Gottlob Frege and Edmund Husserl are two seemingly different philosophers in their methodology. Both have significantly influenced Western philosophy in that their contributions established fields within philosophy that are of intensive study today. Still, their differences in methodology have, in certain instances, yielded similar or distinct results. Their results ranged from the distinction of sense and reference, objectivity, and the theory of mathematics: specifically, their definition of number. Frege and Husserl have such striking similarities in their theory of sense and (...) reference and related notions that from their apparent correspondence, Frege seems to have acknowledged the coincidences in their theories (Frege & Kluge, 1972) (Hill & Rosado Haddock Intro, 4, & 30-33). That is not to say there are exact parallels between Frege and Husserl and their results, as I will acknowledge their similarities and differences within scale. So, I intend to demonstrate their respective theories and results descriptively to show their likenesses while still recognizing their divergences in scope and methodology. Indirectly, I would also hope to illustrate the ties, in terms of subject matter, of these two philosophers who are historically considered at odds with one another; be it personally, in their schools of philosophy, or methodologically (Hartimo 47-53). (shrink)

La obra de Lévinas propone asumir la ética como Filosofía Primera. Allí convergen dos fuentes de inspiración filosófica, el pensamiento judío y la fenomenología, y la experiencia histórica de persecución, violencia y desconocimiento del otro que exigió a Lévinas criticar el totalitarismo ontológico griego con el propósito de hacer justicia a la Alteridad y dar primacía así a la Responsabilidad para con el Otro sobre la Libertad autónoma del Yo. Luego, el autor retorna la crítica de Lévinas a la fenomenología (...) de la conciencia y a la ontología hermenéutica de Heidegger, con la que Occidente lleva a término su limitada opción por el conocimiento y la manifestación del Ser. Rubio y Lévinas, en tercer lugar, señalan hacia una hermenéutica encarnada de nuestras relaciones con el Otro, a una reivindicación de la antropología filosófica que recupere el Sentido desde el Otro. Finalmente, el autor se refiere al terna de la muerte en Lévinas, y subraya, en relación con la desaparición del maestro Rubio que, nuestro adiós a él, significa el 'ante Dios' de todas nuestras relaciones no tematizables con el Otro y antes que todo. (shrink)

Even though Frege is a major figure in the history of analytic philosophy, it is not surprising that there are still issues surrounding his views, interpreting them, and labeling them. Frege’s view on numbers is typically termed as ‘Platonistic’ or at least a type of Platonism (Reck 2005). Still, the term ‘Platonism’ has views and assumptions ascribed to it that may be misleading and leads to mischaracterizations of Frege’s outlook on numbers and ideas. So, clarification of the term ‘Platonism’ is (...) required to portray Frege’s views more accurately (Reck 2005). This clarification gives us a better picture of what Frege is interested in and what he does not emphasize. Moreover, in such a clarifying process, we find that Frege draws significant influence from Rudolf Hermann Lotze, who is frequently called a Neo-Kantian (Vagnetti 2018). In Lotze’s major work, Logik, Lotze has a central focus on validity, in its most general form as he used it, that investigates various related topics, i.e., concepts, language, etc. (Vagnetti 2018; Lotze 1888). Furthermore, we observe that Frege’s work is so similar to Lotze, that it seems questionable to call his outlook ‘Platonism’. Therefore, attributing ‘Platonism’ to Frege may be a slight misnomer. This paper’s entirety is mostly a synthesis of a variety of articles related to Frege, Lotze, and their respective outlooks and the original works of Frege and Lotze that I use to support the view that the term ‘Platonism’ is a slight issue when predicated to Frege. As such, I include an overview of Frege’s treatment in other work that highlights the usage of the term ‘Platonism’ and how broad its uses tend to be utilized (Balaguer 2006; Burge 1992). In sum, it is observed that the general label ‘Platonism’ becomes less appropriate when we consider Lotze in the picture and contrast Lotze alongside Mr. Frege. Overall, this paper is just an explanatory one of Mr. Frege, the Platonist, and the issues of applying the term ‘Platonism’ onto him as his views are seemingly more of a segue from Lotze. Keywords: Frege, Lotze, number, objectification, Platonism, validity. (shrink)

