PREMISSA No século XIX, ocorreram transformações impulsionadas pela emergência de novas fontes energéticas (água e petróleo), por novos ramos industriais e pela alteração profunda nos processos produtivos, com a introdução de novas máquinas e equipamentos. Depois de 300 anos de exploração por parte das nações europeias, iniciou -se, principalmente nas colônias latino-americanas, um processo intenso de lutas pela independência. É no século XIX, já com a consolidação do sistema capitalista na Europa, que se encontra a herança intelectual mais próxima da (...) qual surgirá a Sociologia como ciência particular. No início desse século, as ideias do Conde de Saint-Simon (1760-1825), de Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831), de David Ricardo (1772-1823) e de Charles Darwin (1809-1882), entre outros, foram o elo para que Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859), Auguste Comte (1798-1857), Karl Marx (1818 -1883) e Herbert Spencer (1820-1903), entre outros, desenvolvessem reflexões sobre a sociedade de seu tempo. Auguste Comte e Karl Marx foram os pensadores que lançaram as bases do pensamento sociológico e de duas grandes tradições – a positivista e a socialista – que muito influenciaram o desenvolvimento da Sociologia no Brasil. 1 AUGUSTE COMTE E A TRADIÇÃO POSITIVISTA Isidore Auguste Marie François Xavier Comte nasceu em Montpellier, na França, em 19 de janeiro de 1798. Com 16 anos de idade, ingressou na Escola Politécnica de Paris, fato que teria significativa influência na orientação posterior de seu pensamento. De 1817 a 1824, foi secretário do Conde de Saint-Simon. Comte declarou que, com Saint -Simon, aprendeu muitas coisas que jamais encontraria nos livros e que, no pouco tempo em que conviveu com o conde, fez mais progressos do que faria em muitos anos, se estivesse sozinho. Toda a obra de Comte está permeada pelos acontecimentos que ocorreram após a Revolução Francesa de 1789. Ele defendeu parte dos princípios revolucionários e criticou a restauração da monarquia, preocupando-se fundamentalmente em reorganizar a sociedade, que, no seu entender, estava em ebulição e mergulhada no caos. Para Comte, a desordem e a anarquia imperavam em virtude da confusão de princípios (metafísicos e teológicos), que não se adequavam à sociedade industrial em expansão. Era, portanto, necessário superar esse estado de coisas, usando a razão como fundamento da nova sociedade. Propôs, então, a mudança da sociedade por meio da reforma intelectual plena das pessoas. De acordo com o pensador, com a modificação do pensamento humano, por meio do método científico, que ele chamava de “filosofia positiva”, haveria uma reforma das instituições. Com a proposta do estudo da sociedade por meio da análise de seus processos e estruturas, e da reforma prática das instituições, Comte criou uma nova ciência, à qual deu o nome de “física social”, passando a chamá-la posteriormente de Sociologia. A Sociologia representava, para Comte, o coroamento da evolução do conhecimento, mediante o emprego de métodos utilizados por outras ciências, que buscavam conhecer os fenômenos constantes e repetitivos da natureza: a observação, a experimentação, a comparação e a classificação. De acordo com esse pensador, a Sociologia, como as ciências naturais, deve sempre procurar a reconciliação entre os aspectos estáticos e os dinâmicos do mundo natural ou, no caso da sociedade humana, entre a ordem e o progresso. O lema da “filosofia positiva” proposta por Comte era “conhecer para prever, prever para prover”, ou seja, o conhecimento é necessário para fazer previsões e também para solucionar possíveis problemas. A influência de Comte no desenvolvimento da Sociologia foi marcante, sobretudo, na escola francesa, evidenciando-se em Émile Durkheim e seus contemporâneos e seguidores. Seu pensamento esteve presente em muitas das tentativas de criar tipologias para explicar a sociedade. Suas principais obras são: Curso de filosofia positiva (1830-1842), Discurso sobre o espírito positivo (1848), Catecismo positivista (1852) e Sistema de política positiva (1854). Para concluirmos, Comte explanava que para a superação da anarquia reinante na nova sociedade industrial, a filosofia positivista defendia a subordinação do progresso à ordem. O mesmo era contra o retorno de Luís XVIII ao trono: em sua concepção, a sociedade industrial que emergia requeria um governo fundado na razão. 2 A TRADIÇÃO SOCIALISTA: KARL MARX E FRIEDRICH ENGELS Karl Heinrich Marx nasceu em Tréveris, na antiga Prússia, hoje Alemanha, em 1818 e, em 1830, ingressou no Liceu Friedrich Wilhelm, nessa mesma cidade. Anos depois, foi cursar Direito na Universidade de Bonn, transferindo-se para Berlim em seguida. Pouco a pouco, entretanto, seus interesses migraram para a Filosofia, área na qual defendeu, em 1841, a tese de doutorado A diferença da filosofia da natureza em Demócrito e Epicuro. Sua vida universitária foi marcada pelo debate político e intelectual influenciado pelo pensamento de Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-1872) e, principalmente, pelo de Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770- 1831). Friedrich Engels (1820-1895) nasceu em Barmen (Renânia), na antiga Prússia, hoje Alemanha, filho mais velho de um rico industrial do ramo têxtil. Terminou sua formação secundária em 1837 e a partir de então sua formação intelectual foi por conta própria (autodidata), com alguns cursos universitários esparsos e de curta duração. Desde cedo começou a trabalhar nas empresas de seu pai e foi nessa condição que se deslocou para Bremen por três anos e depois foi enviado pelos pais a Manchester, na Inglaterra, onde trabalhou nas fábricas da família. Engels ficou impressionado com a miséria na qual viviam os trabalhadores das fábricas inglesas. Os dois, Marx e Engels, se encontraram em 1842, quando Marx passou a escrever para A Gazeta Renana, jornal da província de Colônia, do qual Engels era colaborador e mais tarde editor-chefe. O jornal, que criticava o poder prussiano, foi fechado em 1843, e Marx se viu desempregado. Ao perder o emprego, mudou-se para Paris, na França. Ali escreveu, em 1844, os Manuscritos econômico-filosóficos (só publicados em 1932) e, junto com F. Engels, o livro A sagrada família. Por sua vez, F. Engels, em 1844, decidiu voltar para a Alemanha, onde publicou, em 1845, A situação da classe trabalhadora na Inglaterra. Entre 1845 e 1847, Marx exilou-se em Bruxelas, na Bélgica, onde escreveu A ideologia alemã (em parceria com Friedrich Engels) e Miséria da filosofia (1847), obra na qual criticou o filósofo Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865). Em 1848, ainda na Bélgica, a parceria com Engels se solidificou ao escreverem juntos o livreto O Manifesto Comunista. Em 1848, Marx foi expulso da Bélgica e retornou a Colônia, na Alemanha (Prússia), sempre pensando na possibilidade de uma mudança estrutural em sua terra natal. Isso, entretanto, não aconteceu e Marx foi expulso da Alemanha em 1849, ano em que migrou para Londres, na Inglaterra, onde permaneceu até o fim da vida. Lá escreveu O 18 Brumário de Luís Bonaparte (1852), sua mais importante obra de reflexão sobre a vida política europeia do século XIX, desenvolveu pesquisas e concluiu seu maior trabalho: O capital: crítica da economia política. O primeiro volume dessa obra foi publicado em 1867; os outros três, em 1885, 1894 e 1905, após a morte de Marx, revisados por F. Engels. 