In Charles Mills’ essay, “White Ignorance,” and his trail-blazing monograph, The Racial Contract, he developed a view of how Whiteness or anti-Black-Indigenous-and-Latinx racism causes individuals to hold false beliefs or lack beliefs about racial injustice in particular and the world in general. I will defend a novel exegetical claim that Mills’ view is part of a more general view regarding how racial injustice can affect a subject’s epistemic standing such as whether they are justified in a belief and (...) whether their degree of confidence in the belief is rational given their evidence. Then, in light of this novel exegetical claim, I show how this interpretation of Mills’ view that racial injustice causes ignorance relates to how epistemically justified philosophers and social scientists are in the views that dominate their respective scholarly literature. (shrink)

La formación docente es indispensable para responder a los requerimientos de la compleja sociedad actual. De su conocimiento, iniciativa, praxis y creatividad depende el éxito o el fracaso del sujeto que aprende. Al modificar el rol del docente se transforma la actitud de los estudiantes. ¿Cómo entender la formación filosófica transdisciplinar? Este texto responde a este y otros cuestionamientos: ¿cuáles son los planteamientos pedagógicos afines a la era digital? ¿en qué medida las TIC se encuentran al servicio de una filosofía (...) educativa transdisciplinar?, ¿cómo se explica ese enfoque en la formación del docente?, ¿cuál es la función de la formación en la innovación educativa?, ¿cómo formar para la ciudadanía mundial?, ¿cuáles son las contribuciones de las nuevas ciencias para la formación educativa? El crecimiento exponencial de la ciencia y de la tecnología nos obliga a pensar en procesos formativos innovadores. En tal sentido, resulta imprescindible el estudio de estas problemáticas. (shrink)

