Kant’s geographical theory, which was informed by contemporary travel reports, diaries, and journals, developed before his so-called “critical turn.” There are several reasons to study Kant’s lectures and material on geography. The geography provided Kant with terms, concepts, and metaphors which he employed in order to present or elucidate the critical philosophy. Some of the germs of what would become Kant’s critical philosophy can already be detected in the geography course. Finally, Kant’s geography is (...) also one source of some of the empirical claims in his philosophical works, including the Critique of the Power of Judgment. To give an example of this, I examine his account of the sublime. (shrink)

An outline of the wealth of philosophical material that hides behind the flat world of geographic maps, with special reference to (i) the centrality of the boundary concept, (ii) the problem of vagueness, and (iii) the metaphysical question (if such there be) of the identity and persistence conditions of geographic entities. Serves as an introduction to the special issue of "Topoi" (20:2, 2001) on the Philosophy of Geography.

The existence of various sufferings has long been thought to pose a problem for the existence of a personal God: the Problem of Evil. In this paper, we propose an original version of POE, in which the geographic distribution of sufferings and of opportunities for flourishing or suffering is better explained if the universe, at bottom, is indifferent to the human condition than if, as theists propose, there is a personal God from whom the universe originates: the Problem of (...) class='Hi'>Geography. POG moves beyond previous versions of POE because traditional responses to POE are less effective as responses to POG than they are to other versions of POE. (shrink)

In this paper we will address the following points: (1) we will question the general belief that Kant’s philosophical approach has a geographical character, by showing how critical philosophy and physical geography establish, in their respective systems, two inverse relationships between the rational and the aesthetic form of spatiality; (2) we will argue that cartography still plays a role in the realization of a scientific system of cognition, and that this role consists in guiding this very realization; (3) (...) lastly, we will develop the hypothesis that the map of the cognitive faculties, exemplified by the transcendental topic, is part of a device aimed at keeping the subject from the adventures of thought typical of dogmatism. (shrink)

Some have argued that the vagueness exhibited by geographic names and descriptions such as ‘Albuquerque’, ‘the Outback’, or ‘Mount Everest’ is ultimately ontological: these terms are vague because they refer to vague objects, objects with fuzzy boundaries. I take the opposite stand and hold the view that geographic vagueness is exclusively semantic, or conceptual at large. There is no such thing as a vague mountain. Rather, there are many things where we conceive a mountain to be, each with its precise (...) boundary, and when we say ‘Everest’ we are just being vague as to which thing we are referring to. This paper defends this view against some plausible objections. (shrink)

Occasionally, in the introductory philosophy courses I teach, a student will give an interesting argument for non-belief in God. Though I have never seen this argument in print, it seems familiar. Basically, the argument goes like this. Religious belief is largely determined by geography – where you are born and raised largely determines your religious beliefs. But believing something just because of where you are born and raised is not a reliable indication of whether that belief turns out (...) to be true. So, in some sense, you are not justified in your religious beliefs. I will attempt a more rigorous reconstruction of this argument and offer an objection to it. (shrink)

This chapter develops a semantic theory for maps and situates it within the broader geography of meaning and semiotic significance. The discussion focuses on three central aspects of map semantics: the use of space, line marking, and linguistic tags. It is argued that the treatment of space in maps must be based on geometrical projection from a viewpoint rather than the traditional analysis in terms of spatial isomorphism. The chapter then shows how to integrate the projection-based semantics of maps (...) and the symbolic semantics of markers and tags, within the framework of possible-world semantics. The resulting account addresses issues of accuracy, viewpoint, orientation, and exhaustivity. (shrink)

In Genesis we are told that God gathered the waters into one place, in order to let the dry land appear, which He called earth, while the waters were called seas. In the Netherlands, this process took more than a single day, and it was the work of man. Gradually, a cultivated landscape emerged out of diffuse nature. In the course of centuries, the Dutch determined the conditions that allowed different aspects of nature to present themselves. This process is described (...) as a moral geography in the sense that different types of landscape are read as a manifestations of different moral attitudes towards nature, whereas concrete landscape interventions are interpreted as instances of moral criticism directed towards the activities and values of previous generations. At present, this process is being reversed, as diffuse, wetland nature is experiencing a come-back. (shrink)

This is a work in Kantian conceptual geography. It explores issues in analytic epistemology, philosophy of language, and metaphysics by appealing to theses drawn from Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason.

An outline of the wealth of philosophical material that hides behind the flat world of geographic maps, with special reference to (i) the centrality of the boundary concept, (ii) the problem of vagueness, and (iii) the metaphysical question (if such there be) of the identity and persistence conditions of geographic entities.

The present article has as proposal the discussion of the philosophical categories of Idealism and Materialism in the Geographical thought. Starting from the assumption that the knowledge is a fact, we explicit our onto-epistemological basis by a dialog between the main representatives of each Philosophy pole, from Democritus to Hegel, exposing after the sublation to the metaphysics done by the dialectical materialism. Using a bridge to the hard core of the Critical Geography (Lefebvre, Harvey and Quaini), we transmute (...) the philosophical debate to the geographical field showing the often ignored roots, logic and addictions of the Modern Geography. Retaking in the end the duel between Idealism and Materialism, we present our thesis in which the Crisis of Geography is, in fact, just the result of a process originated from its incapacity as a discipline to overcome the limiter vestige of its birth: the Metaphysics. (shrink)