2.1 O contexto histórico e a obra de Marx e Engels Para situar a obra de Marx e Engels, é necessário conhecer um pouco do que acontecia em meados do século XIX. Com as transformações que ocorriam no mundo ocidental, principalmente na esfera da produção industrial, houve um crescimento expressivo no número de trabalhadores industriais urbanos, com uma consequência evidente: precariedade da vida dos operários nas cidades. As condições de trabalho no interior das fábricas eram péssimas. Os empregados eram superexplorados, alimentavam-se mal e trabalhavam em ambientes insalubres. Para enfrentar essa situação e tentar modificá-la, os trabalhadores passaram a se organizar em associações e sindicatos e a promover movimentos de reivindicação. Desenvolveu-se, então, uma discussão das condições sociais, políticas e econômicas para se definirem as possibilidades de intervenção nessa realidade. Desde o início do século XIX, muitos pensadores discutiram essas questões, nas perspectivas socialista e anarquista. Na Inglaterra podem ser citados, entre outros: William Godwin (1756-1836), Thomas Spence (1750-1814), Thomas Paine (1737-1809), Robert Owen (1771-1858) e Thomas Hodgkin (1787-1866). Na França, destacaram-se Étienne Cabet (1788- 1856), Flora Tristan (1803-1844), Charles Fourier (1772-1837) e Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865). Marx e Engels levaram em conta esses pensadores, debatendo com alguns contemporâneos e criticando-os. Além disso, incorporaram a tradição da economia clássica inglesa, presente principalmente nas obras de Adam Smith e de David Ricardo. Pode-se dizer, portanto, que Marx e Engels desenvolveram seu trabalho com base na análise crítica da economia política inglesa, do socialismo utópico francês e da filosofia alemã. Esses dois autores não buscavam definir uma ciência específica para estudar a sociedade (como a Sociologia, para Auguste Comte) ou situar seu trabalho em um campo científico particular. Em alguns escritos, Marx afirmou que a História seria a ciência que mais se aproximava de suas preocupações, por abarcar as múltiplas dimensões da sociedade, a qual deveria ser analisada na totalidade, não havendo uma separação rígida entre os aspectos sociais, econômicos, políticos, ideológicos, religiosos, culturais etc. O objetivo de Marx e Engels era estudar criticamente a sociedade capitalista com base em seus princípios constitutivos e em seu desenvolvimento, visando dotar a classe trabalhadora de uma análise política da sociedade de seu tempo. Assim, a tradição socialista nascida da luta dos trabalhadores, muitos anos antes e em situações diferentes, tem como expressão intelectual o pensamento de Karl Marx e Friedrich Engels. Para entender as concepções fundamentais de Marx e Engels é necessário fazer a conexão entre as lutas da classe trabalhadora, suas aspirações e as ideias revolucionárias que estavam presentes no século XIX na Europa. Para eles, o conhecimento científico da realidade só tem sentido quando visa à transformação dessa mesma realidade. A separação entre teoria e prática não é discutida, pois a “verdade histórica” não é algo abstrato e que se define teoricamente; sua verificação está na prática. Apesar de haver algumas diferenças em seus escritos, os elementos essenciais do pensamento de Marx e Engels podem ser assim sintetizados: • historicidade das ações humanas – crítica ao idealismo alemão; • divisão social do trabalho e o surgimento das classes sociais – a luta de classes; • o fetichismo da mercadoria e o processo de alienação; • crítica à economia política e ao capitalismo; • transformação social e revolução; • utopia – sociedade comunista. A obra desses dois autores é muito vasta e não ficou vinculada estritamente aos movimentos sociais dos trabalhadores. Pouco a pouco foi introduzida nas universidades como parte do estudo em diferentes áreas do conhecimento. Estudiosos de Filosofia, Sociologia, Ciência Política, Economia, História e Geografia, entre outras áreas, foram influenciados por ela. Na Sociologia, como afirma Irving M. Zeitlin, no livro Ideología y teoría sociológica, tanto Max Weber quanto Émile Durkheim fizeram, em suas obras, um debate com as ideias de Karl Marx. Pelas análises da sociedade capitalista de seu tempo e a repercussão que tiveram em todo o mundo, principalmente no século XX, nos movimentos sociais e nas universidades, Marx e Engels são considerados autores clássicos da Sociologia. No campo dessa disciplina, porém, o pensamento deles ficou um pouco restrito, pois perdeu aquela relação entre teoria e prática (práxis), ou seja, entre a análise crítica e a prática revolucionária. Essa relação esteve presente, por exemplo, na vida e na obra dos russos Vladimir Ilitch Ulianov, conhecido como Lênin (1870-1924), e Leon D. Bronstein, conhecido como Trotsky (1879-1940), da alemã Rosa Luxemburgo (1871-1919) e do italiano Antonio Gramsci (1891- 1937), que tiveram significativa influência no movimento operário do século XX. Com base no trabalho de Marx e Engels, muitos autores desenvolveram estudos acadêmicos em vários campos do conhecimento. Podemos citar, por exemplo, Georg Lukács (1885-1971), Theodor Adorno (1903-1969), Walter Benjamin (1892-1940), Henri Lefebvre (1901-1991), Lucien Goldmanm (1913 -1970), Louis Althusser (1918 -1990), Nikos Poulantzas (1936-1979), Edward P. Thompson (1924-1993) e Eric Hobsbawm (1917 -2012). O pensamento de Marx e Engels continua, assim, presente em todo o mundo, com múltiplas tendências e variações, sempre gerando controvérsias. REFERENCIAL TEÓRICO GEMKOW, H.; PSUA, I. M. L. Marx e Engels: Vida e Obra. São Paulo: Alfa e Ômega, 1984. 232 pp. GIANOTTI, J. A. Comte. São Paulo: Abril Cultural, 1978. 318 pp. (Col. Os Pensadores) KONDER, L. Marx: vida e obra. 7ª ed. São Paulo: Paz e Terra, 2007. 154 pp. (Col. Vida e Obra). (shrink)

