In this eleventh book of scilogs – called in-turns and out-turns –, one may find new and old questions and solutions, referring mostly to topics on Neutrosophy, but also Multispace, with miscellaneous addition of topics on Physics, Mathematics, or Sociology – email messages to research colleagues, or replies, notes about authors, articles, or books, spontaneous ideas, and so on. -/- Exchanging ideas with Prem Kumar Singh, Feng Liu, Nicolae Bălașa, Jimmy Quellet, Minodora Rușchița, Frank Gelli, A. R. Vătuiu, Victor Christianto, (...) Vladimir I. Rogozhin, Robert Neil Boyd, Akira Kanda, Stefan Spaarmann, Oliver Consa, Yabin Shao, Junle Zhuo, Nivetha Martin, Said Broumi, Jean Dezert, Erick González, Tomasz Witczak, B. De Baets, I. Couso, D. Dubois, L. Good, Mihaela Colhon, Atiqe Ur Rahman, Muhammad Saeed, Muhammad Ihsan, Edeline Nancy, Shawkat Alkhazaleh, Shazia Rana, Vasantha Kandasamy, Santanu Acharjee, Mohamed Al-Shmrani, Parimala Manie, Mehmet Unver, Murat Olgun, Adel Aleidhri, Akira Kanda, Ilanthenral Kandasamy, Mircea Zărnescu, R. Tayebi Khorami, Arsham Borumand Saeid, Maisam Jdid, M. Abobala, Riad Hamido, Rafael Rojas, Esmaeil Zarei, Faisal Khan, Rouzbeh Abbassi, Adel Al-Odhari, Henry Garrett, Ackbar Rezaei, Saeid Jafari, Karthika Muthusamy, Harish Garg, Huda E. Khalid, Gonca D. Güngör, Muslim A. Noah Zainal, Fakhry Asad Agusfrianto, Madeleine Al-Tahan, Mariam Hariri, Yudi Mahatma, Masoud Ghods, Marco Brigliadori, Luis Enrique Aponte Pérez, Amr Mohammed, M. Aslam (in order of reference in the book). (shrink)

Pérez Carballo adopts an epistemic utility theory picture of epistemic norms where epistemic utility functions measure the value of degrees of belief, and rationality consists in maximizing expected epistemic utility. Within this framework he seeks to show that we can make sense of the intuitive idea that some true beliefs—say true beliefs about botany—are more valuable than other true beliefs—say true beliefs about the precise number of plants in North Dakota. To do so, however, Pérez Carballo argues that (...) we must think of the value of epistemic states as consisting in more than simply accuracy. This sheds light on which questions it is most epistemically valuable to pursue. (shrink)

In this paper two systems of AGM-like Paraconsistent Belief Revision are overviewed, both defined over Logics of Formal Inconsistency (LFIs) due to the possibility of defining a formal consistency operator within these logics. The AGM° system is strongly based on this operator and internalize the notion of formal consistency in the explicit constructions and postulates. Alternatively, the AGMp system uses the AGM-compliance of LFIs and thus assumes a wider notion of paraconsistency - not necessarily related to the notion of formal (...) consistency. (shrink)

The article tries to prove that the famous formula "epekeina tês ousias" has to be understood in the sense of being beyond being and not only in the sense of being beyond essence. We make hereby three points: first, since pure textual exegesis of 509b8–10 seems to lead to endless controversy, a formal proof for the metaontological interpretation could be helpful to settle the issue; we try to give such a proof. Second, we offer a corollary of the formal proof, (...) showing that not only self-predication of the form of the Good, but of any form is not possible, that is: no form of F has the form of F. Third, we apply Spinoza’s distinction between an ens imaginarium and a chimaera to Plato’s Idea of the Good. (shrink)

The article first gives an exegesis of the famous passage in the "Republic", 505d11-506a2. Attention is drawn to the fact that the principle that every soul does everything for the Good can be translated in two ways: Every soul does everything for the sake of the Good, or goes to all lengths for the sake of the Good. Depending on the different translations, we have a different picture of the platonic Socrates in the Republic, an intellectualistic Socrates for whom irrational (...) desires do not exist, or a Socrates who also accepts irrational desires. The article favours the first one. Then it attempts to show that we can elucidate some dark points in the Socratic thesis that the Good is what every soul pursues and for which every soul does everything, with the help of Aquinas’s distinction between it actio hominis and actio humana. Finally, the article outlines three substantive answers to the question “What is the Good?” – the henological, the perfectionist and the structuralist. Instead of advancing a new answer, the article suggests an uncontroversial formal starting point for an answer to this question. (shrink)

Laura Specker Sullivan (2022) makes a fairly compelling case for the value of the perspectives of Buddhist practitioners in neuroethics. In this study, Tibetan Buddhist monks have been asked, among other things, whether consciousness, in brain-injured patients in a minimally conscious state, entails a duty to preserve life. In our view, some of the participants’ responses could be used to inform the bioethical debate on death determination.