In this narrative, Fatima examines the interplay of critical consciousness, relational dynamics, and patriarchy within social-geographical spaces. Drawing on personal experiences, the chapter explores how patriarchal norms, internalized and perpetuated within intimate relationships and community networks, shape gendered expectations and limit agency from childhood through adulthood. While acknowledging the harms inflicted by these norms, it highlights the dual role of these spaces in fostering both oppression and connection. The essay looks at why simplistic solutions like geographic escape ignore the interdependence (...) and cultural norms intrinsic to relational spaces. Instead, it advocates for a nuanced understanding of the challenges and complexities of addressing patriarchy within these contexts. Ultimately, Fatima emphasizes that the feminist struggle lies not in abandoning these spaces but in fostering critical consciousness and collective efforts to undo patriarchal systems while paying attention to the nuances of social-geographical spaces. (shrink)

The Caribbean is a site where multiple cultures, peoples, waysof thinking and acting have come together and where new formsof philosophy are emerging. The promise of Caribbean philoso-phy lays in its ability to give shape to an intellectual tradition which is both true to and beneficial to Caribbean peoples whilesimultaneously being provocative enough to engage wisdom-seekers of various geographies and identities. I argue that onlyby pursuing a “New Dialogic” which engages the philosophicaltraditions of Africans, African Americans, and Native Ameri-cans (...) can we hope to assert a unique philosophy of value toCaribbean peoples and cultures. The highest form of Caribbeanphilosophy thus must be plural and dialogical. Unfortunately,dialogues in philosophy have been typically characterized bya fixation with Europe, and a lack of consideration of otherphilosophical traditions or sources. The “New Dialogic” thatI propose here involves a more dynamic model of dialogue toopen or intensify different and multiple avenues of conceptualelaboration. I provide general guidelines or principles for this“New Dialogic” and demonstrate the extent to which Caribbeanphilosophers can both contribute to the expansion of this projectand be aided by it in their formulations of the field. (shrink)

Writing within and against the set critical practices of psychoanalytic-deconstructive-Foucauldian-feminist cultural theory, Elizabeth Wilson demonstrates, in this provocative and original book, the productivity and the pleasure of direct, complicitous engagement with the contemporary cognitive sciences. Wilson forges an eclectic method in reaction to the 'zealous but disavowed moralism' of those high cultural Theorists whose 'disciplining compulsion' concocts a monolithic picture of science in order to keep their 'sanitizing critical practice' untainted by its sinister reductionism. Her unsettling accounts of texts by, (...) for example, Karl Popper, Judith Butler, Derrida, Turing, Ebbinghaus and Freud will send many readers back to the sources. It is no surprise that such a broad and ambitious project leaves many threads loose, and no criticism at all that it succeeds more in hinting at the promise of a new connectionist politics than in offering up such a hybrid fully-formed. (shrink)

Many philosophers affiliated with the analytic school contend that the history of philosophy is not relevant to their work. The present study challenges this claim by introducing a strong variant of the philosophical history of philosophy termed the “logical–contextual history of philosophy.” Its objective is to map the “logical geography” of the concepts and theories of past philosophical masters, concepts and theories that are not only genealogically, but also logically related. Such history of philosophy cannot (...) be set in opposition to the traditional “systematic philosophy.” Rather, the logical–contextual history of philosophy is, like the traditional school philosophies, systematic, although it develops along different lines. (shrink)

v. 1. As matrizes clássicas originárias -- v. 2. As matrizes da renovação -- v. 3. As matrizes brasileiras.

This project continues our interdisciplinary research into computational and cognitive aspects of narrative comprehension. Our ultimate goal is the development of a computational theory of how humans understand narrative texts. The theory will be informed by joint research from the viewpoints of linguistics, cognitive psychology, the study of language acquisition, literary theory, geography, philosophy, and artificial intelligence. The linguists, literary theorists, and geographers in our group are developing theories of narrative language and spatial understanding that are being tested (...) by the cognitive psychologists and language researchers in our group, and a computational model of a reader of narrative text is being developed by the AI researchers, based in part on these theories and results and in part on research on knowledge representation and reasoning. This proposal describes the knowledge-representation and natural-language-processing issues involved in the computational implementation of the theory; discusses a contrast between communicative and narrative uses of language and of the relation of the narrative text to the story world it describes; investigates linguistic, literary, and hermeneutic dimensions of our research; presents a computational investigation of subjective sentences and reference in narrative; studies children’s acquisition of the ability to take third-person perspective in their own storytelling; describes the psychological validation of various linguistic devices; and examines how readers develop an understanding of the geographical space of a story. This report is a longer version of a project description submitted to NSF. This document, produced in May 2007, is a L ATEX version of Technical Report 89-07 (Buffalo: SUNY Buffalo Department of Computer Science, August 1989), with slightly.. (shrink)

