This paper offers a new interpretation for Wittgenstein`s treatment of mathematical identities. As it is widely known, Wittgenstein`s mature philosophy of mathematics includes a general rejection of abstract objects. On the other hand, the traditional interpretation of mathematical identities involves precisely the idea of a single abstract object – usually a number –named by both sides of an equation.

In the last chapter of In the beginning was the deed: realism and moralism in political argument, Williams raised the question of truthfulness in politics and warned that the media, particularly, television, and the market of communication in general, work in ways contrary to truthfulness -understood as the combination of the virtues of sincerity and accuracy. In this paper we would like to carry on Williams’ line of thinking in connection with the impact of the new social media platforms on (...) politics. Where Williams focused on television, we will consider the impact of the internet public sphere. After reviewing how the digital social media encourages motivated reasoning in general, we propose to focus on two main phenomena derived from it: the rise of conspiracy theories and the moralization of politics. Conspiracy theories epitomize the risk of self-deception Williams was concerned to signal. On the other hand, the process of moralization of politics triggers sectarianism and hate for the “others”, the outgroup. Both phenomena are not exclusive of the internet sphere, but both are boosted by it, and entail a lack of interest in truth and truthfulness, and in this way they threaten the value of truth for democracy. (shrink)

In a larger context of an egalitarian project which aims to reformulate capitalism a job guarantee program in the form of a State as an Employer of Last Resort is considered superior to Unconditional Basic Income by many, namely Alan Thomas. This article claims that most of the arguments used to assert the superiority of SELR fail their objective, for the following reasons: first, SELR falls short in its reformulation of capitalism because neither SELR nor UBI alone can euthanize the (...) rentier class. Second, most accounts are based on a flawed assumption that UBI leads to rampage inflation. Third, if macroeconomic considerations are not enough to justify implementing SELR over UBI, then insisting on the superiority of SELR can only stem from two types of moral reasons: on one hand from a perfectionist view of empowering the worst-off through labor and on the other from demands and obligations of reciprocity. We argue that these two moral-based reasons fall short of providing a justification for the superiority of SELR over UBI. We conclude our paper defending the possibility of conciliating the two policies. (shrink)

De grote uitdagingen op politiek, economisch en vooral ecologisch gebied hebben geleid tot een teneur van apocalyptisch denken: het einde van de wereld en de mensheid zou nabij zijn. Dit ondergangsdenken is geen nieuw verschijnsel, door de geschiedenis heen is vaak verkondigd dat het met de wereld gedaan zou zijn. André Klukhuhn onderwerpt het cultuurpessimisme aan nader onderzoek en vraagt zich af wat wij kunnen leren van het apocalyptische denken in het verleden. Speciale aandacht heeft hij voor vier denkers die (...) geboren zijn in het fin de siècle en die in het interbellum bekendheid verwierven met hun cultuurpessimistische theorieën: Oswald Spengler, José Ortega y Gasset, Johan Huizinga en Sinclair Lewis. Aan de hand van hun denken pleit Klukhuhn voor een radicale verandering in ons denken en handelen om ons te verweren tegen de huidige ecologische crisis. (shrink)

In their annual festival in an eastern village of the Yucatan state, participants verbalized, discussed, and disputed two main understandings of Catholic commitment after a Catholic priest asked his parishioners to reconsider the effects of their ritual offerings. His teachings about compromiso signaled other ritualized practices, which compose the concept: promises and sacrifices. In direct contrast to the priest’s teachings, local ritualists understand that solemn promises and sacrificial exchange work, however, as encompassments of the notion of commitment. On the other (...) hand, the priest’s notion of engagement with the sacred takes its main force from the representation of the work of dying of sacrificial victims. Overcoming an apparently insurmountable pair of opposites, ritual and sacrificial, he defines commitment as vicarious sacrifice, inaugurating for his audience a new representational dimension. (shrink)

This paper explores the relationship between a prominent version of the relational view of memory and recent work on forms of unsuccessful remembering or memory errors. I argue that unsuccessful remembering poses an important challenge for the relational view. Unsuccessful remembering can be divided into two kinds: misremembering and confabulating. I discuss each of these cases in light of a recent relational account, according to which remembering is characterized by an experiential relation to past events, and I argue that experiential (...) relations do not adequately distinguish between remembering and unsuccessful remembering. This is because there are, on the one hand, cases of remembering that do not instantiate the relevant experiential relations, and, on the other hand, cases of confabulation and misremembering that do instantiate the relevant experiential relations. I conclude by suggesting that any successful relationalist attempt to explain remembering needs to come to grips with unsuccessful remembering. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Spirit and Politics: Some Thoughts on Margaret Watkins’s The Philosophical Progress of Hume’s “Essays”Andre C. Willis (bio)Margaret Watkins’s elegant text, The Philosophical Progress of Hume’s Essays (2019),1 is marked by a Humean approach: it fosters philosophical consideration of both the faculties of the mind and the affective features of experience in ways that bear on practical, moral issues. Ever-attentive to the meaning of Hume’s various nuances and strategic ambiguities, (...) Watkins’s even-handed approach guides us into a broad swath of Hume’s ideas and marches us through a trajectory of secondary interlocutors. It also establishes Watkins as an integral part of Hume’s lineage, in the sense that she understands that thoughtful writing itself is an intellectual virtue. Her “unusual sensitivity, not to life’s daily vicissitudes but to beauties and deformities” (193)2 richly textures her overall argument that positions Hume’s Essays as a filter for his vision of “true philosophy:” that reflective turn towards nature and common life that openly challenges abstruse reasoning, fluently embraces historicism and perspectivalism, and deftly foregrounds the usefulness of ideas over their logical certainty.As much as Watkins reveals Hume’s vision for philosophy, she also extends it; for, among other things, her consideration of Hume’s unique endeavor in philosophical literature (ultimately collected under the title Essays, Moral, Political and Literary [1758]), makes an important twofold contribution to Hume studies. It brings greater attention to Hume’s notion of “public spirit,” a distinct mode of human excellence that combines “benevolence” with “greatness of mind.” And, it aestheticizes some practical dimensions of human life (noted in chapter titles, for example, “Working,” [End Page 143] “Thinking,” “Loving”) without losing track of their socio-political valences. I shall return to these two main points below. As an introductory gesture, I want to note that Watkins’s writing both nicely elaborates Hume’s philosophical vision and thoughtfully broadens his literary insights. It does “the job of putting the audience into a responsive relation with the work of art,” what literary critic R. P. Blackmur identified as “the job of intermediary.”3Generally speaking, Watkins’s mediation filters salient themes and terms from Hume’s corpus through a particularly close reading of the Essays. Cast through her richly stylized analysis, Hume’s foundational ideas of “sympathy,” “convention,” “impressions,” “association,” “imagination,” “artifice,” the “passions” (and more) find fresh interpretive air. An example of this in her first chapter tracks Hume’s use of both “artifice” and “convention” from the Treatise through the second Enquiry to the Essays. For Watkins, a through-line for Hume is that “governing” can be thought of as repeated actions that bridge institutional policy to individual character. To think about governing in this way is to open ourselves to new ways of conceiving potential overlaps between nature and artifice (say, in the instance of a moral virtue like courage [50]). To link categories in the Essays back to their antecedent texts along the lines that Watkins does is to situate them in the context of Hume’s larger thought-project and, indirectly, confirm connections between the individual essays. These conjoinings, for Watkins, suggest Hume’s Essays can be treated together, without either blending their disparate themes or diluting their individual subject matter.4This point stands in opposition to Hume’s own semi-admonishment (1741) that “The Reader must not look for any connexion among these Essays but must consider each of them as a Work apart.”5 Watkins’s response—indicative of the graciousness of her overall tone—is to warmly acknowledge Hume’s reproach and affirm the distinctiveness of each of the essays. She proclaims: “The Essays are not unified” (5). Her thinking about them separately, however, reveals a common practical thread in their form. Watkins characterizes this form as serving “to promote public benefit” (4). I think about this form as being philosophical in the way that Richard Rorty conceives of philosophy as cultural criticism. Watkins, however, wants to emphasize the public character of Hume’s philosophy. She writes: “Hume seeks to benefit the public in two ways. First, he tries to allay irrational attitudes that produce imprudent personal and... (shrink)