El presente artículo busca establecer el origen y desarrollo del concepto de ley natural en Tomás de Aquino, especialmente la relación que se establece entre razón y voluntad. Recordemos que esta relación ha sido objeto de numerosos estudios, especialmente en referencia al mismo concepto en Francisco Suárez. El artículo trata el tema de manera objetiva y como testigo de lo que nuestro teólogo pensó y estableció en sus escritos. Al calificarlo como teólogo, entendemos desde dónde está hablando, es decir, desde (...) su condición de creyente y teniendo como fuente la misma Revelación. (shrink)

This paper is a critical review of the most relevant studies about the Levinasian concept of passivity. The purpose is to follow the way in which Levinas’s scholars have dealt with the following aspects: the relation between ethical passivity and the possibility of effective ethical agency, the origin of passivity, and the validity of ethical passivity in the public sphere. As a starting point for future research, I finally argue that the best way to read Levinas’s passive ethics is through (...) the dynamism between maximums and minimums present within it. This means that without sacrificing the omni comprehensive view of divine revelation and Jewish tradition, Levinas presents ethics as rationally understandable by everyone and philosophically defensible. Despite being biblically based, Levinas does not appeal to authority in supporting his view, he is confident in arguing rationally. This account could place Levinas in the way of public ethics, which consists in an ethos shared by all members of democratic societies. These minimums of justice could be the way to universalize Levinas’s ethics. (shrink)

In having an experience one is aware of having it. Having an experience requires some form of access to one's own state, which distinguishes phenomenally conscious mental states from other kinds of mental states. Until very recently, Higher-Order (HO) theories were the only game in town aiming at offering a full-fledged account of this form of awareness within the analytical tradition. Independently of any objections that HO theories face, First/Same-Order (F/SO) theorists need to offer an account of such access to (...) become a plausible alternative. My aim in this paper is twofold. In the first place, I wish to widen the logical space of the discussion among theories of consciousness by offering a distinction, orthogonal to that between F/SO and HO theories, between what I will call 'Self-Involving' (SI) and 'Mental-State-Involving' (MSI) theories and argue in favor of the former one. In the second place, I will present the basics of a characterization of such a Self-Involving theory in Same-Order terms. (shrink)

Recent experimental studies indicate that epistemically irrelevant factors can skew our intuitions, and that some degree of scepticism about appealing to intuition in philosophy is warranted. In response, some have claimed that philosophers are experts in such a way as to vindicate their reliance on intuitions—this has become known as the ‘expertise defence’. This paper explores the viability of the expertise defence, and suggests that it can be partially vindicated. Arguing that extant discussion is problematically imprecise, we will finesse the (...) notion of ‘philosophical expertise’ in order to better reflect the complex reality of the different practices involved in philosophical inquiry. On this basis, we offer a new version of the expertise defence that allows for distinct types of philosophical expertise. The upshot of our approach is that wholesale vindications or rejections of the expertise defence are shown to be unwarranted; we must instead turn to local, piecemeal investigations of philosophical expertise. Lastly, in the spirit of taking our own advice, we exemplify how recent developments from experimental philosophy lend themselves to this approach, and can empirically support one instance of a successful expertise defence. (shrink)

Considerando el contexto bélico y el surgimiento de las vanguardias a inicios del siglo XX, fundamento en este trabajo las razones por las cuales la presencia del concepto de nivola, atribuida por Miguel de Unamuno para hacer referencia a la técnica literaria que emplea en su novela Niebla (1914), suscita una confrontación posible entre universos compuestos por elementos de la realidad y lo virtual. En ese sentido, será propicio explicar el procedimiento que origina esa colisión de planos establecidos. Para (...) ello, recurriré a categorías literarias que sustentan las teorías de la ficción, según la percepción de Thomas Pavel y Marie-Laure Ryan. (shrink)

Interreligious and intercultural dialogue is supposed to be the best way to solve the conflicts arising from rival religious hermeneutics and different modes to conceive the ideal of a good life in contemporary multicultural and pluralistic societies. In regard to communicative or dialogical reason, respectful coexistence can be reached only by argumentative communication between interested people. In this sense, only rational arguments, strong enough to pass the test of the shared rationality can be valid at a discursive level. However, Jewish (...) philosopher Emmanuel Levinas and Catholic theologian Johann Baptist Metz challenge the symmetrical and rational-based dialogue in order to postulate an asymmetrical relation by giving voice to the other. For them, the core of interreligious and intercultural engagement does not start from rational agreements as Habermas, for instance, has proposed; but from prophetic and anamnestic reasons. (shrink)