Filosofia limbajului are legătură cu studiul modului în care limbajul nostru se implică și interacționează cu gândirea noastră. Studierea logicii și relația dintre logică și vorbirea obișnuită poate ajuta o persoană să își structureze mai bine propriile argumente și să critice argumentele celorlalți. Înțelesul este modul în care pot fi considerate în mod corespunzător cuvinte, simboluri, idei și convingeri, definiția sa depinzând de teoria abordată, precum teoria corespondenței, teoria coerenței, teoria constructivistă, teoria consensului sau teoria pragmatică. Există mai multe explicații (...) distince despre ceea ce înseamnă un „sens” lingvistic, în funcție de diverse teorii (ideologice, adevăr-condiționale, de utilizare a limbajului, constructiviste, de referință, verificaționiste, pragmatice, etc.) Investigațiile privind modul în care limbajul interacționează cu lumea sunt numite teorii de referință. Sensul unei propoziții este gândul pe care îl exprimă. Un astfel de gând este abstract, universal și obiectiv. Sensurile determină referința și sunt, de asemenea, modurile de prezentare a obiectelor la care se referă expresiile. Referințele sunt obiectele din lume despre care vorbesc cuvintele. Filosofia limbajului explorează relația dintre limbă și realitate, în special filosofia problemelor de studiu lingvistic care nu pot fi abordate de alte domenii. Logica filozofică se ocupă de descrieri formale ale limbajului obișnuit, nespecializat („natural”). -/- CUPRINS: -/- 1. Filosofia limbajului - 1.1 Istorie - - Filosofia antică - - Filosofia medievală - - Filosofia modernă - - Filosofia contemporană - 1.2 Subiecte și sub-domenii majore - - Compoziție și părți - - Natura sensului - - Referinţă - - Mintea și limba - - - Înnăscut și învățat - - - Limba și gândul - - Interacțiunea socială și limba - 1.3 Limbajul și filozofia continentală - 1.4 Probleme în filosofia limbajului - - Imprecizia - - Problema universalului și a compoziției - - Natura limbajului - - Abordări formale versus informale - - Traducere și interpretare - 1.5 Nominalism - - Istorie - - - Filozofia greacă veche - - - Filozofia medievală - - - Filosofia modernă și contemporană - - Problema universalelor - - Tipuri - - - Filosofie analitică și matematică - - Critica originilor istorice ale termenului 2. Înțeles - 2.1 Adevăr și înțeles - - Teorii majore ale înțelesului - - - Teoria corespondenței - - - Teoria coerenței - - - Teoria constructivistă - - - Teoria consensului - - - Teoria pragmatică - - Teorii și comentarii asociate - - - Logica și limbajul - - - Gottlob Frege - - - Bertrand Russell - - - Alte teorii ale adevărului - - - Saul Kripke - - - Criticile teoriilor de adevăr ale înțelesului - 2.2 Bertrand Russell, Despre denotare - - "Fraza care denotă" - - - Concepția lui Russell despre o frază care denotă - - - Referința la ceva care nu există - - - Epistemologie - - Teoria descrierilor - - - Descrierea matematică - - - Ilustrare - - - Meinong - - Rezolvarea problemei existențialelor negative - - - Declarații despre concepte în care obiectul nu există - - - Ambiguitate - - - Nume fictive - - Critici - 2.3 Sens și referință - - Precursori - - - Antistene - - - John Stuart Mill - 2.3.1 Sens - - Sens și descriere - - Traducerea Bedeutung - - Natura sensului - 2.3.2 Referinţă - 2.4 Nume proprii - - Problema - 2.4.1 Teorii - - Teoria lui Mill - - Teoria bazată pe sensul numelor - - Teoria descriptivă - - Teoria cauzală a numelor - - Teorii de referință directă - - Filosofia continentală - 2.5 Gottlob Frege, Despre sens și referință - 2.6 Teorii cauzale ale referinței - - Motivaţie - - Variații - 2.6.1 Teoria cauzală a referinței a lui Saul Kripke - 2.6.2 Teoria cauzală a referinței a lui Gareth Evans - 2.6.3 Teoria cauzală a referinței a lui Michael Devitt - 2.6.4 Blockchain și arborele cauzal al referinței - 2.6.5 Perspective - 2.7 Saul Kripke, Numire și necesitate - 2.7.1 Prelegerea I - 2.7.2 Prelegerea II - 2.7.3 Prelegerea III - 2.7.4 Concluzii - 2.8 Kit Fine, Relaționismul semantic - - A. Antinomia variabilei - - B. Abordarea tarskiană - - C. Respingerea rolului semantic - - D. Abordarea instanțială - - E. Abordarea algebrică - - F. Abordarea relațională - - G. Semantica relațională pentru logica de primul ordin 3. Logica - Concepte - - Forma logică - - Semantică - - Inferență - - Sisteme logice - - Logică și raționalitate - - Concepte rivale - Tipuri - - Logica silogistică - - Logica propozițională - - Logica predicatelor - - Logica modală - - Raționament informal și dialectică - - Logica matematică - - Logica filozofică - - Logica computațională - - Logica non-clasică - Controverse - - "Este logica empirică?" - - Implicare: Strictă sau materială - - Tolerarea imposibilului - - Respingerea adevărului logic - 3.1 Filosofia logicii - - Adevăr - - - Purtătorii de adevăr - - - Adevăruri analitice, adevăr logic, valabilitate, consecință logică și implicare - 3.2 Logica propozițională - - Explicaţie - - Istorie - - Terminologie - - Noțiuni de bază - - - Închiderea sub operații - - - Argument - 3.3 Logica predicatelor - - Introducere - - Sintaxa - - - Alfabetul - - - - Simboluri logice - - - - Simboluri non-logice - - - Regulile formării - - - - Termeni - - - - Formule - - - - Convenții notaționale - - - Variabile libere și legate - - Semantica - - - Structuri de prim ordin - - - Evaluarea valorilor de adevăr - - - Valabilitate, satisfabilitate și consecință logică - - - Algebrizare - - - Teorii, modele și clase elementare de prim ordin - - - Domenii goale - 3.4 Logica modală - - Dezvoltarea logicii modale - - Semantica - - - Teoria modelului - - - Sisteme axiomatice - - - Teoria dovezilor structurale - - - Metode de decizie - - Tipuri de logici modale - - - Logica aletică - - - Logica epistemică - - - Logica temporală - - - Logica deontică - - - Logica doxastică - - - Alte logici modale - - Ontologia posibilității - - Controverse - 3.5 Declarații - - Declarația ca o entitate abstractă - 3.6 Dileme - - Utilizarea dilemei în logică - 3.7 Argumente - - Formal și informal - - Tipuri standard - - - Argumente deductive - - - Argumente inductive - 3.8 Actualism - - Exemplu - - Puncte de vedere filosofice - - Analiza indexicală a actualității - 3.9 Lumi posibile - - Posibilitate, necesitate și contingență - - Semantica formală a logicii modale - - De la logica modală la instrumentul filosofic - - Teoria lumii posibile în studiile literare - 3.9.1 Lumi reale, ne-reale dar posibile, și imposibile - - Lumi posibile logic - - Constituienții lumilor posibile - 3.10 Saul Kripke - - Wittgenstein - - Adevăr - 3.10.1 Logica modală - - Modele canonice - - Modele Carlson - 3.10.2 Logica intuiționistă - - Logica intuiționistă de ordinul întâi - 3.10.3 Nume și Necesitate - - "Un puzzle despre credință" Referințe Despre autor - Nicolae Sfetcu - - De același autor - - Contact Editura - MultiMedia Publishing . 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En este ensayo intentaremos realizar una pequeña aproximación al pensamiento de Gilbert Simondon, filósofo francés cuya obra podría resumirse en sus dos tesis doctorales defendidas en 1958, una de las cuales no fue publicada de forma completa sino póstumamente. No obstante, lo dicho, tras el creciente interés en su pensamiento comenzaron a publicarse ya nacido este milenio, en particular en Argentina, sus cursos sobre percepción, imaginación, invención, información, comunicación y tecnología. A pesar de su escueta obra, Simondon es un filósofo (...) de sistema, que a partir de su teoría de la individuación intentó fundar un monismo ontogenético en el cual puedan entrar en comunicación todas las disciplinas humanas; y para ello buscó explotar todos los recursos conceptuales que brindaron las revoluciones científicas de su época. En este ensayo, sin embargo, abordaremos tan sólo el tipo de realidad o estatus ontológico que Simondon atribuía a los objetos técnicos. Para ello desarrollaremos 4 apartados y un bis. En el primero, haremos un esbozo de lo que es el método filosófico propuesto por Simondon, el cual describimos como un paradigmatismo analógico. En el segundo, desarrollaremos algunas críticas a cierto paradigmatismo particular que, según Simondon, subyace en gran parte del pensamiento occidental y que nos impide, entre otras cosas, comprender la realidad propia de los OT, a saber: el hilemorfismo. En tercer lugar, analizaremos en qué medida podemos salvar la realidad de los OT de ser reducida a mero constructo social. En cuarto lugar; analizaremos algunas analogías y disparidades entre los OT y los seres vivientes. Por último, a modo de apéndice, expondremos sucintamente un artículo de Esperanza García y Villegas Jaraleño, presentado en el último volumen de Scientia in verba, en el cual se plantea la pregunta sobre el estatus ontológico de los artefactos biotecnológicos desde una perspectiva bungeana; así como pequeñas críticas y aportes que pudiésemos hacerle desde el pensamiento simondoniano. (shrink)