Can we reify the form of a substance? Is it possible to identify DNA as the principle of our personal and numerical identity? These questions will be studied through Berti’s reading of Aristotle’s hylomorphism. Indeed, Enrico Berti proposes the identification of the DNA to the Aristotelian notion of form, thesis which raises many questions from an exegetical point of view and a metaphysical perspective. We will present the sources of Berti’s reading and one of the main objections made by Aristotle. (...) Thus, different versions of the Berti’s thesis will be examined and then, a thought experiment that makes them false. Finally, it will be proposed an aristotelian solution, coming from a contemporary Aristotelian (E. J. Lowe), that seems to prevent Berti’s mistakes and gives us a robust metaphysics of the identity. (shrink)

A Revisão de Crenças estuda como agentes racionais mudam suas crenças ao receberem novas informações. O sistema AGM, trabalho mais influente desta área apresentado por Alchourrón, Gärdenfos e Makinson, postula critérios de racionalidade para os diferentes tipos de mudança de crenças e oferece construções explícitas para tais - a equivalência entre os postulados e operações é chamado de teroema da representação. Trabalhos recentes mostram como o paradigma AGM pode ser compatível com diferentes lógicas não-clássicas, o que é chamado de AGM-compatibilidade (...) - este é o caso da família de lógicas paraconsistentes que analisamos, as Lógicas da Inconsistência Formal (LFIs, da sigla em inglês). A despeito da AGM-compatibilidade, ao se partir de uma nova lógica sua racionalidade subjacente deve ser entendida e sua linguagem deve ser efetivamente usada. Propomos assim novas construções que de fato capturam a intuição presente na LFIs - é o que chamamos de sistema AGMo. Com isso, possibilitamos a estas lógicas uma nova interpretação, na esteira da epistemologia formal. Em uma abordagem alternativa, ao se partir da AGM-compatibilidade os resultados AGM podem ser diretamente aplicados às LFIs - o que chamamos de sistema AGMp. Em ambas abordagens, provamos os respectivos teoremas da representação sempre que necessário. (shrink)

Is the boundary between the normal and the pathological real or fiction? Are health and disease just a matter of fact or are they value-laden? Here we present some examples of how alleged diseases can be invented and propagated by the industry (disease mongering) or by the methodology of medical science itself. We show that the boundary between health and disease is blurred and depends on individual and social representations, culture relative ways of categorising things and people, and by the (...) society’s degree of medicalisation. However, we do not mean that it is not real, rather that it is more complex than expected, as the subjectivity of social constructions and individual experiences makes them no less real. Finally, we conclude that health and disease belong to both objective and subjective kinds of reality, so the fictional can be real. (shrink)

This is a short overview of Plato’s “greatest thing to be learned” or the “greatest lesson” (megiston mathêma) – the Idea of the Good.

By Belief Revision it is understood a system that logically explains the rational process of changing beliefs by taking into account a new piece of information. The most influential approach in this field of study, the AGM system, proposed by Alchourrón, Gärdenfors, and Makinson, postulates rationality criteria for different types of belief change. In this paper I shall assess the relationship between those criteria and argue for an opposition between the principles of Information Economy and Consistency. Furthermore, I shall argue (...) that Paraconsistent Belief Revision manages to minimise this friction in the best possible way. (shrink)

Autonomy has been central to moral and political philosophy for millenia, and has been positioned as a critical aspect of both justice and wellbeing. Research in psychology supports this position, providing empirical evidence that autonomy is critical to motivation, personal growth and psychological wellness. Responsible AI will require an understanding of, and ability to effectively design for, human autonomy (rather than just machine autonomy) if it is to genuinely benefit humanity. Yet the effects on human autonomy of digital experiences are (...) neither straightforward nor consistent, and are complicated by commercial interests and tensions around compulsive overuse. This multi-layered reality requires an analysis that is itself multidimensional and that takes into account human experience at various levels of resolution. We borrow from HCI and psychological research to apply a model (“METUX”) that identifies six distinct spheres of technology experience. We demonstrate the value of the model for understanding human autonomy in a technology ethics context at multiple levels by applying it to the real-world case study of an AI-enhanced video recommender system. In the process we argue for the following three claims: 1) There are autonomy-related consequences to algorithms representing the interests of third parties, and they are not impartial and rational extensions of the self, as is often perceived; 2) Designing for autonomy is an ethical imperative critical to the future design of responsible AI; and 3) Autonomy-support must be analysed from at least six spheres of experience in order to approriately capture contradictory and downstream effects. (shrink)

This is an introductory blog to the question: "What is a human being?".