Logic arguably plays a role in the normativity of reasoning. In particular, there are plausible norms of belief/disbelief whose antecedents are constituted by claims about what follows from what. But is logic also relevant to the normativity of agnostic attitudes? The question here is whether logical entailment also puts constraints on what kinds of things one can suspend judgment about. In this paper I address that question and I give a positive answer to it. In particular, I advance two logical (...) norms of agnosticism, where the first one allows us to assess situations in which the subject is agnostic about the conclusion of a valid argument and the second one allows us to assess situations in which the subject is agnostic about one of the premises of a valid argument. (shrink)

The significance of critical phenomenology for psychiatric praxis has yet to be expounded. In this paper, I argue that the adoption of a critical phenomenological stance can remedy localised instances of hermeneutical injustice, which may arise in the encounter between clinicians and patients with psychosis. In this context, what is communicated is often deemed to lack meaning or to be difficult to understand. While a degree of un-shareability is inherent to subjective life, I argue that issues of unintelligibility can be (...) addressed by shifting from individualistic conceptions of understanding to an interactionist view. This takes into account the contextual, historical and relational background within which meaning is co-constituted. I conclude by providing a corrective for hermeneutical injustice, which entails a specific attentiveness towards the person’s subjectivity, a careful sensitivity to contingent meaning-generating structures, and a degree of hermeneutical flexibility as an attitude of openness towards alternative horizons of possibility. (shrink)

In this paper, I offer two counterexamples to the so-called ‘Uniqueness Thesis.’ As one of these examples rely on the thesis that it is possible for a justified belief to be based on an inconsistent body of evidence, I also offer reasons for this further thesis. On the assumption that doxastic justification entails propositional justification, the counterexamples seem to work.

I reinforce my defense of permissivism about the rationality of doxastic attitudes on the face of a certain body of evidence against criticism published in this journal by Anantharaman. After making some conceptual clarifications, I manage to show that at least one of my original arguments pro-permissivism is left unscathed by Anantharaman's points.

Any plausibly just market exchange must balance two conflicting moral considerations: non-worseness (Wertheimer, 1999) and euvoluntariness (true voluntariness; Munger, 2011). We propose an analytical theory of just market exchange that partly resolves this conflict.

In this paper I present reasons for us to accept the hypothesis that suspended judgment has correctness conditions, just like beliefs do. Roughly put, the idea is that suspended judgment about p is correct when both p and ¬p might be true in view of certain facts that characterize the subject’s situation. The reasons to accept that hypothesis are broadly theoretical ones: it adds unifying power to our epistemological theories, it delivers good and conservative consequences, and it allows us to (...) assess processes of reasoning involving attitudes of suspended judgment. (shrink)

In line with recent efforts to empirically study the folk concept of weakness of will, we examine two issues in this paper: (1) How is weakness of will attribution [WWA] influenced by an agent’s violations of best judgment and/or resolution, and by the moral valence of the agent’s action? (2) Do any of these influences depend on the cognitive dispositions of the judging individual? We implemented a factorial 2x2x2 between–subjects design with judgment violation, resolution violation, and action valence as independent (...) variables, and measured participants’ cognitive dispositions using Frederick’s Cognitive Reflection Test [CRT]. We conclude that intuitive and reflective individuals have two different concepts of weakness of will. The study supports this claim by showing that: a) the WWA of intuitive subjects is influenced by the action’s (and probably also the commitment’s) moral valence, while the WWA of reflective subjects is not; b) judgment violation plays a small role in the WWA of intuitive subjects, while reflective subjects treat resolution violation as the only relevant trait. Data were collected among students at two different universities. All subjects (N=710) answered the CRT. A three-way ANOVA was first conducted on the whole sample and then on the intuitive and reflective groups separately. This study suggests that differences in cognitive dispositions can significantly impact the folk understanding of philosophical concepts, and thus suggests that analysis of folk concepts should take cognitive dispositions into account. (shrink)

Inspired by the early Wittgenstein’s concept of nonsense (meaning that which lies beyond the limits of language), we define two different, yet complementary, types of nonsense: formal nonsense and pragmatic nonsense. The simpler notion of formal nonsense is initially defined within Tarski’s semantic theory of truth; the notion of pragmatic nonsense, by its turn, is formulated within the context of the theory of pragmatic truth, also known as quasi-truth, as formalized by da Costa and his collaborators. While an expression will (...) be considered formally nonsensical if the formal criteria required for the assignment of any truth-value (whether true, false, pragmatically true, or pragmatically false) to such sentence are not met, a (well-formed) formula will be considered pragmatically nonsensical if the pragmatic criteria (inscribed within the context of scientific practice) required for the assignment of any truth-value to such sentence are not met. Thus, in the context of the theory of pragmatic truth, any (well-formed) formula of a formal language interpreted on a simple pragmatic structure will be considered pragmatically nonsensical if the set of primary sentences of such structure is not well-built, that is, if it does not include the relevant observational data and/or theoretical results, or if it does include sentences that are inconsistent with such data. (shrink)

