages their conceptual bases. This article shows successively that Merleau-Ponty laid out a perceptive model of universal scope; that he applied it to several areas, including politics; that this model proves politically deficient when it serves to remove the autochthonous sources of sense; that these depoliticizing effects become more acute when Merleau-Ponty employs the perceptive model to elucidate other people’s thought; and that its frustration in this area not only devalues his political reflections, but also signals that the perceptive model simply prevents a “thinking of the political.”Pensare il visuale, visualizzare il pensiero.Un modello percettivo e politico della visioneIl programma di percettivizzazione del pensiero intrapreso da Merleau-Ponty comporta effetti spoliticizzanti che sconfessano nascostamente la sua comprensione della politica. Tali conseguenze antipolitiche mettono altresì in rilievo le difficoltà intrinseche alla sua posizione anti-intellettualista. Vi sono tre ambiti nei quali Merleau-Ponty, con diverso successo, ha applicato il suo modello percettivo : la presentazione del suo stesso pensiero, nella quale questo programma di pittoricizzazione incontra un successo trionfale; la chiarificazione del processo storico, dove tale modello “visualeˮ non è efficace che in parte; infine l’accesso al pensiero di altri autori, terreno sul quale questa prospettiva percettivista subisce uno scacco innegabile. Molti tentativi merleaupontiani di approcciare il pensiero di altri autori attestano in vario modo un imprevisto deficit politico. Il modello percettivo di Merleau-Ponty si rivela in altri termini incompatibile con le sue idee politiche, nel momento in cui viene applicato in profondità, e in ultima analisi mette a dura prova la coerenza del suo pensiero. In una prospettiva più ampia, esso ostacola un approccio riflessivo alla politica poiché ne degrada le stesse basi concettuali. Il nostro articolo mostra quindi che Merleau-Ponty ha articolato un modello percettivo di portata universale; che l’ha applicato a svariati ambiti d’indagine, tra cui la politica; che quel modello si rivela deficitario quando viene utilizzato per attingere a specifiche fonti di senso; che tali effetti spoliticizzanti si acuiscono nel momento in cui Merleau-Ponty adotta il modello percettivo per illuminare il pensiero di altri autori; che, per concludere, la sua incongruenza con questo peculiare ambito di riflessione non solo impoverisce le sue riflessioni politiche, ma attesta che in linea generale il modello percettivo sbarra la strada a un qualsiasi «pensiero del politico». (shrink)

A review of A. Hisch and N. de Marchi's thorough historical study on Milton Friedman's life-long work as an economist (and more specifically as a monetary economist) and as an economic methodologist (in his famous essay "The Methodology of Positive Economics".

This is a critical review of David Patterson's book Anti-Semitism and Its Metaphysical Origins (2015). In this review, I present the author's new explanation of the roots of anti-Semitism, which he finds in the anti-Semite's desire to become like God himself. Patterson's explanation makes an anti-Semite of all those who partake in the "Western rationalist project," especially philosophers (including Jewish philosophers such as Spinoza, Hermann Cohen, and Marx), but also Islamists and anti-Zionist Jews. I criticize (...) Patterson on two fronts: First, his "metaphysical" explanation relies on a petitio principii. Second, he should have argued his stance against that of Zeev Sternhell's thesis, according to which Western anti-Semitism is rooted, not in Western rationalism, but rather in the Western anti-rationalist (anti-Enlightenment) movement. (shrink)

Review of: Guillelmus de Aragonia, De nobilitate animi, ed. and trans. William D. Paden and Mario Trovato. (Harvard Studies in Medieval Latin 2.) Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012. Pp. xvi, 193. $40. ISBN: 978-0-674-06812-4.