This paper offers some insights and clarifications of the paramount role that Mexico has had in the forging of first-order cybernetics. Our account starts with Arturo Rosenblueth as a key intellectual figure in the foundation and formation of the field. After revisiting a historical context of people and places, we proceed to a cultural and media archeological investigation that helps us obtain new insights into the ongoing effort to intertwine the complex intellectual networks across different countries in Latin America, North (...) America, and Europe. We then present cases and first-hand interviews to discuss the legacy of cybernetics in Mexico around institutions where Rosenblueth was affiliated, mainly the Institute of Cardiology and, later on, the CINVESTAV at the Instituto Politécnico Nacional. We claim that subjective affinities are as important as common scientific goals to establish and keep connections alive, necessary to the development of a research field. As the active compound in spicy peppers, capsaicin represents a local component to the definition of cybernetics. Ultimately, the paper aims to contribute to the research on the importance of cybernetics in Latin America. (shrink)

La thèse soutenue ici affirme que par la liberté humaine nous faisons l’expérience de Dieu autant que Dieu fait l’expérience de l’homme. Ce faisant, nous tentons d’exposer et d’examiner la réponse de Ruyer à une question classique de théologie rationnelle : comment concilier la liberté humaine et l’existence de Dieu ? Cette réponse montre que l’une n’est pas sans l’autre, la liberté requiert Dieu comme océan des possibles, et réciproquement, il est certains actes où Dieu touche notre existence, sans la (...) déposséder de ce qu’elle a en propre, faute de quoi l’activité humaine ne resterait qu’apparente. Une première partie examine le statut de la métaphysique comme fiction et la conscience comme fascination. Un second moment expose et défend contre plusieurs objections une preuve de la liberté humaine : le « cogito axiologique ». La thèse elle-même, en troisième partie, développe et discute un aspect de la théodicée ruyérienne qui lui est liée.The thesis here defended asserts that by human liberty we make experience of God as much as God makes experience of man. So Ruyer gives his answer to a vexed theological question : we must conciliate human freedom and existence of God. Human freedom requires God as a sea of possibility from where it finds its nourishment, and, on the other hand, God can reach, in some peculiar actions, human existence without depriving that existence of its own, or reducing it to a mere appearance. Understanding such an answer requires, in a first part, explanations about metaphysics as fiction, and about conscience as fascination. In a second part human liberty will be proved by an argument so called « axiological cogito », and that proof defended against several objections. The conciliation of human liberty with the existence of God, as a Person, in the third part, develops Ruyerian answers to the theological question of « théodicée ». (shrink)

Buscamos aqui revisitar a leitura de Gyorgy Lukács em História e Consciência de Classe sobre a questão da ação humana. Tendo a história como ponto culminante onde se resolve a relação sujeito-objeto, Lukács propõe uma epistemologia dialética em que o sujeito interfere no conteúdo do real. A problemática central consiste em teorizar a gênese, a geração do novo. A gênese tem sua determinação concreta na contradição da luta de classes. Isso resultará num novo conceito de sujeito. O indivíduo, isoladamente, é (...) incapaz de realizar a gênese. O sujeito da práxis, destarte, não pode ser livre atuando sozinho, mas deve encontrar o fundamento da liberdade na classe social, real sujeito da gênese histórica. We seek here to revisit Gyorgy Lukács' reading in History and Class Conscousness about the question on the human action. Taking at hand history as the culminating point where the relation subject-object is resolved, Lukács proposes a dialectical epistemology in which the subject interferes in the content of reality. The central problematic consists in theorizing the genesis, the genesis of the new. This results in a new concept of subject. The individual isolated is incapable of achieving the genesis. The subject of praxis cannot therefore be free acting alone, but he must find the fundament of freedom in the social class, the real subject of historical genesis. (shrink)

ABSTRACTA much debated passage in the Metaphysics of Morals often leads commentators to believe that it is not possible to act from juridical duty. On the one hand, Kant says that all lawgiving inc...

The present study aims at understanding how Ethica Nicomachea V.6 relates to its preceding chapters, V.1-5. On the one hand, the interpreter wonders for what purpose Aristotle introduces a topic named ‘the civic just’ (to politikon dikaion) in V.6, since V.1-5 treats extensively of matters of justice in the city. On the other hand, the same text posits that there is a certain ‘just without qualification’ (to haplōs dikaion), which may or may not be the civic just itself; (...) compared to the just without qualification, other forms of just are so by similitude (kath’homoiteta). In attempting to clear the confusion around those two points, the present study proposes the following: (1) the civic just is the just without qualification insofar as it is the primordial form of the just, in which only humans who are cumulatively free, equals and self-sufficient have a share; (2) the description of the civic just recapitulates several aspects of the discussions of justice in V.1-5 – the laws, the kinds of equality, rule, the legal suit - because the civic just encompasses all the forms of just (dikaion) related to the virtues of universal justice (V.1) and partial justice (V.2-5); (3) the expression to politikon dikaion is introduced in V.6 in order to contrast everything treated in V.1-5 with the domestic just, to oikonomikon dikaion, mentioned for the first time in V.6; (4) the forms of the domestic just are just only by similitude with the civic just because justice loses density outside the civic sphere, a situation which can be explained by the shortcomings Aristotle ascribes to women, children and slaves in EN V.6 (lack either of freedom or equality or yet self-sufficiency) as well as in Politica I (varying degrees of defective deliberation and virtue). (shrink)