Neste trabalho, é apresentada uma investigação do que poderia ser chamado de formalização lógica do processo de mudança de teorias devido a anomalias. Por anomalia entende-se um fato observado que faz parte do escopo explanatório de uma teoria, mas que vai de encontro à previsão da mesma. Uma abordagem clássica para restaurar o poder explicativo de uma teoria ameaçada por uma anomalia é a postulação de hipóteses novas e provisórias que, em conjunto com as demais hipóteses auxiliares originais, sejam capazes (...) de resolver a anomalia. Após chegar à algumas conclusões sobre a estrutura de tal processo, propomos um framework lógico multimodal e não-monotônico capaz de representar alguns aspectos-chave dessa faceta importante da dinâmica de teorias científicas. Devido à necessidade de acomodar hipóteses provisórias incompatíveis, esse framework incorpora uma forma fraca de paraconsistência. Como um estudo de caso, analisamos o comportamento anômalo do planeta Urano que ameaçou a mecânica celeste Newtoniana por mais de meio século e ensejou a descoberta do planeta Netuno. -/- In this work, an investigation of what could be called the logical formalization of the theory change process due to anomalies is presented. An anomaly is understood as an observed fact that is part of the explanatory scope of a theory, but that goes against its prediction. A classic approach to restoring the explanatory power of a theory threatened by an anomaly is to postulate new and provisional hypotheses that, together with the other original auxiliary hypotheses, are capable of resolving the anomaly. After reaching some conclusions about the structure of such a process, we propose a multimodal and non-monotonic logical framework capable of representing some key aspects of this important facet of the dynamics of scientific theories. Due to the need to accommodate incompatible provisional hypotheses, this framework incorporates a weak form of paraconsistency. As a case study, we analyze the anomalous behavior of the planet Uranus that threatened Newtonian celestial mechanics for more than half a century and prompted the discovery of the planet Neptune. (shrink)

Why should we avoid incoherence? An influential view tells us that incoherent combinations of attitudes are such that it is impossible for all of those attitudes to be simultaneously vindicated by the evidence. But it is not clear whether this view successfully explains what is wrong with certain akratic doxastic states. In this paper I flesh out an alternative response to that question, one according to which the problem with incoherent combinations of attitudes is that it is impossible for all (...) of those attitudes to be simultaneously knowledgeable. This alternative response explains what is wrong with akratic combinations of attitudes using commonly accepted epistemological theses. The paper still shows how this proposal is able to explain the badness of incoherent combinations involving the absence of attitudes, suspended judgment and credence. These explanations deploy the notions of knowledge and being in a position to know, instead of the notion of responding properly to the evidence. Finally, I suggest that this picture can be generalized to the realm of practical rationality as well. (shrink)

In this chapter, Ricardo Silvestre and Alan Herbert offer a reconstruction of the Gītā’s concept of God with a focus on the relationship between God and the world. They try to explain the claim that the Gītā is panentheistic. This is done with the help of some key notions of contemporary metaphysics (such as ontological dependence and fundamentality) along with the Indic notion of prakṛti, considered as a metaphysical primitive denoting the intimate relationship that exists between matter and conscious (...) living beings on the one hand, and God on the other. (shrink)

The paper is concerned with the rational requirements for suspended judgment, or what suspending judgment about a question rationally commits one to. It shows that two purported rational requirements for suspended judgment cannot both be true at the same time, at least when the entailment relation between questions is understood a certain way. The first one says that one is rationally required to suspend judgment about those questions that are entailed by the questions that one already suspends judgment about. The (...) second one says that one is rationally required to believe the presuppositions of the questions one suspends judgment about. Two plausible solutions to the problem are discussed. One of them explicates the relation of entailment between questions in an alternative manner, and the other one rejects the presupposition requirement. Either way, a closure requirement for suspended judgment can be maintained which is analogous to the closure requirement for belief. Whereas belief is ideally closed under entailment between propositions, suspended judgment is ideally closed under entailment between questions. (shrink)

This paper suggests the democratic direction in which the right of freedom of expression should be conceived and applied. In the first two sections it suggests some counter-examples to, and diagnoses of, the libertarian and liberal conceptions of freedom of expression, taking Scanlon (1972) and Scanlon (1979), respectively, to be their chief proponents. The paper suggests that these conceptions cannot take into account clear examples, like fraudulent propaganda, which should not be legal. The democratic conception takes it to heart that (...) the pillars upon which the right of freedom of expression is founded are individual and collective autonomy, the right to know facts of public interest and information necessary for effective democratic control of government. The paper suggests that in a time when private powers seriously threaten these pillars, it is correct for the government to step in to provide the framework in which genuine discussion geared toward fulfilling the objectives of these pillars can take place. (shrink)

In this paper I try to answer four basic questions: (1) How the concept of God is to be represented? (2) Are there any logical principles governing it? (3) If so, what kind of logic lies behind them? (4) Can there be a logic of the concept of God? I address them by presenting a formal-logical account to the concept of God. I take it as a methodological desideratum that this should be done within the simplest existing logical formalism. I (...) start with first-order logic (FOL) with identity, and then show that its simplest modal extension (SQML, or the simplest quantified modal logic) is enough for us to formalize a minimally satisfactory theory of the concept of God. I focus exclusively on the monotheistic concept of God. (shrink)

In this chapter, Ricardo Silvestre and Alan Herbert offer a reconstruction of the Gītā’s concept of God with a focus on the relationship between God and the world. They try to explain the claim that the Gītā is panentheistic. This is done with the help of some key notions of contemporary metaphysics (such as ontological dependence and fundamentality) along with the Indic notion of prakṛti, considered as a metaphysical primitive denoting the intimate relationship that exists between matter and conscious (...) living beings on the one hand, and God on the other. (shrink)