Digital COVID certificates are a novel public health policy to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic. These immunity certificates aim to incentivize vaccination and to deny international travel or access to essential spaces to those who are unable to prove that they are not infectious. In this article, we start by describing immunity certificates and highlighting their differences from vaccination certificates. Then, we focus on the ethical, legal, and social issues involved in their use, namely autonomy and consent, data protection, equity, and (...) international mobility from a global fairness perspective. The main conclusion of our analysis is that digital COVID certificates are only acceptable if they meet certain conditions: that they should not process personal data beyond what is strictly necessary for the aimed goals, that equal access to them should be guaranteed, and that they should not restrict people’s autonomy to access places where contagion is unlikely. We conclude that, if such conditions are guaranteed, digital COVID certificates could contribute to mitigating some of the most severe socioeconomic consequences of the pandemic. (shrink)

Cognitive theories claim, whereas non-cognitive theories deny, that cognitive access is constitutive of phenomenology. Evidence in favor of non-cognitive theories has recently been collected by Block and is based on the high capacity of participants in partial-report experiments compared to the capacity of the working memory. In reply, defenders of cognitive theories have searched for alternative interpretations of such results that make visual awareness compatible with the capacity of the working memory; and so the conclusions of such experiments remain controversial. (...) Instead of entering the debate between alternative interpretations of partial-report experiments, this paper offers an alternative line of research that could settle the discussion between cognitive and non-cognitive theories of consciousness. Here I relate the neural correlates of cognitive access to empirical research into the neurophysiology of dreams; cognitive access seems to depend on the activity of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. However, that area is strongly deactivated during sleep; a period when we entertain conscious experiences: dreams. This approach also avoids the classic objection that consciousness should be inextricably tied to reportability or it would fall outside the realm of science. (shrink)

This work aims to study strategies used in Argentine local development experiences, focussing on industrial design, marketing and entrepreneurship. In order to this purpose, backgrounds are analysed with this approach adding the study of three strategic plans for national and provincial-level that are currently in force. With the analysis of the transport system in the last decade, an accelerated cost increase is evident, resulting in a relatively higher price of distributed products. This situation that was initially perceived as a disadvantage (...) finally set up an opportunity to produce locally. The goal of this paper is to provide tools that contribute to the work shipped by key institutions for local development (public, private and intermediary organisations), and the way these interact with the actors and the territory. In particular, the identification of productive sectors and the selection of goods that can be produced and consumed locally, as a key input for the formulation of projects. (shrink)

Considering the war context and the emergence of the avant-garde in the early twentieth century, I base on this work the reasons why the presence of the concept of nivola, attributed by Miguel de Unamuno to refer to the literary technique used in his novel Mist (1914), provokes a possible confrontation between universes composed of elements of reality and the virtual. In that sense, it will be appropriate to explain the procedure that originates that collision of established plans. For (...) this, I will resort to literary categories that support the theories of fiction, according to the perception of Thomas Pavel and Marie-Laure Ryan. (shrink)

Representations are not only used in our folk-psychological explanations of behaviour, but are also fruitfully postulated, for example, in cognitive science. The mainstream view in cognitive science maintains that our mind is a representational system. This popular view requires an understanding of the nature of the entities they are postulating. Teleosemantic theories face this challenge, unpacking the normativity in the relation of representation by appealing to the teleological function of the representing state. It has been argued that, if intentionality is (...) to be explained in teleological terms, then the function of a state cannot depend on its phylogenetical history, given the metaphysical possibility of a duplicate of an intentional being that lacks an evolutionary history. In this paper, I present a method to produce, according to our current knowledge in genetic engineering, human-like individuals who are not the product of natural selection in the required sense. This variation will be used to shed light on the main replies that have been offered in the literature to the Swampman thought experiment. I argue that these replies are not satisfactory: representations should better not depend on natural selection. I conclude that a non-etiological notion of function is to be preferred for characterizing the relation of representation. (shrink)

