In this paper I address the question whether self-knowledge is compatible with an externalist individuation of mental content. Against some approaches, I consider self-knowledge as a genuine cognitive achievement. Though it is neither incorrigible nor infallible, self-knowledge is direct, a priori (no based on empirical investigation), presumptively true and authoritative. The problem is whether self-knowledge, so understood, is compatible with externalism. My answer will be affirmative. I will defend this species of compatibilism against several objections, in particular those based on (...) the possibility of an individual’s being unwittingly switched between worlds. (shrink)

The complex world of thought and sensitivity in the sphere of contemporary art has entailed the revision and exclusion of disciplines aimed at providing a model to explain and conceptualize reality. Art history, as one such discipline, has had many of its contributions questioned from Gombrich’s epistemological reformulation to the postmodern discourses, which extol the death of the author, the post-structuralist idea of tradition as a textual phenomenon, and the declaration of the death of history as a consequence of the (...) hybridization of disciplines and of other bran- ches of human knowledge. Nevertheless, it can be demonstrated that proposals as those by Julius von Schlosser and Giulio Carlo Argan enclose reflections and methodological aspects which can help us face the task of understanding and visualizing the mediating role of historians in the culture of sensitivity, and the art modulations that have resulted from the blows of history and that, in turn, have shaped both art and art history into what they are or can be to us today. (shrink)

This essay focuses on the intriguing relationship between mathematics and physical phenomena, arguing that the brain uses a single spatiotemporal- causal objective framework in order to characterize and manipulate basic external data and internal physical and emotional reactive information, into more complex thought and knowledge. It is proposed that multiple hierarchical permutations of this single format eventually give rise to increasingly precise visceral meaning. The main thesis overcomes the epistemological complexities of the Frame Problem by asserting that the primal frame (...) of reference – within which chaotic conscious thought ultimately emerges – is essentially a synchronous representation of the four macro properties of existence plus the genetically derived causal objective, and the embodied physical and emotional reactions that even the lowliest cognitive organisms are born with, and which they automatically express as they struggle to exist within an ever-changing and often hostile environment. -/-. (shrink)

Some metaphysicians believe that metaphysical modality is explainable by the essences of objects. In §II, I spell out the definitional view of essence, and in §III, a working notion of metaphysical explanation. Then, in §IV, I consider and reject five natural ways to explain necessity by essence: in terms of the principle that essential properties can't change, in terms of the supposed obviousness of the necessity of essential truth, in terms of the logical necessity of definitions, in terms of Fine's (...) logic of essence, and in terms of the theory of real definitions. I will conclude that the present evidence favours rejecting the hypothesis that modality is explainable by essence. (shrink)

The project of growing meat artificially represents for some the next best thing to humanity. If successful, it could be the solution to several problems, such as feed- ing a growing global population while reducing the environmental impact of raising animals for food and, of course, reducing the amount and degree of animal cruelty and suffering that is involved in animal farming. In this paper, I argue that the issue of the morality of such a project has been framed only (...) in terms of the best conse- quences for the environment, animals, and humans, or in terms of deontic princi- ples. I argue that to appreciate how deep and difficult this issue is, it is necessary to consider it in terms of a virtue-oriented approach. Such an approach will reveal aspects that are not apparent, not contemplated by typical approaches, but are essen- tial to our understanding of the morality of lab-grown meat. As I argue, evaluating the issue from a virtue-oriented perspective suggests that the project of in vitro meat should not be supported because it stems from unvirtuous motivations. (shrink)

On the basis of historical and textual evidence, this paper claims that after his Tractatus, Wittgenstein was actually influenced by Einstein's theory of relativity and, the similarity of Einstein's relativity theory helps to illuminate some aspects of Wittgenstein's work. These claims find support in remarkable quotations where Wittgenstein speaks approvingly of Einstein's relativity theory and in the way these quotations are embedded in Wittgenstein's texts. The profound connection between Wittgenstein and relativity theory concerns not only Wittgenstein's “verificationist” phase , but (...) also Wittgenstein's later philosophy centred on the theme of rule‐following. (shrink)

