This qualitative study presents 27 students’ insights about four teachers’ implementation of an immersive Native American history curricular unit designed to equip students with digital skills to critically navigate complex, polarizing social issues. The Digital Civic Learning (DCL) curriculum used Google Suite and Google Classroom or Schoology to provide collaborative slides supporting immersive 2D-graphics, children’s books/resources, immersive activities/artefact-creation, and multimodal tools (e.g., discussion posts, Flipgrid video-essays). Teachers regulated student thinking/behavior towards cohesive outcomes, and encouraged open-ended exploration, operationalizing the design framework (...) as a zone of proximal development (ZPD). The history unit incorporates four cybernetic design features (DF) that enable teachers to steer student-centered collaboration within the curricular unit. The teacher serves four diverse roles (guide, facilitator, modeler, participant observer) mapping onto the DF. Results of focus group interviews with students, which were analyzed based on a theory-informed coding scheme and narrative inquiry, suggest ways for social studies teachers to operationalize the DCL immersive history unit as a cybernetic ZPD by adapting its basic structure to technologies accessible in their schools by adapting its basic structure to technologies accessible in their schools. (shrink)

Kant develops a concept of savagery, partly characterized by laziness, to envision a program for human progress. He also racializes savagery, treating native Americans, in particular, as literal savages. He ascribes to this “race” a peculiar physiological laziness, a supposedly hereditary trait of blunted life power. Accordingly, while he grants them the same “germs” for perfections as he does the civilized Europeans, he allows them no prospect of actually fulfilling any such perfection. For the road to perfection must be paved (...) through industry, a condition that Kant denies to the “savages” by racializing their alleged laziness. This case will shed new light on the debated relation between Kant’s moral universalism and his racism. (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)

As an important view in the epistemology of perception, dogmatism proposes that for any experience, if it has a distinctive kind of phenomenal character, then it thereby provides us with immediate justification for beliefs about the external world. This paper rejects dogmatism by looking into the epistemology of imagining. In particular, this paper first appeals to some empirical studies on perceptual experiences and imaginings to show that it is possible for imaginings to have the distinctive phenomenal character dogmatists have in (...) mind. Then this paper argues that some of these imaginings fail to provide us with immediate justification for beliefs about the external world at least partly due to their inappropriate etiology. Such imaginings constitute counterexamples to dogmatism. (shrink)

Psychological research has discovered that episodic memories are constructive in nature. This paper examines how, despite being constructive, episodic memories can provide us with justification for beliefs about the past. In current literature, two major approaches to memorial justification are internalist foundationalism and reliabilism. I first demonstrate that an influential version of internalist foundationalism, dogmatism, encounters problems when we compare certain types of memory construction with cognitive penetration in perception. On the other hand, various versions of reliabilism all face skeptical (...) challenges. I propose an alternative, two-factor theory that recognizes an epistemic distinction typically overlooked by dogmatism and reliabilism. Although our account leaves certain aspects unspecified, it is an important step forward. (shrink)

A testimony is somebody else’s reported experience of what has happened. It is an indispensable source of knowledge. It only gives us historical cognition, however, which stands in a complex relation to rational or philosophical cognition: while the latter presupposes historical cognition as its matter, one needs the architectonic “eye of a philosopher” to select, interpret, and organize historical cognition. Kant develops this rationalist theory of testimony. He also practices it in his own work, especially while theorizing about race as (...) a subject of natural philosophy. In three dedicated essays on this subject, he treats race from the standpoint of a philosophical investigator of nature (Naturforscher), who (as Kant puts it in the first Critique) learns from nature “like an appointed judge who compels witnesses to answer the questions he puts to them.” This view underwrites Kant’s use of travel reports (a type of testimony) in developing and defending his theory of race. (shrink)