La présentation qui suit traite de la Colombeia - legs extrêmement riche que nous devons à Francisco de Miranda - et de l’impact qu’a pu avoir à son époque la diffusion des quatre versions connues du “Plan de gouvernance pour une Amérique colombienne” élaboré par Francisco de Miranda (Caracas, 1750- Cadix, 1816) et publié tout au long de son engagement politique pour l’indépendance de l’Amérique Hispanique. Malgré les deux occasions manquées de 1801 et 1806, quand il fit la tentative de (...) mettre en partie en place son “Plan de Gouvernance”, l’on sait que celui-ci n’a jamais réellement été adopté en tant que modèle et pour une organisation politique du nouvel ordre de l’Amérique latine postcoloniale (que ce soit dans les anciennes colonies espagnoles ou au Brésil). Pourtant, il serait pertinent de se demander si le dit “Plan de gouvernance” a été pris en compte par ceux qui à l’époque prirent les décisions politiques des nouveaux états américains tout au long du processus d’émancipation et de formation constitutionnelle des pays hispano-américains. La proposition politique de Miranda prévoyait en même temps le démantèlement de l’État monarchique hispano américain et l’appropriation de quelques notions appartenant à l’empire des Incas. Il apparaît donc essentiel de savoir si dans le reste du continent hispano américain d’autres projets pré-constitutionnels comme celui proposé par le “Précurseur ”avaient été élaborés. Dans l’affirmative, il faudrait alors se demander s’il a existé un lien ou une parenté idéologique entre Miranda et ceux qui, à l’époque ou plus tard, ont élaboré de tels projets Constitutionnels pour un nouveau modèle de gouvernement en l’Amérique Latine . (shrink)

Grappling with the marginalization of the marginal in Western thinking, this paper sets up a dialogue between Emmanuel Levinas’s philosophy and Johann Baptist Metz’s political theology in order to learn from their thoughts on the suffering of victims. For both Levinas and Metz, the idea of theodicy as an explanation of suffering is linked to the ontological conception of time and history, and therefore useless and unjustifiable by nature. The essential question of this research is how to give meaning to (...) the concrete suffering of humanity in order to redeem history from the concept of an evolutionary progress which limits the possibility of hearing the cries of the victims of history. This article will show how Levinas’s and Metz´s rejection of traditional theodicy is closely related to the concepts of memory and history and, therefore, the paper will demonstrate how traditional theodicy becomes for both thinkers an ethical theodicy. Consequently, the ethical account of theodicy replaces the attempt to negotiate the goodness and power of God with the pain of human beings. From this perspective, ethics is shaped by a response to the cry of victims which summons the subject to understand freedom as limited and subordinated to ethical responsibility. In responding to suffering, philosophy and theology can meet beyond idealism and dogmatism. (shrink)

Higher-order thought theories of consciousness attempt to explain what it takes for a mental state to be conscious, rather than unconscious, by means of a HOT that represents oneself as being in the state in question. Rosenthal Consciousness and the self: new essays, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2011) stresses that the way we are aware of our own conscious states requires essentially indexical self-reference. The challenge for defenders of HOT theories is to show that there is a way to explain (...) the required reference-fixing mechanisms that is compatible with the theory. According to Rosenthal, the reference to oneself as such is grounded in the disposition to identify the individual the HOT refers to as the individual who has that HOT. I argue that this leads to a vicious infinite regress on the more than plausible assumption that our cognitive capacities are limited. This leaves such theories without a foundation, since self-reference is thought essential to consciousness. (shrink)

Este artigo consiste em abordagem de cunho introdutório sobre a crítica à metafísica. Destacam-se elementos isolados do conteúdo de crítica à metafísica na modernidade e que tende a vir a ser desenvolvido na contemporaneidade. Com isso quer-se dizer que na passagem da modernidade para a contemporaneidade a filosofia acaba por incorporar o conteúdo de crítica à metafísica e evolui na direção de vir a reconhecer sua condição de ser metafísica e de empreender crítica a essa condição. Para estabelecer a abordagem (...) do assunto procura-se aqui manter subjacente a ideia de crítica à metafísica no contexto da história da filosofia; mas é priorizado nisso o aspecto temático em vez de seu aspecto histórico. Busca-se mostrar que no processo de compreender a crítica à metafísica tem ocorrido de se tentar apartar do caráter de metafísico o caráter de teórico da ciência. Requer então indagar se é possível estabelecer marco de separação entre uma coisa e a outra. Em vez de separação opta-se aqui por investir no conhecimento da identidade da própria metafísica como saber filosófico; busca-se esclarecer que a pergunta pelo que é filosofia e a dificuldade de compreender o seu conteúdo é o que traz à tona a crítica à metafísica e a torna necessária, mas como modo de se compreender melhor o que é filosofia. (shrink)