Este artículo tiene el propósito de argumentar cómo se logra una contribución eximia a la Literatura al abarcar la universalidad de sus recursos. Para demostrar ese acápite, he tomado como referente la perspectiva de Mario Vargas Llosa en relación con el debate que se efectuó entre Julio Cortázar y José María Arguedas. De ese encuentro académico, es asequible auscultar tres tópicos perentorios que se orientan a preservar la condición literaria desde una volición global. El primero de ellos consiste en reanudar (...) un conocimiento sobre la realidad mundial para poder interactuar con una audiencia compatible. El segundo se basa en considerar los estilos y las técnicas que no claudican de la tradición ni la evolución literaria. Para finiquitar, se mencionará la diatriba biográfica como una muestra del desarraigo de lo fundamental en la exégesis. Estos temas buscarán validar la propensión del autor a abordar múltiples realidades. (shrink)

Este escrito pretende aproximarse al anti-fundacionalismo defendido por Stanley Fish y que tiene su manifestación más clara en su teoría literaria. Por ello, iniciaremos, primero, por contextualizar la obra de Fish y, segundo, examinaremos algunos aspectos relevantes de su teoría literaria y su relación con el anti-fundacionalismo, así como algunas de sus consecuencias epistemológicas derivadas de esta postura teórica.

A reflection on the philosophical traditions at the Autonomous University of Nuevo Leon and in the city of Monterrey.

El trabajo somete a discusión algunos elementos y argumentos del ensayo "Anti-Nietzsche. La crueldad de lo político" de Jorge Polo Blanco. Analizo el libro de Polo considerando el problema de la diversidad de caracterizaciones parciales que obtiene la figura de Nietzsche en el pensamiento filosófico contemporáneo y el desafío que supone actualizar a Nietzsche a la luz de nuestras sensibilidades democráticas. Examino los capítulos del libro apuntando algunas de las incorrecciones y aspectos más dudosos de su argumentario “anti-nietzscheano” (...) e incidiendo en la importancia del estudio de fuentes (Quellenforschung) y de la historia de las ediciones de la obra de Nietzsche para una interpretación filosófica rigurosa. Palabras clave: Nietzsche, Política, Democracia, Crítica genética, Fuentes, Ediciones. -/- Abstract: This article discusses some elements and arguments of Jorge Polo Blanco’s book, Anti-Nietzsche. La crueldad de lo político. I analyze Polo’s book while considering the problem of the diversity of characterizations that Nietzsche receives in contemporary philosophical thought and the challenge of evaluating his philosophy in light of our democratic sensibilities. I examine the different chapters and identify some of the inaccuracies and most dubious aspects of Polo’s “anti-Nietzschean” argument. In doing so, I stress the importance of source research (Quellenforschung) and the history of the editions for rigorous philosophical analyses. Keywords: Nietzsche, Politics, Democracy, Genetic Criticism, Sources, Editions. (shrink)

In this engaging, provocative, and highly original study, Karin de Boer offers an interpretation of key parts of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason as a preparation for an anticipated (and positive) system of metaphysics that is broadly Wolffian in character. In contrast to the lopsided scholarly focus on the negative results of Kant’s project—its “all-crushing” effect on traditional metaphysics—de Boer contends that the Critique is in fact the outgrowth of a longstanding ambition on Kant’s part to make metaphysics into a (...) science, that is, an organized body of a priori knowledge. In so doing, de Boer insists that Kant’s approach should not be taken to be that of a revolutionary overthrowing the ancien régime but instead that of a reformer who retains and works within an established (in this case Wolffian) framework by way of resolving metaphysics’ internal conflicts. In what follows, rather than offering a chapter-by-chapter summary, I will offer an overview of what I take to be the main line of argument in de Boer’s book, followed by a couple of critical remarks. (shrink)