The ontological determination of the movement in its quality of way of Being incessantly moves the critic affirmed to denial it through come to be which affirms new critics, unity of continuities and discontinuities with the previous critic. Therefore, it is important to unveil the material determinations in which are rooted the conception of Being dissociated from Non-being consolidated in insurmountable distinction between Being and Entity in its quality of expression of ideas in an inverted reality, falsely apprehended. Ideally reproduced (...) reality that, nevertheless, allows alternatives corresponding to the realization of aims targeted to satisfy historically determined necessities. The confrontations in the production and reproduction of purposes to guide social relations cross-dress debility of determined and impotent movement to impose determinations to the full virtuosity of immobility that moves the transitory. The difference between Being e Entity conforms in a formal logic deprived from/of contradiction to affirm the development of knowledge in what, in truth, hindered and limit it to remain, reducing the movement to stationary, to what moves to what moves without moving, to what isolate the knowledge of reality, to what detaches idea and material, to what conserves and incarcerates and not to what transform and set free. The treatment conceived as a movement from radical critic brings together the ontological primacy to underpin the root of the constitution of social existence to establish the ontological determinations of the existence to consciousness is stated in Marx – being reaffirmed in Lukács – by affirming that categories are forms of Being, determinations from/of existence. The category of totality, as a result of it, constitute expression of form of Being from reality in movement and synthesis from multiples and mutual determinations of negated diversities in an unitarity which affirm them. Therefore, the dialectical reflexive movement refuses as an ineliminable condition to the movement which affirms to mould identity with unitarity between identity and non-identity or don’t conceive relation of identity with dialectic, with the existence of reality to express a contradiction and incessant transmutation between Being and Non-being. The totality by transmuting itself while remain totality albeit not identical to the previous moment embraces a category to synthesize the unity of diversity. This diversity moved and moving from/by unity contemplates the relation of identity ratio (nowadays totality) between the identity (continuity with the preceding totality) and the non-identity (discontinuity with the preceding totality). To ignore the identity of identity with a non-identity conforms the impotence of category to constitute an expression of existence for not affording the contradiction immanent to the existence of reality moving from transport incessant of Being to come to be which puts itself from Non-being to Being. In short, concomitantly the being is transposed to Non-being to a Being come to be transpose from Non-being to a Being whilst ontological determination is constituted and constitutive of movement. The realization of critic conditioned the self-critic that ontologically determines the denial of self-preservation because it constitutes roots in social conditions that limit the intended transformation through critic. The critique of science as an ideological and material condition of reproduction and realization of capital is not effective with the auto-conservation of Geography for conforming the necessity of conservation of science to be rooted in the conception of distinction idealized by superiority that would affirm the permanence and nullity of transcending the limitations to denial the inhumanity of alienation concomitantly affirm the conditions to recognition of necessities and possibilities oriented to an emancipatory purposes. The progressive compressing of expenditure of time on production and productivity of results in various fields of scientific knowledge – which do not realize strictly in the extent of knowledge or it would be equivalent to affirm the fallacy of isolation and to deny the material and historical determinations that constitutes the quality of form of Being -, expressed in the quality of objective necessity and possibility concomitantly to fragment the form and content of the orientation of aims for investigation and for apprehension of reality. The convergence of the movements above-mentioned conforms the constitution of consensus positivity of complexifying of knowledge, delimitating the conceiving of reality and the supposed objective determinations a priori that constraint the conscious apprehension of necessities and of purposes that manifestate in the immediacy by the quality of developing individual and humankind potentialities of social being. Therefore, the conception of suprahistorical and insuppressible ontological determination depriving from social intentionalities in naturalize the impute of greater speed and complexity with lesser time and size of fragmented reality to be known, strengthening the conditions of inversion of reality. Reversed reality deforms the conscious apprehension of corresponding reduce the humanity of individual and gender social sphere of Being for alienating the necessities and goals of theory and practice, consciously aimed to the development of conditions for impoverishment humanity cross-dress in fallaciously things provided by humanity. Things that would had identity with men humanization obfuscating the unifying the developing of thing in the developing of men in the quality of thing, to conceive the most primary theoretical and practical necessity for the purpose of development of thing as an irrevocable necessity from human activity. The confrontation in the sphere of ideas constitutes itself while conceiving the real and, in this direction, the domination of necessities and purposes of material (re)production of society requires the domination of the categories of space and time as forms of Being of substance in motion. The detachment between Being and Entity conceives the indetermination of the dominant conception of reality that determines the conditions for the reproduction of life and the come to be of individuals and humankind. (shrink)

Göbeklitepe is regarded as one of the oldest temples of the humanity according to archaeologs. In this work, by going back twelve thousand years, we will attempt both to provide information about this structure and to make interpretations by highlighting the theological and philosophical associations of this structure. In our study, we will examine Göbeklitepe not from the perspective of archaeology and history of art but from that of philosophy of religion and religious symbolism. In our research, we benefit (...) from the data of archeology and historical geography. The basic aim of this search is archaeological data that is obtained in the region and to evaluate these datas based on the historical geography and the history of religions. When it is, we have interpreted according to language of religion and religious symbolism. As a result, contrary to popular belief, we saw important reasons Göbeklitepe area that is sacred structures, the people of the Stone Age is not primitive and faith is as old as humanity. We have reached the conclusion that must be rethought the development of human civilization on the Göebeklitepe Temples. Our main objective is to connect Göbeklitepe with philosophical and theological literature and to propose a method and subject as to how to accomplish this. Thus, our study is just an attempt at interpretation. (shrink)

The terms “patriotism” and “nationalism” are distinguished historically, conceptually, and geographically. Historically, patriotism is shown to have roots in the classical republican tradition of political thought, according to which citizens should give priority to the common good of their political or civic, as distinct from national, community. Conceptually, it is argued that patriotism is best understood as a political philosophy, an account of the form or forms of dialogue that citizens should engage in when responding to their conflicts, whereas (...) nationalism is a political ideology, an account of the kinds of things that citizens should be saying within those dialogues, in particular, when they take the form of negotiation. Patriotism, then, is that political philosophy which endorses the maxim “conversation first, negotiation second, force third,” since conversation between citizens has the best prospects for realizing and developing the common good. Nationalism, by contrast, is the ideology of those who, when it comes to political negotiations, give the greatest weight to the needs of their national community. Finally, regarding geography, patriotism is shown to be concerned with the jurisdiction of the state, whereas nationalism emphasizes the permanent and sharply demarcated territory where the national community is located. The chapter then concludes with the recommendation that we all need to affirm a global patriotism, alongside the more local forms. (shrink)