In the whole Corpus Platonicum, we find in principle only one "direct argument" (Charles Kahn) for the existence of the ideas (Tim.51d3-51e6). The purpose of the article is to analyse this argument and to answer the question of why Plato in the Timaeus again defended the existence of the ideas despite the objections in the Parmenides. He defended it again because the latent presupposition of the apories in the Parmenides, the substantial view of sensibles, is removed through the introduction of (...) space as "substantialized extension". First (I) it is shown that Plato remained in dialogues, like the Sophist and Politicus, faithful to the "theory of ideas" despite his criticism in the Parmenides. The common theme in the trilogy of the Theaetetus, Sophist and Politicus is to refute relativism by showing that any relativism presupposes something absolute that is something like the "theory of ideas". The second part of the paper (II) examines closely the logical structure of the argument for the existence of ideas in the Timaeus (51d3-52a7). The third part (III) shows how this argument can avoid the criticism of ideas in the Parmenides. In the Parmenides, sensibles are treated as substantial entities. But, as the Timaeus shows, sensibles are not substantial entities but merely qualities, namely qualities of space, which is the only substance in the sensible world. A shortened English version of the paper appeared in Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum, Granada, Selected papers, ed. by T. Calvo/L. Brisson, Academia Verlag, St. Augustin, 1997, 179-186. -/- But the only "direct argument" (Tim.51d3-51e6) seems to be interestingly flawed. Cf. Ferber, Rafael; Hiltbrunner, Thomas, (2005). (shrink)

Despite the fact that Aristotle and Frege/Russell differ in how to understand the ambiguity in the meaning of the word "is", their theories share a common feature: "is" does not have a normative meaning, but a constative meaning. This paper, however, shows (1) that there is a normative meaning of "is" (and correspondingly a constative meaning of the word "ought") and (2) that the ambiguity of "is" is itself ambiguous. Furthermore, the paper proposes (3) a performative criterion for making a (...) distinction between constative and normative "is". Thereby, it is possible to attack Searle's famous argument against Hume's law. (shrink)

Revision operation is the consistent expansion of a theory by a new belief-representing sentence. We consider that in a paraconsistent setting this desideratum can be accomplished in at least three distinct ways: the output of a revision operation should be either non-trivial or non-contradictory (in general or relative to the new belief). In this paper those distinctions will be explored in the constructive level by showing how the remainder sets could be refined, capturing the key concepts of paraconsistency in a (...) dynamical scenario. These are preliminaries results of a wider project on Paraconsistent Belief Change conduced by the authors. (shrink)

Les dernières décennies ont vu apparaître une nouvelle approche de l’histoire de la philosophie liée à la tradition analytique. L’auteur propose de montrer dans cette étude le lien entre la naissance de l’approche analytique de l’histoire de la philosophie et le travail réalisé par trois figures de l’histoire de la philosophie médiévale au XXème siècle : Kretzmann, Pinborg et Kenny. Malgré les nombreux travaux portant sur l’approche analytique, on continue à négliger le rôle joué par ces trois auteurs pour la (...) constitution de ladite approche. -/- . (shrink)

The book is an english translation with revisions and updates of the "Philosophische Grundbegriffe 1" and provides an introduction to six key concepts in philosophy - philosophy, language, knowledge, truth, being and good. At the same time, it aims to initiate its readers into the process of philosophical thinking. The book is addressed to students and laypeople, but also contains new ideas for specialists. It is written in a clear, accessible and engaging style, and its author 'shares, and manages to (...) convey, something of Plato's own commitment to philosophy'. (shrink)

Objectives To increase postmortem organ donation rates, several countries are adopting an opt-out (presumed consent) policy, meaning that individuals are deemed donors unless they expressly refused so. Although opt-out countries tend to have higher donation rates, there is no conclusive evidence that this is caused by the policy itself. The main objective of this study is to better assess the direct impact of consent policy defaults per se on deceased organ recovery rates when considering the role of the family in (...) the decision-making process. This study does not take into account any indirect effects of defaults, such as potential psychological and behavioural effects on individuals and their relatives. -/- Design Based on previous work regarding consent policies, we created a conceptual model of the decision-making process for deceased organ recovery that included any scenario that could be directly influenced by opt-in or opt-out policies. We then applied this model to internationally published data of the consent process to determine how frequently policy defaults could apply. -/- Main outcome measures We measure the direct impact that opt-in and opt-out policies have per se on deceased organ recovery. -/- Results Our analysis shows that opt-in and opt-out have strictly identical outcomes in eight out of nine situations. They only differ when neither the deceased nor the family have expressed a preference and defaults therefore apply. The direct impact of consent policy defaults is typically circumscribed to a range of 0%–5% of all opportunities for organ recovery. Our study also shows that the intervention of the family improves organ retrieval under opt-in but hinders it under opt-out. -/- Conclusions This study may warn policy makers that, by emphasising the need to introduce presumed consent to increase organ recovery rates, they might be overestimating the influence of the default and underestimating the power granted to families. (shrink)

Sacrificial dilemmas such as the trolley problem play an important role in experimental philosophy (x-phi). But it is increasingly argued that, since we are not likely to encounter runaway trolleys in our daily life, the usefulness of such thought experiments for understanding moral judgments in more ecologically valid contexts may be limited. However, similar sacrificial dilemmas are experienced in real life by animal research decision makers. As part of their job, they must make decisions about the suffering, and often the (...) death, of many non-human animals. For this reason, a context-specific investigation of so-called “3R dilemmas” (i.e., dilemmas where there is a conflict between the principles of replacement, reduction, and refinement of the use of animals in research) is essential to improve the situation of both non-human animals and human stakeholders. An approach well suited for such investigation is experimental philosophical bioethics (“bioxphi”), which draws on methods similar to x-phi to probe more realistic, practical scenarios with an eye to informing normative debates and ethical policy. In this article, we argue for a need to investigate 3R dilemmas among professional decision-makers using the tools of bioxphi. In a first step, we define 3R dilemmas and discuss previous investigations of professionals’ attitudes in such cases. In a second step, we show how bioxphi is a promising method to investigate the whys and hows of professional decision-making in 3R dilemmas. In a last step, we provide a bioxphi template for 3R dilemmas, give recommendations on its use, explore the normative relevance of data collected by such means, and discuss important limitations. (shrink)