Los estudiantes de la Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y de Administración de la Universidad de la República deben realizar, como trabajo final de carrera, una investigación o ensayo monográfico en un área de su interés, tutorados por un docente universitario o un investigador de reconocida trayectoria. Un gran número de estos trabajos monográficos han hecho un aporte valioso al conocimiento pero, lamentablemente, la poca difusión de éstos hace que ese conocimiento termine olvidado en los fondos de la biblioteca de la (...) Facultad, entre cientos de producciones monográficas. Se pretende en este libro, mostrar los aportes que se han generado en el área tanto de Economía de la Cultura como de Gestión de Organizaciones Culturales. Varias de las monografías fueron realizadas en la línea de investigación Costos y Gestión de Organizaciones Culturales, la cual coordino. Otros fueron realizados con antelación, como los trabajos tutorados por el referente de la Economía de la Cultura en Uruguay, el hoy fallecido Luis Stolovich. También se incluyen dos trabajos monográficos tutorados por el Dr Gustavo Buquet, quien siempre está presente a la hora de crear investigación de calidad en Economía de la Cultura. Como cada trabajo supera el centenar de páginas, no es posible publicarlos completamente, por lo que para este libro se hicieron resúmenes de esos trabajos, intentando adecuar la terminología y quitándoles el formato estrictamente científico –poco amigable para un no especialista-, de forma tal que su lectura sea accesible al público en general. Se resumieron ocho, clasificados en tres capítulos: Patrimonio, Artes Escénicas e Industria Cultural. El capítulo de Patrimonio comienza con un trabajo realizado por las Economistas Fernanda Arezo y Verónica Pereyra, titulado “Museos y Ciudadanos, el comportamiento del consumidor”, tutorado por Raúl Ramírez y por mí. Este estudio tuvo como centro explicar la modalidad de conducta de consumo del visitante montevideano hacia tres importantes instituciones museísticas como lo son el Museo del Cabildo, el Museo del Carnaval y el Museo de Historia del Arte. El objetivo del trabajo es estimar la demanda y obtener un indicador de la propensión a pagar por el consumo de dichos museos. El segundo trabajo, titulado “Disposición a pagar por la restauración de la Puerta de la Ciudadela”, fue realizado por las Contadoras Beatriz Torres, María Elena Olarán y María Carolina Duarte, y tutorado en forma conjunta por el Phd. Juan José Goyeneche y quien les escribe. En este trabajo se realiza una valoración contingente para medir la disposición a pagar por la restauración de la “Puerta de la Ciudadela”, un monumento fundamental de identidad montevideana. El capítulo de Patrimonio finaliza con un trabajo realizado por las Economistas Malena Rodríguez y María de la Paz Besada y tutorado por el Ec. Luis Stolovich. El mismo se denomina “El arte uruguayo: un estudio sobre el mercado y la pintura como alternativa de inversión” y explora el mercado de arte uruguayo, analizando la rentabilidad de la inversión en pintura uruguaya. Tratan la rentabilidad de la inversión para tres casos específicos: las obras vendidas por el Banco Comercial en su proceso de recuperación de activos, un portafolio de obras de Pedro Figari y otro de Joaquín Torres García. En cuanto al segundo capítulo, Artes Escénicas, comienza con un trabajo realizado para la obtención del título de Contador Público realizado por Pamela Cambeiro, Martín Cami e Ignacio Mouradián. Se denomina “La gestión de teatros. Caso de estudio: Aplicación del Cuadro de Mando Integral al Teatro Solís” y trata sobre la identificación de indicadores que faciliten las tareas de gestión para la dirección del Teatro. Luego se presenta un trabajo realizado por las Economistas Tania Cruz y Natalia Nollenberger titulado “Análisis económico del teatro independiente en Montevideo: una aproximación al problema de la fatalidad de los costos”. Este trabajo, también tutorado por el Ec. Luis Stolovich, muestra un exhaustivo análisis del teatro independiente montevideano identificando los problemas económicos que afectan al sector. El capítulo de Industria Cultural incluye tres trabajos. El primero, fue realizado por el Economista Diego Traverso y tutorado por el Dr. Gustavo Buquet, y su título es “Análisis de competitividad del sector exportador de Productoras Audiovisuales Publicitarias en Uruguay”. El sector audiovisual publicitario es un sector dinámico que se ha internacionalizado tempranamente y que generó divisas para el país del orden de los US$ 24 millones durante el año 2005 por concepto de exportaciones. En este trabajo se caracteriza al sector audiovisual publicitario en Uruguay y se analiza las ventajas competitivas que posee frente a sus principales competidores extranjeros. El segundo trabajo fue realizado por las Contadoras Natalia Rivera, Antonella Triay y María Eugenia Triay y se denomina “Gestión aplicada a las empresas radiales”. En este se identifican el sector radial, su proceso productivo y la complejidad al definir al “cliente”. Se proponen una serie de indicadores con el doble objetivo de medir el desempeño de la empresa y proveer incentivos a su organización. Finalmente, el último trabajo monográfico, fue una investigación interdisciplinaria, que sirvió simultáneamente para obtener el título de Licenciado en Economía a Ernesto Pienika y el de Licenciado en Administración a Nicolás Cohnheim y a Damián Geinsinger. Este trabajo, tutorado por el Dr. Gustavo Buquet y el Cr. Cecilio García de título “Impactos de las nuevas tecnologías en la .industria musical”, muestra cuáles son los principales impactos en esa industria que las nuevas tecnologías han provocado y cuáles son las posibles estrategias para adaptarse a estos cambios, así como los nuevos modelos de negocio. Espero que este libro sea el primero de una larga lista. Las áreas de Economía de la Cultura y Gestión de Organizaciones Culturales son disciplinas jóvenes que necesitan seguir creciendo. La investigación realizada por trabajos monográficos de fin de carrera en estas áreas, será siempre bienvenida. (shrink)

Luego de un rápido bosquejo de las etapas por las que ha pasado el pensamiento filosófico-cristiano en América Latina, el trabajo se concentra en la principales tendencias y autores en el período que va de la década del 40 del siglo XX hasta el momento que se publica el ensayo en 1998.