Many moral philosophers have criticized intensive animal farming because it can be harmful to the environment, it causes pain and misery to a large number of animals, and furthermore eating meat and animal-based products can be unhealthful. The issue of industrially farmed animals has become one of the most pressing ethical questions of our time. On the one hand, utilitarians have argued that we should become vegetarians or vegans because the practices of raising animals for food are immoral since they (...) minimize the overall happiness. Deontologists, on the other hand, have argued that the practices of raising animals for food are immoral because animals have certain rights and we have duties toward them. Some virtue ethicists remain unconvinced of deontic and consequentialist arguments against the exploitation of animals and suggest that a virtue-based approach is better equipped to show what is immoral about raising and using animals for food, and what is virtuous about ethical veganism. (shrink)

The main thesis of this paper is that two prevailing theories about cognitive penetration are too extreme, namely, the view that cognitive penetration is pervasive and the view that there is a sharp and fundamental distinction between cognition and perception, which precludes any type of cognitive penetration. These opposite views have clear merits and empirical support. To eliminate this puzzling situation, we present an alternative theoretical approach that incorporates the merits of these views into a broader and more nuanced explanatory (...) framework. A key argument we present in favor of this framework concerns the evolution of intentionality and perceptual capacities. An implication of this argument is that cases of cognitive penetration must have evolved more recently and that this is compatible with the cognitive impenetrability of early perceptual stages of processing information. A theoretical approach that explains why this should be the case is the consciousness and attention dissociation framework. The paper discusses why concepts, particularly issues concerning concept acquisition, play an important role in the interaction between perception and cognition. (shrink)

The philosophical conception of mechanistic explanation is grounded on a limited number of canonical examples. These examples provide an overly narrow view of contemporary scientific practice, because they do not reflect the extent to which the heuristic strategies and descriptive practices that contribute to mechanistic explanation have evolved beyond the well-known methods of decomposition, localization, and pictorial representation. Recent examples from evolutionary robotics and network approaches to biology and neuroscience demonstrate the increasingly important role played by computer simulations and mathematical (...) representations in the epistemic practices of mechanism discovery and mechanism description. These examples also indicate that the scope of mechanistic explanation must be re-examined: With new and increasingly powerful methods of discovery and description comes the possibility of describing mechanisms far more complex than traditionally assumed. (shrink)

According to the Principle of Alternative Possibilities, an agent is morally responsible for an action of hers only if she could have done otherwise. The notion of a robust alternative plays a prominent role in recent attacks on PAP based on so-called Frankfurt cases. In this paper I defend the truth of PAP for blameworthy actions against Frankfurt cases recently proposed by Derk Pereboom and David Widerker. My defence rests on some intuitively plausible principles that yield a new understanding of (...) the concept of a robust alternative. I will leave aside whether PAP also holds for praiseworthy actions -/- Según el Principio de Posibilidades Alternativas, un agente es moralmente responsable de una acción sólo si hubiera podido actuar de otro modo. La noción de alternativa robusta desempeña un papel prominente en ataques recientes al PPA basados en los llamados casos Frankfurt. En este artículo defiendo el PPA para la culpabilidad moral frente a casos Frankfurt propuestos recientemente por Derk Pereboom y David Widerker. Mi defensa descansa en algunos principios intuitivamente plausibles que dan lugar a una comprensión nueva del concepto de alternativa robusta. No trataré la cuestión de la verdad del PPA para acciones moralmente laudables. (shrink)

Marcus William Hunt argues that when co-parents disagree over whether to raise their child (or children) as a vegan, they should reach a compromise as a gift given by one parent to the other out of respect for his or her authority. Josh Millburn contends that Hunt’s proposal of parental compromise over veganism is unacceptable on the ground that it overlooks respect for animal rights, which bars compromising. However, he contemplates the possibility of parental compromise over ‘unusual eating,’ of animal-based (...) foods obtained without the violation of animal rights. I argue for zero parental compromise, rejecting a rights-oriented approach, and propose a policy that an ethical vegan parent and a non-vegan co-parent should follow to determine how to raise their children. (shrink)

One challenge faced by aesthetics is the development of an account able to trace out the continuities and discontinuities between general experience and aesthetic experiences. Regarding this issue, in this paper, I present an enactive model of some raw cognitive dynamics that might drive the progressive emergence of aesthetic experiences from the stream of general experience. The framework is based on specific aspects of John Dewey’s pragmatist philosophy and embodied aesthetic theories, while also taking into account research in ecological psychology, (...) cognitive sciences, and dynamic systems theory. The model focuses on dynamically relevant nodes at the pre-reflective and the reflective side of experience that would work as nested rhythmic constraints at different cognitive timescales with the potential to shunt experiences toward the aesthetic in everyday situations. My proposal constitutes a way to explore aesthetic experiences from an enactive perspective that regards them as transformative events in which cognitive processes entrain and are entrained by changes taking place in the environment, the brain, and the body. (shrink)

