On the political nature of the analytic - continental distinction in professional philosophy and the general tendency to discredit continental philosophy while redesignating the rubric as analytically conceived.

This volume contains new and original papers on Martin Heidegger's complex relation to Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy. The authors not only critically discuss the many aspects of Heidegger's reading of Nietzsche, they also interpret Heidegger's thought from a Nietzschean perspective. Here is presented for the first time an overview of not only Heidegger's and Nietzsche's philosophy but also an overview of what is alive - and dead - in their thinking. Many authors through a reading of Heidegger and Nietzsche deal with (...) current issues such as technology, ecology, and politics. This volume is of interest for everyone interested in Heidegger's and Nietzsche's thought. Contributors include: Babette Babich, Charles Bambach, Robert Bernasconi, Virgilio Cesarone, Stuart Elden, Michael Eldred, Markus Enders, Charles Feitosa, Véronique Fóti, Luanne T. Frank, Jeffery Kinlaw, Theodore Kisiel, William D. Melaney, Eric Sean Nelson, Abraham Olivier, Friederike Rese, Karlheinz Ruhstorfer, Harald Seubert, Robert Sinnerbrink, Robert Switzer, Jorge Uscatescu Barrón, Nancy A. Weston, Dale Wilkerson, Angel Xolocotzi, Jens Zimmermann. (shrink)

What Ivan Illich regarded in his Medical Nemesis as the ‘expropriation of health’ takes place on the surfaces and in the spaces of the screens all around us, including our cell phones but also the patient monitors and (increasingly) the iPads that intervene between nurse and patient. To explore what Illich called the ‘age of the show’, this essay uses film examples, like Creed and the controversial documentary Vaxxed, and the television series Nurse Jackie. Rocky’s cancer in his last film (...) (submitting to chemo to ‘fight’ cancer) highlights what Illich along with Petr Skrabanek called the ‘expropriation of death’. In contrast to what Illich denotes as ‘Umsonstigkeit’ – i.e., a free gift, given undeservedly, i.e., gratuitously – medical science tends to be tempted by what Illich terms scientistic ‘black magic’, taking over (expropriating) the life and the death of the patient in increasingly technological ways, a point underscored in the concluding section on the commercial prospects of xenotransplants using factory farm or mass-produced (and already for some time) human-pig mosaics or chimeras. (shrink)

Resumen: En La actualidad de lo bello, Gadamer hace una referencia reveladora a la improvisación musical y a la importancia de la escucha musical, además de poner en primer plano la necesidad de justificación del arte. Situando este debate a través de Goethe y Platón, junto con las Lecciones de Estética de Adorno de finales de la década de 1950 y una discusión sobre Nietzsche y la Antigüedad, es posible establecer que lo que está en juego es la afinación, así (...) como una tensión que invita a un debate ulterior tanto sobre la detención del amante en Carson como el demorarse en Heidegger. Al revisar la hermenéutica gadameriana de la programación y la interpretación musical, incluida la improvisación y el desafío de la nueva música, las reflexiones de Gadamer sobre la cultura musical en el contexto de la cultura social y su reflexión no solo pueden ser leídas a través de Platón y Goethe, sino también a partir de las concepciones de "lo bello" en Hölderlin y Rilke. Se trata de una "conversación" cultural en la que la contribución del público puede estar en tensión con la programación musical progresiva, además de la dinámica de respuesta que surge en la energeia de la improvisación tanto para el intérprete como para el oyente.// Abstract: Gadamer’s On the Relevance of the Beautiful makes telling reference to musi-cal improvisation and the importance of musical listening in addition to fore-grounding the need for justification. Situating this discussion via Goethe and Plato along with Adorno’s late 1950s lectures on Aesthetics together with a discussion of Nietzsche and antiquity, what is at stake is attunement and a tension which invites a discussion of Carson on the lover’s arrest and Heidegger on tarrying. By reviewing Gadamer’s hermeneutic of musical pro-gramming and performance, including improvisation and the challenge of new music, Gadamer may be read on music culture in the context of social culture and his reflection not only via Plato and Goethe but Hölderlin and Rilke on ‘the beautiful.’ At work is a cultural ‘conversation’ where audience input can be in tension with progressive musical programing along with the dynamic of response emergent in the energeia of improvisation for performer and listener. (shrink)

Günther Anders offers one of the first phenomenological analyses of broadcast radio (in 1930) and its transformation of the contemporary experience of music. Anders also develops a reflection on its political consequences as he continues his reflection in a discussion of radio and newsreel, film and television in his 1956 ‘The World as Phantom and Matrix’. A reflection on the consequences of this transformation brings in Friedrich Kittler’s reflection on radio and precision bombing. A further reflection on Jean Baudrillard’s notion (...) of ‘speech without response’ permits a review of digital culture and the self-creation of the digital consumer absorbed in what Anders named a schizo-topia, that is, today, an autistic culture of distraction, displacement, and self-driven surveillance. (shrink)

A discussion of Nietzsche's philology as the prelude to his philosophy of science.