This article asks the question “Why did Plato not write the ‘unwritten doctrine’?” and answers it by citing a combination of two obstacles. The first derives from the limitations of the episteme available to an embodied soul about the essence of the good. Even if the dialectician has access to some kind of knowledge, the mismatch between the unchanging essence of the good and the precarious logoi which aim to identify it (and allow others some measure of access to it) (...) can never fully be overcome. At best, Socrates (or Plato) can lead souls to an incomplete account of it: It is possible that even the most expert dialectician can only have a claim to knowledge, but no absolute certainty. Another obstacle lies in the audience or readership itself: No shortcut to understanding is possible, and yet a mere written presentation, which is all they have, is just such a shortcut, and so represents an empty promise. In memory of Charles H. Kahn (1928–2023), a letter of his from September 5, 1989, concerning the question “Why did Plato not write the ‘unwritten doctrine’?” is published, along with some comments. (shrink)

This paper deals with the deuteros plous, literally ‘the second voyage’, proverbially ‘the next best way’, discussed in Plato’s Phaedo, the key passage being Phd. 99e4-100a3. I argue that (a) the ‘flight into the logoi’ can have two different interpretations, a standard one and a non-standard one. The issue is whether at 99e-100a Socrates means that both the student of erga and the student of logoi consider images (‘the standard interpretation’), or the student of logoi does not consider images but (...) that “consistency should suffice for truth” (‘the non-standard interpretation’); (b) the non-standard one implies the problem of the hypothesis, a problem analogous to the problem of the elenchus; (c) there is a structural analogy between Descartes’ ontological argument for the existence of God in his 5th Meditation and the final proof for the immortality of the soul in the Phaedo. (shrink)

The debate over Plato’s “ so called unwritten doctrines”, which he communicated only to a small circle of trusted disciples, has caused a stir among philosophers in recent decades. Rafael Ferber assumes a differentiated position in this controversy. He is convinced that the unwritten doctrines did exist, but that Plato, for reasons inherent in the process of gaining knowledge, was unable to communicate these doctrines even to his closest disciples. In this book, Ferber outlines the discussion and summarizes the (...) standpoints of greatest interest. Ever since Aristotle, we have known that Plato did not put his most important teachings into writing, but instead communicated them only orally to the inner circle of his disciples. While the extant dialogues merely pass down Plato’s “exoteric” doctrines, his most important “esoteric” insights were not meant for the general public. In the meantime, the contents and the significance of Plato’s “unwritten doctrines” have become the subject of debate in philosophical circles. Fifteen years ago, at the height of the controversy over the “unwritten doctrines”, Rafael Ferber entered the fray with a small book. He proposed that Plato was also unable to communicate the “unwritten doctrines” because the highest principles (i.e. the subject of the unwritten doctrines) cannot be known through logical operations due to an epistemological paradox. Ferber’s differentiated position met with great respect and acceptance, although in individual cases it was also rejected. Ferber’s new book again presents the text of 1991, but significantly expands on it through new perspectives and an outline of the discussion it triggered. In this book, the reader learns what is meant by Plato’s unwritten doctrines and what the controversy is all about. (shrink)

In his Vermischte Bemerkungen 43, Wittgenstein notices that he was also influenced by Oswald Spengler. The paper deals with the question of in which way Spengler influenced Wittgenstein’s late works and if it really was influence or only a coincidence of ideas. It is put forward that Spengler’s rather unknown philosophy of language influenced Wittgenstein’s philosophy of language, especially the concepts of family resemblance, antiessentialism, and language-game (Sprachspiel). A picture of the famous Neapolitan gesture of “negation” which motivated Wittgenstein to (...) give up the picture theory of language is also shown with an example taken from Andrea de Jorio, La mimica degli antichi investigala nel gestire napoletano, Napoli 1832. (shrink)

One core question in contemporary political economy is whether economic liberties should be constitutionally protected as basic rights. In this article I do not provide a positive argument for the view that economic liberties are basic rights. Rather, I seek to provide a reason for not embracing the opposing view, i.e. that economic liberties should not be constitutionally protected as basic rights. Based on Hayek’s theory of price as signal, I argue that price control, a view usually associated with high (...) liberals, and sometimes endorsed by moderate welfarists, is environmentally sub-optimal. (shrink)