Expressivists claim that normative judgments (NJ) are non-cognitive states. But what kind of states are they, exactly? Expressivists need to provide us with an adequate account of their nature. Here, I argue that there are structural features that render this task rather daunting. The worry takes the form of a looming dilemma: NJ are either conative states (i.e. states with a world-to-mind direction of fit) or they are not. If they are, then they are either attitudes de se (i.e. attitudes (...) about oneself) or they are not. If they are, then they’re unable to account for disagreement. If they are not, then they're unable to account for agent-relative NJ. So NJ cannot be conative states (they cannot have a world-to-mind direction of fit). On the other hand, however, if NJ are not conative states (if they are states without a direction of fit, like affective or other sui generis non-cognitive, non-conative attitudes) then it remains a mystery how they support relations of disagreement. (shrink)

Context is a concept used by philosophers and scientists with many different definitions. Since Dummett we speak of "context principle" in Frege and Wittgenstein: "an expression has a meaning only in the context of a sentence". The context principle finds an extension in some of Wittgenstein's ideas, especially in his famous passage where he says that "to understand a sentence is to understand a language". Given that Wittgenstein believes that "the" language does not exist but only language games exist, we (...) should conclude that he is speaking of the need to consider any sentence always in the context of a language game1. This general attitude is certainly attuned with the contemporary tendency to place contextual restrictions to the interpretations of our sentences. However we find so many kinds and forms of restrictions that this general attitude is not enough to give us a viable tool to find an order in the web of so many different theories of context. To look for an order or, at least a clarification, we may start with two contrasting paradigms of theories: the "objective" theory of contexts, where context is a set of features of the world, and the "subjective" theories of context, where context is the cognitive background of a speaker or agent in respect to a situation2. We have here not only two different ways of using the term "context" but also two different conceptions of semantics and philosophy. The different conceptions are normally associated, respectively, with the classical paradigm of model theoretic semantics (Kaplan, Lewis Stalnaker) on one hand and with the A.I. paradigm (McCarthy, Buvac, Giunchiglia) on the other hand. For sake of simplicity I will restrict my attention3 mainly to Kaplan 1989 and to McCarthy 1993 and Giunchiglia 1993. The two different conceptions can be summarised with the following schema: a) context as: set of features of the world.. (shrink)

The Whorfian hypothesis has received support from recent findings in psychology, linguistics, and anthropology. This evidence has been interpreted as supporting the view that language modulates all stages of perception and cognition, in accordance with Whorf’s original proposal. In light of a much broader body of evidence on time perception, I propose to evaluate these findings with respect to their scope. When assessed collectively, the entire body of evidence on time perception shows that the Whorfian hypothesis has a limited scope (...) and that it does not affect early stages of time perception. In particular, all the available evidence shows that the scope of language modulation is limited in the case of time perception, and that the most important mechanisms for time perception are cognitive clocks and simultaneity windows, which we use to perceive the temporal properties of events. Language modulation has distorting effects, but only at later stages of processing or with respect to specific categorization tasks. The paper explains what is the role of these effects in the context of all the available evidence on time cognition and perception. (shrink)

This article develops a diagnostic lens to make sense of the still baffling development of a ‘humanitarian marketplace’. Ambivalently hybrid initiatives such as volunteer tourism, corporate social responsibility or even fair trade do not strictly obey a distributive logic of market exchange, social reciprocity or philanthropic giving. They engender a type of ‘economy’ that must be apprehended in its own terms. The article argues that the large-scale collaborative effects of such a dispersed market can be theorized without resorting to the (...) classical biopolitical move of simplified agency/holistic reification. The argument proceeds counterintuitively, by appropriating the notion of symbiosis as redefined by contemporary biology, contending through historical contextualization and conceptual work that nature itself offers the best example to grasp spontaneous collaboration among unrelated human beings as a non-automatically balanced and intrinsically political affair that calls for critical management through an ex post facto interventionist policy of selective cultivation. (shrink)

This paper explores the scope and limits of rational consensus through mutual respect, with the primary focus on the best known formal model of consensus: the Lehrer–Wagner model. We consider various arguments against the rationality of the Lehrer–Wagner model as a model of consensus about factual matters. We conclude that models such as this face problems in achieving rational consensus on disagreements about unknown factual matters, but that they hold considerable promise as models of how to rationally resolve non-factual disagreements.