Commentary on Andrew Mitchell and Patricia Glazebrook on plants and agriculture in the context of Heidegger's own reflections on botany and technology in which I discuss, bees, cell phone radiation, the relatively complex but fairly obvious sociological dynamics of science and powerful commercial interests (capital), and mantid copulation.

This essay is dedicated to elaborating some of the stylistic elements at work in Nietzsche's polemical book, On The Genealogy of Morals with particular attention to the nature of the aphorism from its inception in ancient Greek literaure, Nietzsche's specific deployment of the aphorism as such, including Nietzsche's argument structure and rhetorical technique as well as the language of Greek and Jewish antiquity, master and slave. -/- In: Christa Davis Acampora, ed., Nietzsche’s On the Genealogy of Morals: Critical Essays (Lanham, (...) Md., Rowman & Littlefield, 2006), pp. 177-190. (shrink)

This essay foregrounds “covers” of popular recorded songs as well as male and female desire, in addition to Nietzsche’s interest in composition, together with his rhythmic analysis of Ancient Greek as the basis of what he called the “spirit of music” with respect to tragedy. The language of “sonic branding” allows a discussion of what Günther Anders described as the self-creation of mass consumer but also the ghostly time-space of music in the broadcast world. A brief allusion to Rilke complements (...) a similarly brief reference to Jankelevitch’s “ineffable.”. (shrink)

Continental philosophies of science tend to exemplify holistic themes connecting order and contingency, questions and answers, writers and readers, speakers and hearers. Such philosophies of science also tend to feature a fundamental emphasis on the historical and cultural situatedness of discourse as significant; relevance of mutual attunement of speaker and hearer; necessity of pre-linguistic cognition based in human engagement with a common socio-cultural historical world; role of narrative and metaphor as explanatory; sustained emphasis on understanding questioning; truth seen as horizonal, (...) aletheic, or perspectival; and a tolerance for paradoxical and complex forms of expression. Continental philosophy of science is thus more comprehensive than philosophy of science in the analytic tradition, including (and as analytic philosophy of science does not tend to include) perspectives on the history of science as well as the social and practical dimensions of scientific discovery. Where analytic philosophy is about reducing or, indeed, eliminating the perennial problems of philosophy, Continental philosophy is all about thinking and that will mean, as both Heidegger and Nietzsche emphasize, making such problems more not less problematic. (shrink)

In a single aphorism in The Gay Science, Nietzsche arrays “The Problem of the Artist” in a reticulated constellation. Addressing every member of the excluded grouping of disenfranchised “others,” Nietzsche turns to the destitution of a god of love keyed to the selfturning absorption of the human heart. His ultimate and irrecusably tragic project to restore the innocence of becoming requires the affirmation of the problem of suffering as the task of learning how to love. Nietzsche sees the eros of (...) art as what can teach us how to make things beautiful, desirable, lovable in the routine truth of reality: “When they are not.” The stumbling block for those of us paralyzed by impotence and frozen in a technological age of anxiety, longing for being not becoming (eternal youth), is that one can never possess but can only win great health, again and again (like erotic desire), because one gives it away again and again as sacrifice or affirmation without reserve: that is to say, with erotic artistry. (shrink)

On Heidegger's Beitraege and the influence of Nietzsche's Will to Power (a famous non-book).

Explores the role of the thousands of life-size bronze statues "populating" Athens, Rhode, Olympia and other Greek cities. Applied phenomenological hermeneutics.

On Nietzsche, science, the oral tradition -- or the troubadours and ancient Greek music drama.