The role of this article is to present a historical analysis of how the expropriation occurred and concentration of land in Brazil it has been since the arrival of the colonists to the present day. Evaluate how this event influenced, as a rule, expulsion and enslavement of indigenous peoples in their own lands, the enslavement of black Africans, in the Brazilian rural exodus, the swelling of the cities in recent decades; hunger in the field, the shortage of food commodities in (...) the cities and in the present family farming underdevelopment of the country as a whole and its consequent and continuous concentration in a few hands "the Brazilian agrarian oligarchy" preventing the implementation of agrarian reform and land distribution for families and landless farmers. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that Seneca’s philosophy is a form of therapy and that one of its main concerns is the transformation of one’s life through time control. Aristotelian tradition lies in the idea that philosophy is, in its highest aspect, an abstract form of knowledge. Seneca, on the other hand, is an inheritor of a long tradition that takes philosophy as mind or soul therapy and bases its structure in a practical approach. Epicurus, for instance, goes as (...) far as to declare that “empty is the word of the philosopher by whom no human suffering is treated”. Even if Seneca doesn’t despise the theoretical principles that support the construction of a philosophical system, he builds, in his Letters to Lucilius, a strong therapeutic praxis whose purpose is to heal one’s mind and life. The upmost and fundamental step is providing the pupil with different ways of earning back time deprivation. Time seems to be, in a certain sense, the essential matter of Seneca’s philosophy. Time control, for him, is a kind of self-control that would make it possible to match a simple existence and a meaningful life. Therefore, Seneca’s opening letter to Lucile aims exclusively to identify how one loses time and why it’s essential to take control of it. (shrink)

In a famous text Descartes has written this:Whenever the thought of God's supreme power occurs to me, I cannot help feeling that he might easily, if he so wished, make me go wrong even in what I think I see most clearly with my mind's eye. On the other hand, whenever I turn to the matters themselves which I think I perceive very clearly, I am so convinced by them that I burst out: ‘let who will deceive me, he (...) can never bring it about that I should be nothing at the time of thinking that I am something, nor that it be true that I never existed if it is true that I exist now; nor even that two and three together make more or less than five, or any such thing in which I see manifest contradiction’. (shrink)

This paper addresses longstanding debates around changing patterns of farm ownership and structure on the North American plains. Over the last 150 years, the agrifood system has been transformed by a process of capitalist penetration through which non-farm capital has appropriated key links in the ‘food chain’. Today, large, often transnational corporations dominate in the provision of farm inputs, as well as in food processing, distribution, and retailing. The paradox for food system scholars has been that primary food production (i.e., (...) farming) has generally remained in the hands of independent, family-based operations, especially in the grains sector. This paradox has generated a substantial literature on the barriers to capitalist penetration in agriculture. I revisit these debates in light of two recent trends. First, I highlight the emergence of a class of farm family entrepreneurs comprised of very large, albeit family-owned, grain farming operations, in Saskatchewan. I provide a case study of a vertically integrated, family-based mega-farm to illustrate. Second, I discuss the implications of the launch of One Earth Farms, a corporate farming entity embodying altogether new strategies of land use, labor, and ownership. Structured as a partnership between a Toronto-based investment firm and nine First Nations bands, One Earth Farms brings together the interests of private investors who increasingly view agriculture as a profitable resource sector, and aboriginal communities hoping to redress the historical marginalization of First Nations farming. I interpret the significance of these new avenues of corporatization for “family farms” and prairie agricultural development. (shrink)

There may be few works of philosophy that accurately integrate dialectical and rhetorical aspects such as Contra Academicos, to the point that it becomes difficult at times to separate these two discursive techniques. This, despite the tension that Augustine points out between, on the one hand, his impulse to move away from the vanity of the rhetoric he learned in his youth, and, on the other, its convenience in achieving the persuasion of his audience. Regarding rhetoric, there are two (...) moments in which it is clearly recognizable in the work: 1) Direct references to “persuasion” and to technical elements specific to oratory; and 2) The implementation of a rhetorical discourse, in this case necessary and not accidental, to complete the argument. In this article, I analyze both aspects systematically, in order to investigate the reasons why this Augustinian dialogue invokes, to achieve its objective, both dialectic and rhetoric. (shrink)

A skeptical worry known as ‘the indeterminacy of computation’ animates much recent philosophical reflection on the computational identity of physical systems. On the one hand, computational explanation seems to require that physical computing systems fall under a single, unique computational description at a time. On the other, if a physical system falls under any computational description, it seems to fall under many simultaneously. Absent some principled reason to take just one of these descriptions in particular as relevant for computational (...) explanation, widespread failure of computational explanation would appear to follow. This paper advances a new solution to the indeterminacy of computation. Very roughly, I argue that the computational identity of a physical system is determinate relative to a contextually specified way of regarding that system computationally—known as a labelling scheme. When a system simultaneously implements multiple computations, it does so relative to different labelling schemes. But relative to a fixed labelling scheme, a physical system has a unique computational identity. I argue that this relativistic conception of computational identity vindicates computational explanation in the face of simultaneous implementation. (shrink)