El artículo muestra la estrecha conexión existente entre el concepto de ética y el de tiempo mesiánico en la filosofía de Emmanuel Lévinas. Esto significa que la respuesta ética se da en un tiempo discontinuo en el que –además de romper la continuidad del tiempo ininterrumpido del progreso– el sujeto se convierte en el mesías que responde al sufrimiento del otro. Para lograr este propósito, el trabajo muestra la crítica de Lévinas a la historia ontológica como olvido de lo singular; (...) posteriormente presenta la posición intermedia entre la perspectiva ontológica y la mesiánica representada en el punto de vista de Bergson, para mostrar luego cómo –para Lévinas– es en la tradición judía donde es posible encontrar una respuesta ética al sufrimiento del otro en el ahora del tiempo mesiánico. (shrink)

La administración científica de la educación ha llevado a que las instituciones educativas muestren en los últimos años un marcado interés por los rankings, la rendición de cuentas y por una educación de calidad basada en la excelencia individual. Frente a esta dinámica, el presente trabajo muestra que las exigencias de una sociedad que ha venido de experiencias conflictivas o que quiere formar ciudadanos solidarios, requieren un cambio de perspectiva desde la autonomía individual hacia la construcción de escenarios de cooperación (...) y respeto por el otro. Mediante un análisis teórico, este artículo muestra la insuficiencia del modelo taylorista de educación y propone una educación para la incertidumbre como apertura hacia la cooperación y la solidaridad. (shrink)

This paper analyzes the evolution of the Professional Technical Modality in Secondary Education in Argentina since its inception. How has it been traversed by the various productive models, from the foundation of the first technical school with Fordism to local development? What were the main policy milestones throughout this process? In particular, the study incorporates the design and principles of entrepreneurship in the current educational model and the basic tools for entrepreneurial development that contribute to local technological innovation. To conclude, (...) the impact of these new educational policies is evaluated in this dynamic socio-economic context. (shrink)

The well-known distinction between access consciousness and phenomenal consciousness has moved away from the conceptual domain into the empirical one, and the debate now is focused on whether the neural mechanisms of cognitive access are constitutive of the neural correlate of phenomenal consciousness. In this paper, I want to analyze the consequences that a negative reply to this question has for the cognitive phenomenology thesis – roughly the claim that there is a “proprietary” phenomenology of thoughts. If the mechanisms responsible (...) for cognitive access can be disentangled from the mechanisms that give rise to phenomenology in the case of perception and emotion, then the same disentanglement is to be expected in the case of thoughts. This, in turn, presents, as I argue, a challenge to the cognitive phenomenology thesis: either there are thoughts with cognitive phenomenology we lack cognitive access to or there are good reasons to doubt that there is such a thing as cognitive phenomenology. I discuss a... (shrink)

The traditional approach in cognitive sciences holds that cognition is a matter of manipulating abstract symbols followingcertain rules. According to this view, the body is merely an input/output device, which allows the computationalsystem—the brain—to acquire new input data by means of the senses and to act in the environment following its com-mands. In opposition to this classical view, defenders of embodied cognition (EC) stress the relevance of the body inwhich the cognitive agent is embedded in their explanation of cognitive processes. (...) From a representationalist frameworkregarding our conscious experience, in this article, I will offer a novel argument in favor of EC and show that cognitionconstitutively—and no merely causally—depends upon body activity beyond that in the brain. In particular, I will arguethat in order to solve the problem derived from the empirical evidence in favor of the possibility of shifted spectrum,representationalist should endorse the view that experiences concern its subject: the content of experience isde se.Ishow that this claim perfectly matches the phenomenological observation and helps explaining the subjective characterof the experience. Furthermore, I argue that entertaining this kind of representation constitutively depends on bodilyactivity. Consequently, insofar as cognition depends on consciousness, it is embodied. (shrink)