The frame problem, a long-standing issue in Artificial Intelligence (AI), revolves around determining the relevance of information in an ever-changing array of contexts, posing a formidable challenge in modeling human reasoning. The purpose of this paper is to explore the hypothesis that emotions are able to solve, or at least enable a substantial step towards a solution. I argue that, while emotions are integral to cognitive processes, they do not offer a solution to the frame problem, nor can they play (...) a significant role in a solution. In the course of the argument, I’ll show why some previous claims that emotions could be helpful towards a solution rely on a problematic analysis of what the frame problem is. Ultimately, the conclusion is that no context-dependent feature can play a non-trivial role in solutions to the frame problem, and that is the case of emotions. (shrink)

Counselling y cuidados paliativos es el título del libro escrito por la doctora Esperanza Santos y el profesor José Carlos Bermejo. En esta obra, de fácil lectura y con consejos muy prácticos y útiles, se presentan elementos fundamentales para brindar un acompañamiento de óptima calidad en el cuidado paliativo, así como la posibilidad de hacer un autoexamen de cómo los cuidadores de los pacientes prestan sus servicios e incluso para no caer en burnout. Este libro es de gran utilidad, (...) tanto para los profesionales de la salud que trabajan en las unidades de cuidados paliativos, como para personas que dedican gran parte de su tiempo al cuidado de familiares con enfermedades terminales, o que pasan por procesos prolongados de enfermedad. Con ejemplos de conversaciones de la vida real entre cuidadores y pacientes, la lectura del libro se hace, a la vez, agradable, divertida y profundamente reflexiva. (shrink)

It has been commonplace to equate Foucault’s 1979 series of lectures at the Collège de France with the claim that for neoliberalism, unlike for classical liberalism, the market needs to be artificially constructed. The article expands this claim to its full expression, taking it beyond what otherwise would be a simple divulgation of a basic neoliberal tenet. It zeroes in on Foucault’s own insight: that neoliberal constructivism is not directed at the market as such, but, in principle, at society, arguing (...) that the value of this insight goes beyond the critique of a neoliberal present. The neoliberal rationale rather helps him to reveal a unique historical architecture, a latent approach to the social dissimilar to the one that has long predominated in the human sciences. The inversion of homo œconomicus in neoliberal theory amounted to the unearthing of a ‘social subject of interest’ within civil society. Such a subject, barely recognized by neoliberals who simply instrumentalize it for the sake of the market, demonstrates that the social is not necessarily the natural product of ethical subjects; that society may also need to be constructed. (shrink)

Is it possible to know anything about life we have not yet encountered? We know of only one example of life: our own. Given this, many scientists are inclined to doubt that any principles of Earth’s biology will generalize to other worlds in which life might exist. Let’s call this the “N = 1 problem.” By comparison, we expect the principles of geometry, mechanics, and chemistry would generalize. Interestingly, each of these has predictable consequences when applied to biology. The surface-to-volume (...) property of geometry, for example, limits the size of unassisted cells in a given medium. This effect is real, precise, universal, and predictive. Furthermore, there are basic problems all life must solve if it is to persist, such as resistance to radiation, faithful inheritance, and energy regulation. If these universal problems have a limited set of possible solutions, some common outcomes must consistently emerge. In this chapter, I discuss the N = 1 problem, its implications, and my response (Mariscal 2014). I hold that our current knowledge of biology can justify believing certain generalizations as holding for life anywhere. Life on Earth may be our only example of life, but this is only a reason to be cautious in our approach to life in the universe, not a reason to give up altogether. In my account, a candidate biological generalization is assessed by the assumptions it makes. A claim is accepted only if its justification includes principles of evolution, but no contingent facts of life on Earth. (shrink)

Although the idea of the Anthropocene originated in the earth sciences, there have been increasing calls for questions about the Anthropocene to be addressed by pan-disciplinary groups of researchers from across the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities. We use data analysis techniques from corpus linguistics to examine academic texts about the Anthropocene from these disciplinary families. We read the data to suggest that barriers to a broadly interdisciplinary study of the Anthropocene are high, but we are also able to (...) identify some areas of common ground that could serve as interdisciplinary bridges. (shrink)

Replies to commentators Respuestas a los comentarios críticos de Carlos Patarroyo, Mirja Pérez de Calleja y Pablo Rychter.

