A groundbreaking, revisionist account of the importance of the history of philosophy to intellectual change - scientific, philosophical and religious - in seventeenth-century England.

SummaryHistorians of science have neglected early modern natural philosophers' varied attitudes to the history of philosophy, often preferring to use loose labels such as ‘Epicureanism’ to describe the survival of ancient doctrines. This is methodologically inappropriate: reifying such philosophical movements tells us little about the complex ways in which early modern natural philosophers approached the history of their own discipline. As this article shows, a central figure of early modern natural philosophy, Robert Boyle, invested great intellectual energy into his depiction (...) of the history of philosophy. Boyle's historical worldview was mediated through an array of textual traditions: classical, patristic, humanist and contemporary. Drawing extensively on his manuscript notes, this is examined for three topics. First, from his turn to natural philosophy in the late 1640s, Boyle combined a sceptical attitude towards philosophy's potential – stemming from humanist historicisations of the ‘speculative’ heritage of Greek philosophy – with a belief in natural philosophy's efficacy as a spiritual exercise, as performed by ancient ‘priests of nature’. Second, Boyle's attitude to the history of matter theory was far more complex than any simple comparison with ‘ancient atomism’ can convey. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Boyle held Epicurus to be a speculative and reductionist philosopher, leading him to posit a different lineage for a non-reductionist corpuscularianism which depended on exploitation of non-standard historiographical traditions. Appreciating this allows us to make an intervention in the ongoing debate about the relationship between corpuscularianism, chymistry and experiment in Boyle's philosophy. Third, Boyle's historicisation of supposedly anthropomorphic philosophies in his famous Free Enquiry exploited recent theological historiography, most importantly Samuel Parker's combination of the history of idolatry with the history of Greek philosophy, which itself relied on developments in continental sacred history. It was this historicisation, rather than any philosophical realities, which led to the positing of the mechanical philosophy as more compatible than Aristotelianism with Christian doctrine. (shrink)

Summary Historians of science have neglected early modern natural philosophers' varied attitudes to the history of philosophy, often preferring to use loose labels such as ?Epicureanism? to describe the survival of ancient doctrines. This is methodologically inappropriate: reifying such philosophical movements tells us little about the complex ways in which early modern natural philosophers approached the history of their own discipline. As this article shows, a central figure of early modern natural philosophy, Robert Boyle, invested great intellectual energy into his (...) depiction of the history of philosophy. Boyle's historical worldview was mediated through an array of textual traditions: classical, patristic, humanist and contemporary. Drawing extensively on his manuscript notes, this is examined for three topics. First, from his turn to natural philosophy in the late 1640s, Boyle combined a sceptical attitude towards philosophy's potential ? stemming from humanist historicisations of the ?speculative? heritage of Greek philosophy ? with a belief in natural philosophy's efficacy as a spiritual exercise, as performed by ancient ?priests of nature?. Second, Boyle's attitude to the history of matter theory was far more complex than any simple comparison with ?ancient atomism? can convey. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Boyle held Epicurus to be a speculative and reductionist philosopher, leading him to posit a different lineage for a non-reductionist corpuscularianism which depended on exploitation of non-standard historiographical traditions. Appreciating this allows us to make an intervention in the ongoing debate about the relationship between corpuscularianism, chymistry and experiment in Boyle's philosophy. Third, Boyle's historicisation of supposedly anthropomorphic philosophies in his famous Free Enquiry (1686) exploited recent theological historiography, most importantly Samuel Parker's combination of the history of idolatry with the history of Greek philosophy, which itself relied on developments in continental sacred history. It was this historicisation, rather than any philosophical realities, which led to the positing of the mechanical philosophy as more compatible than Aristotelianism with Christian doctrine. (shrink)