Given that mitigating climate change is a large-scale global issue, what obligations do individuals have to lower their personal carbon emissions? I survey recent suggestions by Walter Sinnott-Armstrong and Dale Jamieson and offer models for thinking about their respective approaches. I then present a third model based on the notion of structural violence. While the three models are not mutually incompatible, each one suggests a different focus for mitigating climate change. In the end, I agree with Sinnott-Armstrong that people have (...) limited moral obligations to directly lower personal emissions, but I offer different reasons for this conclusion, namely that the structural arrangements of our lives place a limit on how much individuals can restrict their own emissions. Thus, individuals should focus their efforts on changing the systems instead (e.g., the design of cities, laws and regulation, etc.), which will lead to lower emissions on a larger scale. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Cognitive penetrability refers to the possibility that perceptual experiences are influenced by our beliefs, expectations, emotions, or other personal-level mental states. In this paper, I focus on the epistemological implication of cognitive penetration, and examine how, exactly, aetiologies matter to the justificatory power of perceptual experiences. I examine a prominent theory, according to which some cognitively penetrated perceptual experiences are like conclusions of bad inferences. Whereas one version of this theory is psychologically implausible, the other version has sceptical consequences. (...) In the second half of the paper, I suggest an alternative theory, drawing on recent empirical research on imagining-perception interaction and the epistemology of imagining. (shrink)

According to an oft-repeated narrative, while Kant maintained racist views through the 1780s, he changed his mind in the 1790s. Pauline Kleingeld introduced this narrative based on passages from Kant’s Metaphysics of Morals and “Toward Perpetual Peace”. On her reading, Kant categorically condemned chattel slavery in those texts, which meant that he became more racially egalitarian. But the passages involving slavery, once contextualized, either do not concern modern, race-based chattel slavery or at best suggest that Kant mentioned it as a (...) cautionary tale for labor practices in Europe. Overall, Kant never explicitly considered chattel slavery as a moral problem to be addressed on its own. Rather, he treated it primarily in terms of its function in human history. If he ended up expressing some qualms about its practices, it was likely because they threatened to deepen intra-European conflicts and undermine the prospect of perpetual peace. The humanity of the enslaved “Negroes” was never part of the reasoning. This was not a casual oversight on Kant’s part. It reflects the complexity of his philosophical system: everything he did or did not say about chattel slavery begins to make sense once we connect his philosophy of history and his depiction of “Negroes” as natural slaves. (shrink)

This paper rigorously examines the primitive foundations of economic reasoning through an original framework based on symbolic logic. Extending previous work, it formalizes economic conceptions ($\mathbb{C}$), symbols ($s_i$), and introduces a structured language ($\mathcal{L_{\mathbb{C}}}$) to define their formation and interpretation. Organized as a continuous chain of declarations and illustrations, the paper offers a concise, systematic approach to understanding the philosophy of economic reasoning through formal representations.

Leibniz, and many following him, saw the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR) as pivotal to a scientific (demonstrated) metaphysics. Against this backdrop, Kant is expected to pay close attention to PSR in his reflections on the possibility of metaphysics, which is his chief concern in the Critique of Pure Reason. It is far from clear, however, what has become of PSR in the Critique. On one reading, Kant has simply turned it into the causal principle of the Second Analogy. On (...) a different reading, PSR is but the supreme principle of reason, which roughly states that, if the conditioned is given, so is the unconditioned. On my reading, PSR appears in the guises of both the causal principle and the supreme principle. This twofold specification, I argue, is key to understanding (i) Kant’s allegations that past metaphysicians failed to prove PSR, (ii) his own Critical account of the possibility of metaphysics in both of its parts (ontology and metaphysics proper), and (iii) his nuanced answer to the contentious question about the relation between physical inquiry and metaphysical reasoning about nature (both being quests for reasons). (shrink)

By moving beyond the overly emphasized image of a “fusion of horizons” and focusing on Gadamer’s concept of “play,” this paper aims to rehabilitate the dynamic and multi-vocal character of understanding as Gadamer conceives it, and to argue that “difference” is the life-blood of understanding against the recurring charge that Gadamer’s hermeneutics is fundamentally antagonistic to otherness.

Kant claims that Aristotles logic as complete, explain the historical and philosophical considerations that commit him to proving the completeness claim and sketch the proof based on materials from his logic corpus. The proof will turn out to be an integral part of Kant’s larger reform of formal logic in response to a foundational crisis facing it.