Es difícil imaginar una sociedad del buen vivir sin arte. Por ello, la creatividad artística es reconocida como derecho en la Constitución del Ecuador, y como derecho humano en los intrumentos internacionales relevantes. Partiendo de esta reflexión, los artículos de este libro argumentan que siendo el arte un derecho, le corresponde al Estado la provisión de condiciones para su garantía por medio de políticas públicas, que deben tomar en cuenta tanto las especificidades de las personas, y los pueblos y nacionalidades, (...) como el contexto tecnológico de la era digital, que brinda las bases para una sociedad abierta donde el conocimiento sea libre. (shrink)

Detractors of Searle’s Chinese Room Argument have arrived at a virtual consensus that the mental properties of the Man performing the computations stipulated by the argument are irrelevant to whether computational cognitive science is true. This paper challenges this virtual consensus to argue for the first of the two main theses of the persons reply, namely, that the mental properties of the Man are what matter. It does this by challenging many of the arguments and conceptions put forth by the (...) systems and logical replies to the Chinese Room, either reducing them to absurdity or showing how they lead, on the contrary, to conclusions the persons reply endorses. The paper bases its position on the Chinese Room Argument on additional philosophical considerations, the foundations of the theory of computation, and theoretical and experimental psychology. The paper purports to show how all these dimensions tend to support the proposed thesis of the persons reply. (shrink)

Since its inception, a core aspiration of deliberative democracy has been to enable more and better inclusion within democratic politics. In this article, we argue that deliberative democracy can achieve this aspiration only if it goes beyond verbal forms of communication and acknowledges the crucial role of non-verbal communication in expressing and exchanging arguments. The article develops a multidimensional approach to deliberative democracy by emphasizing the visual, sonic and physical dimensions of communication in public deliberation. We argue that non-verbal modes (...) of communication can contribute to public deliberation when they (1) are used as part of reason-giving processes, (2) enable the inclusion of marginalized actors in public debates and (3) induce reflection and encourage new ways of thinking about the public controversies at hand. (shrink)

This paper is a follow-up of the first part of the persons reply to the Chinese Room Argument. The first part claims that the mental properties of the person appearing in that argument are what matter to whether computational cognitive science is true. This paper tries to discern what those mental properties are by applying a series of hypothetical psychological and strengthened Turing tests to the person, and argues that the results support the thesis that the Man performing the computations (...) characteristic of understanding Chinese actually understands Chinese. The supposition that the Man does not understand Chinese has gone virtually unquestioned in this foundational debate. The persons reply acknowledges the intuitive power behind that supposition, but knows that brute intuitions are not epistemically sacrosanct. Like many intuitions humans have had, and later deposed, this intuition does not withstand experimental scrutiny. The second part of the persons reply consequently holds that computational cognitive science is confirmed by the Chinese Room thought experiment. (shrink)

This paper introduces the special issue on Formal Approaches to the Ontological Argument of the Journal of Applied Logics (College Publications). The issue contains the following articles: Formal Approaches to the Ontological Argument, by Ricardo Sousa Silvestre and Jean-Yves Béziau; A Brief Critical Introduction to the Ontological Argument and its Formalization: Anselm, Gaunilo, Descartes, Leibniz and Kant, by Ricardo Sousa Silvestre; A Mechanically Assisted Examination of Begging the Question in Anselm’s Ontological Argument, by John Rushby; A Tractarian Resolution (...) to the Ontological Argument, by Erik Thomsen; On Kant’s Hidden Ambivalence Toward Existential Generalization in his Critique of the Ontological Argument, by Giovanni Mion; The Totality of Predicates and the Possibility of the Most Real Being, by Srećko Kovač; An Even More Leibnizian Version of Gödel’s Ontological Argument, by Kordula Świętorzecka and Marcin Łyczak; A Case Study On Computational Hermeneutics: E. J. Lowe’s Modal Ontological Argument, by David Fuenmayor. (shrink)

The main claim of this study is that, contrary to Latour’s view about the need to leave aside epistemology to deal with anything valuable about science, Mario Bunge has consistently built up a detailed and thorough epistemology. The argumentative strategy will be to show that (a) it is not true that we have never been modern (b) epistemology is here to stay, and (c) Mario Bunge endorses a strong scientific realism, a brand of materialism, systemism and emergentism, including a moral (...) dimension (there are objective values like, truth, peace and justice that deserve to be respected). Then, Bunge’s realism rejects axiological neutrality making scientists responsible for their actions. Bunge has always been modern and keeps enriching his own views. (shrink)

It is not yet clear which response behavior requires self-regulatory effort in the moral dilemma task. Previous research has proposed that utilitarian responses require cognitive control, but subsequent studies have found inconsistencies with the empirical predictions of that hypothesis. In this paper we treat participants’ sensitivity to utilitarian gradients as a measure of performance. We confronted participants (N = 82) with a set of five dilemmas evoking a gradient of mean utilitarian responses in a 4-point scale and collected data on (...) heart rate variability and on utilitarian responses. We found positive correlations between tonic and phasic HRV and sensitivity to the utilitarian gradient in the high tonic group, but not in the low tonic group. Moreover, the low tonic group misplaced a scenario with a selfish incentive at the high end of the gradient. Results suggest that performance is represented by sensitivity correlated with HRV and accompanied with a reasonable placement of individual scenarios within the gradient. (shrink)

The so-called theory of karma is one of the distinguishing aspects of Hinduism and other non-Hindu south-Asian traditions. At the same time that the theory can be seen as closely connected with the freedom of will and action that we humans supposedly have, it has many times been said to be determinist and fatalist. The purpose of this paper is to analyze in some deepness the relations that are between the theory of karma on one side and determinism, fatalism and (...) free-will on the other side. In order to do that, I shall use what has been described as the best formal approach we have to indeterminism: branching time theory. More specifically, I shall introduce a branching time semantic framework in which, among other things, statements such as “state of affairs e is a karmic effect of agent a”, “a wills it to be the case that e” and “e is inevitable” could be properly represented. (shrink)