In 1500, speculative philosophy lay at the heart of European intellectual life; by 1700, its role was drastically diminished. The Kingdom of Darkness tells the story of this momentous transformation. Dmitri Levitin explores the structural factors behind this change: the emancipation of natural philosophy from metaphysics; theologians' growing preference for philology over philosophy; and a new conception of the limits of the human mind derived from historical and oriental scholarship, not least concerning China and Japan. In turn, he (...) shows that the ideas of two of Europe's most famous thinkers, Pierre Bayle and Isaac Newton, were both the products of this transformation and catalysts for its success. Drawing on hundreds of sources in many languages, Levitin traces in unprecedented detail Bayle and Newton's conceptions of what Thomas Hobbes called The Kingdom of Darkness: a genealogical vision of how philosophy had corrupted the human mind. Both men sought to remedy this corruption, and their ideas helped lay the foundation for the system of knowledge that emerged in the eighteenth century. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Few texts in the history of science and philosophy have achieved the level of interpretative indeterminacy as a short manuscript tract by Isaac Newton, known as ‘De gravitatione’. On the basis of some new evidence, this article argues that it is an introductory fragment of some lectures on hydrostatics delivered in the of spring 1671. Taking seriously the possibility of a pedagogical purpose, it is then argued that the famous digression on space, far from articulating a sophisticated metaphysics that (...) may have owed something to Henry More, was a simple piece of mixed-mathematical prolegomena designed to facilitate the subsequent geometrical argumentation. In this regard, Newton was doing the same as his mentor, Isaac Barrow, had done in his own mathematical lectures; both drew heavily on the explicitly anti-metaphysical approach of Pierre Gassendi. It is shown that More himself would have almost certainly opposed Newton’s approach. The excesses of metaphysical readings of Newton’s intentions are challenged; there is no warrant for reading the digression as directly relevant to the Principia. (shrink)

The Catholic polemicist John Sergeant published three major works of philosophy towards the end of his literary career, The Method to Science (1696), Solid Philosophy (1697) and Metaphysics (1700). They were highly critical of what Sergeant saw as the idea-grounded epistemology of the Cartesians and John Locke, whom he labelled 'ideists'. Previous scholars have interpreted Sergeant's texts as manifestations of his lifelong obsession with certainty, as initially developed in his Restoration polemics against Anglican divines. Using a previously neglected autobiographical letter, (...) it is demonstrated that Sergeant's intentions were very different. Like Edward Stillingfleet and other critics, Sergeant saw Locke's philosophy as inspiring contemporary heterodoxy. The article identifies the specific channels by which Sergeant saw Lockeanism seeping into irreligion. Moreover, unlike Locke's Anglican critics, Sergeant resorted not to polemical accusations, but to abstract philosophy. This must also be explained contextually: Sergeant wished his works to become textbooks at the universities, concerned as he was by the pedagogical impact of the Essay. A premise of this article is that reception history is less useful for elucidating on the meaning of the received text than for telling us something about the intentions of the receiver, and about the intellectual culture in which the process of reception occurs. With this in mind, the article finishes by recontextualizing Sergeant's works within a broader narrative: his was an attempt to reassert the place of philosophy as a propaedeutic to theology in an age when such a conception of philosophy's social role was coming under intense scrutiny. (shrink)

SummaryThis article introduces some previously unknown Egyptological discussions written in Britain between 1680 and 1740. They are significant in their own right: the last of them, a manuscript ‘Essay towards illustrating the History, Chronology, and Mythology of the Ancient Egyptians’ by the Aberdonian antiquary Alexander Gordon, has a claim to being the most important European Egyptological tract of the period, even if its contents are currently entirely unknown to scholarship. But it will also be argued that the treatises permit some (...) broader reconsideration of historiographical culture in the period. First, they suggest that antiquarian rhetoric was not necessarily matched with antiquarian practice, and that, contrary to the famous claims of Arnaldo Momigliano and some of his more recent followers, eighteenth-century ‘antiquarianism’ was not always so different from seventeenth-century historical criticism. Second, they allow us to make some revisionist judgements about the origins of conjectural history: conjectural-developmental accounts often stemmed less from philosophical assumptions and more from developments in seventeenth-century source criticism, as Hellenistic accounts of ancient history came more and more to be questioned. This finding permits some important revisionist judgements about William Warburton's famous analysis of the hieroglyphs, and about eighteenth-century historiography more generally. (shrink)

We are bombarded with more information each day than our brains can process especially in election season. It's raining bad data, half-truths, and even outright lies. Daniel J. Levitin shows how to recognize misleading announcements, statistics, graphs, and written reports revealing the ways lying weasels can use them.