This dissertation shows how initial conditions play a special role in the explanation of contingent and irregular outcomes, including, in the form of geographic context, the special case of uneven development in the social sciences. The dissertation develops a general theory of this role, recognizes its empirical limitations in the social sciences, and considers how it might be applied to the question of uneven development. The primary purpose of the dissertation is to identify and correct theoretical problems in the study (...) of uneven development; it is not intended to be an empirical study. Chapter 1 introduces the basic problem, and discusses why it has become especially salient in debates concerning uneven development. Chapter 2 develops an argument for the importance of initial conditions in the philosophy of science, developed specifically in the context of the Bhaskar/Cartwright ‘open systems’ (and by extension, ‘exogenous factor’) emphasis on the ubiquity of contingency in the universe and rejection of explanation based on laws of nature (regularity accounts) of causation. Chapter 3 makes three claims concerning the concept of contingency, especially as related to the study of society: 1) that there are eight distinct uses of the word contingency, and its many meanings are detrimental to clarity of discussion and thought in history and the social sciences; 2) that it is possible to impose some order on these different uses through developing a classification of contingency into three types based on assumptions concerning possible worlds and determinism; 3) that one of the classes is a special use of the word without relevance to the social sciences, while the two remaining classes are nothing more than a variety of the ‘no hidden factors’ argument in the debate on indeterminism and determinism (and thus related to the concept of spacetime trajectories caused by initial conditions and the interference of these in the form of ‘exogenous factors’ with ‘open systems’). Chapter 4 The concept of explanation based on initial conditions together with laws of nature is widely associated with determinism. In the social sciences determinism has frequently been rejected due to the moral dilemmas it is perceived as presenting. Chapter 4 considers problems with this view. Chapter 5 considers attitudes among geographers, economists, and historians towards using geographic factors as initial conditions in explanation and how they might acceptably be used, in particular their role in ‘anchoring’ aspatial theories of social processes to real-world distributions. Chapter 6 considers the relationship of the statistical methods common in development studies with the trend towards integrating geographical factors into econometric development studies. It introduces the statistical argument on ‘apparent populations’ that arrives at conclusions concerning determinism consistent with Chapters 2 and 3 of the dissertation. The need for the visual interpretation of data with descriptive statistics and maps and their utility in the study of uneven development is discussed with a number of examples. Chapter 7 applies these concepts to the ‘institutions versus geography’ debate in development studies, using Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson’s 2002 ‘reversal of fortune’ argument as a primary example. Chapter 8 considers possible directions for future work, both theoretical and empirical. Chapter 9 concludes with a discussion of additional possible objections to the use of initial conditions as exogenous factors in explanation. (shrink)

Historical and cultural approaches to climate generally consider climate to be a stabilising concept between weather and culture. Different historical and cultural concepts of climate signify different ways of learning to live with the weather. However, anthropogenic climate change evidences the limit of this approach: instead of stabilising, climates ephemeralise together with the ways we have come to adapt to them. Changing climates require a concept of climate that captures how climates are experienced both as stable and ephemeral. To create (...) such a concept, I engage in an exercise of counterfactual etymology, reconstructing the concept of climate that might have emerged from the Ancient Greek term hora as opposed to klima. Central to my re-creation of phenomenological climate are Plato's myths, through which I highlight the methodological kinship between myth and phenomenology. Drawing on a later dialogue, Philebus, I provide an ontological account of climates as both stable and ephemeral. I conclude by situating my approach to climate and its changes in recent work on the relationship between weather and climate, arguing for the necessity of phenomenological climate in order to make sense of what changes with climate change. My turn to Ancient Greek philosophy and its application to the phenomenology of climate and its changes sounds out a novel approach to research in historical geography. (shrink)

According to the cliché a picture is worth a thousand words. But this is a canard, for it vastly underestimates the expressive power of many pictures and diagrams. In this note we show that even a simple map such as the outline of Manhattan Island, accompanied by a pointer marking North, implies a vast infinity of statements—including a vast infinity of true statements.

The central claim of the volume in which this chapter appears (*Fermented Landscapes*, ed. Colleen C. Myles, Univ. of Nebraska Press 2020) is that the chemical process of fermentation supplies an apt metaphor for understanding certain kinds of landscape change. The kinds of landscape change in question are, fortuitously, those often occasioned by commercial processes centered around fermentation itself: the commercial production of beer, wine, spirits, cider, cheese, and related fermented products. But what makes this metaphor apt? Which kinds of (...) landscape change are most fruitfully conceptualized as exhibiting “fermentation,” and how do they differ from other sorts of landscape change? What is it about fermentation-centered industries that effects fermentation-modeled landscape change, and when (if ever) do these industries contribute to other, different forms of landscape change? Is there any essential reason why fermentation-centered industries should create in their environs processes of transformation usefully characterized in terms of ferment? Or is this little more than a happy linguistic coincidence? In short: how much mileage do we get from this metaphor? This chapter offers a number of considerations germane to an evaluation of the “fermented landscapes” research paradigm—considerations to which readers may wish to remain alert as they study the contributions in this volume. (shrink)

This is a draft of the introduction to a forthcoming volume that brings together all of J. G. Herder's student notes from Immanuel Kant's lectures. It is intended as a volume in Kant's gesammelte Schriften (de Gruyter). These are the earliest notes (1762-64) we have from Kant's lectures (which span from 1755 to 1796) and the only notes before his professorship began in 1770. Included are improved transcriptions of Herder's notes on metaphysics, moral philosophy, logic, physics, and mathematics, and (...) the first transcription of his notes from Kant’s physical geography lectures. (shrink)