The Challenge from Cognitive Diversity (CCD) states that demography-specific intuitions are unsuited to play evidential roles in philosophy. The CCD attracted much attention in recent years, in great part due to the launch of an international research effort to test for demographic variation in philosophical intuitions. In the wake of these international studies the CCD may prove revolutionary. For, if these studies uncover demographic differences in intuitions, then in line with the CCD there would be a good reason to challenge (...) philosophical views that rely on those intuitions for evidential support. I argue that philosophical views that rely on demography-specific intuitions for evidential support need not be threatened by such findings. I first provide a detailed analysis of the epistemological principles driving the CCD and distinguish three formulations of this challenge. I then show that there are good reasons to reject all such formulations of the CCD. (shrink)

TRABAJO DE FIN DE GRADO -/- Søren Kierkegaard (Copenhague, 1813-1855) figura como una de las grandes figuras del pensamiento filosófico de Europa en pleno siglo XIX. Su filosofía se articula como una tensión constante entre el pesimismo existencial, la fe protestante y la impotencia de la razón, motivo por el cual se ha debatido acerca de lo adecuado del calificativo de filósofo o teólogo. Los años 1844 y 1849, por otra parte, son uno de los más prolijos de su carrera (...) como escritor, publicando textos como "Migajas filosóficas", "El concepto de angustia" o "La enfermedad mortal". Se trata de las obras seleccionadas para el presente trabajo, cuyo primer objetivo no es sino la investigación del papel de la fe en la filosofía de Kierkegaard. Esto responde a varios motivos: el primero de ellos, por la inextricabilidad que comporta la religión con las concepciones de la existencia en su obra. Como hemos mencionado, el análisis vital que hace en sus escritos siempre tienen presente las aportaciones del cristianismo, sobre todo en su vertiente protestante. De esta manera, saber cuál es la significación esencial de fe en el autor danés permitirá una más profunda dilucidación de su vinculación con el resto de los condicionantes existenciales que plantea, como lo son la angustia o el terror. -/- El segundo motivo se marcaría por la cercanía temática que guarda con un aclamado personaje de nuestras letras: Miguel de Unamuno. En efecto, el bilbaíno escritor de "nivolas" ha sido y es conocido por una finísima —y, desde luego, también agónica— sensibilidad existencial. Los temas centrales de sus escritos principales son, mediata o inmediatamente, la expresión y canalización literaria de los análisis de Kierkegaard. Así, "San Manuel Bueno, mártir" rezuma una incertidumbre nauseabunda —en el sentido sartreano del término— que recuerda a "El concepto de angustia"; mientras que "Del sentimiento trágico de la vida" expone, a caballo entre la poesía y la filosofía —a las cuales, como veremos, considera idénticas—, las características esenciales de la fe y su naturaleza de «salto» aducidas en las "Migajas filosóficas". De hecho, es bien conocida la fascinación de don Miguel por el autor de Copenhague, llegando incluso a estudiar danés para acceder a los textos originales. -/- De esta manera, el breve ensayo que se sigue pretende investigar uno de los conceptos angulares de la filosofía de Søren Kierkegaard con el objetivo último de aproximarlo al contexto peninsular, donde los desasosiegos existenciales del norte europeo encuentran en la figura de Miguel de Unamuno un digno interlocutor. Para ello, se hará una lectura comparativa, si bien no tratando de detectar influencias intelectuales o biográficas reales, sí planteando el núcleo de investigación como perteneciente a una misma preocupación fundamental: lo que Unamuno bautizó como el sentimiento trágico de la vida. (shrink)

Desde la última década del siglo pasado, tras el declive de los “Annales”, el presente y futuro de la Historia como ciencia ha motivada un intensa polémica académica de orden “global” y en la que están participando no sólo historiadores sino filósofos -de la ciencia y la Historia– como también especialistas de las restantes ciencias sociales e incluso de otras disciplinas afines a la Historia, como son la genética y la biología. Más allá del debate epistemológico clásico al respecto, están (...) ausente del mismo otras áreas del conocimiento las que, como las llamadas TICs –técnicas de la información, comunicación y conocimiento– tanto han aportado a la “maduración” de la casi generalidad de las ciencias y respecto de las cuales la Historia persisten en estar alejada. Este trabajo intenta motivar algunas reflexiones en la aludida polémica de la que podría ser la Historia de siglo XXI; la que, ciertamente, está aún por nacer. (shrink)