O objetivo deste trabalho é apresentar a tese do filósofo e economista nipo-americano Francis Fukuyama, conhecida como “fim da história”, para refletir sobre o argumento central dessa tese de que o transumanismo representa um problema para a democracia. Para tanto, será realizada uma análise conceitual, a partir de trechos selecionados, dos trabalhos de Fukuyama intituladosO fim da história e o último homem, Ourposthuman futuree “Transhumanism”. Segundo Fukuyama, uma vez que os resultados da biotecnologia permitem cada vez mais aos humanos controlar (...) sua própria evolução, também podem permitir que os humanos alterem sua própria natureza. Dessa forma, Fukuyama argumenta que um resultado possível da alteração da natureza humana de alguns indivíduos pode ser a desigualdade radical, o que colocaria em risco a democracia liberal. Com base nesse argumento de Fukuyama busca-se refletir sobre as possíveis implicações negativas do transumanismo para a democracia em geral. The objective of this paper is to present the thesis of the Japanese-American philosopher and economist Francis Fukuyama, known as the “end of history”, to reflect on the central argument of this thesis that transhumanism represents a problem for democracy.Therefore, a conceptual analysis will be carried out, based on selected excerpts, of Fukuyama's works entitledThe end of history and the last man, Our posthuman futureand “Transhumanism”.According to Fukuyama, as the results of biotechnology increasingly allow humans to control their own evolution, they may also allow humans to alter their own nature.Thus, Fukuyama argues that a possible result of altering the human nature of some individuals could be radical inequality, which would put liberal democracy at risk.Based on Fukuyama's argument, we seek to reflect on the possible negative implications of transhumanism for democracy in general. (shrink)

Book Review: De Regt, H. W. Understanding Scientific Understanding. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017.

There is a tension in our theorizing about laws of nature: our practice of using and reasoning with laws of nature suggests that laws are universal generalizations, but if laws are universal generalizations then we face the problem of explanatory circularity. In this paper I elucidate this tension and show how it motivates a view of laws that I call Minimal Anti-Humeanism. This view says that the laws are the universal generalizations that are not grounded in their instances. I (...) argue that this view has a variety of advantages that could make it attractive to people with both Humean and anti-Humean inclinations. (shrink)

We propose a novel interpretation of consciousness and an enlarged definition of locality, which provide a solution to the problem of the consistency of measurements in quantum mechanics: consciousness is a characteristics of the Universe as a whole. Besides its physical consequences, this interpretation has also moral implications: individuality comes out naturally to be just an accident functional to evolution which shaped past and present history through competition, and realizing this fact should enforce cooperation.

La cobertura universal de salud está en el centro de la acción actual para fortalecer los sistemas de salud y mejorar el nivel y la distribución de la salud y los servicios de salud. Este documento es el informe fi nal del Grupo Consultivo de la OMS sobre la Equidad y Cobertura Universal de Salud. Aquí se abordan los temas clave de la justicia (fairness) y la equidad que surgen en el camino hacia la cobertura universal de salud. Por lo (...) tanto, el informe es pertinente para cada agente que infl uye en ese camino y en particular para los gobiernos, ya que se encargan de supervisar y guiar el progreso hacia la cobertura universal de salud. (shrink)

Recent experimental research has revealed surprising patterns in people's intuitions about free will and moral responsibility. One limitation of this research, however, is that it has been conducted exclusively on people from Western cultures. The present paper extends previous research by presenting a cross-cultural study examining intuitions about free will and moral responsibility in subjects from the United States, Hong Kong, India and Colombia. The results revealed a striking degree of cross-cultural convergence. In all four cultural groups, the majority of (...) participants said that (a) our universe is indeterministic and (b) moral responsibility is not compatible with determinism. (shrink)