This paper is an original attempt to understand the foundations of economic reasoning. It endeavors to rigorously define the relationship between subjective interpretations and objective valuations of such interpretations in the context of theoretical economics. This analysis is substantially expanded through a dynamic approach, where the truth of a valuation results in an updated interpretation or changes in the agent's subjective belief regarding the effectiveness of the selected action as well as the objective reality of the effectiveness of all other (...) possible actions (i.e. consequence realization). Complications arise when the economic agent is presented with a set of actions that render ambiguous preference, or when the effectiveness of an action cannot be perceived upon its selection, thereby necessitating a different theory of choice and consequence realization. (shrink)

We tend to think that perceptual experiences tell us about what the external world is like without being influenced by our own mind. But recent psychological and philosophical research indicates that this might not be true. Our beliefs, expectations, knowledge, and other personal-level mental states might influence what we experience. This kind of psychological phenomena is now called “cognitive penetration.” The research of cognitive penetration not only has important consequences for psychology and the philosophy of mind, but also has interesting (...) epistemological implications. According to the Downgrade Thesis, some cognitively penetrated perceptual experiences give their subjects less justification for believing their penetrated contents than perceptual experiences that are unpenetrated to represent those contents would usually give. In this paper, I propose an innovative argument for the Downgrade Thesis. First, I develop a positive account of how some cognitive penetration works, according to which cognitive states influence perceptual experiences by triggering some imaginings. Second, I argue that imaginings do not give their subjects justification for believing their contents. I apply this epistemology of imagining to cognitive penetration, and argue that because of the role that imaginings play, some cognitively penetrated experiences also give their subjects less justification for believing their penetrated contents. (shrink)

This paper presents a critical analysis of dual-class share structures (DCSS) within an ethical and logical framework for ownership and control. Moreover, it contends that the existence of DCSS constitutes a de facto infringement on the ownership rights of shareholders. By adopting a conceptual approach rooted in symbolic logic, the paper demonstrates that DCSS falls short of the ethical precept of “one share, one vote” and is therefore an unjust and inefficient equity arrangement. The paper contributes to the existing literature (...) on DCSS by focusing on the ethical and logical basis of such share structures. (shrink)

Does phenomenal force, the distinctive phenomenology attributed to perceptual experience, really form an integral part of the latter? If not, what implications does it have for perceptual justification? In this paper, I first argue for a metacognitive account, according to which phenomenal force constitutes a separate, metacognitive state. This account opens up a previously unexplored path for challenging phenomenal conservatism or dogmatism, which has been a prominent theory of perceptual justification over the past two decades. Moreover, I investigate several alternative (...) possibilities in which phenomenal force might still be deemed as significant, but ultimately demonstrate that its epistemic role remains marginal at best. (shrink)

In this chapter, I discuss some problems of Kant’s logic corpus while recognizing its richness and potential value. I propose and explain a methodic way to approach it. I then test the proposal by showing how we may use various mate- rials from the corpus to construct a Kantian demonstration of the formal rules of thinking (or judging) that lie at the base of Kant’s Metaphysical Deduction. The same proposal can be iterated with respect to other topics. The said demonstration (...) will have cleared the path for such iterations. (shrink)

According to phenomenal conservatism or dogmatism, perceptual experiences can give us immediate justification for beliefs about the external world in virtue of having a distinctive kind of phenomenal character—namely phenomenal force. I present three cases to show that phenomenal force is neither pervasive among nor exclusive to perceptual experiences. The plausibility of such cases calls out for explanation. I argue that contrary to a long-held assumption, phenomenal force is a separate, non-perceptual state generated by some metacognitive mechanisms that monitor one’s (...) first-order mental processes and states. This new account advances our understanding of the nature of phenomenal force. (shrink)

At A71/B96–7 Kant explains that singular judgements are ‘special’ because they stand to the general ones as Einheit to Unendlichkeit. The reference to Einheit brings to mind the category of unity and hence raises a spectre of circularity in Kant’s explanation. I aim to remove this spectre by interpreting the Einheit-Unendlichkeit contrast in light of the logical distinctions among universal, particular and singular judgments shared by Kant and his logician predecessors. This interpretation has a further implication for resolving a controversy (...) over the correlation between the logical moments of quantity (universal, particular, singular) and the categorial ones (unity, plurality, totality). (shrink)