Epistemologists often describe subjects as being capable of adopting a third kind of categorical doxastic stance regarding whether something is the case, besides belief and disbelief. They deploy a variety of idioms in order to ascribe that stance. In this paper, I flesh out the properties that the third kind of categorical stance is supposed to have and start searching for the best ways to ascribe it. The idioms ‘suspends judgment about whether’ and ‘is agnostic about whether’, among others, are (...) found to be unfit to play the desired role. In the end, I suggest that ‘is in doubt as to whether’ is our best choice among the alternatives surveyed here. (shrink)

Cette étude défend l’idée que, contrairement à l’opinion de Latour sur la nécessité de laisser de côté l’épistémologie pour traiter de tout ce qui a de la valeur pour la science, Mario Bunge a systématiquement construit une épistémologie détaillée et approfondie. La stratégie argumentative consistera à montrer (a) qu’il est faux que nous n’avons jamais été modernes (b) que l’épistémologie est là pour de bon et (c) que Mario Bunge soutient un réalisme scientifique fort, une version du matérialisme, du systémisme (...) et de l’émergentisme, comportant une dimension morale (il existe des valeurs objectives comme la vérité, la paix et la justice qui méritent d’être étudiées). Ensuite, le réalisme de Bunge rejette la neutralité axiologique rendant les scientifiques responsables de leurs actions. Bunge a toujours été moderne et continue à enrichir ses propres positions. (shrink)

Panentheism has seen a revival over the past two decades in the philosophical literature. This has partially triggered an interest in Indian models of God, which have traditionally been seen as panentheistic. On the other hand, panentheism has been often associated with panpsychism, an old ontological view that sees consciousness as fundamental and ubiquitous in the natural world and which has also enjoyed a renaissance in recent decades. Depending on where one places fundamentality (whether on the microlevel or on the (...) cosmic-level) there will be two types of panpsychism: micropsychism and cosmopsychism. Despite the apparently rich connection between Indian traditions and panpsychism, especially in its cosmopsychist version, recent work within cross-cultural analytic philosophy of mind seems to be mostly focused on atheistic traditions, such as Advaita Vedānta and Buddhism. My goal in this paper is to contribute to the cross-cultural debate over panentheism and Indian models of God, as well as to the debate on the connections between panpsychism, cosmopsychism and Indian traditions, by examining one of the most important and often quoted texts in Indian religious and philosophical traditions: the theistic Bhavagad Gītā. From a more specific standpoint, the paper has a threefold goal: to offer a panentheistic reconstruction of the Gītā’s concept of God, to show how this panentheistic model of God entails a form of theistic cosmopsychism, and to locate the Gītā’s cosmopsychism within a broader map of cosmopsychist views. Based on this reconstructive analysis of the Gītā’s cosmopsychism, I also outline some few reflections on the philosophical prospects of theistic cosmopsychism. (shrink)

There are many ways in which a speaker can confuse their audience. In this paper, I will focus on one such way, namely, a way of talking that seems to manifest a cross-level kind of cognitive dissonance on the part of the speaker. The goal of the paper is to explain why such ways of talking sound so twisted. The explanation is two-pronged, since their twisted nature may come either from the very mental states that the speaker thereby makes manifest, (...) or from how the speaker chooses to express themselves (even if there is nothing wrong with their mental states). So-called ‘Moore-paradoxical’ utterances are but one example of the phenomenon, and the explanation of what is wrong about them is subsumed under a more general explanation here—one that captures also the twisted-ness of utterances whereby questions are raised or intentions expressed. (shrink)

Es difícil imaginar una sociedad del buen vivir sin arte. Por ello, la creatividad artística es reconocida como derecho en la Constitución del Ecuador, y como derecho humano en los intrumentos internacionales relevantes. Partiendo de esta reflexión, los artículos de este libro argumentan que siendo el arte un derecho, le corresponde al Estado la provisión de condiciones para su garantía por medio de políticas públicas, que deben tomar en cuenta tanto las especificidades de las personas, y los pueblos y nacionalidades, (...) como el contexto tecnológico de la era digital, que brinda las bases para una sociedad abierta donde el conocimiento sea libre. (shrink)

In this paper I deal with epistemological issues that stem from the hypothesis that reasoning is not only a means of transmitting knowledge from premise-beliefs to conclusion-beliefs, but also a primary source of knowledge in its own right. The idea is that one can gain new knowledge on the basis of suppositional reasoning. After making some preliminary distinctions, I argue that there are no good reasons to think that purported examples of knowledge grounded on pure reasoning are just examples of (...) premise-based inferences in disguise. Next, I establish what kinds of true propositions can to a first approximation be known on the basis of pure reasoning. Finally, I argue that beliefs that are competently formed on the basis of suppositional reasoning satisfy both externalist and internalist criteria of justification. (shrink)

Em analogia com outras discriminações, como o racismo ou o sexismo, o especismo é concebido como uma forma de discriminação moral com base na espécie. Em grande medida, a discussão contemporânea sobre a importância moral dos animais surgiu e desenvolveu-se em torno da crítica e da defesa do especismo. Este artigo oferece uma visão da discussão filosófica contemporânea sobre o especismo. Após uma breve introdução, apresenta-se uma definição de especismo e caracterizam-se vários tipos de especismo, sendo o Antropocentrismo o mais (...) relevante. Depois, expõe-se um argumento proeminente contra o Antropocentrismo: o argumento dos casos marginais. Por fim, algumas posições antropocêntricas são criticamente discutidas. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that the cleavage between the theory of reference and the theory of meaning, which under the influence of Quine has dominated a large part of the philosophy of language of the last fifty years, is based on a misrepresentation of Tarski's achievement and on an overestimation of the scope and value of disquotation. In particular, I show that, if we accept Davidson's critique of disquotation, the same kind of reasons that Quine offered in opposition to (...) the Carnapian theory of meaning also apply, mutatis mutandis, to the Tarskian theory of reference. (shrink)