In Ancient Greece, when philosophy began, it included all the theoretical knowledge. But later, in the time of Aristotle, specialized sciences started to emerge and the scope of philosophy grew smaller and smaller. The question is what to do when philosophy has lost its competence to deal with any relevant topic. The paper discusses three possible views of the relation between philosophy and science: anti-scientism, conceptual analysis and naturalism. All these approaches deal with various disadvantages. For anti-scientism it (...) is mainly the inability to explain the unprecedented success of modern science. Proponents of conceptual analysis are confronted with Quine’s attack on analytic statements and its consequences for a priori truths. Finally, naturalistic philosophers might be threatened by hegemony of science and its universal application of hypothetico-deductive method. The worst scenario for naturalistic philosophers is not as bad as some worry. Philosophers can solve their traditional problems using the knowledge of well-established special sciences, even though they might play the role of high-end science journalists. (shrink)

In this paper we extend Neutro-Algebra and Anti-Algebra to geometric spaces, founding Neutro/Geometry and AntiGeometry. While Non-Euclidean Geometries resulted from the total negation of a specific axiom (Euclid's Fifth Postulate), AntiGeometry results from the total negation of any axiom or even more axioms of any geometric axiomatic system (Euclidean, Hilbert, etc. ) and of any type of geometry such as Geometry (Euclidean, Projective, Finite, Differential, Algebraic, Complex, Discrete, Computational, Molecular, Convex, etc.), and Neutro-Geometry results from the partial negation of (...) one or more axioms [and without total negation of any axiom] of any geometric axiomatic system and of any type of geometry. Generally, instead of a classical geometric Axiom, one can take any classical geometric Theorem of any axiomatic system and of any type of geometry, and transform it by Neutrosophication or Antisofication into a Neutro-Theorem or Anti-Theorem respectively to construct a Neutro-Geometry or Anti-Geometry. Therefore, Neutro-Geometry and Anti-Geometry are respectively alternatives and generalizations of Non-Euclidean Geometries. In the second part, the evolution from Paradoxism to Neutrosophy, then to NeutroAlgebra and Anti-Algebra, then to Neutro-Geometry and Anti-Geometry, and in general to Neutro-Structure and Anti-Structure that arise naturally in any field of knowledge is recalled. At the end, applications of many Neutro-Structures in our real world are presented. (shrink)

The article aims to focus on a brief historical and epistemological reflection on the issue of the emergence of fundamental rights in the Western tradition and its universalist and hegemonic claim in the colonized countries of the New World -whose ideal of the subject of law is paradoxically restricted to the human person of an autochthonous-European and Euro-diasporic character due to affirmative policies and promotion of European immigration, subsidized by the colonized Ibero-American States. At the same time, it seeks to (...) analyze the phenomenon of acculturation of the aforementioned law and its inducing character of the process of destitution of the condition of subject of the Afro-diasporic population in the New World, from the perspective of the Critical Theory of Race (CCT). and emphasizing its relationship with the ideology of racial supremacism present in the institutional ideal of a post-independence Ibero-American State during the 19th century. (shrink)

Taking as an assumption the existence of an informatics revolution nowadays and that the examination of studies and debates related to it may allow the identification of questions of a philosophical nature, the present study aims to identify and formulate some of these questions, as well as to investigate whether the historical controversy about monopsychism, which occurred at the University of Paris in 1270, can be considered a theoretical framework capable of providing contributions to these philosophical questions. The answer to (...) this research problem may be positive, insofar as the aforementioned theoretical framework allows to identify contributions to the solution of the above mentioned questions. Or negative, otherwise. Or even in terms, to the extent that such subsidies only partially meet their objectives or raise, in turn, new questions. (shrink)

In this review essay, I review in detail Abram de Swann's fine new book, The Killing Compartments. The book is a theoretical analysis of the varieties and causes of genocides and other mass asymmetrical killing campaigns. I then suggest several criticisms of his analysis.

State of the art paper on the topic realism/anti-realism. The first part of the paper elucidates the notions of existence and independence of the metaphysical characterization of the realism/anti-realism dispute. The second part of the paper presents a critical taxonomy of the most important positions and doctrines in the contemporary literature on the domains of science and mathematics: scientific realism, scientific anti-realism, constructive empiricism, structural realism, mathematical Platonism, mathematical indispensability, mathematical empiricism, intuitionism, mathematical fictionalism and second philosophy.