How does the critical Kant view ontology? There is no shared scholarly answer to this question. Norbert Hinske sees in the Critique of Pure Reason a “farewell to ontology,” albeit one that took Kant long to bid (Hinske 2009). Karl Ameriks has found evidence in Kant’s metaphysics lectures from the critical period that he “was unwilling to break away fully from traditional ontology” (Ameriks 1992: 272). Gualtiero Lorini argues that a decisive break with the tradition of ontology is essential to (...) Kant’s critical reform of metaphysics, as is reflected in his shift from “ontology” to “transcendental philosophy,” two notions that Lorini takes to be related by mere “analogy” (Lorini 2015). I agree with Lorini that a thorough reform of ontology is a pivotal part of Kant’s critical plan for metaphysics and that ontology somehow “survives within the critical philosophy” (Lorini 2015: 76). To make this case, however, I deem it important to identify “ontology” and “transcendental philosophy” in the sense of extensional equivalence. While we can detect this identification in Kant’s writings, only from his metaphysics lectures can we get a full sense of its historical and philosophical significance. In this chapter I focus on how it represents a definitive turn from as well as notable continuity with traditional treatments of ontology, particularly the Wolffian one. (shrink)

The causal principle of the Kalām cosmological argument—Everything that begins to exist has a cause—remains controversial. One common objection is that while the principle may apply to things within the universe, it does not apply to the universe itself. Here, I argue that if the universe began uncaused, then there is an extremely high probability that the universe began just moments ago with the appearance of age. However, I further argue that the general agreement of independent estimates for the universe’s (...) age provides powerful empirical evidence that if the universe began to exist, then the universe has a cause. (shrink)

This text, commissioned by the OSUN Global Observatory of Academic Freedom, discusses how the concept of academic freedom is codified in Colombian Law and regulations of public and private higher education institutions. It also explores common conceptions of academic freedom among Colombian scholars, as well as commonly observed threats to it.

Inside the family, all individuals define their identity in relation to previous generations, the present ones, and the future ones. This intergenerational exchange plays important educational roles: it fosters a sense of belonging and identification, promotes dialogue, and guarantees the passing down of ethical orientations. In addition to feelings of security and reliance on others, family memory creates a matrix that gives people a placement in the world, a sort of existential code through which to be located in existence. Fostering (...) the habit of memory-making becomes therefore a major educational imperative, which however is not without challenges. The present contribution will consider those phenomena which can give rise to a weakening of bonds between generations and a growing exclusion of the ethical value of family heritage. The educational perspective that will be drawn is that of building a sense of alliance.. (shrink)

In this paper I examine the question of when human life begins from a neo-Aristotelian perspective. In my view, the basic principles of Aristotle’s metaphysics inform an account of human life (and the human person) that offers the best available explanation of the available phenomena. This account – the substance account of the human person – can fully incorporate the contemporary findings of empirical embryology, while also recognizing the essential uniqueness of rational human nature.

How "red", "green" were defined? Through analyzing how two children with congenitally inverted color sensations corresponding to red flags and green grass accept their grand mothers’ teaching about colors, the paper get opposite conclusions against logical empiricism. The “red” and “green” and other names of properties of objects were defined by objective physical properties (or together with behavior, such as in defining “beauty”), instead our sensations. So language directly points to things in themselves passing through sensations and presentative world. It (...) is not that things in themselves are unknowable, but that sensations and presentative world cannot be exactly described by daily language. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe distinction between ‘context of discovery’ and ‘context of justification’ in philosophy of science appears simple at first but contains interesting complexities. Paul Hoyningen-Huene has catalogued some of these complexities and suggested that the core usefulness of the ‘context distinction’ is in distinguishing between descriptive and normative perspectives. Here, I expand on Hoyningen-Huene’s project by tracing the label ‘context of discovery and context of justification’ to its origin. I argue that, contrary to initial appearances, Hans Reichenbach’s initial context distinction from (...) 1938 does not easily map onto Hoyningen-Huene’s distinction between descriptive and normative perspectives on science. However, this is not a reason to reject Hoyningen-Huene’s simplified context distinction, nor do I recommend returning to Reichenbach’s initial proposal. It is, however, further reason to believe that the context distinction does not have a single, easily understood meaning. Along the way, I revisit Reichenbach’s version of ‘rational reconstruction’ and highlight its usefulness as a tool for philosophy in general. (shrink)

Cheryl Hall has argued that framing of climate change must acknowledge the sacrifices needed to reach a sustainable future. This paper builds on that argument. Although it is important to acknowledge the value of what must be sacrificed, this paper argues that current frames about the environment falsely portray humans and the environment as in a zero-sum game, and in doing so ask people to give up the wrong things. This could undermine the public’s trust in environmentalism, and might even (...) create a backlash against action on climate change. I propose we need alternative framing that portrays humans as a keystone species, and highlights positive human activity. (shrink)