John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism is one of the most important, controversial, and suggestive works of moral philosophy ever written. Mill defends the view that all human action should produce the greatest happiness overall, and that happiness itself is to be understood as consisting in "higher" and "lower" pleasures. This volume uses the 1871 edition of the text, the last to be published in Mill's lifetime. The text is preceded by a comprehensive introduction assessing Mill's philosophy and the alternatives to utilitarianism, (...) and discussing some of the specific issues Mill raises in Utilitarianism. (shrink)

I discuss an aspect of the relation between accounts of de se thought and the phenomenon of immunity to error through misidentification. I will argue that a deflationary account of the latter—the Simple Account, due to Evans —will not do; a more robust one based on an account of de se thoughts is required. I will then sketch such an alternative account, based on a more general view on singular thoughts, and show how it can deal with the problems I (...) raise for the Simple Account. (shrink)

I defend a Deferred Ostension view of quotation, on which quotation-marks are the linguistic bearers of reference, functioning like a demonstrative; the quoted material merely plays the role of a demonstratum. On this view, the quoted material works like Nunberg’s indexes in his account of deferred ostensión in general. The referent is obtained through some contextually suggested relation; in the default case the relation will be … instantiates the linguistic type __, but there are other possibilities. In this way, the (...) deferred ostension view deals with a problem I pointed out for the identity proposal in my earlier work, that we do not merely refer with quotations to expression-types, but also to other entities related in some way to the relevant token we use: features exhibited by the token distinct from those constituting its linguistic type, features exhibited by other tokens of the same type but not by the one actually used (as when, by using a graphic token, we refer to its phonetic type), or even other related tokens (see the examples on p. 261 of García-Carpintero 1994). (shrink)

I argue for a substantive interpretation of Carlos Vaz Ferreira’s account of intellectual flourishing as intellectual liberation. For Vaz Ferreira, I argue, there is an inescapable master-slave dynamic between language and language users, so that flourishing intellectually essentially involves a type of mastery of language that frees up thinking from enslaving linguistic/conceptual confusions and thus facilitates the acquisition of truth. Central to this project are Vaz Ferreira’s most interesting, and radical, views on the nature of language signification and thus on (...) human’s ability to accurately describe and know reality, for failing to keep these linguistic limitations in mind, Vaz Ferreira argues, is a central way for language to enslave humans to confused thinking and thus prevent their intellectual flourishing. (shrink)

Trope theory is an increasingly prominent contender in contemporary debates about the existence and nature of properties. But it suffers from ambiguity concerning the nature of a trope. Disambiguation reveals two fundamentally different concepts of a trope: modifier tropes and module tropes. These types of tropes are unequally suited for metaphysical work. Modifier tropes have advantages concerning powers, relations, and fundamental determinables, whereas module tropes have advantages concerning perception, causation, character-grounding, and the ontology of substance. Thus, the choice between modifier (...) tropes and module tropes is significant and divides the advantages of trope theory simpliciter. In addition, each resulting trope theory is unstable: modifier trope theory threatens to collapse into realism and module trope theory threatens to collapse into austere nominalism. This invites reflection on the stability of trope theory in general. (shrink)

The Oxford Philosophical Texts series consists of authoritative teaching editions of canonical texts in the history of philosophy from the ancient world down to modern times. Each volume provides a clear, well laid out text together with a comprehensive introduction by a leading specialist, providing the student with detailed critical guidance on the intellectual context of the work and the structure and philosophical importance of the main arguments. Endnotes are supplied which provide further commentary on the arguments and explain unfamiliar (...) references and terminology, and a full bibliography and index are also included. The series aims to build up a definitive corpus of key texts in the Western philosophical tradition, which will form a reliable and enduring resource for students and teachers alike. John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism is one of the most important, controversial, and suggestive works of moral philosophy ever written. Mill defends the view that all human action should produce the greatest happiness overall, and that happiness itself is to be understood as consisting in higher and lower pleasures. This volume uses the 1871 edition of the text, the last to be published in Mill's lifetime. The text is preceded by a comprehensive introduction assessing Mill's philosophy and the alternatives to utilitarianism, and discussing some of the specific issues Mill raises in Utilitarianism. This volume also includes an analysis of the text, substantial endnotes, suggestions for further reading, and a full bibliography. (shrink)

After a critical examination of several attempts to characterize the Analytic tradition in philosophy, in the book here discussed Hanjo Glock goes on to contend that Analytic Philosophy is “a tradition that is held together both by ties of influence and by a family of partially overlapping features”. Here I question the need to appeal to a “family resemblance” component, arguing instead (in part by drawing on related attempts to characterize art, art genres and art schools) for a genealogical characterization. (...) Nonetheless, I point out that the difference between these two views might end being merely terminological, for, properly understood, a genealogical characterization will have to mention a “family of partially overlapping features” in describing the origins of Analytic Philosophy and the lines of influence among analytic philosophers. (shrink)

In this article we argue that the social value of health research should be conceptualized as a function of both the expected benefits of the research and the priority that the beneficiaries deserve. People deserve greater priority the worse off they are. This conception of social value can be applied for at least two important purposes: in health research priority setting when research funders, policy-makers, or researchers decide between alternative research projects; and in evaluating the ethics of proposed research proposals (...) when research ethics committees assess whether the social value of the research is sufficient to justify the risks and burdens to research participants and others. In assessing how far a proposed research project will advance the interests of people who are more disadvantaged, research priority setters and RECs should examine the diseases that the research targets and the type of research. Just as certain diseases impose a greater burden on people who are more disadvantaged, so certain types of intervention and forms of research are more likely to benefit people who are more disadvantaged. We outline which populations are likely to be representative of the global worst off and identify what types of health research, and which disease categories, are priorities for these populations. (shrink)