The notion of a correct appreciation of nature, like the one put forward in Carlson’s environmental account, has been rejected by many other authors in the aesthetics of the natural environment. Their critics challenge the idea that only scientific cat- egories can ground the aesthetic appreciation of nature as nature, and they hold that there is not a correct way of appreciating nature. However, they may share with Carlson the idea of correctness under an objectivist paradigm of aesthetic appreciation, according (...) to which correctness means the adequation of the experi- ence to properties of the object. My aim in the article is to claim that it is necessary to endorse an aesthetic standard of correctness that takes into consideration the subjective character of aesthetic appreciation. An aesthetic standard of correct- ness implies universal assent, or validity for everyone in Kantian terms, in place of an objectivist notion. This notion of correctness permits the inclusion of expressive perception of nature as an essential form of aesthetic appreciation. (shrink)

Two systems of belief change based on paraconsistent logics are introduced in this article by means of AGM-like postulates. The first one, AGMp, is defined over any paraconsistent logic which extends classical logic such that the law of excluded middle holds w.r.t. the paraconsistent negation. The second one, AGMo , is specifically designed for paraconsistent logics known as Logics of Formal Inconsistency (LFIs), which have a formal consistency operator that allows to recover all the classical inferences. Besides the three usual (...) operations over belief sets, namely expansion, contraction and revision (which is obtained from contraction by the Levi identity), the underlying paraconsistent logic allows us to define additional operations involving (non-explosive) contradictions. Thus, it is defined external revision (which is obtained from contraction by the reverse Levi identity), consolidation and semi-revision, all of them over belief sets. It is worth noting that the latter operations, introduced by S. Hansson, involve the temporary acceptance of contradictory beliefs, and so they were originally defined only for belief bases. Unlike to previous proposals in the literature, only defined for specific paraconsistent logics, the present approach can be applied to a general class of paraconsistent logics which are supraclassical, thus preserving the spirit of AGM. Moreover, representation theorems w.r.t. constructions based on selection functions are obtained for all the operations. (shrink)

A strange dialectical reversal characterizes the oppositions which psychoanalysis posits against philosophy and neuroscience: what psychoanalysis intervenes with as a unique and missing quality of these subjects, reveals itself upon enquiry as already having been a feature of said subjects. This article first discusses the failed intervention of psychoanalysis within the perceived totalities and absolutes of German idealism. Psychoanalysis, founded on an ontological division and internal inconsistency with a retroactive logic, finds this internal contradiction already reflected within the supposed totalities (...) of Schelling and Hegel. Schelling’s “blind act,” a decision with no prior foundation that grounds an abstract identity-in-itself, appears as the counterpart to what Badiou calls the strictly “analytic act.” Hegel’s Science of Logic, in which the inconclusive interpenetration of being and nothing presupposes its own conclusion in the transitions to essence, and in which an internal incompleteness and contradiction are retroactively constitutive of the concept, similarly nullifies the intervention of psychoanalysis. Finally, precisely such a reversal is presented in neuroscience, where the constitutive contradiction of contingently functional neuronal formations in the adaptive “multiple demand” model of executive functioning repeats the contingent and self-contradicting psychoanalytic subject as being its own deference within linguistic, discursive formations. (shrink)

Choreographing Space is a reflection on the collaborative work of e+i studio, a New York City based architecture practice. Founders Eva Perez de Vega and Ian Gordon guide the reader through a dynamic selection of projects, each one opening us up to their relationship with the choreography of human and nonhuman forces at play. -/- Born as a retrospective and future-oriented book, it engages philosophical thought with architectural projects located in Europe, Asia, and the US, as well as speculative scenarios (...) that offer an alternative, less human-centric way of practicing architecture. -/- Organised into four parts, each part opens with a philosophical text that acts as an insightful prelude to the topics, questions and reflections posed by each project. Each part concludes with a speculative scenario, where one of the projects is imagined thriving in a future where life is now almost extinct. These are not intended as apocalyptic or even nostalgic scenarios, but rather as affirmative alternatives to the bleak imaginary arising from the world’s current climate crisis. (shrink)

Nosso objetivo neste trabalho é apresentar uma proposta de solução a paradoxos relacionados à lógica deôntica presentes na literatura, reunidos sob o que é chamado de dilemas deônticos - situações nas quais duas obrigações conflitantes estão presentes num mesmo sistema normativo. Situações deste tipo, quando formalizadas (em SDL - standard deontic logic - ou em outras lógicas relacionadas), levam a uma inconsistência. Nossa proposta baseia-se em relações de preferência que geram uma ferramenta de escolha dentre as duas soluções normativas conflitantes, (...) o que evita a inconsistência e permite o pleno cumprimento do sistema. Justificativas filosóficas são fornecidas as ferramentas lógicas, bem como as suas implicações. (shrink)

El presente trabajo nació como una reflexión posterior a la traducción del libro de Stanley Cavell Contesting Tears: The Hollywood Melodrama of the Unknown Woman. La reflexión era necesaria habida cuenta de las dudas suscitadas por la traducción del título del libro. Para ser más exacto, la reflexión giraba en torno a las lágrimas que forman parte de la primera parte del título, las lágrimas vertidas por las mujeres desconocidas que protagonizan los melodramas analizados en el libro. En mi opinión, (...) llegar a entender la razón y la naturaleza de esas lágrimas es clave para comprender lo que Cavell nos viene contando desde hace cinco décadas. Por ello, lo que sigue intenta reunir mis propios comentarios sobre la obra de Cavell en general, con la justificación de la traducción final del título: Más allá de las lágrimas. (shrink)