In this paper we give some formal examples of ideas developed by Penco in two papers on the tension inside Frege's notion of sense (see Penco 2003). The paper attempts to compose the tension between semantic and cognitive aspects of sense, through the idea of sense as proof or procedure – not as an alternative to the idea of sense as truth condition, but as complementary to it (as it happens sometimes in the old tradition of procedural semantics).

On a highly influential way to think of modality, that I call ‘relationalism’, the modality of a state is explained by its being composed of properties, and these properties being related by a higher-order and primitively modal relation. Examples of relationalism are the Dretske-Tooley-Armstrong account of natural necessity, many dispositional essentialist views, and Wang’s incompatibility primitivism. I argue that relationalism faces four difficulties: that the selection between modal relations is arbitrary, that the modal relation cannot belong to any logical order, (...) that to explain how the modal relation can relate properties of different adicities additional ideological complexity has to be introduced, and that not all modal constraints are relational. From the discussion, I will extract desiderata for a successor theory of modality. (shrink)

Carlos Pereda's "Mexico Unveiled" is a fresh, idiosyncratic synthesis of twentieth-century Mexican philosophy that puts contemporary debates about Mexican identity politics into a critical perspective. In three engaging essays written in a peerless prose style, Pereda considers the persistent influence of European colonialism on Mexican intellectual life, the politics of inclusion, and the changing ideas of what it means to be Mexican. He identifies three "vices"—social habits, customs, and beliefs inherited from European colonialism—that have influenced the development of Mexican (...) national identity: subaltern fervor, craving for novelty, and nationalist zeal. Pereda demonstrates that these three tendencies have led Mexican intellectuals, and Mexican society more generally, to uncritically adopt a politics of exclusion and destructive nationalist attitudes. To do all of this, Pereda invites readers to follow him along as he explores an often surprising series of arguments and counterarguments. Using a strategy he calls "nomadic" thinking—the act of moving beyond our cultural preconceptions and habits of thinking—he guides readers through a number of examples drawn from Mexican philosophy and culture that illustrate these tendencies. At its core, "Mexico Unveiled" is an accessible and entertaining introduction to the philosophical themes that have long occupied Pereda's life and work and Mexican philosophy more generally. (shrink)

With millions of animals brought into existence and raised for food every year, their negative impact upon the environment and the staggering growth in the number of chronic diseases caused by meat and dairy diets make a global move toward ethical veganism imperative. Typi-cally, utilitarians and deontologists have led this discussion. The purpose of this paper is to pro-pose a virtuous approach to ethical veganism. Virtue ethics can be used to construct a defense of ethical veganism by relying on the (...) virtues of compassion and fairness. Exercising these values in our relations with animals involves acknowledging their moral value, thus seeing that they are not our property or our food. It is important to emphasize that this argument applies only to well-developed societies that need not rely upon animals as sources of food, clothing, and various by-products. (shrink)

In this article I will begin by discussing recent criticism, by Mauro Antonelli and Werner Sauer, of the ontological interpretation of Franz Brentano’s concept of intentionality, as formulated by i.a. Roderick Chisholm. I will then outline some apparent inconsistencies of the positions advocated by Antonelli and Sauer with Brentano’s formulations of his theory in several works and lectures. This new evaluation of (unpublished) sources will then lead to a sketch of a new approach to Brentano’s theory of intentionality. Specifically, it (...) will be argued that the notion of “intentional object” is inherently and un- avoidably ambiguous in every act of external perception, due to the fact that we can only have improper intentions directed at the external world. (shrink)