A note summarizing a workshop dedicated to the discussion of Dennett's book Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life (1995). It includes a reflection on the basic tenets of Darwin's theory of evolution and natural selection.

Incluido a modo de prólogo en el libro Epistemología crítica de la violencia del capital. Verdad y violencia epistémica, el trabajo “Verdad y violencia epistémica. Desafíos al conocimiento humanista sobre lo universal” busca analizar críticamente esa forma particular de violencia que, utilizando herramientas epistemológicas, se basa en el control monopólico de la verdad y en el secuestro de la universalidad humana por parte de aquellos que encarnan los intereses asociados a la lógica del capital y que, precisamente gracias a ese (...) control y a ese secuestro, hacen pasar por verdadera y universal su propia visión del mundo. Al mismo tiempo, se devela la complicidad que con tal posición posee en los hechos, sea o no consciente de ello, aquella postura teórica que, para supuestamente enfrentar tal usurpación de la verdad y la universalidad, asume como salida la negación en abstracto de la existencia misma de la una y la otra. En contraste crítico con esta postura, el trabajo se propone mostrar las condiciones de posibilidad real y concreta del conocimiento verdadero sobre lo universal. (shrink)

Anti-individualists hold that having a thought with a certain intentional content is a relational rather than an intrinsic property of the subject. Some anti-individualists also hold that thought-content serves to explain the subject’s cognitive perspective. Since there seems to be a tension between these two views, much discussed in the philosophical literature, attempts have been made to resolve it. In an attempt to reconcile these views, and in relation to perception-based demonstrative thoughts, Stalnaker (Our knowledge of the internal (...) world, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2008) argues that an anti-individualist account of the facts that determine thought-content can be reconciled with a suitably qualified version of a principle of epistemic transparency. Acknowledging this, and in agreement with the view that thought-content should serve to explain the subject’s cognitive perspective, I argue that, his intentions notwithstanding, this view of transparency of thought-contents does not serve to explain the subject’s cognitive perspective on Stalnaker’s own terms and that the intricacies involved in his argumentation for saving his anti-individualist project are indirectly supportive of an individualist account of the subject’s cognitive perspective. In so doing, I leave intact some of his key claims that are plausible in their own right. (shrink)

This paper concerns anti-Humean intuitions about connections in nature. It argues for the existence of a de re link that is not necessity.Some anti-Humeans tacitly assume that metaphysical necessity can be used for all sorts of anti-Humean desires. Metaphysical necessity is thought to stick together whatever would be loose and separate in a Hume world, as if it were a kind of universal superglue.I argue that this is not feasible. Metaphysical necessity might connect synchronically co-existent properties—kinds and (...) their essential features, for example—but it is difficult to see how it could also serve as the binding force for successions of events. That is, metaphysical necessity seems not to be fit for diachronic, causal affairs in which causal laws, causation, or dispositions are involved. A different anti-Humean connection in nature has to do that job.My arguments focus mainly on a debate which has been the battleground for Humean vs. anti-Humean intuitions for many decades—namely, the analysis of dispositional predicates—yet I believe (but do not argue here) that the arguments generalise to causation and causal laws straightforwardly. (shrink)

a book review for Hagen Schulze's "Gibt es überhaupt eine deutsche Geschichte?" done as a homework for university (KIT Institut für Geschichte) Modul Pol.G. I.

En 1994 el shayj Ali Muhsin Al Barwani concluyó en el exilio su traducción del Corán al swahili. La principal característica es que huía del swahili estándar formulado por los británicos, para usar el swahili clásico que se enseñaba en las madâris (escuelas coránicas) de Kenya, Tanzania y Zanzíbar. Además, esta traducción introducía elementos (léxico, símbolos, construcciones sociales) del pensamiento tradicional islámico swahili. Nuestro trabajo es un análisis hermenéutico simbólico de la primera sûrâ del Corán, al Fâtiha, para determinar los (...) elementos tradicionales swahilis, descristianizantes y anti-colonialistas en el texto de Al Barwani. De ahí inferiremos qué papel tiene esta traducción como elemento de resistencia contra el colonialismo. (shrink)

Review of Henk de Regt's "Understanding Scientific Understanding".