Pobreza e educação: diálogos entre o passado e o presente, entre conformações e resistências docentes Resumo: Desde o século XIX, a pobreza tem sido objeto de governo em todos os âmbitos do Estado Brasileiro. No entanto, desde lá, a seu modo, a área educacional tem assumido fortemente essa tarefa para si, quer seja na política educacional ou na experiência docente. De fato, essa é uma questão importante, mas paradoxal. Por um lado, governam-se os pobres visando a sua liberdade; por outro, (...) para subjugá-los. A partir de aportes teórico-metodológicos de Michel Foucault, mas também de recortes analíticos de pesquisadores do campo da sociologia da educação e da história da educação brasileira, este artigo procura estabelecer diálogo com alguns aspectos atuais da experiência docente brasileira, tentando responder se, na prática, ela é capaz de analisar esse paradoxo e de agir frente a ele. Como conclusão, o artigo sugere que a analítica de tal questão depende, enormemente, da perspicácia da política educacional e dos professores para diagnosticarem o presente e o passado da educação, para, quem sabe, experimentar novas formas de educação com as populações pobres. Palavras-chave: Pobreza; Educação; Experiência docente. Poverty and education: dialogues between past and present, between conformations and resistance of teachers Abstract: Since the 19th century, poverty has been an object of government in all spheres of the Brazilian State. However, since then, the educational area has strongly assumed this task for itself in its own way, both in educational policy and in teaching experience. Indeed, this is an important but paradoxical issue. The poor are ruled with their freedom in mind on the one hand, and on the other, with their subjugation as an objective. Based on Michel Foucault's theoretical-methodological contributions, but also on analytical pieces by researchers in the field of sociology of education and the history of Brazilian education, this paper seeks to establish a dialogue with current aspects of the Brazilian teaching experience, trying to answer whether it is capable of analyzing this paradox and acting upon it in practice. In conclusion, the paper suggests that the analysis of such a matter greatly depends on the perspicacity of educational policy and teachers to diagnose the present and past of education in order to possibly experiment new forms of education with poor populations. Keywords: Poverty; Education; Teaching experience. Pauvreté et éducation: dialogues entre le passé et le présent, entre conformations et résistances des enseignants Résumé: Depuis le 19ème siècle, la question de la pauvreté a été l’objet du gouvernement dans tous les domaines de l’État brésilien. Cependant, depuis lors, à sa manière, le domaine de l'éducation a fortement assumé cette tâche, que ce soit en matière de politique éducative ou d'expérience d’enseignement. En fait, c'est une question importante, mais paradoxale. D'une part, les pauvres sont gouvernés pour leur liberté; mais aussi d'autre part, pour les soumettre. À partir des contributions théoriques et méthodologiques de Michel Foucault, mais également d'extraits analytiques de chercheurs dans le domaine de la sociologie de l'éducation et de l'histoire de l'éducation brésilienne, cet article cherche à établir un dialogue avec certains aspects actuels de l'expérience d'enseignement au Brésil, en essayant de répondre si, dans la pratique, elle est capable d'analyser ce paradoxe et d'agir face à ce dernier. En conclusion, l'article suggère que l'analyse d'une telle question depend, énormément, de la perspicacité de la politique éducative et des professeurs à diagnostiquer le présent et le passé de l'éducation, pour, on ne sait jamais, essayer de nouvelles formes d'éducation avec les populations pauvres. Mots-clés: Pauvreté; Éducation; Expérience d'enseignement. Data de registro: 14/05/2020 Data de aceite: 02/10/2020. (shrink)

The antirealist argument from the underdetermination of theories by data relies on the premise that the empirical content of a theory is the only determinant of its belief-worthiness (premise NN). Several authors have claimed that the antirealist cannot endorse NN, on pain of internal inconsistency. I concede this point. Nevertheless, this refutation of the underdetermination argument fails because there are weaker substitutes for NN that will serve just as well as a premise to the argument. On the other hand, (...) antirealists have not made a convincing casefor NN (or its weaker substitutes) either. In particular, I criticize van Fraassen's recent claim that all ampliative rules in epistemology must be rejected on the grounds that they lead to incoherence. The status of the underdetermination argument remains unsettled. (shrink)

Depending on the dissemination of discursive forms through linguistic practices as well as a particular change in our contemporary doxa, the development language of collective social improvement has been based upon a particular mode of ontological naturalism. In a renewed version of the ontological mode that Descola termed “naturalism”, international development has set social expectations in terms of a progressive future framed by violent ruptures, crises, perils and a threat actual of human annihilation. This paper investigates how this developmental enterprise (...) and the consequent ideology of “developmentalism” have further expanded a bi-polar ontology. Since its inception, it articulates two radical sets of possibilities: one of infinite progress for humankind and one of its total annihilation according to the well-known metaphysics of possibilism. First, I will show how the institutionalization of development goes hand in hand with the emergence of a new form of naturalism that accentuates extreme possibilities as results of human action. My main claim here is that, after World War II, science and technology radicalized naturalism through the institutionalization of a new ideology. By presupposing a new transformational capability of science and technology, developmentalism furthers the naturalistic ontology. (shrink)

This paper deals with meta-statistical questions concerning frequentist statistics. In Sections 2 to 4 I analyse the dispute between Fisher and Neyman on the so called logic of statistical inference, a polemic that has been concomitant of the development of mathematical statistics. My conclusion is that, whenever mathematical statistics makes it possible to draw inferences, it only uses deductive reasoning. Therefore I reject Fisher's inductive approach to the statistical estimation theory and adhere to Neyman's deductive one. On the other (...) class='Hi'>hand, I assert that Neyman-Pearson's testing theory, as well as Fisher's tests of significance, properly belong to decision theory, not to logic, neither deductive nor inductive. I then also disagree with Costantini's view of Fisher's testing model as a theory of hypothetico-deductive inferences.In Section 5 I disapprove Hacking1's evidentialists criticisms of the Neyman-Pearson's theory of statistics (NPT), as well as Hacking2's interpretation of NPT as a theory of probable inference. In both cases Hacking misses the point. I conclude, by claiming that Mayo's conception of the Neyman-Pearson's testing theory, as a model of learning from experience, does not purport any advantages over Neyman's behavioristic model. (shrink)

Moral motivation refers to the psychological causes that motivate or explain moral action. Moral action refers to action that complies with the requirements of morality. In this essay, I lay out alternative views on moral motivation, giving particular attention the way each view conceives of the explanatory link between practical reasoning and moral conduct. In trying to understand this link, philosophers look to moral judgment. The main rival accounts of the relationship between practical reasoning, moral judgment, and moral motivation can (...) be distinguished according to the way in which they respond to two questions: (1) Can a cognitive (i.e., belief-like) state produce in an agent a motivation at time t, without being accompanied by an affective (i.e., emotional or desire-like) state which exists prior to t? (2) Are moral judgments cognitive states or affective states? -/- I shall defend the Humean theory of motivation, or HTM, as the best account of moral motivation. HTM is often called the belief-desire model of action because it explains behavior by citing a combination of a desire for some end and a belief that a certain action is a means to satisfying that desire. The Humean answer to the first question above is that any process of practical reasoning which generates a motivation is necessarily linked to a non-cognitive state. Regarding the second question, Humeans are split between cognitivists and non-cognitivists. Anti-Humeans, on the other hand, hold that moral judgments express cognitive states, and that cognitive states can independently produce motivations via practical reasoning. -/- I offer two arguments in favor of HTM. First, I suggest that Humeanism meets one criterion of theory choice better than anti-Humeanism. This is the continuity constraint. Given that humans and non-humans evolved common ancestors, the continuity constraint advises us to prefer an account of human psychology which can explain how complex human traits evolved from simpler antecedents resembling the traits of non-human animals. Non-human primates, in particular, are capable of acting altruistically toward con-specifics. Altruistic behavior in primates can shed light on an evolutionary precursor to moral action in humans, since morally significant action often involves altruism. I maintain that a Humean theory of motivation offers the best explanation of altruistic behavior in non-human primates. Therefore, by the continuity constraint, HTM should be the preferred model of the psychological mechanisms underlying human moral motivation, unless empirical evidence strongly suggests otherwise. -/- To ward off the objection that anti-Humeanism is warranted due to the vast differences between humans and non-human primates, I offer a second argument for HTM. This is an argument from a criterion of theory choice called Morgan’s Canon. Morgan’s Canon is a standard of theoretical parsimony according to which a psychological mechanism should be attributed to an organism only if it’s the sole mechanism which can cause some behavior. I argue that HTM meets this criterion much better than anti-Humeanism. This is because the special psychological mechanisms which anti-Humeans postulate to explain moral action are not the sole mechanisms which could produce such action. Rather, the Humean belief-desire model could easily be recruited to explain moral action, as well as a broad variety of non-moral actions. (shrink)