In his article 'Individualism and Descartes' (Teorema, vol. 16, pp. 71-86), William Ferraiolo puts into question the widely accepted interpretation of Descartes as an individualist about mental content. In this paper, I defend this interpretation of Descartes thought against Ferraiolo's objections. I hold, first, that the interpretation is not historically misguided. Second, I try to show that Descartes’s endorsement of anti-individualism would lead either to depriving skeptical hypotheses of their force or to rejecting the epistemological privilege of the first person. (...) Finally, I argue that Ferraiolo’s objections to the individualistic interpretation rest on two important errors: a misapprehension of the argumentative order of the Meditations and a confusion between the notions of causal and constitutive dependence of content on the external environment. (shrink)

This article presents what I call the Central Normative Proposal of Luis Villoro. This proposal is based on an interpretation of the principle of non-exclusion in ethics and epistemology. The core argument of the paper is based on a linguistic analogy that demonstrates the importance of reasonable communication for non-exclusion in epistemology, which is assumed in various theses of Villoro. A consequence of this analogy for non-exclusion in ethics is that Villoro defends basing what is reasonable on the concrete possibilities (...) of mutual understanding, starting with asymmetries and injustices that are obfuscated or eliminated in a contractualist analysis, or one that begins with strictly egalitarian principles. This criticism is compatible with egalitarian views, but it assumes a radically different point of departure. Although various theses by Villoro are compatible with egalitarian notions, given this point of departure based on asymmetries of power his proposal should be understood based on our cognitive capacities to understand and appreciate such asymmetries. For this reason, the paper concludes with an analysis of the notion of reasonableness, which under my interpretation Villoro defines in terms of our capacities for attention, that are not reducible to beliefs or systems of beliefs. In this way, the Central Normative Proposal of Villoro depends on the convergence between truth and the dignity of the members of communities in which as matter-of-fact asymmetries exist and must be eliminated through concrete communicative efforts. (shrink)

20th century physics has revealed a pervasive relational aspect of the physical world. This fact is relevant in view of some of the motivations for panpsychism. In facts, it may be seen as a vindication of the panpsychist idea of a monist continuity where some aspects of the consciousness’ perspectivalism are universal. But this same fact undermines the motivations for genuine forms of panpsychism.

A man or woman who has a great spiritual sensitivity, who is interested in matters of faith and religion, or who dedicates a good part of his time to the cultivation of the spiritual life, is almost always associated with a priest or a nun, sometimes even in a derogatory way for the rest of the people. It seems that the interest in the spiritual was something exclusive to some. However, Alexander Schmemann is an example of how a great sensitivity, (...) a deep interest in matters of faith and religion, and a great dedication of time to the cultivation of the spiritual life are combined with being a father of a family. That is why this book will particularly appeal to many men who are already married or who want to be and at the same time want to lead a solid, consistent and coherent life of faith. (shrink)

No es usual leer un libro de un gran teólogo y a la vez de un gran artista. Ubicándonos en el siglo XXI, es fácil reconocer al personaje del cual estamos hablando: Marko I. Rupnik. La sensibilidad artística, unida a la profundidad teológica y a su ascendencia espiritual católica oriental, hacen de los escritos del padre Rupnik grandes novedades para la teología occidental actual. En su libro According to the Spirit, el padre Rupnik propone, siguiendo los lineamientos del papa Francisco, (...) que será una teología espiri-tual que exprese la renovación de la vida eclesial, la que podrá afrontar el periodo épico de transición en el cual nos encontramos. La Iglesia Católica necesita una nueva mentalidad que corresponde a una vida nueva, pero basada en una vida según el Espíritu, una vida espiritual que le haga espacio interior al Espíritu, recibiéndolo como un don, que nos libere del apego a nosotros mismos. Las aproximaciones exis-tenciales, así como la profundidad teológica y los matices fruto de la sensibilidad espiritual del padre Rupnik, hacen del libro una aguda, dura y muy acertada crítica a la situación actual de la Iglesia Católica, en sus métodos teológicos, evangelización y respuesta a las necesidades del mundo de hoy. (shrink)