This paper aims of is to present Richard Rorty’s Philosophy of Education, through his analysis of the education as being divided into two distinct processes: socialization and individualization. Thereafter, it is intended to show two critiques, of conservadorism and elitism, that are addressed to these processes. Finally, a redescription of the Rorty’s positions will be proposed, by assigning a reformist character to its apparent conservatism and a private character to the supposedly elitist individualization, in order to weaken the strength of (...) those critics. (shrink)

This paper introduces the special issue on Logic and Philosophy of Religion of the journal Sophia: International Journal of Philosophy and Traditions (Springer). The issue contains the following articles: Logic and Philosophy of Religion, by Ricardo Sousa Silvestre and Jean-Yvez Béziau; The End of Eternity, by Jamie Carlin Watson; The Vagueness of the Muse—The Logic of Peirce’s Humble Argument for the Reality of God, by Cassiano Terra Rodrigues; Misunderstanding the Talk(s) of the Divine: Theodicy in the Wittgensteinian Tradition, by (...) Ondřej Beran; On the Concept of Theodicy, by Ricardo Sousa Silvestre; The Logical Problem of the Trinity and the Strong Theory of Relative Identity, by Daniel Molto; Thomas Aquinas on Logic, Being, and Power, and Contemporary Problems for Divine Omnipotence, by Errin D. Clark. -/- . (shrink)

This is the handbook of abstracts of the 1st World Congress on Logic and Religion, which took place in João Pessoa, Brazil, April 01-05, 2015. -/- .

In this essay, I focus on Lugones’s relatively lesser explored notion of playfulness. I weigh in on the debate about whether playfulness is necessary for what Lugones calls “world-traveling,” which enables one to recognize another person as a full subject. I argue that although the attribute of playfulness may not be necessary for world-traveling, it is necessary for collaborative world-making––creating a new, shared world that is opened through the activity of play.

Animal replaceability is supposed to be a feature of some consequentialist theories, like Utilitarianism. Roughly, an animal is replaceable if it is permissible to kill it because the disvalue thereby caused will be compensated by the value of a new animal’s life. This is specially troubling since the conditions for such compensation seem easily attainable by improved forms of raising and killing animals. Thus, grounding a strong moral status of animals in such theories is somewhat compromised. As is, consequently, their (...) position as an alternative to rights-based theories in animal ethics. Recognising this, some utilitarians tried to disassociate utilitarianism and replaceability. I will here add my voice to this project. However, instead of seeing the culprit in the usual suspects (hedonism, maximisation or the total view), I advance a new proposal. After identifying that the compensating value for a disvaluable action has to be its consequence, I present a restriction on consequences: consequences of sequences of actions cannot be consequences of the isolated actions in the sequences. Given this, the main argument is simple: killing an animal is permissible only if the the value of the new animal’s life is a consequence of the killing; but this value is a consequence of a sequence of actions which involves the killing plus some additional actions; therefore, since, via the restriction, such value is not a consequence of the killing, it is irrelevant to its normative status. I then present two further motivations for the restriction: firstly, it prevents the value of conditional actions from trivially influencing the value of the actions on which they are conditional; secondly, it is useful – even if not a complete solution – to reply other objections to consequentialism: the accordion effect of action and the cluelessness problem. I finally consider a couple of objections. (shrink)

El Realismo Científico Estándar sostiene el enfoque metafísico de que el mundo es como es independiente de la mente. Sin embargo, el presente artículo demuestra cómo esta postura es incompatible con todas las teorías no-eliminativistas sobre la mente, lo cual hace que la postura sea inconsistente, incompatible con la ciencia, elimina la consciencia, la intencionalidad, la causación mental y la ética. Se propone una tesis realista alternativa que conserva la idea de que el mundo en general es de la forma (...) que es, independiente de lo que pensemos sobre él, compatible con la mente como parte real del mundo. Este cambio restaura la posibilidad de consistencia, la mente, la consciencia, la intencionalidad, la ciencia y la ética. -/- Standard Scientific Realism holds the metaphysical view that the world is the way it is independent of the mind. However, this paper demonstrates how this view is incompatible with all non-eliminativist theories of mind, leading it to be inconsistent, incompatible with science, and eliminating consciousness, intentionality, mental causation and ethics. An alternative realist thesis is proposed which preserves the idea that generally the world is the way it is independent of what we think of it, compatible with mind as a real part of the world. This reform restores the possibility of consistency, mind, consciousness, intentionality, science and ethics, while at the same time preserving the theoretical advantages over non-realist competitors. (shrink)

No artigo “O vegetarianismo como obrigação ética” (Crítica, 10 de Setembro de 2015), Moutinho defende que o vegetarianismo é uma obrigação moral. Fá-lo argumentando por duas vias: que o estatuto moral dos animais é incompatível com serem usados pelos humanos para alimentação; e que o vegetarianismo é consequência do nosso dever em preservar o equilíbrio ecológico do planeta. O meu objectivo neste artigo é mostrar que os argumentos apresentados são insuficientes para estabelecer o vegetarianismo como obrigação moral.