Róisín Lally’s Sustainability in the Anthropocene provides a wealth of essays on the philosophical meanings and implications of renewable technologies, as well as glimpses of novel ways toward a sustainable future that integrate deeply meaningful ways of being for humans. The edited collection features some of the most reputable thinkers in the philosophy of technology, such as Don Ihde, Babette Babich, and Trish Glazebrook, as well as some newcomers with novel perspectives that need to be taken into consideration (...) not only for fellow philosophers, but for anyone interested in the future of our increasingly vulnerable planet. The book is divided into four parts: defining sustainability, exploring the relationship between sustainability and particular renewable technologies, investigating sustainability and design, and finally examining sustainability and ethics. The authors engage in applications of various philosophers from the Continental tradition, most prominently the work of Martin Heidegger. I provide a brief summary of the various sections and highlight key arguments while providing some commentary with an aim to keep the conversation going. (shrink)

Wittgenstein’s concepts shed light on the phenomenon of schizophrenia in at least three different ways: with a view to empathy, scientific explanation, or philosophical clarification. I consider two different “positive” wittgensteinian accounts―Campbell’s idea that delusions involve a mechanism of which different framework propositions are parts, Sass’ proposal that the schizophrenic patient can be described as a solipsist, and a Rhodes’ and Gipp’s account, where epistemic aspects of schizophrenia are explained as failures in the ordinary background of certainties. I argue that (...) none of them amounts to empathic-phenomenological understanding, but they provide examples of how philosophical concepts can contribute to scientific explanation, and to philosophical clarification respectively. (shrink)

Resumo: A crise na União Europeia e os programas de austeridade subsequentes fizeram emergir uma miríade de movimentos sociais, diversos na sua natureza e nos seus propósitos. O que se pretende aferir neste artigo é a relação e a conexão existentes entre o Estado, o poder económico, a sociedade civil e os movimentos sociais neste contexto específico de crise. Procuraremos, nesta breve abordagem, explanar alguns elementos de originalidade intrínsecos aos movimentos sociais hodiernos, patentes na sua forma de participação e organização, (...) assim como aplicar estas questões teóricas relevantes ao contexto português. A parte empírica, dada a escassez de estudos de caso existentes, será apoiada no último inquérito do European Social Survey, de 2012. Analisando um conjunto de perguntas aí explícitas, podemos compreender, de forma indirecta, algumas das dinâmicas que caracterizam estes movimentos. Abstract: The crisis in the European Union and the subsequent austerity programs have unleashed a myriad of social movements, diverse in its nature and purpose. The purpose of this paper is to assess the relationship and connection between the State, economic power, civil society and social movements in this specific context of crisis. We will try, in this brief approach, to explain some elements of originality intrinsic to modern social movements, evident in their form of participation and organization, as well as to apply these theoretical questions relevant to the Portuguese context. The empirical part, given the paucity of existing case studies, will be supported in the last survey of the European Social Survey of 2012. By analyzing a set of questions explicit there, we can, indirectly, understand some of the dynamics that characterize these movements. (shrink)

The term philosophy of chemistry is here construed broadly to include some publications from the history of chemistry and chemical education. Of course this initial selection of material has inevitably been biased by the interests of the author. This bibliography supersedes that of van Brakel and Vermeeren (1981), although no attempt has been made to include every single one of their entries, especially in languages other than English. Also, readers interested particularly in articles in German may wish to consult the (...) bibliography by Dittus and Mayer which also contains some material not included here (Dittus and Mayer, 1992). The aim is to maintain an up-to-date version of this bibliography and to publish a revised version in due course. Suggestions for further inclusions should be sent to the author. (shrink)

There are many different meanings of sustainability and precaution and no evident connection between the new normative concepts and the traditional moral theories. We seek an ethical basis for sustainability and precaution—a common framework that can serve as a means of resolving the conceptual ambiguities of the new normative concepts and the conflicts between new and traditional moral concepts and theories. We employ a systemic approach to analyze the past and possible future extension of ethics and establish an inclusive framework (...) of ethical extension. This framework forms the basis for what we call a systemic ethic. (shrink)

O presente trabalho visa apresentar a solução dada por Santo Agostinho ao problema do mal, aliado à aparente contraditoriedade entre a presciência de Deus e a liberdade humana. Para isto, será útil como bibliografia principal do filósofo sua obra De libero arbitrio, um livro em forma de diálogo onde o pensador esclarece suas posições acerca do livre-arbítrio e da presciência divina.