Nietzsche is absent from today’s growing debate on slavery past and present. In this article I argue that his views on the subject add a pertinent, if challenging, dimension to this wide-ranging discussion. Nietzsche’s analysis is capable of contributing to our understanding of this multifaceted phenomenon in a number of respects. I look at Nietzsche’s use of the controversial notions of slavery, understood both historically and in the context of modern society, to explore such central concerns of political anthropology as (...) the nature and role of leadership, and the questions of development and inequality. The key focus of Nietzsche’s examination concerns slavery as an enduring facet of human existence. He sees it becoming an important hallmark of the industrial culture as a barometer of modern society’s physiological well-being, as well as acting as the repository for its externalities. Nietzsche’s genealogical inquiry leads him to explore the psychological content of slavery and to conceptualise it in terms of human vulnerability, which increases susceptibility to exploitation. In these respects, Nietzsche’s views resonate with pertinence today and deserve closer critical attention and scrutiny – something Nietzsche would undoubtedly welcome. (shrink)

The purpose of the study is to reveal the main actions of the major central banks during the COVID - 19 pandemic and their main impact on the world stock markets. The scientific novelty consists in identifying the key results of the impact of the pandemic in general and the restrictive measures of national governments, in particular, on the dynamics of the state of the stock markets of the world, namely, the level of decline in the main stock indexes of (...) the S &P 500, Dow Jones and NASDAQ. The measures taken by the central banks of the United States, Japan, England and other developed and developing countries of the world to provide financial assistance to commercial banks and other financial organizations related to the purchase of government bonds at a "zero" rate, targeting the yield of government bonds, reducing key rates and other measures are summarized. It is indicated that the influx of new private investors provided a great help to the stock market, for which many Central Banks introduced special programs and preferences. As a result, the main measures taken by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation to stabilize the financial situation in the country and the domestic stock market, in particular, are summarized. (shrink)

This book explores the major differences between the kinds of risk encountered in different sectors of industry - production and services - and identifies the main features of accidents within different industries. Because of these differences, unique risk-mitigation measures will need to be implemented in one industry that cannot be implemented in another, leading to large managerial differences between these broad economic sectors. Based on the analysis of more than 500 disasters, accidents and incidents - around 230 cases from the (...) production sector and around 280 cases from the service sector - the authors compare the risk response actions appropriate within different sectors, and establish when and how it is possible to generalize the experience of dealing with risks in any given industry to a wider field of economic activity. This book is mainly intended for executives, strategists, senior risk managers of enterprise-wide organizations and risk management experts engaged in academic or consulting work. By setting out clearly the sector differences in risk management, the authors aim to improve the practice of general risk assessment with regard to identifying and prioritizing risks, and of risk control with regard to planning appropriate mitigation measures. (shrink)

Journal Name: Apeiron Issue: Ahead of print.

This paper considers the problem of evil as it has been discussed and formulated by Plotinus and polemically taken over by Proclus. Contrary to Plotinus, Proclus does not consider matter as evil. Rather, evil in its elusive indefinite nature has to be characterized by the redefined concepts of privation, subcontrary and parypostasis. In its inescapable deficiency, evil, then, is the privation and subcontrary of the good that exists parypostatically, that is, as elusively present in its absence as the misplacement of (...) being and the displacement of the good. (shrink)