What distinguishes the Socrates of the early from the Socrates of the middle dialogues? According to a well-known opinion, the “dividing line” lies in the difference between the Socratic and the Platonic theory of action. Whereas for the Platonic Socrates of the early dialogues, all desires are good-dependent, for the Platonic Socrates of the middle dialogues, there are good-independent desires. The paper argues first that this “dividing line” is blurred in the "Symposium", and second that we have in the "Symposium" (...) a more distinctive dividing line, namely the introduction of the separate existence of the idea of beauty. This introduction by Diotima/Plato of separate ideas and the lack of understanding of separate ideas – here the idea of beauty – by Socrates may have been the limit not only of the Socrates of the early Platonic dialogues, but of the historical Socrates as well. (shrink)

Wittgenstein’s mature philosophy offers a therapeutic way out of some conundrums stemming from taxonomic expectations regarding philosophical description of experience in general. The paper asks if this is also true of the facts of aesthetic experience. This possibility is hinted at by examining an application of the notion of certainty to aesthetic experience. Some traits of possible uses of central concepts of the mature Wittgenstein to a philosophical aesthetics inspired by the “new method” are also canvassed.

Despite the fact that Aristotle and Frege/Russell differ in how to understand the ambiguity in the meaning of the word “is”, their theories share a common feature: “is” does not have a normative meaning. This paper, however, (I) shows (a) that there is a normative meaning of “is” (and correspondingly a constative meaning of the word “ought”) and (b) that the ambiguity of “is” is itself ambiguous. Furthermore, it proposes (c) a performative criterion for making a distinction between constative and (...) normative “is”. Thereby, (II) a new interpretation of Kant’s critique of the ontological argument (CPR A 598/B626) makes sense: The difference between being as a real predicate and being as a position depends on the difference between “is” as a descriptive and “is” as a normative predicate. (III) The criterion also makes possible a new answer to Leibniz’s and Schelling’s question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?”: The “is” in “there is something” is normative and the question means “Why shall there be something rather than nothing?”. As “there shall be nothing” is self-refuting, the question evokes an ultimate foundation in a practical sense. (shrink)

In this paper I consider recent discussions within the representationalist theories of phenomenal consciousness, in particular, the discussions between first order representationalism (FOR) and higher order representationalism (HOR). I aim to show that either there is only a terminological dispute between them or, if the discussion is not simply terminological, then HOR is based on a misunderstanding of the phenomena that a theory of phenomenal consciousness should explain. First, I argue that we can defend first order representationalism from Carruthers' attacks (...) and ignore higher order thoughts in our account of phenomenal consciousness. Then I offer a diagnostic of Carruthers' misunderstanding. In the last section I consider further reasons to include mindreading abilities in an explanation of phenomenal consciousness. (shrink)

The article first (i) gives an exegesis of the famous passage in the Republic, 505d11-506a2. Attention is drawn to the fact that the principle that every soul does everything for the Good (panta prattei) can be translated in two ways: Every soul does everything for the sake of the Good, or goes to all lengths for the sake of the Good. Depending on the different translations, we have a different picture of the platonic Socrates in the Republic, an intellectualistic Socrates (...) for whom pure irrational desires do not exist, or a Socrates who also accepts irrational desires. The article favours the first picture. Then it (ii) attempts to show that we can elucidate two dark points in the Socratic thesis that the Good is what every soul pursues and for which every soul does everything, with the help of Aquinas. Finally, the article (iii) outlines three substantive answers to the question ``What is the Good?'' - the henological, the perfectionist and the structuralist - and shows that these three answers lead into a trilemma. Instead of advancing a new answer, the article suggests an uncontroversial formal starting point for an answer to this question. (shrink)

Abstract: It deals with the question of what a moral judgment is. On the one hand, a satisfactory theory of moral judgments must take into account the descriptive character of moral judgments and the realistic language of morals. On the other hand, it must also meet the non-descriptive character of moral judgments that consists in the recommending or condemning element and in the fact that normative statements are derived from moral judgments. However, cognitivism and emotivism or “normativism” are contradictory theories: (...) If moral judgments are descriptive, it is not possible to deduce norms from them. But if one can deduce norms from moral judgments, they are not descriptive. As a solution to this problem, the paper suggests that moral judgments represent institutional facts; the corresponding theory is moral institutionalism. A moral institutional fact – “an act X is Y”, Y” means “morally right” or “morally false” – is a hybrid of descriptive and prescriptive elements: It is stating a fact in descriptive language (“is”) and at the same time, it is short for the prescriptive constitutive rule “X is Y according to the moral rules of the language community C”. Institutional facts contain normative presuppositions without letting them appear in their grammatical form. Institutional facts are now (in relation to the language community C) objective and intersubjective and they can be generalized (cognitive aspect), although they cannot be reduced to brute physical or psychological facts, and it is also possible to deduce norms from them because they are built into them. The meta-ethical concept of moral institutionalism, which is evolved further in the paper, preserves the best intentions of emotivism and cognitivism without leading to contradiction. As a by-product, the article shows exactly the error in J. R. Searle’s alleged counterexample against the so-called naturalistic fallacy from “is” to “ought”. This lies in the normative “are” of the analytic premise or definition in “2a. All promises are [that is ought to be] acts of placing oneself under (undertaking) an obligation to do the thing promised”. In “Key concepts in philosophy”, Sankt Augustin 2015, institutionalism is explained further (p.184-191) and confined to what Hegel has called “Sittlichkeit” that is customary morality in in distinction to the “morality” of my personal consciousness (p.212-213):. (shrink)