Abstract. Following the tracks of Ryle and based upon the theory of complex systems, we shall develop a characterization of action-based consciousness as an embodied, embedded, selforganized process in which action and dispositions occupy a special place. From this perspective, consciousness is not a unique prerogative of humans, but it is spread all around, throughout the evolution of life. We argue that artificial systems such as robots currently lack the genuine embodied embeddedness that allows the type of self-organization that is (...) relevant to consciousness. -/- Sommario. Seguendo la linea tracciata da Ryle e basata sulla teorie dei sistemi complessi, svilupperemo una caratterizzazione della coscienza basata sull’azione come un processo incarnato, situato e auto organizzante nel quale le azioni e le disposizioni occupano un ruolo decisivo. Da questo punto di vista, la coscienza non è una prerogativa esclusiva degli esseri umani, ma è diffusa nel mondo naturale grazie ai processi evolutivi. Noi sosteniamo che i sistemi artificiali come i robot attualmente sono carenti del tipo di relazione con la corporeità e con l’ambiente che consente quel tipo di auto-organizzazione indispensabile per l’emergenza della coscienza. (shrink)

De uma perspectiva comportamentalista radical, o eu é um repertório verbal complexo, que, como tal, tem uma gênese social. O reconhecimento da origem social do “eu” abre caminho para uma análise política, incluindo uma discussão do pa- pel das relações de poder na constituição do eu. Entretanto, uma concepção radicalmente social do “eu”, como a proposta pelo comportamentalismo, suscita um problema político: se o eu é integralmente produto do ambiente social, de onde viria uma eventual “vontade” de romper com esse (...) sistema? Parece que para reconhecer a possibilidade de ação política transformadora seria preciso preservar uma noção descontextualizada de “eu”. Considerando essa dificuldade, o objetivo deste artigo é propor uma interpretação política da constituição do “eu” no âmbito do comportamentalismo radical, mantendo no horizonte a possibilidade de uma ação política transformadora. Para tanto, destacamos como “eus” oprimidos são tornados submissos, mas também como de certas contingências podem emergir “eus” subversivos, que se opõem a um sistema social opressivo. Esse “eu” subversivo é caracterizado por um repertório de autoconhecimento mais amplo, que inclui a discriminação do papel das relações de poder e do controle promovido por instituições. Concluímos, com isso, que um “eu” socialmente constituído pode ser politicamente ativo. (shrink)

Shedding light on the political power and oppressive potential of language, theories of illocutionary silencing and discursive injustice show how gender, class and race can shape the pragmatics of speech, limiting in some circumstances the speaker’s ability to do things with her words. This article takes a close look at discursive injustice in trials for gender-based violence in connection with the phenomenon of misogyny. It argues that in the courtroom the testimony of the complainant is sometimes silenced by a sexist (...) ideology used in service of misogynistic ends. In particular, it argues that sexist social meanings can sometimes be enacted by the judge and accommodated by prosecutors, figuring as a component of the score in the language game of the trial and thus 1) determining what counts as sexual violence and 2) preventing complainants from making the moves they intend to make. (shrink)

Este ensaio estabelece uma comparação estética e fenomenológica entre os pensamentos de Yves-Klein e Merleau-Ponty. Se o pintor materializou as suas reflexões e concepções em obra pictórica, o fenomenólogo francês dissertou na escrita filosófica o resultado da sua reflexão. Da análise conjunta entre um e outro resulta esta fenomenologia e estética comparativa que apresenta alguns conceitos fundamentais que alimentaram essas reflexões, tais como a visibilidade, o corpo, o mundo. Assim, para além dessa comparação, este ensaio viabiliza o diálogo entre ambos. (...) Palavras-chave: Corpo. Mundo. Visibilidade. Merleau-Ponty. Yves Klein -/- Abstract:This essay establishes an aesthetic and phenomenological comparison between the thoughts of Yves-Klein and Merleau-Ponty. If the painter materialized his reflections and concepts in pictorial work, the French phenomenologist disserted in the philosophical writing the result of his reflection. From the joint analysis between one and the other, this phenomenology and comparative aesthetics results, which presents some fundamental concepts that fed these reflections such as visibility, the body, the world. Thus, in addition to this comparison, this essay enables the dialogue between both. Keywords: Body. World. Visibility. Merleau-Ponty. Yves Klein. (shrink)