The article develops the idea of forming postcapitalist social relations as a social revolution of an individual, which consists in the fact that popularity becomes a key advantage, the “possession” of which is a desired goal and a significant resource of political influence. At the same time, it is shown that this process leads to forming a new dominant stratum — personalities (“people with personality”): celebrities, popular bloggers, social media influencers, micro- and nanosignature. It is substantiated that the personaliat domination (...) is a consequence of contradictory social relations between the new aristocracy represented by the representatives of the personaliat and many people who do not “possess” a popular personality - the impersonaliat (“extra people”, “lower” precariat, those who turn out to be outsiders in the world of social platforms). This contradiction is associated with the rooting of a celebrity’s culture, which encourages a lot of people to fight for popularity and focus on finding advantageous differences from others in the process of self-realization. However, this struggle in the end for the overwhelming majority turns into an increase in creative competition and subtraction. Various new forms of subtraction that appear in situations of widespread self-realization are revealed. Accordingly, arguments are given in favor of the fact that in the context of the “personality revolution”, the truly left will be rather an alternative that will call into question the ways of solving social problems formulated by popular personalities. In other words, it will be possible to oppose the total pursuit of popularity with the projects of society, in which the person is relied not as someone who rises above the others, but as an involved person who values life in harmony with others higher than his own “I”. (shrink)

The recent surge of discoveries concerning the structural organization of nucleosomes, together with genetic evidence of highly specialized roles for the histones in gene regulation, have brought a renewed need for a detailed understanding of nucleosomal anatomy. Here we review recent structural advances leading to a new level of understanding of the nucleosome and chromatin fibre structure. We discuss the problems and challenges for existing models of chromatin structure and, in particular, consider how linker histones may bind within the nucleosome, (...) together with the implications of their association for the structure of the chromatin fibre. (shrink)

A conception of an information system has been introduced by Pawlak. The study has been continued in works of Pawlak and Orlowska and in works of Vakarelov. They had proposed some basic relations and had constructed a formal system of a modal logic that describes the relations and some of their Boolean combinations. Our work is devoted to a generalization of this approach. A class of relation systems and a complete calculus construction method for these systems are proposed. As a (...) corollary of our main result, our paper contains a solution of a Vakarelov's problem: how to construct a formal system that describes all the Boolean combinations of the basic relations. (shrink)

Ambiguity affects decisions of people who exhibit a distaste of and require a premium for dealing with it. Do ambiguity-neutral subjects completely disregard ambiguity and react to any vague news? Online vending platforms often attempt to affect buyer’s decisions by messages like “20 people are looking at this item right now” or “The average score based on 567 reviews is 7.9/10”. We augment the two-color Ellsberg experiment with similarly worded signals about the unknown probability of success. All decision-makers, including ambiguity-neutral, (...) recognize and account for ambiguity; ambiguity-neutral subjects are less likely to respond to vague signals. The difference between decisions of ambiguity-neutral and non-neutral subjects vanishes for high precision signals; still less than 60% subjects choose the ambiguous urn, even for high communicated probabilities of success. We conjecture participants may discard information, if they see no contradiction between it and their prior beliefs, hence the latter are not updated. Higher confidence makes subjects more likely to discard the news, and empirically ambiguity-neutral subjects appear more confident than those ambiguity-averse. (shrink)

This article deals with the question of the interrelation between two papers, both called, in short, “Onomatodoxy”, dedicated to the doctrine of Name-glorification (Imiaslavie, Onomatodoxy), both of which were created in line with the Neo-Patristic movement in the Russian philosophy of the Silver Age. One of these papers is by Alexei Losev and the other by Pavel Florensky. In my opinion, there are sufficient grounds to state that Losev’s “Onomatodoxy” was written either after Florensky created his own “Onomatodoxy”, i.e., after (...) November 1922, or, at the earliest, after Florensky started to give clandestine lectures about Onomatodoxy in Moscow (where Losev lived), i.e., not earlier than spring 1921. Therefore, Losev’s article “Onomatodoxy” could have been intended for the religious-philosophical collection of articles planned for publishing by Yaschenko in 1922 in Berlin. (shrink)