Since the publication of Hartry Field’s influential paper “Tarski’s Theory of Truth” there has been an ongoing discussion about the philosophical import of Tarski’s definition. Most of the arguments have aimed to play down that import, starting with that of Field himself. He interpreted Tarski as trying to provide a physicalistic reduction of semantic concepts like truth, and concluded that Tarski had partially failed. Robert Stalnaker and Scott Soames claimed then that Field should have obtained a stronger conclusion, namely that (...) Tarski’s failure in his allegedly intended physicalistic reduction was total. From another front, Hilary Putnam argued for an even more sweeping thesis: “[a]s a philosophical account of truth, Tarski’s theory fails as badly as it is possible for an account to fail.” Scott Soames followed suit also on this count, endorsing Putnam’s argument in section iii of the aforementioned paper; and John Etchemendy used a very similar argument to contend that “a Tarskian definition of truth [...] cannot possibly illuminate the semantic properties of the object language.” The paper argues that these contentions are based on several misunderstandings about the nature of a definition like Tarski’s. Regarding the Putnam-Soames-Etchemendy argument, we must apply a distinction Frege found natural to draw—and is natural to draw anyway—between what he called “constructive” definitions, definitions properly so called, which are mere stipulations, and what he described as “analytic” definitions, definitions which aim to make explicit the meaning of a term already in use. Regarding the Field-Soames-Stalnaker criticism, the paper contends that the true aims of a Tarskian truth definition are perfectly well fulfilled without Field’s amendments. (shrink)

There is a largely unrecognized ambiguity concerning the nature of a trope. Disambiguation throws into relief two fundamentally different conceptions of a trope and provides two ways to understand and develop each metaphysical theory that put tropes to use. In this paper I consider the relative merits that result from differences concerning a trope’s ability to ground the character of ordinary objects. I argue that on each conception of a trope, there are unique implications and challenges concerning character-grounding.

One of the hottest philosophical debates in recent years concerns the nature of the semantics/pragmatics divide. Some writers have expressed the reserve that this might be merely terminological, but in my view it ultimately concerns a substantive issue with empirical implications: the scope and limits of a serious scientific undertaking, formal semantics. In this critical note I discuss two arguments by Recanati: his main methodological argument --viz. that the contents posited by what he calls 'literalists' play no relevant role in (...) communication--, and some phenomenological considerations regarding the "Availability Principle" that he appeals to in order to buttress that main argument. /// Uno de los más encarnizados debates filosóficos recientes atañe a la naturaleza de la distinción entre semántica y pragmática. Aunque algunos autores han expresado reservas en el sentido de que èste pudiera ser sólo terminológico, en mi opinión tiene que ver con una cuestión sustantiva con implicaciones empíricas: el alcance y los límites de una empresa científica seria, la semántica formal. En este texto discuto dos argumentos de Recanati: su principal argumento metodológico, que los contenidos postulados por los autores que él denomina "literalistas" no desempeñan ningùn papel relevante en la comunicación, y, en segundo lugar, ciertas consideraciones fenomenológicas en torno a su "Principio de Accesibilidad", a las cuales apela para apoyar el argumento metodológico. (shrink)

As the subtitle “A Syncretistic Account of Fictional Entities” makes clear, Alberto Voltolini intends in this book to argue for a syncretic view of the ontology and the semantics of fiction. In the process, he offers sympathetic and clear presentations of the main contenders in the field, discussing first ontological matters (chapters 1–4) and then semantic questions (chapters 5–6), and concluding with an ‘ontological’ argument for the allegedly syncretic brand of realism about fictional entities he has by then endorsed. The (...) book will therefore be very useful for all those who want to have a guided overview of the state of the art in the field, and very helpful if used as a main text for an introductory graduate course. (shrink)

The paper defends a version of Direct Reference for indexicals on which reference-fixing material (token-reflexive conditions) plays the role of an ancillary presupposition.

In this paper I explore Michael Loux’s important distinction between “tropes” and “tropers”. First, I argue that the distinction throws into relief an ambiguity and discrepancy in the literature, revealing two fundamentally different versions of trope theory. Second, I argue that the distinction brings into focus unique challenges facing each of the resulting trope theories, thus calling into question an alleged advantage of trope theory—that by uniquely occupying the middle ground between its rivals, trope theory is able to recover and (...) preserve the insights of these views. Ultimately, the distinction suggests that trope theory is a divided house. (shrink)

In recent work, Williamson has defended a suggestive account of assertion. Williamson claims that the following norm or rule (the knowledge rule) is constitutive of assertion, and individuates it: (KR) One must ((assert p) only if one knows p) Williamson is not directly concerned with the semantics of assertion-markers, although he assumes that his view has implications for such an undertaking; he says: “in natural languages, the default use of declarative sentences is to make assertions” (op. cit., 258). In this (...) paper I will explore Williamson’s view from this perspective, i.e., in the light of issues regarding the semantics of assertion-markers. I will end up propounding a slightly different account, on which, rather than KR, what is constitutive and individuating of assertion is an audience-involving transmission of knowledge rule: (TKR) One must ((assert p) only if one’s audience comes thereby to be in a position to know p) I will argue that TKR, of which KR is an illocutionary consequence (but not the other way around), has all the virtues that Williamson claims for his account and no new defect. (shrink)

The truth of a statement depends on the world in two ways: what the statement says is true if the world is as the statement says it is; on the other hand, what the expressions in the statement mean depends on what the world is like (for instance, on what conventions are in place). Each of these two kinds of dependence of truth on the world corresponds to one of the dimensions on the two-dimensional semantic framework, developed in the 1970’ (...) in the work of Evans, Kaplan, Kripke and Stalnaker. The introduction provides a systematic overview of the framework, the ideas of its earlier originators, recent developments and criticism. Finally, it gives a brief overview over the contributions to the volume. (shrink)