In this article, I examine the moral dimensions of gender affirmation. I argue that the moral value of gender affirmation is rooted in what Iris Murdoch called loving attention. Loving attention is central to the moral value of gender affirmation because such affirmation is otherwise too fragile or insincere to have such value. Moral reasons to engage in acts that gender affirm derive from the commitment to give and express loving attention to trans people as a way of challenging their (...) marginalization. In the latter part of the paper, I will discuss how my arguments bear on recent arguments by Robin Dembroff and Daniel Wodak (2018) on the use of gender-neutral language. They argue that we have a duty not to use gender-specific pronouns for anyone. Their conclusion turns, in part, on a rejection of gender affirmation as a moral duty. The value of gender affirmation, rooted in our moral perception of trans people, should make us skeptical of this conclusion, in favor of a more nuanced and pluralistic approach to the ethics of gendering. (shrink)

The role of imagination in Descartes. The critic of Sartre to the concept of image in Descartes.

Logical realism is a view about the metaphysical status of logic. Common to most if not all the views captured by the label ‘logical realism’ is that logical facts are mind- and language-independent. But that does not tell us anything about the nature of logical facts or about our epistemic access to them. The goal of this paper is to outline and systematize the different ways that logical realism could be entertained and to examine some of the challenges that these (...) views face. It will be suggested that logical realism is best understood as a metaphysical view about the logical structure of the world, but this raises an important question: does logical realism collapse into standard metaphysical realism? It will be argued that this result can be accommodated, even if it cannot be altogether avoided. (shrink)

When we perceive an object, we perceive the object from a perspective. As a consequence of the perspectival nature of perception, when we perceive, say, a circular coin from different angles, there is a respect in which the coin looks circular throughout, but also a respect in which the coin's appearance changes. More generally, perception of shape and size properties has both a constant aspect—an aspect that remains stable across changes in perspective—and a perspectival aspect—an aspect that changes depending on (...) one's perspective on the object. How should we account for the perspectival aspect of spatial perception? We present a framework within which to discuss the perspectival aspect of perception and put forward three desiderata that any account of the perspectival aspect of perception should satisfy. We discuss views on which the perspectival aspect of perception is analyzed in terms of constitutively mind-dependent appearance properties as well as views on which the perspectival aspect of perception is analyzed in terms of representations of mind-independent perspectival properties. (shrink)

The ability to perceive the shapes of things as enduring through changes in how they stimulate our sense organs is vital to our sense of stability in the world. But what sort of capacity is shape constancy, and how is it reflected in perceptual experience? This paper defends a pluralist account of shape constancy: There are multiple kinds of shape constancy centered on geometrical properties at various levels of abstraction, and properties at these various levels feature in the content of (...) perceptual experience, governing patterns of apparent shape similarity. I propose that the varieties of shape constancy are subserved by the syntactic complexity of perceptual shape representations. By assigning discrete constituents to various abstract shape parameters, these representations attune us to the preservation of certain abstract shape properties through changes in more determinate shape properties. Finally, I draw broader lessons concerning the nature and function of perceptual constancy. (shrink)

Arguments from divine hiddenness attempt to show that God, as understood by traditional Christianity, does not exist.Eleonore Stump has argued that, contrary to a key premise in such arguments, it is possible for God to have a personal relationship with human beings who do not believe that he exists. I describe Stump’s account of the will and describe its connection to her explanation of divine hiddenness. Specifically, I show that her account of the knowledge of persons cannot solve the problem (...) of divine hiddenness. I also argue that Stump’s account of the will commits her to the claim that lacking belief in God’s existence entails resistance to God’s grace. (shrink)

Causal closure arguments against interactionist dualism are currently popular amongst physicalists. Such an argument appeals to some principles of the causal closure of the physical, together with certain other premises, to conclude that at least some mental events are identical with physical events. However, it is crucial to the success of any such argument that the physical causal closure principle to which it appeals is neither too strong nor too weak by certain standards. In this paper, it is argued that (...) various forms of naturalistic dualism, of an emergentist character, are consistent with the strongest physical causal closure principles that can plausibly be advocated. (shrink)