Although the international legal framework protects the rights of all persons to adopt or manifest any religion or belief of choice without discrimination, indigenous spirituality is generally dismissed, marginalised or denied respect and recognition in many states. The dismissal and denial of recognition of indigenous spirituality has led to severe discrimination against many indigenous communities and human rights violations, including the dispossession and loss of sacred sites, the obstruction of spiritual practices and the violation of the right to religious freedom. (...) This article examines state policies and practices on the recognition and registration of indigenous religious groups and the implications for their exercise of religious freedom. It argues that while states’ recognition of indigenous spirituality has grown in recent decades, indigenous beliefs remain among the most marginalised, disrespected, discriminated and unrecognised. Consequently, many indigenous groups cannot fully exercise their religious freedom. (shrink)

Kant describes logic as “the science that exhaustively presents and strictly proves nothing but the formal rules of all thinking”. (Bviii-ix) But what is the source of our cognition of such rules (“logical cognition” for short)? He makes no concerted effort to address this question. It will nonetheless become clear that the question is a philosophically significant one for him, to which he can see three possible answers: those representations are innate, derived from experience, or originally acquired a priori. Although (...) he gives no explicit argument for the third answer, he seems committed to it—especially given his views on the source of pure concepts of the understanding and on the nature of logic. It takes careful preparatory work to gather all the essential materials for motivating and reconstructing Kant’s “original acquisition” account of logical cognition. I shall proceed in two sections. In section 1, I analyze Kant’s argument that pure concepts of the understanding (or intellectual concepts)—as one kind of pure cognition—must be acquired originally and a priori. My analysis partly concerns his varied attitudes toward Crusius’s and Leibniz’s versions of the nativist account of such concepts. I give special attention to how Kant characterizes the nativist account and his own “original acquisition” account in terms of “preformation” and “epigenesis”. My goal is, firstly, to tease out the sense in which Kant grants that there must be an innate ground (or preformation) for the derivation of pure concepts and, secondly, to introduce—and pave the way for answering—the question about the source of logical cognition. In section 2, in light of Kant’s reference to Locke and Leibniz as the greatest reformers of philosophy (including logic) in their times (Log, AA 9: 32), I examine the Lockean and Leibnizian approaches to logic, respectively. Both approaches are “physiological” by Kant’s standard and are directly opposed to his own strictly critical method. I explain how this methodological move shapes Kant’s view that representations of logical rules must be originally acquired a priori. This acquisition involves a kind of radical epigenesis of pure reason: unlike the acquisition of pure concepts, it presupposes no further innate ground (or preformation). This view will have important consequences for issues such as the ground of the normativity of logical rules and the boundaries of their rightful use. (shrink)

The origin of languages was a hotly debated topic in the eighteenth century. This paper reconstructs a distinctively Kantian account according to which the origination, progression, and diversification of languages is at bottom reason’s self-development under certain a priori constraints and external environments. The reconstruction builds on three sets of materials. The first is Herder’s famous prize essay on the origin of languages. The second includes Kant’s explicit remarks about language – especially his notion of “transcendental grammar,” his argument that (...) language cannot be innate, his contrast of “Oriental” symbolic (intuitive) and “Occidental” discursive languages, and his treatment of the latter as a sine qua non of humanity’s cultural and moral progress. The third includes the concepts that we need to make sense of those remarks, such as Kant’s epigenetic theory of biological formation and his account of categories as originally acquired. (shrink)

By Focusing on Hans-Georg Gadamer’s magnum opus Truth and Method, this paper aims to show how understanding itself — including the understanding of artworks, texts, tradition, and living speech — can be understood as a kind of game or dialogical play-process which requires crucial ethical conditions to be met if it is going to succeed. Success, in terms of the communication of meaning, requires that the players (or interlocutors) commit to a genuine participation with each other in which they “open” (...) themselves to each other’s “claims to truth,” take each other seriously, listen, respond and question, and stand prepared to risk their old prejudices, learn from each other, and be transformed in the process. (shrink)

In this critical response, I clarify my critique of the commonly held assumption that racism contradicts Kant’s pure moral philosophy. I explain why Kant’s belated criticisms of some practices of slavery should not be interpreted as a rejection of colonial slavery as an institution. I end with a reflection on the relation between Kant’s philosophy and anti-racism.