Testimony about the future dangerousness of a person has become a central staple of many judicial processes. In settings such as bail, sentencing, and parole decisions, in rulings about the civil confinement of the mentally ill, and in custody decisions in a context of domestic violence, the assessment of a person’s propensity towards physical or sexual violence is regarded as a deciding factor. These assessments can be based on two forms of expert testimony: actuarial or clinical. The purpose of this (...) paper is to examine the scientific and epistemological basis of both methods of prediction or risk assessment. My analysis will reveal that this kind of expert testimony is scientifically baseless. The problems I will discuss will generate a dilemma for factfinders: on the one hand, given the weak predictive abilities of the branches of science involved, they should not admit expert clinical or actuarial testimony as evidence; on the other hand, there is a very strong tradition and a vast jurisprudence that supports the continued use of this kind of expert testimony. It is a clear case of the not so uncommon conflict between science and legal tradition. (shrink)

According to Ronald Dworkin's mature views on jurisprudence, legal normativity depends on judges’ views about political morality. Plato's own mature views on this subject seem to take the contrary position as he claims that the law is expected to be authoritative in order to preserve a given state of affairs. Therefore, in Plato's view judges are not expected to interpret the law ubiquitously according to their own standards of political morality. In what follows, the discussion starts off by offering a (...) brief account of Dworkin's interpretivism and some of its shortcomings. We shall then move on to Plato's account of legal normativity, especially his views on the authority of law, law as preservation, and finally the politics of law in the light of the debate between conservatism and progressivism. (shrink)

RESUMO O presente artigo pretende sistematizar os principais elementos do conceito de "cena", termo fundamental para a conexão entre teoria e método no pensamento do filósofo francês Jacques Rancière. O "método da igualdade" empregado por Rancière pretende, entre outras coisas, delimitar os diferentes momentos de conflito entre regimes de verdade e atos de tomada da palavra - independentemente de classificações feitas a priori como dados para se investigar um objeto de estudo - por meio do conceito de "literalidade", que demonstra (...) duas lógicas distintas de circulação das palavras: de um lado, uma lógica "policial"; de outro, uma lógica "política". Desta maneira, o conceito de "cena" é um elemento central em uma significativa mudança da relação teoria-metodologia-objeto defendida por boa parte do meio acadêmico, inclusive na área de história, nos dias atuais, uma vez que toma a própria noção de historicidade como descontínua e considera amplamente a racionalidade das palavras em vez da minuciosa articulação dos fatos. ABSTRACT This article intends to systematize the main elements of the concept of 'scene', a fundamental term for the connection between theory and method in the thought of the French philosopher Jacques Rancière. Rancière's 'method of equality' aims, among other things, to delineate the different moments of conflict between regimes of truth and acts of taking the word - regardless of classifications made a priori as data to investigate an object of study - through of the concept of 'literality', which demonstrates two distinct logics of word circulation: on the one hand, a 'police' logic; on the other, a 'political' logic. In this way, the concept of 'scene' is a central element in a significant change in the theory-methodology-object relation defended by a fair amount of the academic world, including in history field, nowadays, since it takes the very notion of historicity as discontinuous and broadly considers the rationality of words rather than the detailed articulation of facts. (shrink)

Literature reports that depressive symptoms may precede suicidal ideation. Several studies have identified social support and substance use as moderators of this relationship. However, no study has evaluated these variables together by testing how substance use can affect the moderating effect of social support in this relationship. The purpose of this article is to individually evaluate dimensions of social support (friends, family, significant others, and school) and substance use (alcohol, marijuana, and other illicit drugs), as moderators of the relationship between (...) depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation; as well as analyze the moderating role of substance use in the moderation exerted by social support in this relationship. This study, quantitative and cross-sectional, considered 775 adolescents [Average age = 15.48 (SD = 0.96), 45.9% women], from 20 randomly selected schools in Santiago de Chile. Simple moderation models were used to analyze possible moderators separately, and double moderation models were used to analyze the moderating role of substance use in the moderating effect of social support. The results show that the four dimensions of social support moderate the relationship between depressive symptomatology and suicidal ideation, showing the strongest interaction in the case of family support, followed by support of a significant person, support at school, and support of friends, in that order. On the other hand, alcohol was the only drug that moderated the relationship in question. In addition, the results show that the use of alcohol limits the moderating effect of social support in the fields of family, significant person, and school support, but not in the case of support of friends. The use of marijuana and other illicit drugs did not affect the moderating effects of social support for any of the areas evaluated. The results are discussed according to the different roles that alcohol use can play in adolescence, and how these, together with perceived social support, are related to the emergence of suicidal ideation from depressive symptoms. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to explore the concept of Philosophy within the works written by Wittgenstein if we take into account the ambivalent sense of the term phármakon. Thus, it will be outlined a contest of paradoxes between, on the one hand, healthiness, sanity, and the adaptable confidence produced by western rationality materialized into objective science, and, on the other hand, sickness, insanity, the world of perplexities, and the realm of desire and death, essential to philosophical (...) thought. Bearing in mind last Wittgenstein’s approaches, we will understand the Tractatus both critical to the deficiencies of western Reason and imprisoned within them. But the “enchanting” power of western Reason, conducting to identify rationality and scientificity in that work, will be conjured in the last Wittgenstein through the opening of plural realms of rationality and of discourses. In this way, philosophical questions will be rescued from silence and absurdity. (shrink)

This article takes up Diogenes again, investigating some of the reasons Diogenes has been unappreciated, and making a case for Diogenes' mind-based teleology as a significant philosophical contribution. The sophists, too, have suffered from the charge, which goes back to Plato, of not being “real” philosophers. Diogenes did not bother himself with, or was not interested in, showing in what sense the world is organized in the best possible manner; this looked to him as something that happened as a matter (...) of course. What did interest him, on the other hand, was to show what the thing that exercised intelligence is. From this point of view, the emphasis is definitely not on teleology, but rather on noetics. Here, primary textual evidence is available, for the fragments, as well as Simplicius's presentation of them, definitely support the view that the point of Diogenes' argumentation was to show that intelligence is air's. (shrink)

Unification of physical theories is an ambiguous idea. Gravitation is perhaps distinct from “other” interactions. Arguments for a unification can be found, either from an analysis of the nature of time, or from the canonicity of most formalisms used in physics. Space-time continuum requires a physics of fields, but not necessarily of quantized fields. Various notions of space as used in physics show that these spaces—including Newtonian space—are never real spaces, but inventions of the mind not only useful, but necessary (...) for the development of many physical theories. Time is, on the other hand, real. (shrink)