Iberian repertorios de los tiempos stemmed from Medieval almanacs and calendars. During the sixteenth century significant editorial, conceptual and material changes in repertorios incorporated astronomy, geography, chronology and natural philosophy. From De Li’s Repertorio (1492) to Zamorano’s Cronología (1585), the genre evolved from simple almanacs to more complex cosmological works which circulated throughout the Iberian-American world. This article claims that repertorios are a form of syncretic knowledge rather than “popular science” by relying on the concept of “knowledge in (...) transit”. Elaborating on this perspective, I present how repertorios ended up delivering a worldview from existing materials, a fact so far unnoticed by scholarship. At the same time, repertorios should not be considered an exclusively Iberian phenomenon, but the full scope of their nature as a form of syncretic knowledge should include their networks with migrants, indigenous, mestizos, and criollos across the Atlantic. In this sense, I try to trace the paths connecting productions in the Americas with Iberian repertorios. (shrink)

Ideas about soul and body – about thinking or remembering, mind and life, brain and self – remain both diverse and controversial in our neurocentric age. The history of these ideas is significant both in its own right and to aid our understanding of the complex sources and nature of our concepts of mind, cognition, and psychology, which are all terms with puzzling, difficult histories. These topics are not the domain of specialists alone, and studies of emotion, perception, or reasoning (...) have never been isolated theoretical endeavours. As Francis Bacon described human philosophy or ‘the knowledge of ourselves’, within which he located the study of body, soul, and mind, it ‘deserveth the more accurate handling, by how much it toucheth us more nearly’ (1605/ 2000: 93). The history of ideas in these domains is particularly challenging given the practical dimensions and implications of theories of mind. Because theories of human nature and debates about body and mind do ‘touch us’ so ‘nearly’, they attract and can thus reveal, in specific historical contexts, interconnected discourses or associations which may be quite unlike our own. So there are no neat boundaries around a historical category of ‘seventeenth-century British philosophy of the soul’. The central topic of this chapter can be thought of either as pneumatology, the doctrine or science of spirits and souls, or as continuous with the ‘psychologia’ or psychology of Aristotelian traditions (Park and Kessler 1988; Hatfield 1995: 184-6). In neither case, however, should we expect any deep unity to be provided by history, geography, discipline, or subject-matter. (shrink)

By treating America as a «new» continent «by virtue of its wholly peculiar character in both physical and political respects» Hegel reiterates the increasingly dominant image of America in the Europe of his time. This image crystallized in the context of the consolidation of the colonization process. According to Europeans, the inhabitants of the colonized lands were far less civilized than the inhabitants of Western Europe. Not a few thinkers found the explanation for that cultural difference in the natural differences (...) between the respective geographies, climates and races. In this general framework, Hegel considered the American Indians as people without history; as for the history of America after its conquest and colonization, it is in his eyes nothing other than an episode of the history of Europe itself. Insofar as it is through Europe´s history that human beings have attained self-consciousness of their essence, namely, freedom as autonomy and self-determination, Europe seems to be a non plus ultra of the ideological development of humanity. However, as seen from the perspective of the 21st century, the intellectual and political history of Europe can hardly be identified with the full awareness of the value and dignity of each human being as such. Since the countries of the American continent rely on the principle of civic nationalism and not on that of ethnic na-tionalism, which is typical for Europe, they signify, in this respect, a step forward with regard to the «principle of the European mind». (shrink)

While we typically think of culture as defined by geography or ethnicity (e.g., American culture, Mayan culture), the term also applies to the practices and expectations of smaller groups of people. Though embedded in the larger culture surrounding them, such subcultures have their own sets of rules like those that scientists do. Philosophy of science has as its main object of studio the scientific activity. A way in which we have tried to explain these scientific practices is from (...) the actual ontological commitments that scientists do through their scientific theories. Certainly, we know scientific theories through some specific scientific language, which is, in its turn, a subset of the natural language developed by a particular culture. This study is conducted to explore and evaluate some of the most important epistemological consequences of these ontological commitments, specially the so-called ‘truth-commitment’ and its relation with a linguistic-cultural framework. There is an interesting debate between advocates and opponents of scientific realistic view of the natural world. Some lines of scientific realism argumentation assure that: (i) Mature scientific theories are approximately true. (ii) There are entities and organisms in the world that correspond with the ontology presupposed by the best scientific theories within a specific domain of scientific research and (iii) The new acceptable scientific theories should explain why past theories were successful predecessors (Colyvan 2008, Cocchiarella 2007 & Laudan 1981). Contrary, anti- realist positions ensure against the realist’s true - claim that is a semantic commitment - that the purpose of scientific theories to found the truth it is simple an unattainable goal, especially if the kind of truth they are looking for is a corresponding relation between scientific theories and the ontology of the world. Anti-realist positions held that this relation could be circular and unknowable. I do believe that there is a deep confusion between the way in which we accede to the knowledge of the constitutive structures, entities and organisms of the world (which is an epistemological matter) and the way these structures, entities and organisms are (which is an ontological matter). It seems that there is a bridge between the epistemological and ontological aspect in need for conceptual clarification. I do propose that the type of link between the two extremes have to be linguistic in nature. (shrink)

Mencius, referred to as second sage in Chinese philosophy history, grounds his theory about original goodness of human nature on psychological components by bringing in something new down ancient ages. Including the principles of virtuous action associated with Confucius to his doctrine, but by composing them along psychosocial development, he theorizes utterly out of the ordinary that makes all the difference to the school. In his argument stated a positive opinion, he explains the method of forming individuals' moral awareness (...) by means of inseparable integrity of feelings and thoughts, saying human being are born innately good. According to Mencius, heart-mind correlation is the motivational complement of inner incentives. Knowledge and virtue, which are extensions of inborn goodness, comprehended intuitively; then affective motives respond to circumstance, what is learned transmits to cognitive process and eventually behavior emerges. Comparing during the years of Warring State period he lived, in western geography Aristotle, who is one of the pioneers of Greek philosophy, argues deductive and inductive methods in mental activity. On the other hand, Mencius uses analogical reasoning throughout his self-titled work. This essay is an attempt to assert that most postulates of developmental theories, which have been considered an integral part of modern psychology, begin with Mencius in early era. Secondly, this study also aims to discuss the main paradigm of Mencius across emotivist-rationalist opposition, which keeps emotion above thought as well as reason above emotion. (shrink)

