The Fifth Element (1997) is a French science-fiction film in English, directed and co-written by Luc Besson. The title and the plot of the film refer to a central notion of Greek philosophy, that is, pemptousia, or quintessence. Pre-Socratic philosophers such as Thales, Anaxagoras, Anaximenes and others, were convinced that all natural beings – in fact, nature itself – consist in four primary imperishable elements or essences (ousiai), i.e., fire, earth, water, and air. To these four, Aristotle added aether, (...) a fifth essence (pemptousia). The introduction of aether gave birth to a great tradition in late Antique and Medieval philosophy, and eventually it came to signify not an additional primary element, but the core-essence of all beings, their fundamental ontological structure. Besson’s film draws its inspiration on this philosophical tradition but its cinematographic rendering of the concept of Quintessence is typical of the contemporaneous views on the core characteristics of matters. The modernity that stimulates the film is equally anti-transcendentalist and anti-essentialist. Thus, the fifth element of the film is existentially personified and genderized making the traditional philosophical significance of the term to be adjusted by modernity in an immanent and temporal context where in addition aesthetics plays a crucial role. (shrink)

Even the most cursory reader of Husserl’s writings must be struck by the frequent references to essences (“Wesen”, “Essenzen”), Ideas (“Idee”), kinds, natures, types and species and to necessities, possibilities, impossi- bilities, necessary possibilities, essential necessities and essential laws. What does Husserl have in mind in talking of essences and modalities? What did he take the relation between essentiality and modality to be? In the absence of answers to these questions it is not clear that a reader of Husserl can (...) be said to understand him. (shrink)

Master Nome makes Advaita Vedanta accessible to us without losing its rigour. This review shows how a neophyte to Advaita Vedanta can use this book to remap the domains of hermeneutics and translations studies.

According to the standard interpretation of Einstein’s field equations, gravity consists of mass-energy curving spacetime, and an additional physical force or entity—denoted by Λ (the ‘cosmological constant’)—is responsible for the Universe’s metric-expansion. Although General Relativity’s direct predictions have been systematically confirmed, the dominant cosmological model thought to follow from it—the ΛCDM (Lambda cold dark matter) model of the Universe’s history and composition—faces considerable challenges, including various observational anomalies and experimental failures to detect dark matter, dark energy, or inflation-field candidates. This (...) paper shows that Einstein’s Equivalence Principle entails two possible physical interpretations of General Relativity’s field equations. Although the field equations facially appear to support the standard interpretation—that gravity consists of mass-energy curving spacetime—the field equations can be equivalently understood as holding that gravitational effects instead result from mass-energy accelerating the metric-expansion of a second-order spacetime fabric superimposed upon an absolute, first-order Euclidean space, resulting in the observational appearance of spacetime curvature. This alternative interpretation of relativity is shown to be empirically equivalent to the standard interpretation of relativity, albeit with a changing value for Λ (which is similar to how Λ is understood in the conception of Λ as ‘quintessence’, but in this case takes Λ to be gravity). The reconceptualization is then shown to potentially resolve major observational anomalies for the ΛCDM model, including recent observations conflicting with ΛCDM predictions, as well as failures to directly detect dark matter, dark energy, and inflation field/particle candidates. (shrink)

The representations of deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) are formed from generalizing similarities and abstracting from differences in the manner of the empiricist theory of abstraction (Buckner, Synthese 195:5339–5372, 2018). The empiricist theory of abstraction is well understood to entail infinite regress and circularity in content constitution (Husserl, Logical Investigations. Routledge, 2001). This paper argues these entailments hold a fortiori for deep CNNs. Two theses result: deep CNNs require supplementation by Quine’s “apparatus of identity and quantification” in order to (1) (...) achieve concepts, and (2) represent objects, as opposed to “half-entities” corresponding to similarity amalgams (Quine, Quintessence, Cambridge, 2004, p. 107). Similarity amalgams are also called “approximate meaning[s]” (Marcus & Davis, Rebooting AI, Pantheon, 2019, p. 132). Although Husserl inferred the “complete abandonment of the empiricist theory of abstraction” (a fortiori deep CNNs) due to the infinite regress and circularity arguments examined in this paper, I argue that the statistical learning of deep CNNs may be incorporated into a Fodorian hybrid account that supports Quine’s “sortal predicates, negation, plurals, identity, pronouns, and quantifiers” which are representationally necessary to overcome the regress/circularity in content constitution and achieve objective (as opposed to similarity-subjective) representation (Burge, Origins of Objectivity. Oxford, 2010, p. 238). I base myself initially on Yoshimi’s (New Frontiers in Psychology, 2011) attempt to explain Husserlian phenomenology with neural networks but depart from him due to the arguments and consequently propose a two-system view which converges with Weiskopf’s proposal (“Observational Concepts.” The Conceptual Mind. MIT, 2015. 223–248). (shrink)