De una u otra forma, los diferentes procesos independentistas iberoamericanos de comienzos del siglo XIX suelen ser involucrados dentro de la larga cadena revolucionaria que alternativamente sacudió a ambos meridianos del mundo occidental a lo largo de no menos de cincuenta años (1774-1824), para otros ciento treinta y seis (1668-1824)3, o incluso ciento sesenta años (1645-1824). Consumado el mencionado ciclo revolucionario americano, este significó o bien la transformación —Canadá, Brasil, Cuba y Puerto Rico— o bien el derrocamiento del "Antiguo régimen (...) colonial" en la casi totalidad del continente americanos, y con ello surgimiento de un nuevo y ampliado orden político y económico mundial. (shrink)

When reasoning about dependence relations, philosophers often rely on gradualist assumptions, according to which abrupt changes in a phenomenon of interest can result only from abrupt changes in the low-level phenomena on which it depends. These assumptions, while strictly correct if the dependence relation in question can be expressed by continuous dynamical equations, should be handled with care: very often the descriptively relevant property of a dynamical system connecting high- and low-level phenomena is not its instantaneous behaviour but its stable (...) fixed points (those in the vicinity of which it spends most of the time, after comparatively short transitory periods), and stable fixed points can change abruptly as a result of infinitesimal changes of the low-level phenomenon. We illustrate this potential gradualist trap by showing that Chalmers’ fading qualia argument falls into it. (shrink)

The notion of the human embryo is not immutable. Various scientific and technological breakthroughs in reproductive biology have compelled us to revisit the definition of the human embryo during the past 2 decades. Somatic cell nuclear transfer, oocyte haploidisation and, more recently, human stem cell-derived embryo models have challenged this scientific term, which has both ethical and legal repercussions. Here, we offer a legal perspective to identify a universally accepted definition of ‘embryo’ which could help to ease and unify the (...) regulation of such entities in different countries. (shrink)

Higher-Order Thought (HOT) theories of consciousness maintain that the kind of awareness necessary for phenomenal consciousness depends on the cognitive accessibility that underlies reporting. -/- There is empirical evidence strongly suggesting that the cognitive accessibility that underlies the ability to report visual experiences depends on the activity of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC). This area, however, is highly deactivated during the conscious experiences we have during sleep: dreams. HOT theories are jeopardized, as I will argue. I will briefly present HOT (...) theories in the first section. Section 2 offers empirical evidence to the effect that the cognitive accessibility that underlies the ability to report depends on the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex: dlPFC is the neural correlate of HOTs. Section 3 shows the evidence we have of the deactivation of this brain area during dreams and, in section 4, I present my argument. Finally, I consider and rejoin two possible replies that my opponent can offer: the possibility of an alternative neural correlate of HOTs during dreams and the denial that we have phenomenally conscious experiences during sleep. (shrink)

Non-representational approaches to cognition have struggled to provide accounts of long-term planning that forgo the use of representations. An explanation comes easier for cognitivist accounts, which hold that we concoct and use contentful mental representations as guides to coordinate a series of actions towards an end state. One non-representational approach, ecological-enactivism, has recently seen several proposals that account for “high-level” or “representation-hungry” capacities, including long-term planning and action coordination. In this paper, we demonstrate the explanatory gap in these accounts that (...) stems from avoiding the incorporation of long-term intentions, as they play an important role both in action coordination and perception on the ecological account. Using recent enactive accounts of language, we argue for a non-representational conception of intentions, their formation, and their role in coordinating pre-reflective action. We provide an account for the coordination of our present actions towards a distant goal, a skill we call distal engagement. Rather than positing intentions as an actual cognitive entity in need of explanation, we argue that we take them up in this way as a practice due to linguistically scaffolded attitudes towards language use. (shrink)