In a famous text Descartes has written this:Whenever the thought of God's supreme power occurs to me, I cannot help feeling that he might easily, if he so wished, make me go wrong even in what I think I see most clearly with my mind's eye. On the other hand, whenever I turn to the matters themselves which I think I perceive very clearly, I am so convinced by them that I burst out: ‘let who will deceive me, he (...) can never bring it about that I should be nothing at the time of thinking that I am something, nor that it be true that I never existed if it is true that I exist now; nor even that two and three together make more or less than five, or any such thing in which I see manifest contradiction’. (shrink)

In the last decade, the migrant population in Chile has substantially increased, where the rates have not only increased in the adult population, but also among children and adolescents, creating a potential for social and cultural development in the educational system. The present work analyzes the relationship between self-concept, self-efficacy, and subjective well-being in native and migrant adolescents in Santiago de Chile. The sample consisted of 406 students, 56.65% women, with an age range that fluctuated between 12 and 16 years, (...) with an average of 13.36 years. Student’s t-tests were used to compare the average of the constructs evaluated between natives/migrants and boys/girls participants. Subsequently, two multivariate models of simple mediation were constructed, one for natives and another for migrants, which assumed subjective well-being as a dependent variable, academic self-concept as an independent variable and the general self-efficacy as a mediating variable. In both models, gender was considered as a control variable. Results show that migrant students present higher levels of academic self-concept and general self-efficacy than native students. There are no differences with regard to well-being. In the case of gender, differences are observed only for the case of general self-efficacy, where boys present higher levels. On the other hand, a partial mediation is observed for the model of native students and a total mediation for the model of migrant students. The study yielded interesting results regarding the differences in the evaluation of the constructs of self-concept, self-efficacy, and subjective well-being in both groups. Such data can be used as inputs for the development of public policies for adolescents. (shrink)

Very few—if any—will doubt Hobbes's aversion to the state of nature and sympathy for civil society. On the other hand, it is not quite news that it would be inaccurate to claim that Hobbes rejected the state of nature entirely. Indeed, he embraced or at the very least tolerated the state of nature at the international level in order to escape from the individual state of nature. Hobbes's recommended exchange of an individual state of nature for an international one (...) does seem to have a smack of contradiction, arguably first noted by Rousseau. There is yet another charge of contradiction lurking around Hobbes's account of the state of nature. Hobbes's political thought would still reflect an ambivalent attitude towards a third instantiation of the state of nature, i.e. civil war. This is one of the main reasons why the political allegiance of Thomas Hobbes has been an issue ever since the publication of De Cive at the very least. This paper deals with Hobbes's differential treatment of the original and the international states of nature and discusses the source of Hobbes's somewhat ambivalent attitude towards civil war. It is here argued that Hobbes can fairly hold his ground vis-à-vis Rousseau's criticism, in spite of the normative resemblance between the international state of nature and the initial state of nature, and that Hobbes ambivalent attitude of attraction and repulsion towards civil war is actually due not so much to opportunism on his part as to the normative autonomy he has granted to the state of nature. (shrink)

Le développement conjoint, au cours du XVIIIe siècle, de la méthode historico-critique et du perspectivisme est à l'origine d'une tension nouvelle dans le traitement de l'histoire de la philosophie. L'article analyse brièvement quelques réactions, plus ou moins radicales, à cette configuration féconde. Zeller, Dilthey, Yorck, Nietzsche, Weber, Heidegger, Rorty, sont les principaux témoins. Il est aussi suggéré que la « doxographie », en dépit de la réputation détestable dont elle jouit, aussi bien chez les historiens que chez les philosophes, demeure (...) une composante importante de toute réflexion sur la relation de la philosophie à son passé. The joint development, in the course of the XVIIIth century, of the historico-critical method on the one hand and of a self-conscious perspectivism on the other hand, created a new tension in the handling of the history of philosophy. In the following, I sketch some characteristic ways, hard or more compromising, of dealing with this lasting and, I suggest, productive tension. Zeller, Dilthey, Yorck, Nietzsche, Weber, Heidegger, Rorty are my main witnesses. In the wake of an analysis made by M. Frede, I also suggest, in the light of this tension, that « doxography », despite the detestable reputation the genre has among philosophers and historians of philosophy alike, remains an important component of any reflexion about the relationship between philosophy and its past. (shrink)

The possible evolutionary significance of epigenetic memory and codes is a key problem for extended evolutionary synthesis and biosemiotics. In this paper, some less known original works are reviewed which highlight theoretical parallels between current evolutionary epigenetics, on the one hand, and its predecessors in the eco-physiology of higher nervous activity, on the other. Recently, these areas have begun to converge, with first evidence now indicating the possibility of transgenerational epigenetic inheritance of conditional associations in the mammalian nervous system, (...) and related findings in other taxa. This can serve as an interesting example of evolutionary code-making, where the molecular mechanisms underlying arbitrary associations between stimuli involve lasting changes in gene expression that may be transmitted epigenetically across generations, and which in some cases could be further assimilated into the genome over subsequent evolution. Although preliminary, such epigenetic scenarios would also offer an interesting, if so far overlooked parallel to earlier research carried out by one of I.P. Pavlov’s leading students, acad. P.K. Anokhin, and his colleagues, but also by eminent eco-physiologists of the time, several of whom offered arguments for the possibility of unconditional reflexes representing evolutionarily later, specialized, and reduced forms of associative reflexes, from which they may be derived. Although discarded under the growing dominance of modern synthesis, these early epigenetic investigations may deserve renewed attention in the modern context, and if further confirmed, could open essentially new perspectives on the morphofunctional evolution of the nervous system. (shrink)

Resumen En esta conversación, María del Rosario Acosta y Jean-Luc Nancy reflexionan sobre los distintos registros de la palabra "murmullo" y la relación que puede establecerse entre cada uno de ellos y la pregunta por la crítica política y de lo político en el pensamiento de Nancy. El aspecto sonoro del murmullo permite acercarse, por un lado, a una reflexión sobre la circulación del sentido en términos de resonancia. Conduce también a la pregunta por la singularidad de la experiencia de (...) la escucha en la constitución de ser-en-común, y por el papel del testimonio -y la desaparición de espacios para su escucha- en medio de las múltiples violencias que afectan nuestro presente histórico. Nancy revisa algunas de sus posturas anteriores frente a estas preguntas, profundiza en otras, y trae a colación temas nuevos que no se encuentran desarrollados en otros de sus escritos. Como texto inédito, esta conversación es un homenaje a su voz en el contexto de su muerte reciente. Nos recuerda que el murmullo de su pensamiento seguirá circulando entre nosotres.In this conversation, María del Rosario Acosta and Jean-Luc Nancy reflect on the different registers of the word "murmur" and the relationship that can be established between each of them and the question of the political and political criticism in the thought of Nancy. The sound aspect of the murmur allows us to approach, on the one hand, a reflection on the circulation of meaning in terms of resonance. It also leads to the question of the uniqueness of the experience of listening in the constitution of being-in-common, and of the role of testimony -and the disappearance of spaces for listening to it- during the multiple violence that affects our historical present. Nancy reviews some of his previous positions on these questions, delves into others, and brings up new themes that are not developed in other of his writings. As a previously unpublished text, this conversation is a tribute to his voice in the context of his recent death. He reminds us that the murmur of his thoughts will continue to circulate. (shrink)