Is it even possible to resist or oppose neoliberalism? I consider two responses that translate musical practices into counter-hegemonic political strategies: Jacques Attali’s theory of “composition” and the biopolitics of “uncool.” Reading Jacques Attali’s Noise through Foucault’s late work, I argue that Attali’s concept of “repetition” is best understood as a theory of neoliberal biopolitics, and his theory composition is actually a model of deregulated subjectivity. Composition is thus not an alternative to neoliberalism but its quintessence. An aesthetics and (...) ethos of “uncool” might be a more viable alternative. If and when they function as bad, unprofitable investments, uncool practices like smoothness (predictable regularity) can undercut neoliberal imperatives to self-capitalization. I consider both the impact of neoliberalism on music, and how the study of music can advance theories of neoliberalism. (shrink)

This article focuses on justified responses to “immoral” behavior and crimes committed by patients undergoing neuromodulation therapies. Such patients could be held morally responsible in the basic desert sense—the one that serves as a justification of severe practices such as backward‐looking moral outrage, condemnation, and legal punishment—as long as they possess certain compatibilist capabilities that have traditionally served as the quintessence of free will, that is, reasons‐responsiveness; attributability; answerability; the abilities to act in accordance with moral reasons, second‐order volitions, (...) or Deep Self. Recently leading compatibilist neuroethicists added the condition of not feeling alienated from desires motivating a person's action. This article argues against such attempts to determine conditions under which patients undergoing neuromodulation should be subject to negative reactive attitudes and legal punishment. Compatibilism should not be used to justify basic desert moral responsibility and legal punishment. Instead, a new way of thinking about the function of moral responsibility attribution is proposed for patients with neuromodulation. Their compatibilist capabilities should serve as important indicators for determining appropriate, forward‐looking courses of action, such as quarantining and restorative treatment, to ensure the public safety and well‐being of the patients. (shrink)

In a previous paper we outlined a series of historical touchpoints between classical aether theories and modern theoretical physics which showed a shared conceptual lineage for the modern tools and methods of the most common interpretations and fluid based “Hydrodynamic” treatments of an electromagnetic medium. It was proposed that, though the weight of modern experimentation leaves an extremely narrow and convoluted window for even a reconceptualization of a medium, all of modern physics recognizes a plethora of behaviors and attributes for (...) free space and these physics are interchangeable with modern methods for treating superfluid-like continuums. Thus the mathematical equivalence of the methods do not comprise alternative physics but an alternative interpretation of the same physics. Though many individual components describing a “neo-aether” or “quintessence” are available, an overarching structural outline of how these tools can work together to provide an alternative working overview of modern physics has remained undefined. This paper will propose a set of introductory concepts in the first outline of a toy model which will later connect the alternative tools and conceptualizations with their modern counterparts. This introductory paper provides the simpler “100-miles out” overview of the whole of physics from this perspective, in an easily comprehensible, familiar and intuitive, informal dialog fashion. While this paper grants the largest and loosest introductory overview, subsequent papers in this series will address the finite connections between modern physics and this hydrodynamic view. (shrink)

Acknowledging that Nature is one unified whole, we expect that physics and biology are intimately related. Keeping in mind that physics became an exact science with which we are already familiar with, while, apparently, we do not have at present a similar knowledge about biology, we consider how can we make useful the clarity of physics to shed light to biology. The next question will be what are the most basic categories of physics and biology. If we do not want (...) to cut laws of Nature into different parts, we obtain a constraint, and the remaining part of physics will be the input data to the equations of physics. In these terms, our question will be: if we keep biological laws intact, as indivisible units, what remains in case of biology? This approach, just because it is more fundamental, has significant consequences for philosophy, and obviously offers a new conceptual framework considering the relation between the ontopoietic principle of Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka and the biological principle. The quintessence of science, namely, the first essentially complete scientific world picture is presented in a detailed form. (shrink)