Dossier sobre Pragmatismo. Los trabajos que se incluyen en este dossier tienen como hilo conductor el discutir una noción de verdad provisional y débil, en oposición a una concepción de verdad entendida como una fundamentación fuerte, objetiva y universal de las creencias.

I defend the thesis that Kantian analytic judgments are about objects (as opposed to concepts) against two challenges raised by recent scholars. First, can it accommodate cases like “A two-sided polygon is two-sided”, where no object really falls under the subject-concept as Kant sees it? Second, is it compatible with Kant’s view that analytic judgments make no claims about objects in the world and that we can know them to be true without going beyond the given concepts? I address these (...) challenges in two steps. First, given Kant’s distinction between an object in general = x from an object of sensible intuition, I argue that analytic judgments are about objects in the former sense, no matter whether the purported objects can be given in our intuition. Second, using Kant’s method of representing certain logical relations of concepts with such figures as circles, I construct a model to show that analytic truths are truths about objects in general = x and yet can be determined solely by the intensional relation between the given concepts plus certain Kantian-logical laws. Analytic truths are thus shown as formal in the Kantian sense that they do not presuppose the purported objects as givable in our intuition. This account of the formality of analytic truths captures Kant’s diagnosis of the Leibnizian illusion that we can make material claims about the world by analytically true judgments. (shrink)

This paper provides a philosophical proof for the case against axiomatization.

There has been a recent resurgence of what Betsy Hartmann dubbed “the greening of hate” (blaming immigrants for environmental issues in the US). When immigrants move to the U.S., the argument goes, their CO2 emissions increase, thereby making climate change worse. Using migration from the Lower 48 to Alaska as a model, I illustrate how this anti-immigration argument has more traction than it is generally given credit for, and might be more convincing in a different situation. Nonetheless, it is not (...) convincing given the current pattern of climate emissions and prevailing justice considerations. Climate matters; how we treat each other matters, too. (shrink)

From the refusal of some parents to apply some vaccines to their children, in this work we will show that to act properly it is not enough with a good intellectual justification to validate a belief as accurate, it will be necessary to take into account also the systematic actions in relation to which we are constituted, as well as the feelings that accompany those actions. We begin by exposing the notion of belief that Villoro presents from authors such as (...) Braithwaite and Bain. Next, we briefly explain the topic of the justification of beliefs and then articulate it with some of the controversies related to the application of vaccines. Later, we turned to Hume to show the role of imagination in relation to pleasure and pain in decision making. Finally, we present an outline of the discussion about paternalism in the application of vaccines. (shrink)

There is an exegetical quandary when it comes to interpreting Locke's relation to logic.On the one hand, over the last few decades a substantive amount of literature has been dedicated to explaining Locke's crucial role in the development of a new logic in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. John Yolton names this new logic the "logic of ideas," while James Buickerood calls it "facultative logic."1 Either way, Locke's Essay is supposedly its "most outspoken specimen" or "culmination."2 Call this reading the (...) 'New Logic interpretation.'On the other hand, from the typical standpoint of a philosopher accustomed to the modern conception of logic, whatever Locke—indeed, whatever most of the... (shrink)

John Venn has the “uneasy suspicion” that the stagnation in mathematical logic between J. H. Lambert and George Boole was due to Kant’s “disastrous effect on logical method,” namely the “strictest preservation [of logic] from mathematical encroachment.” Kant’s actual position is more nuanced, however. In this chapter, I tease out the nuances by examining his use of Leonhard Euler’s circles and comparing it with Euler’s own use. I do so in light of the developments in logical calculus from G. W. (...) Leibniz to Lambert and Gottfried Ploucquet. While Kant is evidently open to using mathematical tools in logic, his main concern is to clarify what mathematical tools can be used to achieve. For without such clarification, all efforts at introducing mathematical tools into logic would be blind if not complete waste of time. In the end, Kant would stress, the means provided by formal logic at best help us to express and order what we already know in some sense. No matter how much mathematical notations may enhance the precision of this function of formal logic, it does not change the fact that no truths can, strictly speaking, be revealed or established by means of those notations. (shrink)