Sensibility, in any of its myriad realms – moral, physical, aesthetic, medical and so on – seems to be a paramount case of a higher-level, intentional property, not a basic property. Diderot famously made the bold and attributive move of postulating that matter itself senses, or that sensibility (perhaps better translated ‘sensitivity’ here) is a general or universal property of matter, even if he at times took a step back from this claim and called it a “supposition.” Crucially, sensibility is (...) here playing the role of a ‘booster’: it enables materialism to provide a full and rich account of the phenomena of conscious, sentient life, contrary to what its opponents hold: for if matter can sense, and sensibility is not a merely mechanical process, then the loftiest cognitive plateaus are accessible to materialist analysis, or at least belong to one and the same world as the rest of matter. This was noted by the astute anti-materialist critic, the Abbé Lelarge de Lignac, who, in his 1751 Lettres à un Amériquain, criticized Buffon for “granting to the body [la machine, a common term for the body at the time] a quality which is essential to minds, namely sensibility.” This view, here attributed to Buffon and definitely held by Diderot, was comparatively rare. If we look for the sources of this concept, the most notable ones are physiological and medical treatises by prominent figures such as Robert Whytt, Albrecht von Haller and the Montpellier vitalist Théophile de Bordeu. We then have, or so I shall try to sketch out, an intellectual landscape in which new – or newly articulated – properties such as irritability and sensibility are presented either as an experimental property of muscle fibers, that can be understood mechanistically (Hallerian irritability, as studied recently by Hubert Steinke and Dominique Boury) or a property of matter itself (whether specifically living matter as in Bordeu and his fellow montpelliérains Ménuret and Fouquet, or matter in general, as in Diderot). I am by no means convinced that it is one and the same ‘sensibility’ that is at issue in debates between these figures (as when Bordeu attacks Haller’s distinction between irritability and sensibility and claims that ‘his own’ property of sensibility is both more correct and more fundamental in organic beings), but I am interested in mapping out a topography of the problem of sensibility as property of matter or as vital force in mid-eighteenth-century debates – not an exhaustive cartography of all possible positions or theories, but an attempt to understand the ‘triangulation’ of three views: a vitalist view in which sensibility is fundamental, matching up with a conception of the organism as the sum of parts conceived as little lives (Bordeu et al.); a mechanist, or ‘enhanced mechanist’ view in which one can work upwards, step by step from the basic property of irritability to the higher-level property of sensibility (Haller); and, more eclectic, a materialist view which seeks to combine the mechanistic, componential rigour and explanatory power of the Hallerian approach, with the monistic and metaphysically explosive potential of the vitalist approach (Diderot). It is my hope that examining Diderot in the context of this triangulated topography of sensibility as property sheds light on his famous proclamation regarding sensibility as a universal property of matter. (shrink)

Certain realists about properties and relations identify them with universals. Furthermore, some hold that for a wide range of meaningful predicates, the semantic contribution to the propositions expressed by the sentences in which those predicates figure is the universal expressed by the predicate. I here address ontological issues raised by predicates first introduced to us via works of fiction and whether the universal realist should accept that any such predicates express universals. After assessing arguments by Braun, D. and Sawyer, S. (...) for fictional universal anti-realism, I propose a novel, Kripke-inspired argument for the same conclusion. I ultimately defend the claim that while this argument presents the strongest case for fictional universal anti-realism, it is nonetheless unsound. I conclude that nothing stands in the way of accepting that some fictional predicates express fictional universals. (shrink)