The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it aims at introducing the ontological argument through the analysis of five historical developments: Anselm’s argument found in the second chapter of his Proslogion, Gaunilo’s criticism of it, Descartes’ version of the ontological argument found in his Meditations on First Philosophy, Leibniz’s contribution to the debate on the ontological argument and his demonstration of the possibility of God, and Kant’s famous criticisms against the (cartesian) ontological argument. Second, it intends to critically examine (...) the enterprise of formally analyzing philosophical arguments and, as such, contribute in a small degree to the debate on the role of formalization in philosophy. My focus will be mainly on the drawbacks and limitations of such enterprise; as a guideline, I shall refer to a Carnapian, or Carnapian-like theory of argument analysis. (shrink)

It is a fact that there is ethical criticism about art. Art critics, the general public and even artists point out moral flaws in artworks while evaluating them. Philosophers, however, have maintained a hot debate on the meaning of such criticism. This debate can be understood as a disagreement about the kind of relation between the artistic value of artworks and their alleged moral value. While some claim that moral value can contribute to artistic value (moralism), others claim that there (...) cannot be such a contribution (autonomism). Since at least some works of architecture are artworks, that debate also concerns architecture. A moderate moralist view claims that some works of architecture have moral flaws/merits that bear on their artistic evaluation. In an apparently promising version, the contention is that some moral flaws/merits are aesthetically relevant. In this paper I argue against such contention and defend an autonomist view. Following some taxonomy remarks I distinguish the views in the debate and present two points in favour of autonomism: its simplicity and not having the burden of proof. Then I discuss Carroll’s merited response argument for moralism and I argue that in its best interpretation either it begs the question against autonomism or it is compatible with it. I conclude with some possible objections that may help further investigations on the subject. (shrink)

Substructural approaches to paradoxes have attracted much attention from the philosophical community in the last decade. In this paper we focus on two substructural logics, named ST and TS, along with two structural cousins, LP and K3. It is well known that LP and K3 are duals in the sense that an inference is valid in one logic just in case the contrapositive is valid in the other logic. As a consequence of this duality, theories based on either logic are (...) tightly connected since many of the arguments for and objections against one theory reappear in the other theory in dual form. The target of the paper is making explicit in exactly what way, if any, ST and TS are dual to one another. The connection will allow us to gain a more fine-grained understanding of these logics and of the theories based on them. In particular, we will obtain new insights on two questions concerning ST which are being intensively discussed in the current literature: whether ST preserves classical logic and whether it is LP in sheep’s clothing. Explaining in what way ST and TS are duals requires comparing these logics at a metainferential level. We provide to this end a uniform proof theory to decide on valid metainferences for each of the four logics. This proof procedure allows us to show in a very simple way how different properties of inferences (unsatisfiability, supersatisfiability and antivalidity) that behave in very different ways for each logic can be captured in terms of the validity of a metainference. (shrink)

This review article takes up the issue of race in Latin American philosophy and Susan Nuccetelli's analysis of it by asking how we think the place of race in Latin American philosophy given that she argues that race is both an internal factor (in the sense that Latin American philosophy theorizes race) as well as an external factor (in the sense that racism and raciality have significantly determined the production of Latin American philosophy)? The article thematizes white supremacy in Latin (...) American philosophy in order to ask to what degree Latin American philosophy can respond to white supremacy in philosophy without questioning its own grounds and relation to white supremacy. (shrink)

The terms “model” and “model-building” have been used to characterize the field of formal philosophy, to evaluate philosophy’s and philosophical logic’s progress and to define philosophical logic itself. A model is an idealization, in the sense of being a deliberate simplification of something relatively complex in which several important aspects are left aside, but also in the sense of being a view too perfect or excellent, not found in reality, of this thing. Paraconsistent logic is a branch of philosophical logic. (...) It is however not clear how paraconsistent logic can be seen as model-building. What exactly is modeled? In this paper I adopt the perspective of looking at a particular instance of paraconsistent logic—paranormal modal logic—which might be seen as a model of a specific kind of agent: inductive agents. After ntroducing what I call the highlevel and low-level models of inductive agents, I analyze the extent to which the above-mentioned idealizing features of model-building appear in paranormal modal logic and how they affect its philosophical significance. (shrink)

Individualism or communalism? This is a very important question about how societies can live, develop, work and solve problems. Throughout history, this question has been considered from philosophical, sociological, anthropological, psychological, political, economic, and even theological or spiritual perspectives. Perhaps we will not find a solution, and the possibilities of reconciling these two concepts seem slim. Today, with Carolyn Smith-Morris' book, we approach the question from the experience of Indigenous communities. The title of the book is "Indigenous Communalism," but the (...) author will point out several times throughout the book that we cannot fully understand communalism without considering individualism. In her own words, the goal of this book “has been to initiate more overt attention to the individual and communal together, encapsulating (without resolving) the tensions that create human societies, and to value Indigenous communalism as the central feature of Indigeneity that it is” (Smith-Morris, 2020, p. 136). -/- ¿Individualismo o comunalismo? Esta es una pregunta muy importante sobre cómo las sociedades pueden vivir, desarrollarse, trabajar y resolver problemas. A lo largo de la historia, se ha reflexionado sobre este tema desde los puntos de vista filosófico, sociológico, antropológico, psicológico, político, económico, e incluso, teológico o espiritual. Quizás no encontremos ninguna solución y parecen pocas las posibilidades de conciliar estos dos conceptos. Hoy, con el libro de Carolyn Smith-Morris, que se titula en español Comunalismo indígena, abordamos la cuestión desde la experiencia de las comunidades indígenas. En esta línea, la autora señalará varias veces que no podemos entender plenamente el comunalismo sin tener en cuenta el individualismo. En sus propias palabras, se refiere a que su objetivo fue “iniciar un esfuerzo de atención más abierto a lo individual y lo comunal juntos, encapsulando (sin resolver) las tensio-nes que crean las sociedades humanas, y valorar el comunalismo indígena como la característica central de la indigeneidad que es” (Smith-Morris, 2020: 136). (shrink)

Epistemologists take themselves to disagree about whether there are situations where it is rational for one to believe that p and rational for one to believe that one’s evidence does not support p (rational akrasia). The embedded sentence ‘one’s evidence does not support p’ can be interpreted in two ways, however, depending on what the semantic contribution of ‘one’s evidence’ is taken to be. ‘One’s evidence’ might be seen as a sheer indexical or as a descriptive singular term. The first (...) interpretation makes the relevant kind of rational akrasia impossible, whereas the second one makes it possible. But the proposition that is taken to be expressed by ‘one’s evidence does not support p’ by each of these interpretations is not the same. We thus have a rational reconstruction of views that are labeled as being for and against the possibility of rational akrasia according to which they do not really contradict each other. (shrink)