This paper looks at the centrality of action in social disciplines and examines the implications of this for whether social disciplines can be called scientific. Various reasons for calling social disciplines scientific are examined and rejected: (1) the claim that social disciplines are reducible to natural scientific ones, (2) the claim, from Donald Davidson, that reasons for action are to be construed in causal terms, (3) the claim that social disciplines employ, or should employ, the methodologies of the natural sciences. (...) The question of progress in social disciplines will also be examined critically. Does the (apparent) lack of progress in social disciplines suggest that academics working in sociology, economics, politics, human geography, and philosophy should adopt the methods of natural science? My answer will be that it does not but nonetheless I will side with John Dupré against Hutchinson, Read, and Sharrock in claiming that social disciplines can properly be called scientific. There is such a thing as a social science. (shrink)

Kant scholars have paid relatively little attention to his raciology. They assume that his racism, as personal prejudice, can be disentangled from his core philosophy. They also assume that racism contradicts his moral theory. In this book, philosopher Huaping Lu-Adler challenges both assumptions. She shows how Kant's raciology--divided into racialism and racism--is integral to his philosophical system. She also rejects the individualistic approach to Kant and racism. Instead, she uses the notion of racism as ideological formation to demonstrate how (...) Kant, from his social location both as a prominent scholar and as a lifelong educator, participated in the formation of modern racist ideology. As a scholar, Kant developed a ground-breaking scientific theory of race from the standpoint of a philosophical investigator of nature or Naturforscher. As an educator, he transmitted denigrating depictions of the racialized others and imbued those descriptions with normative relevance. In both roles, he left behind, as one of his legacies, a worldview that excluded non-whites from such goods as recognitional respect and candidacy for cultural and moral achievements. Scholars who research and teach Kant's philosophy therefore have an unshakable burden to take part in the ongoing antiracist struggles, through their teaching practices as well as their scholarship. And they must do so with a pragmatic attention to nonideal social realities and a deliberate orientation toward substantial racial justice, equality, and inclusion. Lu-Adler pushes the discourse about Kant and racism well beyond the old debates about whether he was racist or whether his racism contaminates his philosophy. By foregrounding the lasting legacies of Kant's raciology, her work calls for a profound reorientation of Kant scholarship. (shrink)

Academics have increasingly used video and other electronic methods to collect data and capture reflections from participants. But, until recently, it’s been less common to use film as way of disseminating the results of research. That’s beginning to change. Film can be a powerful way to share research findings with a broad audience. This is particularly true when academics are combining) the traditions of ethnography, documentary filmmaking, and storytelling. -/- Film and cinema are increasingly being used in environmental humanities to (...) complement – or challenge – text-based research. The filmmakers in the arts, sciences and humanities see potential in using the moving images within political philosophy, environmental politics, postcolonial studies, human geography, urban ecology, postcolonial studies, design and literature. An example of this is the film One Table Two Elephants. It is a cinematic ethnography created by two Swedish researchers and filmmakers Jacob von Heland and Henrik Ernstson. Based on years of research in Cape Town, it was filmed in 2015 as part of a longer-term research and film-project . The documentary deals with race, nature and knowledge politics in Cape Town as part of the ways of knowing urban ecologies research project. -/- . (shrink)

This lecture, held at the Earth System Governance annual meeting in Nimedjin, Holland (2023), aims to answer the question of how to reconceptualise planetary justice in a radically new way. The approach of organic philosophy combines an awareness of time, of the bond between life and death, beyond the boundaries of physical geography or the fantasy of cultural differences.

Since the disintegration of the USSR Eurasia has gained a new geopolitical and strategic significance. Fifteen Countries emerged as a result of disintegration, among which only the Russian Federation was the successor state. The post-soviet era especially the era of the 1990s was a political and economic trauma for the Russian Federation and the post-soviet space. But Eurasianists were well aware of the American unilateralism and American ‘Grand Chessboard strategy” that was solely aimed at encircling Russian geography. With these (...) concerns, the Eurasianists advised the Russian political and military elites to initiate the Eurasian Union Project. This paper briefly sketches the Russian historical Eurasian dream, which deeply rooted in Russian imperial history, and discusses the importance of Eurasian philosophy for the political and economic stability of Russia-Eurasia. The paper also illustrates the challenges and opportunities for Eurasian integration and for the establishment of multipolar world order. Moreover, the paper also briefly outlines the geopolitical rationale behind the Eurasian project as a key objective of contemporary Russian foreign policy and geopolitics. (shrink)

This paper applies a very traditional position within Natural Law Theory to Cyberspace. I shall first justify a Natural Law approach to Cyberspace by exploring the difficulties raised by the Internet to traditional principles of jurisprudence and the difficulties this presents for a Positive Law Theory account of legislation of Cyberspace. This will focus on issues relating to geography. I shall then explicate the paradigm of Natural Law accounts, the Treatise on Law, by Thomas Aquinas. From this account will (...) emerge the structure of law and the metaphysics of justice. I shall explore those aspects of Cyberspace which cause geography to be problematic for Positive Law Theory and show how these are essential, unavoidable and beneficial. I will then apply Aquinas’s structure of law and metaphysics of justice to these characteristics. From this will emerge an alternative approach to cyberlaw which has no problem with the nature of Cyberspace as it is but treats it as a positive foundation for new legal developments. (shrink)