Introduction. One of the drivers of the Russian regions’ development is traditionally considered to be local universities and the scientific activity development, in particular. However, such a belief is usually based on speculative conclusions and is not subjected to detailed empirical testing. The purpose of the study is to assess the relationship between the development of science in universities in Russian regions and indicators of regional development according to 2017—18 data. Methods. The authors use methods of generalization, grouping, assessment of (...) indicators of central tendency and variations, as well as methods of correlation analysis. The study is based on the data from regional statistics presented on the official website of Russian Statistics Agency, as well as data from monitoring the universities effectiveness, commissioned by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation. Scientific novelty of the research. For the first time, the authors present an empirical analysis of the relationship between indicators of socioeconomic development of Russian regions and indicators of scientific activity in universities in the region. The study is characterized by using a sample of homogeneous regions. The sample excluded regions that did not have significant scientific results, as well as regions that are leaders in economic development. As a result, a “core” of 57 Russian regions with similar characteristics of both economic development and the results of scientific activity was investigated. This increased the practical significance of the conclusions and their reliability. Results. As a result of the study, it was found out that there is a statistically significant relationship between all indicators of regional development and science in universities. However, a deeper analysis made it possible to establish that this relationship is indirect. In some cases, we can talk about the opposite influence - regional development on scientific results in universities. Conclusions. It was found that the indicators used in the public administration system for assessing the effectiveness and efficiency of scientific activity are not key in terms of their impact on regional development. It was revealed that publications in leading world databases and in the Russian Science Citation Index (RSCI) are equally related to regional development. It has been determined that in a number of cases, within the considered sample, it is possible to distinguish two groups of regions with a different nature of the relationship between regional development and science in universities. (shrink)

Comparative study between Tibetan Bon and Buryatian Bø religion of ancient Shamanic traditions.

In their useful logic for a computer network Shramko and Wansing generalize initial values of Belnap’s 4-valued logic to the set 16 to be the power-set of Belnap’s 4. This generalization results in a very specific algebraic structure — the trilattice SIXTEEN 3 with three orderings: information, truth and falsity. In this paper, a slightly different way of generalization is presented. As a base for further generalization a set 3 is chosen, where initial values are a — incoming data is (...) asserted, d — incoming data is denied, and u — incoming data is neither asserted nor denied, that corresponds to the answer “don’t know”. In so doing, the power-set of 3, that is the set 8 is considered. It turns out that there are not three but four orderings naturally defined on the set 8 that form the tetralattice EIGHT 4 . Besides three ordering relations mentioned above it is an extra uncertainty ordering. Quite predictably, the logics generated by a –order (truth order) and d –order (falsity order) coincide with first-degree entailment. Finally logic with two kinds of operations ( a –connectives and d –connectives) and consequence relation defined via a –ordering is considered. An adequate axiomatization for this logic is proposed. (shrink)

Introduction. The human world is presented as an integrity — an organic unity of many inter- connected and interdependent centers (parts, sides, elements): natural and cultural, natural and artificial, animate and inanimate. When any center dominates over others (for example, technical and technological) and / or attempts to realize its claim to the status of a whole, the agreed and optimal ra- tio in the coexistence and synergistic development of all centers, and, consequently, of the whole, is violated. There arises (...) an ecosystem problem. The purpose of the study is to present and analyze the techno-technologized world in the context of current philosophical and scientific methodologi- cal principles: polycentricity, complexity, network- centricity, and ecosystem; to designate their theoretical and practical significance, interdepend- ence; to substantiate the principle of ecosystems as more general and fundamental and to present its effectiveness in preserving the integrity of man, his world and the full value of human being-in-the- world. Methods. The author uses methods of dialectics, synergetics and systemic approach in the philo- sophical understanding of the specifics of the modern techno-technological world and a person’s existence in it. The author also uses the methods of extrapolation and interpretation, the ideas of B. Latour’s actor-network theory, and ecosystem approach. Scientific novelty of the research. The author projects the key attitudes and concepts of the actual conceptual and paradigm principles on the techno-technological world, and formulates the main advantages and disadvantages. The author substantially justifies that the principle of ecosys- tem is the most effective in solving the problem of preserving and reproducing the integrity of the human world, the person himself and his being. Results. The author carries out theoretical and methodological analysis of the techno-technolo- gized world and a person’s existence in it. It has been determined that when solving the problem of preserving and reproducing the integrity of a person and his world, the principle of ecosystems is the most effective and preferable. The ecosystem principle implies the synergistic unity of all centers of human existence, their interdependence and interconnection, ensures the priority of the whole for the benefit of each center, expressed in mutual strengthening and expansion of their potential. Conclusions. The author comes to the conclusion that the application of relevant paradigm principles in studying and analyzing the techno-technological world will make it possible to obtain a more mul- tidimensional and accurate interpretation of the ways and means of achieving a full-fledged human being, with a focus on preserving his identity, origi- nality, subjectivity and integrity. (shrink)