This paper discusses the proper taxonomy of the semantics-pragmatics divide. Debates about taxonomy are not always pointless. In interesting cases taxonomic proposals involve theoretical assumptions about the studied field, which might be judged correct or incorrect. Here I want to contrast an approach to the semantics-pragmatics dichotomy, motivated by a broadly Gricean perspective I take to be correct, with a contemporary version of an opposing “Wittgensteinian” view. I will focus mostly on a well-known example: the treatment of referential uses of (...) descriptions and descriptive uses of indexicals. The paper is structured as follows. I will start by characterizing in the first section the version of the Gricean approach I favor; in the second section, I will illustrate the differences between the two views by focussing on the example, and in the third section I will object to what I take to be the main Wittgensteinian consideration. (shrink)

In a recent paper, Peacocke (2001) continues an ongoing debate with McDowell and others, providing renewed arguments for the view that perceptual experiences and some other mental states have a particular kind of content, nonconceptual content. In this article I want to object to one of the arguments he provides. This is not because I side with McDowell in the ongoing debate about nonconceptual content; on the contrary, given the way I understand it, my views are closer to Peacocke’s, and (...) have been strongly influenced by him. It is just that I am not persuaded by the particular argument I will be questioning here. (shrink)

Despre analogia existentă între aspectele epistemologice şi metodologice ale activităţii serviciilor de informaţii şi unele discipline ştiinţifice, pledând pentru o abordare mai ştiinţifică a procesului de culegere şi analiză de informaţii din cadrul ciclului de informaţii. Afirm că în prezent aspectele teoretice, ontologice şi epistemologice, în activitatea multor servicii de informaţii, sunt subestimate, determinând înţelegere incompletă a fenomenelor actuale şi creând confuzie în colaborarea inter-instituţională. După o scurtă Introducere, care include o istorie a evoluţiei conceptului de serviciu de informaţii după (...) al doilea război mondial, în Activitatea de informaţii definesc obiectivele şi organizarea serviciilor de informaţii, modelul de bază al acestor organizaţii (ciclul informaţional), şi aspectele relevante ale culegerii de informaţii şi analizei de informaţii. În secţiunea Ontologia evidenţiez aspectele ontologice şi entităţile care ameninţă şi sunt ameninţate. Secţiunea Epistemologie include aspecte specifice activităţii de informaţii, cu analiza principalului model (Singer) folosit în mod tradiţional, şi expun o posibilă abordare epistemologică prin prisma conceptului de cunoaştere tacită dezvoltat de omul de ştiinţă Michael Polanyi. În secţiunea Metodologii prezint diverse teorii metodologice cu accent pe tehnicile analitice structurale, şi câteva analogii, cu ştiinţa, arheologia, afacerile şi medicina. Lucrarea se încheie cu Concluziile privind posibilitatea unei abordări mai ştiinţifice a metodelor de culegere şi analiză a informaţiilor din cadrul serviciilor de informaţii. -/- Cuvinte cheie: servicii de informaţii, agenţii de informaţii, informaţii, intelligence -/- CUPRINS -/- Abstract 1. Introducere 1.1. Istorie 2. Activitatea de informaţii 2.1. Organizaţii 2.2. Ciclul informaţional 2.3. Colectarea informaţiilor 2.4. Analiza informaţiilor 2.5. Contrainformatii 2.6. Comunităţi epistemice 3. Ontologia 4. Epistemologia 4.1. Cunoaşterea tacită (Polanyi) 5. Metodologii 6. Analogii cu alte discipline 6.1. Stiinta 6.2. Arheologia 6.3. Afaceri 6.4. Medicina 7. Concluzii Bibliografie -/- ISBN: 978-606-033-160-5 , DOI: 10.58679/TW56764. (shrink)

n this paper I take up these proposals, giving reasons to incorporate semantic features associated with proper names over and above their referent in any (genuine) semantic account of natural language. I also argue that my proposal is compatible with the main points made in Naming and Necessity, by contending that not Millianism but externalism was the claim most forcefully argued for in that impressive piece of work.

Singular terms used in fictions for fictional characters raise well-known philosophical issues, explored in depth in the literature. But philosophers typically assume that names already in use to refer to “moderatesized specimens of dry goods” cause no special problem when occurring in fictions, behaving there as they ordinarily do in straightforward assertions. In this paper I continue a debate with Stacie Friend, arguing against this for the exceptionalist view that names of real entities in fictional discourse don’t work there as (...) they do in simple-sentence assertions, but rather as fictional names do. (shrink)

The general concept of a trope – that of a non-shareable character-grounder – admits of a distinction between modifier tropes and module tropes. Roughly, a module trope is self-exemplifying whereas a modifier trope is not. This distinction has wide-ranging implications. Modifier tropes are uniquely eligible to be powers and fundamental determinables, whereas module tropes are uniquely eligible to play a direct role in perception and causation. Moreover, each type of trope theory faces unique challenges concerning character- grounding. Modifier trope theory (...) faces challenges concerning the inscrutability of predication and the incompatibility with bundle theory, whereas module trope theory faces challenges concerning character overdetermination and a collapse into austere nominalism. These differences indicate that the modifier/module distinction divides the advantages of general trope theory and thus presents the trope theorist with a pivotal choice. (shrink)

In recent decades, several theories have claimed to explain the teleological causality of organisms as a function of self-organising and self-producing processes. The most widely cited theories of this sort are variations of autopoiesis, originally introduced by Maturana and Varela. More recent modifications of autopoietic theory have focused on system organisation, closure of constraints and autonomy to account for organism teleology. This article argues that the treatment of teleology in autopoiesis and other organisation theories is inconclusive for three reasons: First, (...) non-living self-organising processes like autocatalysis meet the defining features of autopoiesis without being teleological; second, organisational approaches, whether defined in terms of the closure of constraints, self-determination or autonomy, are unable to specify teleological normativity, that is, the individuation of an ultimate beneficiary; third, all self-organised systems produce local order by maximising the throughput of energy and/or material (obeying the maximum entropy production (MEP) principle) and thereby are specifically organised to undermine their own critical boundary conditions. Despite these inadequacies, an alternative approach called teleodynamics accounts for teleology. This theory shows how multiple self-organising processes can be collectively linked so that they counter each other’s MEP principle tendencies to become codependent. Teleodynamics embraces – not ignoring – the difficulties of self-organisation, but reinstates teleology as a radical phase transition distinguishing systems embodying an orientation towards their own beneficial ends from those that lack normative character. (shrink)