This paper outlines new work in cross-cultural psychology largely drawn from Nisbett, Choi, and Smith (Cognition, 65, 15–32, 1997); Nisbett, Peng, Choi, & Norenzayan, Psychological Review, 108(2), 291–310, 2001; Nisbett, The Geography of Thought: How Asians and Westerners Think Differently...and Why. New York: Free Press 2003), Ji, Zhang and Nisbett (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 87(1), 57–65, 2004), Norenzayan (2000) and Peng (Naive Dialecticism and its Effects on Reasoning and Judgement about Contradiction. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan (...) 1997) Peng and Nisbett (Cross-Cultural Similarities and Differences in the Understanding of Physical Causality. Paper presented at the Science and Culture: Proceedings of the Seventh Interdisciplinary Conference on Science and Culture, Frankfort, K. Y. 1996), and Peng, Ames, & Knowles (Culture and Human Inference: Perspectives from three traditions. In: D. Matsumoto (Ed.), Handbook of Cross-Cultural Psychology (pp. 1–2). Oxford: Oxford University Press 2000). The paper argues that the findings on cultural influences on inference-making have implications for teaching and education generally, and specifically for the debate on conceptions and misconceptions of Asian students studying in western tertiary institutions around the world. The position defended is that, while there seems to be compelling empirical evidence for intercultural differences in thought patterns, these patterns are, for the most part, insignificant in everyday exchanges, though language and culture might subtlety modulate our inference-making at the margins. Linguistic determinism however is not defended. Nonetheless, the evidence provides food for thought, and it needs to inform the recent debates about international students studying overseas. (shrink)

This paper proposes that the resurgence of geographic factors in the study of uneven development is not due simply to the recurrent nature of intellectual fashions, nor necessarily because arguments that rely on geographic factors are less simplistic than before, nor because they avoid racialist, imperialistic, and deterministic forms they sometimes took in the past. Rather, this paper argues that geographic factors have been turned to once again because they are an indispensable part of explanation, playing a special role that (...) has not been properly understood, a role especially crucial for the explanation of the inherently spatial questions that development studies seek to address. The paper is made up of two sections and an appendix. The first section discusses why geographic factors are necessary for explanations of uneven development with a brief example from the ‘institutions versus geography’ debate. The second section discusses why the reflexive rejection by social scientists of geographic and environmental factors is misguided, with a separate note on geography and geographers. The ideas in this paper were in part arrived at inductively while surveying instances where social scientists in some way attempt to account for real-world locations/distributions of social phenomena (as opposed to discussing a social theory or process aspatially or with its distribution taken as a starting point). A number of these are included with discussion as an appendix. (shrink)

We argue that work on norms provides a way to move beyond debates between proponents of individualist and structuralist approaches to bias, oppression, and injustice. We briefly map out the geography of that debate before presenting Charlotte Witt’s view, showing how her position, and the normative ascriptivism at its heart, seamlessly connects individuals to the social reality they inhabit. We then describe recent empirical work on the psychology of norms and locate the notions of informal institutions and soft structures (...) with respect to it. Finally, we argue that the empirical resources enrich Witt’s ascriptivism, and that the resulting picture shows theorists need not, indeed should not, choose between either the individualist or structuralist camp. (shrink)

Ci imbattiamo in un confine ogni volta che pensiamo a un’entità demarcata rispetto a ciò che la circonda. C’è un confine (una superficie) che delimita l’interno di una sfera dal suo esterno; c’è un confine (una frontiera) che separa il Maryland dalla Pennsylvania. Talvolta la collocazione esatta di un confine non è chiara o è in qualche modo controversa (come quando si cerchi di tracciare i limiti del monte Everest, o il confine del nostro corpo). Talaltra il confine non corrisponde (...) a una discontinuità fisica o a una differenziazione qualitativa (come nel caso dei confini del Wyoming, o della demarcazione tra la metà superiore e la metà inferiore di una sfera omogenea). Ma, che sia netto o confuso, naturale o artificiale, sembra esservi per ogni oggetto un confine che lo separa dal resto del mondo. Anche gli eventi hanno confini, quantomeno confini temporali. Le nostre vite sono delimitate dalle nostre nascite e morti; una partita di calcio comincia alle quindici in punto e termina col fischio finale dell’arbitro alle sedici e quarantacinque. E a volte si dice che anche le entità astratte, come i concetti o gli insiemi, hanno dei propri confini. Se tutto questo parlare di confini abbia davvero un senso, e se rifletta la struttura del mondo o solo l’attività organizzatrice del nostro intelletto, è però oggetto di profonda controversia filosofica. (shrink)

Kant and Medicine - the Philosopher as Anthropologist, Physician and Patient. It remains uncertain whether the student Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) truly wanted to become a physician or only said this in order to please a sponsor. Due to his narrow chest and other typical weaknesses of a scholar he considered himself a hypochondriac and cautiously kept his distance from dangerous illnesses, especially those of the mind. He inspired his students - including Herder, Herz, Lenz and Hoffmann - far less with (...) logic and metaphysics than with exciting findings about far away countries, their alien inhabitants and the health dangers lurking in exotic parts of the world. He called for philosophical treatment of physical illnesses beyond the limited "veterinary" approach of medicine. He claimed the responsibility of the philosophy faculty for forensic questions. Kant developed original ideas about the seat of the soul, which led to the construction of a first model of the brain including functioning synapses. He was unable to overcome reservations about smallpox vaccination because he feared a change in the germ line. He wanted to see "how long the stuff would last" and during his later decades used all the classic dietetics to successfully extend his life. These sex res non-naturales continue to play a significant role in the prevention of widespread diseases today. Then an "electric revolution of the air strata" took its toll on him. Towards the end, his confidants were to look at him like a child, who, however, left posterity an extensive work with deep insights into his thinking, the Opus postumum. (shrink)