About 550 years ago, Nanakian philosophy emerged with the advent of Guru Nanak (1469‐1539). It is sad to note that the present human society is still suffering from the same ills, which were prevalent at the time of the birth of Guru Nanak. Punjab, the birthplace of Nanakian Philosophy, is at present suffering from rampant practices of bribery and corruption, widespread usage of intoxicants/ narcotics, infanticide, and exploitation of weaker sections of society. It is in direct violation of the basic (...) tenets of the Nanakian Philosophy. Not only this, Guru Nanak urged us to live in harmony with nature. However, Punjabi community has over‐exploited the natural resources of the state, resulting in deforestation, soil, air and water pollution, and damage to its water table. Besides, there is a proliferation of numerous sects all around. Rituals and vain practices rule the roost in religious affairs. Such activities of Punjabi people are in direct conflict with the teachings of Guru Nanak. Thereby Sikhs have failed to implement Nanakian philosophy in its true essence. It is dire need of the hour to apply the quintessence of Nanakian philosophy, in all spheres of our life. (shrink)

The article is devoted to the historical and philosophical problems of the study of the text of the "Gridaya Sutra" ("Sherab Nyingpo") within the tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. As a prolegomena, an overview of the field of translation was chosen - for a better understanding of both the logic of the formation of the Buddhist tradition of the Prajna-paramita sutras in India (which is revealed during translations from Sanskrit into Western languages), and the principles of their textual transmission to Tibet (...) (through the clarification of the principles of Tibetan translation from Sanskrit in the Lotsa tradition). The purpose of the study is to identify the mechanism that made it possible to make a transition in the Buddhist religious and philosophical space from the intellectual understanding of the ideas of emptiness (explained in the Magayana sutras) to their direct practice, the meaning of which is the detection of emptiness in one's own stream of consciousness (proposed by the tantric teachings of Vajrayana).. And since the "Gridaya-sutra" is the quintessence of the entire tradition of Prajna-paramita texts and contains a unique Buddhist mantra of "consolation in suffering", it, as a representative of the teachings of the sutras, was chosen for comparative analysis with the tradition of Mantrayana texts, i.e. Tantrayana. The representative of the tantric tradition was chosen to be the teaching text of the highest class of tantras - the Anuttarayogatantra called Kalachakra, which, due to its systematic development and strong semantic connections with classical Buddhist sciences, is considered the most consistent and structured tantra. As a result of research in Kalachakra, a specific complication of the meanings of the "Gridaya-sutra" was revealed, which opened the way for the individual from contemplating the emptiness of dharmas to collapsing the space-time continuum of the inner experience of conceptuality into a transcendent singularity for the sake of understanding true knowledge (jnana). In addition, the key mechanism of such a transition, which made it possible for the third turning of the Dharma wheel to become a continuation of the practice of the second turning, and not just another separate method, turned out to be the mechanism of the mantra, which is transformed from a concise morphological formula in the "Gridaya-sutra" into a phonetic formula in the Kalachakra. Therefore, the "Gridaya-sutra" takes the place of a trigger in the paramitayana, which makes it possible to organically connect the "higher" arsenal of Buddhist tantra to the process of enlightenment. (shrink)

Pour la première fois en langue française, la traduction du Commentaire des huit livres des Physiques d'Aristote de Thomas d'Aquin, offre la quintessence de ce qu'on a appelé l' « aristotélo-thomisme ». Encore méconnue des spécialistes d'Aristote, l’œuvre constitue pourtant le sommet qui domine toute la tradition philosophique antique et médiévale. Traversant les aléas critiques du modernisme et du scientisme des trois derniers siècles, ce commentaire brille d'une actualité renouvelée grâce à l'évolution des sciences physiques et humaines les plus (...) récentes, avec lesquelles il est étonnamment en accord. Les Leçons sur la Nature (autre titre du livre) d'Aristote sont le porche d'entrée pour quiconque veut approfondir la philosophie et en vivre. Le métaphysicien reçoit d'elles le modèle méthodologique et l'assise conceptuelle pour sa contemplation ; le moraliste en hérite les principes d'une éthique rationnelle et sociale ; le théologien y puise les fondements naturels de sa discipline. En détachant le fonds philosophique de son apparat méthodologique, cette traduction met singulièrement l'un et l'autre en relief. La densité de réflexion se voit ainsi libérée des nombreuses coupures techniques, pour permettre une lecture ininterrompue, tandis que l'ordre de progression, dont Thomas d'Aquin avait un tel souci, est exhaussé pour lui-même. L'ensemble se veut donc autant une oeuvre de méditation qu'un instrument de travail. (shrink)