We explore a possibility of generalization of classical truth values by distinguishing between their ontological and epistemic aspects and combining these aspects within a joint semantical framework. The outcome is four generalized classical truth values implemented by Cartesian product of two sets of classical truth values, where each generalized value comprises both ontological and epistemic components. This allows one to define two unary twin connectives that can be called “semi-classical negations”. Each of these negations deals only with one of the (...) above mentioned components, and they may be of use for a logical reconstruction of argumentative reasoning. (shrink)

I detect a specific attitude to Byzantium (“the Byzantine Enlightenment”) in Ivan Kireevsky’ Slavophile article “On the Character of Enlightenment in Europe” (1852). I qualify this attitude as Byzantinocentrism. I take that as a focal point and, against this background, consider the image of Byzantium in Kireevsky and some thinkers of his social circle. It allows me to trace the most important lines of attitudes to Byzantium in the Russian historiosophical literature and opinion journalism of the nineteenth century. I detect (...) two opposite lines in perceiving Byzantium in Kireevsky’s early social circle: the anti- and pro-Byzantine ones. The first line goes back to an anti-Byzantine message, characteristic of the epoch of Enlightenment. It found its manifestation in G. W. F. Hegel’s Lectures on the Philosophy of History. I point to the traces of the implicit polemics with Hegel’s anti-byzantinism in Kireevsky and identify the context of these polemics in Arist Kunick. As well, I outline how these lines worked in Pyotr Chaadaev and Alexander Pushkin. Then I distinguish between how the image of Byzantium was presented, first, in Kireevsky’s earlier Slavophile article “On the Character of Enlightenment in Europe” and, second, in his last article “On the Necessity and Possibility of the new Foundations for Philosophy” (1856). In the latter article, which sees Byzantium as bipolar, I find another view on Byzantium. I suggest that this view on Byzantium as a bipolar entity goes back to Alexey Khomyakov’s Semiramis. My point is that this difference in the views on Byzantium is paradigmatic and it reflects a division that was present in the Russian Slavophile-conservative milieu of that time. I suggest that this division stands behind another division within the same milieu, which was politically oriented, the one in relation to the Greek-Bulgarian ecclesiastical question. I analyze how both monopolar (Byzantinocentric) and bipolar views on Byzantium were reflected in the Greek-Bulgarian question as it was considered by Alexey Khomyakov and Terty Filippov. I find a context for developing Kireevsky’s attitude towards Byzantium in François Guizot’s historiosophic scheme as well. (shrink)

While Western political scientists have a variety of opinions on democracy and how its institutions could be improved, they almost never argue about the validity of democracy as a form of government. Of course, it would be unfair here to ignore the presence of an authoritarian streak in Western thought. Thomas Hobbes comes to mind most immediately. Yet the views of those thinkers with an authoritarian bent have become marginalized in present-day discourse; or, to be more precise, it is assumed (...) that their views on the importance of a strong government are irrelevant to the present. The assumption that a strong regime might be necessary in non-Western societies is thought to be the product of these authoritarian/totalitarian societies' elite classes—that is, a justification for imposing the power of the elite upon the people. Most Western political scientists are convinced that democracy is the best of all possible forms of government. (shrink)

In this paper we continue the study of Girard's Linear Logic and introduce a new Linear Logic with modalities. Our logic describes not only the consumption, but also the presence of resources. We introduce a new semantics and a new calculus for this logic. In contrast to the results of Lincoln [7] and Kanovich [4] about the NP-completeness of the problem of the construction of a proof for a given sequent in the multiplicative fragment of Girard's Linear Logic, we present (...) here a non-exponential algorithm to construct a proof for a given sequent and a given point of a given model in our Linear Logic. (shrink)