This article defends a relational account of personhood. I argue that the structure of personhood consists of dyadic relations between persons who can wrong or be wronged by one another, even if some of them lack moral competence. I draw on recent work on directed duties to outline the structure of moral communities of persons. The upshot is that we can construct an inclusive theory of personhood that can accommodate nonhuman persons based on shared community membership. I argue that, once (...) we unpack the internal relation between directed duties, moral status, and flourishing, relations can ground personhood and include nonhuman animals. (shrink)

I describe a phenomenon that has not yet been described in the epistemology literature. I label this phenomenon expression-style exclusion. Expression-style exclusion is an example of how s...

Call ‘a substance’ a person who is at home in a relatively stable and unified sense-making framework: a social structure that to some degree specifies which categories are important for interpreting reality, which goals are worth pursing, which character traits are admirable, etc. Call ‘an accident’ a person who is not at home in one such framework. It is tempting to think that being a substance is preferable, but I present some considerations for thinking otherwise. Mexican philosophers Emilio Uranga and (...) Jorge Portilla, I argue, present notions of accidentality as decolonial tools. Uranga’s account enables Mexicans to have positive valuation of their being independently of the approving gaze of the colonizers and their standards of value. Portilla’s thought distinguishes between pernicious accidentality resulting from the disintegration of sense-making frameworks and authentic accidentality as a condition for freedom, self-creation, and ultimately for individual and communal liberation. (shrink)

World food production is facing exorbitant challenges like climate change, use of resources, population growth, and dietary changes. These, in turn, raise major ethical and political questions, such as how to uphold the right to adequate nutrition, or the right to enact a gastronomic culture and to preserve the conditions to do so. Proposals for utopic solutions vary from vertical farming and lab meat to diets filled with the most fanciful insects and seaweeds. Common to all proposals is a polarized (...) understanding of food and diets, famously captured by Warren Belasco in the contraposition between technological fixes and anthropological fixes. According to the first, technology will deliver clean, just, pleasurable, affordable food; future generations will not need to adjust much of their dietary cultures. According to the second, future generations should dramatically change their dietary habits (what they eat and how they eat it) to achieve a sustainable diet. The two fixes found remarkably distinct perspectives over dietary politics and the ethics of food production and consumption. In this paper we argue that such polarized thinking rests on a misrepresentation of the ontological status of food, which in turn affects the underlying ethical and political issues. Food is a socially constructed object that draws in specific ways on habits, norms, traditions, geographical, and climatic conditions. Although this thesis seems somewhat obvious, its consequences on the ethical and political perspectives on the future of food have not been derived properly. After introducing the issue at stake (¤1), we point out the polarities that characterize food utopias (¤2) and their ontological faults (¤3). We hence suggest that a socio-ontological analysis of food can better deliver the principles for a foundation of food utopias (¤4). (shrink)

The picture of moral development defended by followers of Aristotle takes moral cultivation to be like playing a harp; one gets to be good by actually spending time playing a real instrument. On this view, we cultivate a virtue by doing the actions associated with that virtue. I argue that this picture is inadequate and must be supplemented by imaginative techniques. One can, and sometimes must, cultivate virtue without actually performing the associated actions. Drawing on strands in Buddhist philosophy, I (...) explain several methods of moral development that rely on imagination and visualization rather than overt action. These techniques are essential in cases where cultivating virtue the way one practices the harp is impossible. In particular, I focus on single-event virtues, first-time virtuous acts, and morally dangerous situations. (shrink)

Schiffer has given an argument against supervaluationist accounts of vagueness, based on reports of vague contents. Suppose that Al tells Bob ‘Ben was there’, pointing to a certain place, and later Bob says, ‘Al said that Ben was there’, pointing in the same direction. According to supervaluationist semantics, Schiffer contends, both Al’s and Bob’s utterances of ‘there’ indeterminately refer to myriad precise regions of space; Al’s utterance is true just in case Ben was in any of those precisely bounded regions (...) of space, and Bob’s is true just in case Al said of each of them that it is where Ben was. However, while the supervaluationist truth-conditions for Al’s utterance might be satisfied, those for Bob’s cannot; for Al didn’t say, of any of those precisely delimited regions of space, that it is where Ben was. In an earlier version of the material presented here (García-Carpintero 2000) I replied to Schiffer’s argument that supervaluationism has an independently well-motivated defense. The response is essentially based on the point that the occurrence of ‘there’ in Bob’s utterance (and of ‘tall’ in Wright’s argument) occurs in indirect discourse, and supervaluationists may allow that it shifts its referent there. Schiffer’s reply to this response shows that it was not made sufficiently clearly. In this paper I will try to improve on that score. In his more recent reply, Schiffer (2000b, 325) dismisses a proposal like the one I will make, mainly because it “undermines … a leading virtue of supervaluationism … its implication that vagueness is … not a feature of the world.” I will argue that my reply does not undermine the fundamental contentions of the supervaluationist account. (shrink)

Most people agree that inflicting unnecessary suffering upon animals is wrong. Many fewer people, including among ethicists, agree that painlessly killing animals is necessarily wrong. The most commonly cited reason is that death (without pain, fear, distress) is not bad for them in a way that matters morally, or not as significantly as it does for persons, who are self-conscious, make long-term plans and have preferences about their own future. Animals, at least those that are not persons, lack a morally (...) significant interest in continuing to live. At the same time, some argue that existence itself can be good, insofar as one’s life is worth living. For animals, a good life can offset a quick, if early, death. So, it seems to follow that breeding happy animals that will be (prematurely) killed can be a good thing overall. Insofar as slaughter and sale makes it economically sustainable to raise new ones, who would otherwise not exist, raising and killing animals for food who will have lives worth living is good overall. It benefits them as well as consumers, and makes the world better by adding to the sum of happiness. The process of raising and killing animals with positive welfare produces a sequence of replacement that maintains or increases overall welfare, all else being equal (assuming in particular no overall negative impact on the welfare of other parties). Call this the Replaceability Argument (RA) and the ensuing controversy the Replaceability Problem (RP). This is a problem at the crossroads of the ethics of killing, agricultural ethics, procreation ethics, and population ethics. (shrink)

Critical notice of Richard Gaskin's "The Unity of the Proposition" (OUP 2008).