This article develops a view of shape representation both in visual experience and in subpersonal visual processing. The view is that, in both cases, shape is represented in a ‘layered’ manner: an object is represented as having multiple shape properties, and these properties have varying degrees of abstraction. I argue that this view is supported both by the facts about visual phenomenology and by a large collection of evidence in perceptual psychology. Such evidence is provided by studies of shape discriminability, (...) apparent motion, multiple-object tracking, and structure-from-motion. Recent neuroscientific work has also corroborated this psychophysical evidence. Finally, I draw out implications of the layered view for processes of concept acquisition. 1 Introduction2 Metric Properties andShape Properties3 Metric Views4 Against Metric Views of Visual Shape Experience5 The Visual System Uses Abstract Shape Properties6 Against Metric Views of Visual Shape Representation7 Neural Underpinnings of Abstract Shape Perception8 Implications. (shrink)

Causation has multiple distinct meanings in genetics. One reason for this is meaning slippage between two concepts of the gene: Mendelian and molecular. Another reason is that a variety of genetic methods address different kinds of causal relationships. Some genetic studies address causes of traits in individuals, which can only be assessed when single genes follow predictable inheritance patterns that reliably cause a trait. A second sense concerns the causes of trait differences within a population. Whereas some single genes can (...) be said to cause population-level differences, most often these claims concern the effects of many genes. Polygenic traits can be understood using heritability estimates, which estimate the relative influences of genetic and environmental differences to trait differences within a population. Attempts to understand the molecular mechanisms underlying polygenic traits have been developed, although causal inference based on these results remains controversial. Genetic variation has also recently been leveraged as a randomizing factor to identify environmental causes of trait differences. This technique—Mendelian randomization—offers some solutions to traditional epidemiological challenges, although it is limited to the study of environments with known genetic influences. (shrink)

The circular economy (CE) framework has captured the attention of industry and academia and received strong policy support. It is currently deemed as a powerful solution for sustainability, despite ongoing criticism on its oversimplification and lack of consideration of socio-ethical issues. In parallel, the concept of RRI has emerged strongly with a strong focus on the integration of social desirability in innovation under transparency, democracy and mutual responsiveness principles. In this paper, we critically examine the literature on the CE and (...) RRI in order to find out how the different focus of RRI may provide an innovation governance framework to strengthen the CE framework. There are two main ways in which RRI could further the CE: first, anticipating unexpected consequences, helping to break disciplinary barriers and acknowledging systemic limits that are not currently taken into consideration; and second, the integration of socio-ethical issues in the CE, and addressing the social implications of the CE through stakeholder participation. However, future research should look at remaining blind spots of CE and RRI, such as non-technological innovation, the demand-side of innovation and the development of business models. With that objective, we suggest a research agenda for common development of the frameworks. (shrink)

There is a widespread belief that for their own safety and for the protection of wildlife, cats should be permanently kept indoors. Against this view, I argue that cat guardians have a duty to provide their feline companions with outdoor access. The argument is based on a sophisticated hedonistic account of animal well-being that acknowledges that the performance of species-normal ethological behavior is especially pleasurable. Territorial behavior, which requires outdoor access, is a feline-normal ethological behavior, so when a cat is (...) permanently confined to the indoors, her ability to flourish is impaired. Since cat guardians have a duty not to impair the well-being of their cats, the impairment of cat flourishing via confinement signifies a moral failing. Although some cats assume significant risks and sometimes kill wild animals when roaming outdoors, these important considerations do not imply that all cats should be deprived of the opportunity to access the outdoors. Indeed, they do not, by themselves, imply that any cat should be permanently kept indoors. (shrink)

In _Deaths in Venice_ Philip Kitcher explores the bearing that _Death in Venice_ by Thomas Mann may have on 'the oldest and deepest question of philosophy: _how to live_'. In this paper, I will distinguish two ways in which this question can be interpreted. One one reading, it amounts to the question 'how to lead a valuable or worthy life?', whereas on the other it involves a more elusive idea, namely, that a person may breath and walk and still be (...) dead in a relevant sense, that is, from the perspectivo in which being alive does not reduce to biological survival. In my view, Kitcher's reflection on Mann's novella relies on the first, more standard reading. I argue, though, that the being-alive interpretation sheds a more unified light on _Death in Venice_; in fact, I will conclude that the need to shift from one to another interpretation constitutes a fundamental concern in the novella. (shrink)