It has been widely acknowledged that indexical thought poses a problem for traditional theories of mental content. However, recent work in philosophy has defied this received view and challenged its defenders not to rely on intuitions but rather to clearly articulate what the problem is supposed to be. For example, in “The Inessential Indexical”, Cappelen and Dever claim that there are no philosophically interesting or important roles played by essential indexical representations. This paper assesses the role of essential indexicality in (...) understanding the content of perception and argues that, if the perceptual experiences of different subjects can have the same phenomenology, and thus share a representational content (phenomenal content)—assumptions shared by a well-established research project, including a wide variety of theories—, then phenomenal content exhibit a particular kind of essential indexicality (perspectival). I also discuss how the argument is immune to Cappelen and Dever’s objections to the idea that the content of perceptual experiences is essentially indexical. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This article offers the first step in an ongoing project of revisiting the foundations of latinidad and lo latinoamericano by focusing on the exclusions enacted by the history of these concepts and the cultural and political identity that comes with them. In conversation with Susana Nuccetelli and Omar Rivera, the author focuses on two emblematic authors in the history of Latin American philosophy (Simón Bolívar and José de Vasconcelos) that are usually read as offering a novel, liberatory conception of (...) the Latin American reality/identity, categorically different from European and Anglo-American conceptions. This common reading of some of the foundational texts on Latin American identity, however, conceals not only the active, textual removal of Blackness in the construction of this identity, but also the literal subtraction of Black bodies, lives, and histories from the Latin American nations and communities. Both of these elements are an explicit part of the philosophical programs of Bolívar and Vasconcelos. The article shows how the thought and political practice of these two authors, celebrated in different ways as foundational of what we understand as Latin America today, exemplify the exclusionary historical demarcation of latinidad. (shrink)

In this essay we discuss recent attempts to analyse the notion of representation, as it is employed in cognitive science, in purely informational terms. In particular, we argue that recent informational theories cannot accommodate the existence of metarepresentations. Since metarepresentations play a central role in the explanation of many cognitive abilities, this is a serious shortcoming of these proposals.

Las últimas décadas del siglo XX hasta nuestros días parecen estar mostrando un continuo abandono de la filosofía para explicar los temas del mundo y del hombre, más específicamente, el abandono de la metafísica. ¿Se está olvidando la metafísica?, ¿se trata de un saber perimido, reservado sólo para especialistas de estudios clásicos? En esta comunicación pretendo señalar, en primer lugar la actualidad e importancia de la reflexión en torno a la antropología filosófica, y en segundo, la insoslayable necesidad de contar (...) con una metafísica como saber de supuestos. Toda antropología se basa en una idea de hombre, en una filosofía que intenta explicar quién es el ser humano. La ciencia no puede dar una respuesta cabal a dichos supuestos, porque su estatuto epistemológico asume como hechos de experiencia la constitución psico-física humana y su comportamiento. La filosofía, en cambio, indaga acerca del por qué del ser humano, no solo de sus aspectos fenomenológicos, sino el sustrato que lo constituye. Mucho se ha oído hablar de la crisis de la metafísica, sin embargo, a pesar de “tantos sepultureros” que desean enterrarla, ella se sigue presentando para reclamar respuestas fundamentales, radicales. ¿Por qué tanto rechazo? Este es un tema que nos puede dar para pensar y debatir en el Congreso que celebramos. Hay propuestas de una “renovación de la metafísica” que viene de corrientes personalistas, pero también hay sugerencias estimulantes desde la Filosofía Analítica, ¿merece la pena el intento? Quisiera recordar que las preguntas que se oyen en nuestras aulas de Filosofía remiten a explicaciones de hondo calado acerca del hombre, si deseamos plantear una antropología filosófica que no se quede en medianías, tal vez haya que analizar la vuelta a esa reflexión de ultimidades. (shrink)

Desde la consideración de Tomás de Aquino del conocimiento por connaturalidad, "el conocimiento que aporta a la inteligencia más datos que los puramente racionales, especialmente todos los datos proporcionados por la afectividad", es posible hacer un acercamiento integral a la realidad y establecer una relación con otras áreas de sabiduría y sus objetos de estudio. Esto ayuda a confrontar algunos problemas filosóficos reales, como la pérdida de la visión holística de la realidad, el reduccionismo epistemológico y el relativismo gnoseológico. Recordar (...) el estudio iniciado en la primera parte del siglo XX por tomistas bien conocidos sobre la connaturalidad ayudaría a comprender mejor la realidad y el ser humano, y facilitaría el diálogo entre Filosofía, Ciencia y Teología sobre temas como Ecología, Estética o Mística. (shrink)

Alleged self-evidence aside, conceivability arguments are one of the main reasons in favor of the claim that there is a Hard Problem. These arguments depend on the appealing Kripkean intuition that there is no difference between appearances and reality in the case of consciousness. I will argue that this intuition rests on overlooking a distinction between cognitive access and consciousness, which has received recently important empirical support. I will show that there are good reasons to believe that the intuition is (...) misguided—at least on the reading that the conceivability arguments require—and hence that the arguments are unsupported. This, in turn, alleviates the Hard Problem but leaves us with what I think is a not easy problem. (shrink)