Establishing the basic knowledge, methodology, and technology for a framework for the continuous decoding of hand/arm movement intention was the aim of the ERC-funded project “Feel Your Reach”. In this work, we review the studies and methods we performed and implemented in the last 6 years, which build the basis for enabling severely paralyzed people to non-invasively control a robotic arm in real-time from electroencephalogram. In detail, we investigated goal-directed movement detection, decoding of executed and attempted movement trajectories, grasping (...) correlates, error processing, and kinesthetic feedback. Although we have tested some of our approaches already with the target populations, we still need to transfer the “Feel Your Reach” framework to people with cervical spinal cord injury and evaluate the decoders’ performance while participants attempt to perform upper-limb movements. While on the one hand, we made major progress towards this ambitious goal, we also critically discuss current limitations. (shrink)

For Bakhtin the “gradual narrowing down” of the carnival’s regenerative power is directly linked to its separation from “folk culture” and its ensuing domestication as “part of the family’s private life.” Nonetheless, Bakhtin’s faith in the inherent indestructibility of “the carnival spirit” compels him to find it preserved, even if in an interiorized and psychological form, in the post-Renaissance literary tradition, and he specifically names Diderot, along with Molière, Voltaire, and Swift, as authors who kept alive the subversive possibilities of (...) a Saturnalian laughter . But, of course, as Bakhtin himself recognizes, much more has changed in both the nature and the effects of that laughter than merely its locus of action. The crucial difference, according to Bakhtin, is a new sense of terror felt at the heart of the post-Renaissance carnival grotesque:The transformation of the principle of laughter which permeates the grotesque, that is the loss of its regenerating power, leads to a series of other essential differences between Romantic grotesque and medieval and Renaissance grotesque…The world of Romantic grotesque is to a certain extent a terrifying word, alien to man…Something frightening is revealed in that which was habitual and secure. [Pp. 38-39]Directly linked to this burden of terror, of laughter as a response to dread, not exuberance, is a change in the literary function of madness:Other specific traits are linked with the disappearance of laughter’s regenerating power…. The theme of madness is inherent to all grotesque forms, because madness makes men look at the world with different eyes, not dimmed by “normal,” that is by commonplace ideas and judgments. In folk grotesque, madness is a gay parody of official reason, of the narrow seriousness of official “truth.” It is a “festive” madness. In Romantic grotesque, on the other hand, madness acquires a somber, tragic aspect of individual isolation. [P. 39]Bakhtin’s typology of laughter, for all its richly textured local insights, is haunted, from its inception, by a wistfully nostalgic longing for a realm of pure and ahistorical spontaneity, a rite of universal participation whose essentially affirmative character is guaranteed by its very universality. The most characteristic feature of such a carnival is, in fact, its abolition of all distinctions between participant and viewer:Carnival does not know footlights, in the sense that it does not acknowledge any distinction between actors and spectators. Footlights would destroy a carnival, as the absence of footlights would destroy a theatrical performance. Carnival is not a spectacle seen by the people; they live in it, and everyone participates because its very idea embraces all the people. While carnival lasts, there is no other life outside it…. It has a universal spirit: it is a special condition of the entire world, of the world’s revival and renewal, in which all take part. [P. 7]Yet as soon as the question of representation arises, whether in Rabelais or in his successors, the “footlights” which separate actor and spectator, reader and character, come into being, introducing the very divisions the work’s themes deny. Belatedness, the knowledge of coming after the festival has already been fragmented, is thus not limited to a post-Rabelaisian, bourgeois culture; it is itself a condition of every Saturnalian text, and what has changed is not the inclusiveness of the carnival per se but the literary consequences of acknowledging that belatedness. Michael André Bernstein, associate professor of English and comparative literature at the University of California, Berkeley, is the author of The Tale of the Tribe: Ezra Pound and the Modern Verse Epic and Prima della Rivoluzione, a volume of verse. He is currently at work on a book about the Abject Hero and literary genealogy. (shrink)

The focus is on the meaning of ὑπόϑεσις in Irenaeus of Lyons’ Adversus haereses. Our case is to argue that two different elements converge in ὑπόϑεσις or its translations in the Latin version of AH. The first stems from the Greek literary field, in which ὑπόϑεσις means the “subject” or “plot” of a dramatic or poetic composition. The second is related to the philosophical meaning of ὑπόϑεσις as “that which is placed under” or “foundation”. On the one hand, Irenaeus (...) uses ὑπόϑεσις theologically to express the plot of the historia salutis, so that the term can be understood as teaching or doctrine. On the other hand, this ὑπόϑεσις is at the same time a regula, the normative foundation of all the elements that take part in God’s economy of salvation. (shrink)

Freedom of expression is one of the issues of concern to human societies in the contemporary world, because this issue is one of the most important basic rights of people in societies due to its special nature, and on the other hand, it is always in conflict with the authoritarian point of view. Islam accepts freedom of expression for everyone in the Islamic society, but it has specified limits and regulations for it. These restrictions and conditions, more than cumbersome (...) and intolerable regulations, are instructions for better use of freedom, which if not followed, not only the freedom of everyone in the society will not be realized, but also the category it will become anti-value and create cultural chaos. Imam Ali (peace be upon him), during his rule period, not only did not limit the freedom of expression, but also emphasized the expansion of this freedom. Based on Islam, since man is a free being, the privacy of his freedom must always be preserved; Therefore, freedom is the natural right of every human being and cannot be taken away from him. The practical life of Imam Ali (PBUH) and his advice to his agents in caring for freedom of expression in society and politics, bring its importance to the fore. Considering the importance of this issue, the purpose of this research is to study freedom of expression in Islamic teachings with emphasis on Nahj al-Balagha. Based on this, the related themes to freedom of expression have been extracted and explained from the point of view of Nahj al-Balagha, and conclusions have been presented in this regard. Contribution: This research showed that in the Islamic system, all citizens have the right to freedom of speech in ideological, political and social issues (according to the limits set by Islamic teachings and prevent the violation of Islamic values and other human values). These points are emphasized in Islamic teachings, especially in Nahj al-Balagha. (shrink)