Abstract: Alienation and slavery from Precious or what we don't want to see. It is our purpose to establish, in a parallel reading, these two films (highly rewarded), namely The Fence and Precious, that apparently being so different, are an illustration of the reality of life and the modern democratic world: the social uprooting and slavery. If in the movie of Phillip Noyce and Christone Olsen The Fence, is told a story of three young Aboriginal girls who are forcibly taken (...) to be transformed into domestic slaves, in the movie of Lee Daniels Precious, the young woman is already a servant in her own home and seeks the transformation of her life. Uniting these two stories, we find fundamental elements: illiteracy, ill-treatment, the idea of a migration (real or metaphysical), among others, but whose fundamental notion is the journey. If the film The Fence, the fence itself is used to conduct the three young Aboriginal to a real reunion with the family, in Precious, the metaphorical ‘fence’ is the limit of her world. From this interpretation, we will undertake our reflection about what we consider to be the alienation of the modern world and the silence we produce about them. (shrink)

A prominent view holds that perception and memory are distinguished at least partly by their temporal orientation: Perception functions to represent the present, while memory functions to represent the past. Call this view perceptual presentism. This chapter critically examines perceptual presentism in light of contemporary perception science. I adduce evidence for three forms of perceptual sensitivity to the past: (i) shaping perception by past stimulus exposure, (ii) recruitment of mnemonic representations in perceptual processing, and (iii) perceptual representation of present objects (...) as possessing past properties. I argue that forms (i) and (ii) are consistent with perceptual presentism, while form (iii) poses a genuine threat to the view. While the empirical case for form (iii) remains inconclusive, I suggest that the most serious challenges to perceptual presentism derive from representations that integrate mnemonic and present-tensed elements in the performance of canonical perceptual functions, such as perceiving object continuity over time. (shrink)

Recently, the concept of "gender identity" has enjoyed a great deal of attention in gender metaphysics. This seems to be motivated by the goal of creating trans-inclusive theory, by explaining trans people's genders. In this paper, we aim to unmotivate this project. Notions of "gender identity" serve important pragmatic purposes for trans people, such as satisfying the curiosity of non-trans people, and, relatedly, securing our access to important goods like legal rights and medical care. However, we argue that this does (...) not mean that "gender identity" is a metaphysically substantial thing that deserves extensive theoretical attention. There are reasons to be skeptical of such a concept. We trace the history of "gender identity," primarily to identify its roots in trans-antagonistic medical theory and its connections to the problematic "wrong-body" model--a legacy that has pathologized and flattened trans experience. Moreover, we argue that trans people primarily use "gender identity" to explain ourselves to non-trans people, rather than to discuss ourselves among ourselves. Thus, we urge theorists to resist the urge to substantiate gender identity. Instead, we encourage the development of new and better concepts, ones that attend to the lived realities of trans community and the flourishing gender terms and practices that are constructed there. If these lived realities are taken seriously, there is no need to “explain” trans people’s genders; we can simply see them as they are. (shrink)

Marr’s seminal distinction between computational, algorithmic, and implementational levels of analysis has inspired research in cognitive science for more than 30 years. According to a widely-used paradigm, the modelling of cognitive processes should mainly operate on the computational level and be targeted at the idealised competence, rather than the actual performance of cognisers in a specific domain. In this paper, we explore how this paradigm can be adopted and revised to understand mathematical problem solving. The computational-level approach applies methods from (...) computational complexity theory and focuses on optimal strategies for completing cognitive tasks. However, human cognitive capacities in mathematical problem solving are essentially characterised by processes that are computationally sub-optimal, because they initially add to the computational complexity of the solutions. Yet, these solutions can be optimal for human cognisers given the acquisition and enactment of mathematical practices. Here we present diagrams and the spatial manipulation of symbols as two examples of problem solving strategies that can be computationally sub-optimal but humanly optimal. These aspects need to be taken into account when analysing competence in mathematical problem solving. Empirically informed considerations on enculturation can help identify, explore, and model the cognitive processes involved in problem solving tasks. The enculturation account of mathematical problem solving strongly suggests that computational-level analyses need to be complemented by considerations on the algorithmic and implementational levels. The emerging research strategy can help develop algorithms that model what we call enculturated cognitive optimality in an empirically plausible and ecologically valid way. (shrink)

Prioritarianism is a variant of utilitarianism. It differs from utilitarianism in that benefiting individuals matters more the worse off these individuals are. On this view, there are two standard ways of handling risky prospects: Ex-Post Prioritarianism adjusts for prioritizing the worse off in final outcomes and then values prospects by the expectation of the sum total of those adjusted values, whereas Ex-Ante Prioritarianism adjusts for prioritizing the worse off on each individual's expectation and then values prospects by the sum total (...) of those adjusted expectations. A standard objection to Ex-Post Prioritarianism is that it violates Ex-Ante Pareto, that is, it prescribes choices that worsen the expectations for everyone. In this article, I argue that Ex-Ante Prioritarianism suffers from much the same problem: it violates a sequential version of Ex-Ante Pareto, that is, it prescribes sequences of choices that worsen the expectations for everyone. (shrink)