Most physics theories are deterministic, with the notable exception of quantum mechanics which, however, comes plagued by the so-called measurement problem. This state of affairs might well be due to the inability of standard mathematics to “speak” of indeterminism, its inability to present us a worldview in which new information is created as time passes. In such a case, scientific determinism would only be an illusion due to the timeless mathematical language scientists use. To investigate this possibility it is necessary (...) to develop an alternative mathematical language that is both powerful enough to allow scientists to compute predictions and compatible with indeterminism and the passage of time. We suggest that intuitionistic mathematics provides such a language and we illustrate it in simple terms. (shrink)

This commentary is devoted to offer a rejoinder to an argument by Schiffer against semantic accounts of vagueness (typically relying on supervaluationist techniques) based on indirect discourse. A short sketch of the argument can be found on pp. 246-48 of ‘Vagueness and Partial Belief’ ; a more elaborated presentation occurs in “TWOIs sues of Vagueness”.

There are propositions constituting the content of fictions—sometimes of the utmost importance to understand them—which are not explicitly presented, but must somehow be inferred. This essay deals with what these inferences tell us about the nature of fiction. I will criticize three well-known proposals in the literature: those by David Lewis, Gregory Currie, and Kendall Walton. I advocate a proposal of my own, which I will claim improves on theirs. Most important for my purposes, I will argue on this basis, (...) against Walton’s objections, for an illocutionary-act account of fiction, inspired in part by some of Lewis’s and Currie’s suggestions, but (perhaps paradoxically) above all by Walton’s deservedly influential views. (shrink)

Evoluția testelor gravitaționale dintr-o perspectivă epistemologică încadrată în conceputul de reconstrucție rațională al lui Imre Lakatos, pe baza metodologiei acestuia a programelor de cercetare. Perioada evaluată este foarte vastă, începând cu filosofia naturală a lui Newton și până la teoriile gravitației cuantice din zilele noastre. Pentru a explica mai rațional evoluția complexă a conceptului de gravitație din ultimul secol, propun o extindere naturală a metodologiei programelor de cercetare pe care o folosesc apoi pe parcursul lucrării. Consider că această abordare oferă (...) o nouă perspectivă asupra modului în care au evaluat în timp conceptul de gravitație și metodele de testare a fiecărei teorii a gravitației, prin observații și experimente. Argumentez, pe baza metodologiei programelor de cercetare și a studiilor oamenilor de știință și filosofilor, că actualele teorii ale gravitației cuantice sunt degenerative, datorită lipsei dovezilor experimentale pe o perioadă îndelungată de timp și a auto-imunizării împotriva posibilității falsificării. Mai mult, în prezent este în curs de dezvoltare un curent metodologic care atribuie un rol secundar, neimportant, verificărilor prin observații și/sau experimente. Din această cauză, nu va fi posibilă o teorie completă a gravitației cuantice în forma actuală care să includă la limită relativitatea generală, întrucât teoriile fizice au fost dintotdeauna ajustate, în decursul evoluției lor, pe baza testelor observaționale sau experimentale, și verificate prin predicțiile făcute. De asemenea, contrar unei opinii răspândite și a unor programe active actuale privind unificarea tuturor forțelor fundamentale ale fizicii într-o singură teorie finală, pe baza teoriei corzilor, argumentez că este puțin probabil în general să se realizeze această unificare, și nu este posibil oricum ca unificarea să se elaboreze pe baza teoriilor actuale ale gravitației cuantice, inclusiv prin teoria corzilor. În plus, susțin punctele de vedere ale unor oameni de știință și filosofi că în prezent se consumă mult prea multe resurse pe ideea dezvoltării teoriilor gravitației cuantice, și în special teoria corzilor, care să includă relativitatea generală și să unifice gravitația cu celelalte forțe, în condițiile în care știința nu impune astfel de programe de cercetare. -/- DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.14582.75842 . (shrink)

Defends a version of the Davidsonian Demonstrative Theory of quotation against proponents of the Fregean Identity Theory.

In the course of his discussion of perception, Searle criticizes representative theories in general. In this paper I will argue that, even though his criticisms may be adequate regarding a certain form of these theories, perhaps the most frequently defended by philosophers of perception, a version I will outline here scapes to them. A second issue I raise concerns Searle’s claim that his theory of perception is a form of direct realism. I will raise difficulties for Searle’s attempt to maintain (...) at the same time a “token-reflexive” theory of perception and the thesis of direct realism. (shrink)

Despite intensive exegetical work, Plato’s description of dialectic in the Sophist still raises many questions. Through a close reading of this passage that contextualizes it in the general organisation of the Sophist, this paper provides answers to these questions. After presenting the difficult text, I contend that the “vowel-kinds” are necessary conditions for the blending of kinds. Then, I interpret the “cause of divisions” mentioned by the Stranger as the kinds responsible of the dichotomous division in the first half of (...) the dialogue. In the next part, I show that 235d5-e2 does not describe a procedure of “meta-divison” as some commentators have it, but that it describes the method of division itself. Finally, I connect the difficulty and the obscurity of the passage to the fact that dialectic is the supreme science and I explain why dialectic is the science of free men. (shrink)