In this paper I deal with Richard Moran's account of self-knowledge in his book Authority and Estrangement. After presenting the main lines of his account, I contend that, in spite of its novelty and interest, it may have some shortcomings. Concerning beliefs formed through deliberation, the account would seem to face problems of circularity or regress. And it looks also wanting concerning beliefs not formed in this way. I go on to suggest a diagnosis of these problems, according to which (...) they would arise out of a view of agents too strongly dependent on the will. /// Este trabajo se ocupa de la concepción del autoconocimiento en el libro de Richard Moran Authority and Estrangement. Tras presentar las líneas maestras de dicha concepción, sostengo que ésta, a pesar de su novedad e interés, podría adolecer de defectos importantes. Así, con respecto a las creencias formadas mediante la deliberación, la propuesta de Moran parece enfrentarse a problemas de circularidad o de regreso. Y parece también insatisfactoria acerca de creencias no formadas de ese modo. Finalmente, sugiero un diagnóstico de estos problemas, según el cual éstos surgirían de una concepción de los agentes excesivamente dependiente de la voluntad. (shrink)

This appears in a supplementary issue of the Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, entitled "Ancient Approaches to Plato's Timaeus.".

Abstract: This paper is a response to Park Seungbae’s article, “Defence of Cultural Relativism”. Some of the typical criticisms of moral relativism are the following: moral relativism is erroneously committed to the principle of tolerance, which is a universal principle; there are a number of objective moral rules; a moral relativist must admit that Hitler was right, which is absurd; a moral relativist must deny, in the face of evidence, that moral progress is possible; and, since every individual belongs to (...) multiple cultures at once, the concept of moral relativism is vague. Park argues that such contentions do not affect moral relativism and that the moral relativist may respond that the value of tolerance, Hitler’s actions, and the concept of culture are themselves relative. In what follows, I show that Park’s adroit strategy is unsuc-cessful. Consequently, moral relativism is incoherent. (shrink)

In this paper [submitted in 2008] I discuss the relation between truth and assertion. But the paper was never published, because the journal did not start (I don't know whether it started with another name and I wish all the best for this enterprise). After a while, I realized that what I had written was unclear and I tried to re-write with more details for "Agora filosofica". In this new paper I discuss in detail Kripke's example presented as a case (...) against Donnellan's distinction, and I claim that one of the two dialogues breaks Grice's Cooperation principle (and,in general, the charity principle). (shrink)

Although the treatise presented here is most interesting, it was never widely disseminated. As far as we know, it is preserved only in Latin, in one manuscript. The text poses many questions. Who produced a copy of the text? Who is the translator? Is the treatise a genuine work of Averroes? And if so, what was his intention in writing this monograph on the First Cause?

In this paper, I will discuss a well-known oscillation in Frege’s conception of sense. My point is only partially concerned with his two different criteria of sense identity, and touches upon a more specific point: what happens if we apply Frege’s intuitive criterion for the difference of thoughts to logically equivalent sentences? I will try to make a schematic argument here that will preempt any endeavor to make Frege more coherent than he really is. In sections A and B, I (...) will present two alternative Fregean ways to treat the sense of logically equivalent sentences. Frege really oscillated between two alternative conceptions of sense, and his inability to detect the contrast between the two alternative conceptions is partly due to his strong conception of rationality. To apply the criterion of difference of thoughts to logical matters, we may also use a weak notion of rationality, or at least a notion of rationality of human agents, with limited computational resources. The distinctions towards which Frege was striving are better understood nowadays from the point of view of the treatment of limited rationality, which imposes itself even in logical matters. (shrink)

In Overlooking Conventions Michael Devitt argues in defence of the traditional approach to semantics. Devitt’s main line of argument is an inference to the best explanation: nearly all cases that linguistic pragmatists discuss in order to challenge the traditional approach to semantics are better explained by adding conventions into language, in the form of expanding the range of polysemy or the range of indexicality (in the broad sense of linguistically governed context sensitivity). In this paper, we discuss three aspects of (...) a draft of Devitt’s Overlooking Conventions, which was discussed at a conference in Dubrovnik in September 2018. First, we try to show that his rejection of Bach’s distinction between convention and standardization overlooks important features of standardization. Second, we elaborate on Devitt’s argument against linguistic pragmatism based on the normative aspect of meaning and show that a similar argument can be mounted against semantic minimalism. While Devitt and minimalists have a common enemy, they are not allies either. Third, we address a methodological difficulty in Devitt’s view concerning a threat of over-generation and propose a solution to it. Although this paper is the result of collaboration the authors have written different parts. Carlo Penco has written part 1, Massimiliano Vignolo has written part 2 and part 3. (shrink)