The field of Latin American philosophy has established itself as a relevant subfield of philosophical inquiry. However, there might be good reasons to consider that our focus on the subfield could have distracted us from considering another subfield that, although it might share some geographical proximity, does not share the same historical basic elements. In this paper, I argue for a possible and meaningful conceptual difference between Latin American Philosophy and Indigenous philosophy produced in Latin America. First, I raise what (...) I call Mariátegui’s Solidarity Challenge to show that there might be some neglectful treatment of the philosophical views of different Indigenous groups. I then depart from Mariátegui and engage in a critical exercise to show that even he would be guilty of failing in his own solidarity demands. I follow that by drawing out some implications of the argument. I first sketch how this differentiation would play out against the political project of “Mestizaje,” a project that seems to inform some of the Latin American philosophical tradition. I then speculate about the kinds of duties that the field of Latin American philosophy might have towards the field of Indigenous Philosophy produced in Latin America. (shrink)

In this chapter, we will summarize recent empirical results highlighting how different groups of people solve pure coordination games. Such games are traditionally studied in behavioural economics, where two people need to coordinate without communicating with each other. Our results suggest that coordination choices vary across groups of people, and that people can adapt flexibly to these differences in order to coordinate between groups. We propose that pure coordination games are a useful empirical platform for studying aspects of mindshaping. Drawing (...) on existing psychological literature on alignment during interactions, we suggest that experience of successful interaction leads people to develop aligned intuitions about what is relevant and appropriate that support coordination when interaction and communication is not possible. Consistent with arguments made in the literature on mindshaping we believe that such alignment is more important for coordination than mindreading inferences about mental states, and indeed that mindreading is instead a form of coordination behaviour that is dependent upon intuitive alignment. (shrink)

The paper puts forward that the basic principle of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus (4.0312) transforms the supreme principle of all synthetic judgments a priori in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason (A158/B197) from a level of reason to the level of language. Both philosophers, Kant and Wittgenstein, put forward a transcendental principle and both hold a formal identity true, Kant an identity between the form of experience and the form of the object of experience, Wittgenstein an identity between the form of a sentence (...) and the form of a fact. (shrink)

Na era das tecnologias digitais, entender vieses algorítmicos por meio das teorias da verdade ajuda a fazer perguntas cujas respostas facilitam a filtragem da informação de forma mais eficaz. O ganho é a compreensão aprofundada da realidade.

La termodinámica, se desarrolló en gran medida bajo el impulso de la Revolución Industrial, que ayudó a afianzar metodológicamente las seculares investigaciones sobre el calor y la temperatura. Como tal desarrollo se produjo a la sombra de la triunfante mecánica clásica —cuyos referentes físicos son notablemente distintos— y a causa de la carencia de herramientas formales adecuadas, durante mucho tiempo se admitió sin discusión que esta ciencia había de limitarse a los sistemas en equilibrio o muy cercanos a él. En (...) el presente artículo se exponen tanto el desarrollo histórico como las premisas intelectuales de semejante opción epistemológica, señalando el cambio de perspectiva ocurrido en la segunda mitad del siglo XX. (shrink)

Not only is freedom a shared concern of Sartre and Schelling, which would not be anything particularly unique, but for both philosophers, freedom must be articulated out of an ontological ground, or within the confines of an ontological system. A contradiction nevertheless appears to arise regarding the “orientation” of Sartre and Schelling’s respective “ontologies of freedom”: the freedom of Sartre, reflecting a contemporary stoic-inspired doctrine, is directed toward the future, while for Schelling, with affinities to the temporal logic of psychoanalysis, (...) freedom is oriented toward the past. This article presents both Sartre and Schelling’s ontological reasoning out of which either a progressively oriented freedom (the freedom to negate the present in the name of future “possibles”) or a retrogressively oriented freedom (the freedom to determine the ground of the present out of an indefinite, a-temporal becoming), before attempting to resolve this contradiction in the temporality of freedom by examining the position and role of the negative (of negation, contradiction, or nothingness), as either secondary or primary, within the ontology of each respective philosopher. (shrink)