This paper is inspired by and develops on E. J. Lowe’s work, who writes in his book The Possibility of Metaphysics that ‘metaphysical possibility is an inescapable determinant of actuality’ (1998: 9). Metaphysics deals with possibilities – metaphysical possibilities – but is not able to determine what is actual without the help of empirical research. Accordingly, a delimitation of the space of possibilities is required. The resulting – controversial – picture is that we generally need to know whether something is (...) possible before we can know whether it is actual. In order to appreciate this picture, we need to understand Lowe’s slogan: ‘essence precedes existence’ (Lowe 2008: 40). This slogan has both an ontological and an epistemic reading. The ontological reading is related to the now familiar idea that essence grounds modality, as popularised by Kit Fine. The epistemic reading suggests that we can know the essence of some entity before we know whether or not that entity exists. However, this idea is often met with puzzlement and Lowe himself sadly passed away before he had a chance to clarify this framework. I will present the framework as I understand it, develop it on my own terms, and put forward a qualified defence of it. I will also illustrate how the framework can be put to use with a case study concerning the discovery of transuranic elements. (shrink)

Abstract. In this article we developed scientific and applied foundations of commercialization of the nature-resource potential of anthropogenic objects, on the example of exhausted mines. It is determined that the category of “anthropogenic object” can be considered in a narrow-applied sense, as specific anthropogenic objects to ensure the target needs, and in a broad theoretical sense, meaning everything that is created and changed by human influence, that is the objects of both artificial and natural origin. It was determined that problems (...) of commercialization of the natural-resource potential of anthropogenic objects are most often considered by researchers for specific objects, without having complex methodological coverage from the point of view of combining environmental, technical, economic and managerial components. When studying the substantiation of the scientific base, the authors confirmed the feasibility of the commercialization of natural-resource potential of anthropogenic objects on the example of a number of theoretical scientific studies in reclamation, reconstruction, recreation, remediation, restoration of biological productivity and economic value of land disturbed by economic activity. The considered examples of exhausted mines in the 21st century in the USA, Canada, Germany, Romania, and Poland indicate a wide range of opportunities for their commercialization. The study of the potential for commercialization of exhausted mines in the post-Soviet countries testified to the underused reserves for the commercialization of their nature-resource potential and their high potential for further development. The authors proposed the identification of anthropogenic objects on the basic livelihood spheres of society. There were identified the main system (natural, biological, technical, economic, social, managerial) and structural (subjects, trends, threats, risks, problems, challenges) factors of diagnosing the state of an anthropogenic object. A set of measures has been developed for commercialization of an anthropogenic object in functional and production activities, product policy, financial and investment spheres, pricing and sales policies, promotion, management and determination of property rights. Recommendations were provided on optimizing the management decision-making process based on a set of positivistic development principles, methods, and management functions. The study allows international organizations, state and local authorities, territorial communities, owners and potential investors to see new opportunities and make mutually beneficial decisions on the rational use of the nature-resource potential of anthropogenic objects. (shrink)

In this paper the class of Fidel-structures for the paraconsistent logic mbC is studied from the point of view of Model Theory and Category Theory. The basic point is that Fidel-structures for mbC (or mbC-structures) can be seen as first-order structures over the signature of Boolean algebras expanded by two binary predicate symbols N (for negation) and O (for the consistency connective) satisfying certain Horn sentences. This perspective allows us to consider notions and results from Model Theory in order to (...) analyze the class of mbC-structures. Thus, substructures, union of chains, direct products, direct limits, congruences and quotient structures can be analyzed under this perspective. In particular, a Birkhoff-like representation theorem for mbC-structures as subdirect poducts in terms of subdirectly irreducible mbC-structures is obtained by adapting a general result for first-order structures due to Caicedo. Moreover, a characterization of all the subdirectly irreducible mbC-structures is also given. An alternative decomposition theorem is obtained by using the notions of weak substructure and weak isomorphism considered by Fidel for Cn-structures. (shrink)