In “On Drawing Lines on a Map” (1995), I suggested that the different ways we have of drawing lines on maps open up a new perspective on ontology, resting on a distinction between two sorts of boundaries: fiat and bona fide. “Fiat” means, roughly: human-demarcation-induced. “Bona fide” means, again roughly: a boundary constituted by some real physical discontinuity. I presented a general typology of boundaries based on this opposition and showed how it generates a corresponding typology of the different sorts (...) of objects which boundaries determine or demarcate. In this paper, I describe how the theory of fiat boundaries has evolved since 1995, how it has been applied in areas such as property law and political geography, and how it is being used in contemporary work in formal and applied ontology, especially within the framework of Basic Formal Ontology. (shrink)

This essay draws on the work of Jacques Derrida and Angela Y. Davis towards a philosophical resistance to the death penalty in the U.S. I find promise in Derrida’s claim that resistance to the death penalty ought to contest a political structure that founds itself on having the power to decide life and death, but I move beyond Derrida’s desire to consider the abolition of the death penalty without engaging with the particular histories and geographies of European colonialism. I offer (...) a critique of Derrida’s recently published work on the death penalty by engaging with the work of Davis and argue that discussions of state violence in nations that inherit European forms of sovereignty must take seriously the racist violence on which those sovereign powers rely. (shrink)

Despite the minimal attention paid by philosophers to gardening, the activity has a myriad of philosophical implications—aesthetic, ethical, political, and even edible. The same could be said of community food security and struggles for food justice. Two of gardening’s most significant practical benefits are that it generates communal solidarity and provides sustenance for the needy and undernourished during periods of crisis. In the twentieth century, large-scale community gardening in the U.S. and Canada coincided with relief projects during war-time and economic (...) downturn. More recently, small-scale gardening projects have emerged in schools, blighted urban areas, and communities of activists committed to increasing food security and resisting neo-liberal city planning policies. It is therefore surprising that pragmatist philosophers, who typically work at the nexus of theory and practice, have remained relatively silent about the relationship between gardening and food security. If more were to take up the challenge, they would find considerable guidance from several contemporary scholars working in diverse disciplines, from cultural geography to community studies, who explore the topic in a number of non-philosophical, though equally effective and imaginative, ways. In this paper, I propose a tentative pragmatist model for understanding how gardens make our food system more secure—a model inspired by John Dewey’s writings on school gardening, which I call the pragmatic pyramid. (shrink)

This essay suggests an alternative accountability process on the basis of critiques of current evaluation practice in higher education. Using cases in the British university system, with some international commentary and thinking through experience in Asian universities in four countries in the wake of ‘audit culture’, the work of Thorstein Bunde Veblen is revived. With Veblen, the current structures and mechanics of the corporate and fully-monetised university might once more be challenged. The risk of importing the metrics and audit culture (...) of Britain, and the neoliberal managerialist administration-led university of North America, wholesale into Asian universities is questioned by acknowledgment that exiting hierarchies are persistent, and competing on Euro-American terms is a recipe for disaster. Due recognition is curtailed, hard work and standards are ignored, prospects for junior staff are constrained to a kind of intellectual and social penury. Resources based on research skills more robust than the current axiomatic research assessment calculus are suggested from within the university. The solution is not to emulate a declining system, but to innovate and invent new horizons and terms of engagement. The proposals offered here are only a suggestion for reflexive inquiry and informed self-examination—criticism-self-criticism from co-research sociology, ethnographic film and urban geography, among others—offered as alternate concurrent paths to accountability. (shrink)

There is a basic distinction, in the realm of spatial boundaries, between bona fide boundaries on the one hand, and fiat boundaries on the other. The former are just the physical boundaries of old. The latter are exemplified especially by boundaries induced through human demarcation, for example in the geographic domain. The classical problems connected with the notions of adjacency, contact, separation and division can be resolved in an intuitive way by recognizing this two-sorted ontology of boundaries. Bona fide boundaries (...) yield a notion of contact that is effectively modeled by classical topology; the analogue of contact involving fiat boundaries calls, however, for a different account, based on the intuition that fiat boundaries do not support the open/closed distinction on which classical topology is based. In the presence of this two-sorted ontology it then transpires that mereotopology—topology erected on a mereological basis—is more than a trivial formal variant of classical point-set topology. (shrink)

In this chapter, we evaluate the politically generative dynamic of urban space. Notably, we put forward the notion of the ‘multiplier effect’ of the urban, referring to its ingrained tendency to multiply resistance to oppression and violence being exerted against subaltern groups and minorities and, in doing so, to turn this multiplied resistance into an active force of social change. We, therefore, look at the twofold valence of ‘resistance’: negative and affirmative. Resistance initially takes form as a defensive response to (...) oppression and violence. When this happens, the urban becomes the living platform for a multiplying dynamic of encounter and, potentially, of inter-group solidarity, thus laying the foundations for a cooperative – rather than competitive, as in neoliberal rationality, or inimical, as in national-populist reason – way of ‘being together’. After having developed this argument against the backdrop of the women’s movement in Tehran and the urban disobedience to anti-immigration policies in Italy, our chapter concludes by reflecting on the multiplier effect of urban resistance within the current context of national revanchism. (shrink)