There has been much debate recently on the question whether essence can explain modality. Here, I examine two routes to an essentialist account of modality. The first is Hale's argument for the necessity of essence, which I will argue is — notwithstanding recent attempted defences of it — invalid by its very structure. The second is the proposal that it is essential to essential truth that it is necessary. After offering three possible versions of the view, I will argue that (...) each fails to provide a metaphysical explanation of necessity in terms of essence. (shrink)

Evolutionary adaptation has been suggested as the hallmark of life that best accounts for life’s creativity. However, current evolutionary approaches still fail to give an adequate account of it, even if they are able to explain both the origin of novelties and the proliferation of certain traits in a population. Although modern-synthesis Darwinism is today usually appraised as too narrow a position to cope with all the complexities of developmental and structural biology—not to say biosemiotic phenomena—, Darwinism need not be (...) if we separate metaphor from reality in natural selection in order to show the axiological complexity of this concept. This can shed light on the relationship between biosemiotics and biological evolution. (shrink)

The CRISPR system for gene editing can break, repair, and replace targeted sections of DNA. Although CRISPR gene editing has important therapeutic potential, it raises several ethical concerns. Some bioethicists worry CRISPR is a prelude to a dystopian future, while others maintain it should not be feared because it is analogous to past biotechnologies. In the scientific literature, CRISPR is often discussed as a revolutionary technology. In this paper we unpack the framing of CRISPR as a revolutionary technology and contrast (...) it with framing it as a value-threatening biotechnology or business-as-usual. By drawing on a comparison between CRISPR and the Ford Model T, we argue CRISPR is revolutionary as a product, process, and as a force for social change. This characterization of CRISPR offers important conceptual clarity to the existing debates surrounding CRISPR. In particular, conceptualizing CRISPR as a revolutionary technology structures regulatory goals with respect to this new technology. Revolutionary technologies have characteristic patterns of implementation, entrenchment, and social impact. As such, early identification of technologies as revolutionary may help construct more nuanced and effective ethical frameworks for public policy. (shrink)

This paper is a comparison of Kripke’s and Künne’s interpretations of Frege’s theory of indexicals, especially concerning Frege’s remarks on time as “part of the expression of thought”. I analyze the most contrasting features of Kripke’s and Künne’s interpretations of Frege’s remarks on indexicals. Subsequently, I try to identify a common ground between Kripke’s and Künne’s interpretations, and hint at a possible convergence between those two views, stressing the importance given by Frege to nonverbal signs in defining the content of (...) thought. I conclude by indicating a possible direction for further research. (shrink)

Franz Brentano is not usually associated with mathematics. Generally, only Brentano’s discussion of the continuum and his critique of the mathematical accounts of it is treated in the literature. It is this detailed critique which suggests that Brentano had more than a superficial familiarity with mathematics. Indeed, considering the authors and works quoted in his lectures, Brentano appears well-informed and quite interested in the mathematical research of his time. I specifically address his lectures here as there is much less to (...) be found about mathematics in his published works. Besides Brentano’s own work, it is quite remarkable to see that practically all of his better-known students sooner or later produced a work on the philosophy of mathematics. This also encourages the supposition not just of a common interest in the matter, but of a common theoretical core. All this prompts the question: Can we speak of a Brentanist philosophy of mathematics? (shrink)

Resumo: Este artigo visa explorar a questão da educação em Platão a partir da contextualização histórica, pensando o modelo de Atenas, Lesbos e Esparta, e da perspectiva por onde uma má paideía, a baixa qualidade na formação de cidadãos, se torna a principal causa geradora da ruptura social. Foi feita, então, uma reflexão sobre as possibilidades de educação que atenienses de classes sociais distintas teriam e sobre a proposta platônica fundamentada na combinação entre a ginástica e a música, para que (...) se desenvolvesse um perfil de cidadão com ideais coletivos sólidos a ponto de se evitar a stásis. Palavras-chave: Platão, educação, dissensão, stásis, paideía. Abstract:This article aims to explore the question of education in Plato from the historical context, thinking the model of Athens, Lesbos and Sparta, and from the perspective where a bad paideía, the low quality in the formation of citizens, becomes the main generating cause of social disruption. Then, a reflection was made on the educational possibilities that Athenians from different social classes would have and on the Platonic proposal based on the combination of gymnastics and music, so that a citizen profile with solid collective ideals would be developed to the point of avoiding stásis. Keywords: Plato, education, dissension, stásis, paideía. (shrink)