The anthropologist James Frazer investigates the ritual gesture in search of be- liefs about the physical world by the native. Wittgenstein considers this a case of aspect- blindness, one that is disruptive of the conditions for understanding the native’s most triv- ial gestures. Unable to cast his glance from within the native situation, this methodological view from nowhere has an arresting effect on experience – in particular, the experience of speaking. This interruption is to be examined by means of a (...) thought experiment. Then, through the interplay of the concepts of Spirit and Aspect, a philosophical tool is described to assess the problem that can also serve as practical guide back to ordinary experience. The next step is to examine this way out in a particularly sensitive kind of experience of meaning: the aesthetic experience, also seen as a ritual. We conclude by alluding to a pos- sibly mutual illumination between aesthetic experience, translation studies and a Cavellian take on ordinary language. (shrink)

Conceptual analysis is one of the notions undergoing dramatic changes during Wittgenstein's intermediate period. There's an aspect of such changes which might prove characteristic of the new directions taken by Wittgenstein's thought after 1929: it is the notion of complete analysis. We believe that Wittgenstein's treatment of this notion is also an interesting indication of new concerns generated by the "new method" itself, in terms of its radical openness to dialogism and its anti-dogmatism. Our aim here will be to explore (...) a couple of hints as to why this can be so. (shrink)

The paper deals with the beginning and the main properties of the science of nature (he peri physeos historiê). According to Themistius (DK 12 A 7), the founder of this kind of Ionic philosophy is Anaximander of Miletus because he was the first who wrote about nature (especially a cosmography and a cosmogony) and developed three main principles of nature: 1. Nature has a mathematical structure (Arist. De coelo I3 295b10-14.32); 2. nature has a physical structure (DK 12 A 10-11); (...) and 3. nature follows natural laws (DK 12 A 9). The origin of this introduction lies in the prolongation of primitive expectations of constancy. It is especially argued that the shift from mythos to logos is characterized by the depersonalization of nature and the introduction of theoretical terms. In fact, the "apeiron" of Anaximander seems to be something similar to a theoretical term, because Anaximander seems to have realized that the explanans of nature cannot be one of its explananda like water (Thales) or air (Anaximenes). (shrink)

A mudança da concepção do critério geral da significação que tinha Wittgenstein no seu período intermediário para a concepção dos critérios de significação do seu período posterior justifica que se fale numa correlativa mudança na aplicabilidade do conceito de ‘uso’. Acompanhar esta mudança é importante para se caracterizar o âmbito do pragmático tal como Wittgenstein o concebe, e bem assim o tipo de investigação sobre os fundamentos do simbolismo linguístico e sobre a ligação entre linguagem e mundo que esse filósofo (...) advoga como adequada. Este artigo pretende circunscrever algumas das novas questões que, no período intermediário de Wittgenstein , conduziriam a tal mudança conceptual. (shrink)

*Winner of the American Philosophical Association's 2020 Essay Prize in Latin American Thought* This essay offers a novel account of the secularity of Latin American liberation philosophy. It challenges the accepted notion that liberation philosophy applies the methods and approaches of Latin American liberation theology to the philosophical arena, thus putting liberation theology on secular grounds. While this formulation is true insofar as liberation philosophy is not bound by the hermeneutics of any particular religious tradition, this formulation could be misconstrued (...) given that liberation philosophy does not premise such secularization in an undialectical understanding of secularity as secularism that disavows religion. Rather, liberation philosophy’s secularity is dialectical in that it requires constant engagement with re-ligion, not in the hermeneutics of any specific tradition but with “the traditional question of the Absolute.” Due to this often-misunderstood element of liberation philosophy, it has frequently been “ghettoized and relegated to the ‘safe’ area of theological studies,” as Eduardo Mendieta argues. However, I contend that liberation philosophy’s secular grounds offer an original contribution to philosophy as a decolonial and postsecularist liberation philosophy, one that conceives of secularism as an aspect of coloniality to be overcome, an obstacle rather than a benefit for Latin American philosophers seeking to gain a better understanding of our historical conditions. (shrink)

A lo largo de la tradición psicopatológica, incluso de la pre-fenomenológica, se encuentra la categorización del delirio como creencia. Jaspers asumió ese uso y lo fundó fenomenológico-existencialmente, definiendo su carácter de convicción. El concepto de creencia ha tenido un largo recorrido dentro de la historia del pensamiento, aunque recientemente se ha intensificado el debate acerca de la visión doxástica del delirio. En virtud de lo ya mencionado, en el presente artículo presentamos un análisis conceptual de la creencia, con el objetivo (...) de identificar de manera precisa los aspectos esenciales que permiten al delirio definirse según ella. De esta manera, se discutirán algunas de las principales incursiones realizadas en el concepto desde la antigüedad periplatónica hasta José Ortega y Gasset, remarcando en cada pensador las directrices esenciales de su aproximación a la creencia. A su vez, introducir al filósofo español al debate psicopatológico permitirá incluir en la discusión dos aspectos importantes que creemos pueden ser fructíferos para la discusión filosófica sobre el delirio: la diferencia entre ideas y creencias, y la vitalidad de estas últimas. Finalmente, hacemos referencia al actual debate pro- y antidoxástico, haciendo hincapié en la necesidad de considerar la amplitud del concepto de creencia en su genealogía histórica. Con base en ello estaríamos en condición de acercarnos a la visión doxástica moderada que han defendido autoras como Lisa Bortolotti. (shrink)