In this article I argue that the notion of truth is so closely linked to the notion of justification that it is not possible to access the truth, even with the best reasons upon which a justification is supported. -/- I’ll show that the notions of truth and reality can only be inferred from our experience of the world, in which our social practices can be verified or disproved, and if our hypotheses are accepted or refuted. I maintain that we (...) can only access realities which we constitute in relation to one of several possible conceptual frameworks. These conceptual frameworks are not transcendental entities nor are they established definitively, they are social constructs. This means that the conceptual frameworks are constituted by the social practices of the subjects. We understand that social practices are institutionalized groups of actions undertaken by members of a community and directed toward the consecution of an end. These actions presuppose that the beliefs, norms and values are shared by members of an epistemic community. Olivé (1999: 135-42). -/- This article begins by presenting Rorty’s counter-proposal for the notion of truth, in relation to which I put forward the principal theses of onto-epistemological pluralism. Subsequently, I develop the idea of inter-subjective contextual justification and I show that this posture, although it does depend on specific conditions for justification, is not arbitrary. -/- I demonstrate the relevance of onto-epistemological pluralism and the need to adequately substantiate our beliefs and decision making, by presenting the case of parents guided by a notion of ´post-truth´ who decide not to vaccinate their children against measles based on insufficiently justified subjective reasons. A fact that is having serious harmful consequences to health, particularly among young children. (shrink)

From the epistemological posture that we present in this work we sustain the following thesis:-That as subjects we constitute the world we live in through one of the possible conceptual frameworks.-Our cognitive and social practices construct the world in a certain manner, which makes us responsible for the way this world is constituted.

Advocates of Extended Evolutionary Synthesis claim that the gene-centric framework of Modern Synthesis (MS) inadequately addresses epigenetics and extended heredity. Historically, epigenetic inheritance relates to Lamarck's inheritance of acquired characters, which was widely accepted before the dominance of MS. In this talk, I argue that the challenge posed by epigenetic inheritance to the gene-centric view arises partly from the ambiguous use of "gene," "phenotype," and "environment" concepts. A functional analysis of the gene concept played in the formal evolutionary models shows (...) that the gene can include materials like exogenes, demonstrating the flexibility of evolutionary theory beyond the verbal MS. Properly understanding the evolutionary gene concept reveals that incorporating epigenetic inheritance does not demand a radical revision of the contemporary evolutionary theory. (shrink)

In this paper, I defend an epistemological pluralism that moves away from universal and absolute rationality, as well as from a radical and arbitrary relativism, where any criterion is valid for decision making. Such epistemological pluralism maintains that subjects know the world in which they live according to different conceptual schemes. We posit a notion of truth linked to the justification process and practical effectiveness. Then we present the importance of traditional knowledge in the socio-ecological field and relative to complex (...) systems. Finally, we explain the relevance of epistemic equity between traditional and scientific knowledges in order to anticipate consequences and to make decisions less uncertain. (shrink)

In this paper we discuss whether the thesis of Nietzsche’s perspectivism, from an interpretation, could be read in keys of onto-epistemological pluralism. For this, we begin by exposing Nietzsche’s questioning of the notion of rational truth, as well as the universalist and transcendental positions linked to this concept. In the second section we expose some of the main theses of American pragmatism and show that perspectivism is not close to this current of thought. Finally, we present the proposal of ontological (...) and epistemological pluralism and we refer to why Nietzsche’s perspectivism could be articulated with this position and why not. (shrink)

A generalized information theory is proposed as a natural extension of Shannon's information theory. It proposes that information comes from forecasts. The more precise and the more unexpected a forecast is, the more information it conveys. If subjective forecast always conforms with objective facts then the generalized information measure will be equivalent to Shannon's information measure. The generalized communication model is consistent with K. R. Popper's model of knowledge evolution. The mathematical foundations of the new information theory, the generalized communication (...) model , information measures for semantic information and sensory information, and the coding meanings of generalized entropy and generalized mutual information are introduced. Assessments and optimizations of pattern recognition, predictions, and detection with the generalized information criterion are discussed. For economization of communication, a revised version of rate-distortion theory: rate-of-keeping-precision theory, which is a theory for datum compression and also a theory for matching an objective channels with the subjective understanding of information receivers, is proposed. Applications include stock market forecasting and video image presentation. (shrink)

This paper offers a proof of the Coase theorem by formalizing the notion of ideal exchanges.