The author interprets the dialogues belonging to Plato’s first Tetralogy, i. e. Euthyphro, Apology, Crito and Phaedo, as a coherent whole, in which the concept of ‘gratuitousness’ plays the leading role. The expression ‘gratuitous’ does not mean here, however, ‘arbitrary’ or ‘as someone likes’ but rather ‘free’, ‘gratis’, ‘for nothing’. Based on such an interpretation the author discusses then the important similarities existing between – on the one hand – Plato’s metaphysics of ‘gratuitousness’ and – on the other (...) class='Hi'>hand – Meister Eckhart’s ‘mystics’ and Schelling’s Philosophy of Identity. These three thinkers are all interested in the world as it is not merely for us or for something else – that is not in the world as it merely appears to someone under particular given conditions –, but in the world as it is in itself. However, this distinction between ‘appearances’ and ‘things-in-themselves’ is not to be thought as an epistemological but rather as an ethical or existential one, which is not related to the way how we ‘can know’ the world but rather to the way how we ‘should live’ in it. (shrink)

RESUMEN En el marco de la pregunta por la actualidad del pensamiento político de Hegel ha surgido en las últimas décadas una renovada vertiente interpretativa que defiende la tesis de la indeterminación del monarca como un elemento necesario en los Principios de la filosofía del derecho. Esta tesis consiste, por un lado, en que el monarca, aun como soberano, cumple una función meramente protocolar dentro de la Constitución; y por otro lado, afirma que, en esa medida, su particularidad o su (...) carácter personal es completamente irrelevante para la administración y desarrollo de los asuntos públicos. Sin embargo, a partir de una revisión detallada de los argumentos originales de la obra se logra apreciar que dicha tesis resulta problemática. Este trabajo se propone explicitar las razones que demuestran dicha inconsistencia, así como señalar otros aspectos particulares en la argumentación hegeliana que invitan a poner nuevamente la mirada en este elemento complejo de su obra y pensamiento. ABSTRACT Within the framework of the question about the actuality of Hegel's political thought, a renewed interpretative perspective has arisen in recent decades, which defends the thesis of the monarch's indetermination as a necessary component at Elements of Philosophy of Right. This thesis claims, on the one hand, that the monarch, even as a sovereign, fulfills a titular function within the Constitution; and on the other hand, it maintains that, to that extent, his particularity or personal character is completely irrelevant for the determination of public affairs. However, based on a detailed review of the original arguments of Hegel's work, it is possible to appreciate that this thesis is problematic. This article seeks to explain the reasons which prove this inconsistency. It also highlights other particular aspects of Hegel's argument which invite to reconsider this complex aspect of his work and thought. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 269 severally through hearing, tasting, and smelling, so that we should have on our hands five spatially unrelated spaces. He can find no reason for abandoning the spontaneous commonsense conviction that the puffing I hear is that of the locomotive I am looking at, that the chocolate I am tasting is the one I have put in my mouth, that what I am smelling is the rose (...) I am seeing and also perhaps holding; and, to return to Berkeley, that I perceive the surface I am seeing to be the very one that I am touching with my finger. Mr. Armstrong seems to be laying down the basis of a general theory of perception, that no given perception can be reduced to the datum proper to the sense-organ used plus an associate, a guess, or an inference. To turn this negative statement into a positive one, to say what the activity is that grasps more than the presumed datum, and what makes it reliable, is, as the history of the theory of perception makes plain, desperately hard. Far from grumbling at Mr. Armstrong for not having gone forward to this task, I am grateful for his having given us a book that is so intelligent, acute, clear, stimulating, and blessedly concise--one that deserves to be read by anyone interested in Berkeley, or the theory of vision, or the theory of perception generally. T. E. Jzssov Hull, England Studies in the Philosophy of David Hume. A new edition. By Charles W. Hendel. (Indianapolis, New York: The Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1963. 14 x 21. Pp. li + 516.) Cette nouvelle 6dition des Studies a subi d'importants changements non seulement dans sa pr6sentation, mais aussi dans son esprit. Elle nous prouve combien la pens6e d'un homme se d6veloppe sans cesse et s'enrichit. L'interpr&ation d'un philosophe et la pens& m~me du philosophe ont connu et connaissent encore ces transformations. La pens& humaine ne consid~re jamais sa t$che comme achev&. C'est pourquoi nous ne devons jamais cesser d'ftendre le champ de nos &udes philosophiques pour provoquer la naissance de nouvelles comparaisons f&ondes. Nous y passons certes beaucoup de temps, en retour, nous discernons mieux les complexit6s de la nature humaine. Nous savions d6jh qu'il y avait plusieurs Platon, car le progr& de l'homme se poursuivait de dialogue en dialogue; nous savons maintenant qu'il y a plusieurs David Hume, et que le Hume de Kant ou le Hume du dernier siecle, ne peuvent plus 6tre les n6tres. Comme le remarque Charles Hendel, dans son introduction, vingt-cinq annfes ont suffi h renouveler l'interpr&ation que nous donnions de Hume. Aujourd'hui c'est l'imagination qui se forme l'habitude de repr&enter par un seul mot une collection d'id&s semblables et qui nous sugg~re d'user de l'id& de causalit~ pour interpr&er le retour de cons&utions analogues. C'est aussi l'imagination, plus que la raison, qui nous r&~le la probabilit~ d'un &6nement donn6. Hendel nous rapelle aussi que Buder pourrait bien avoir inspir6 ~t Hume l'importance morale de la sympathie, et que l'Alciphron de Berkeley aurait sugg6r6 le Cl~anthe des Dialogues sur la Religion Naturelle. Hendel a 6galement raison d'insister sur l'importance des interpr&ations de Norman Kemp Smith. Cette nouvelle et si 6rudite &ude de Hendel nous fait mieux comprendre ~ la fois les variations des pens6es de Hume, de Kemp Smith et de Hendel lui-m~me. Nous sommes ainsi mieux avertis des difficult6s de l'histoire de la philosophie, dues non seulement au d6veloppement des sciences, mais aussi du progr&s moral et spirituel, sujet h tant de fluctuations dans l'histoire et m~me, ~t une m~me epoque, d'homme h homme. Aussi cette nouvelle ~dition ne manquera pas d'apporter de nouvelles dart& h nombre de ses lecteurs. ANDV.a~ Lotas LEROY Sorbonne... (shrink)

Resumen En este artículo se examina el papel de la enseñanza de la filosofía de la educación en la formación inicial docente, tomando como punto de partida la tensión que es posible notar entre, por un lado, el discurso de la mayoría de las facultades encargadas de preparar profesores, que rescatan la necesidad de formar docentes críticos y reflexivos, y, por otro lado, la praxis de la formación docente que parece tener un acento marcadamente técnico. Ante este escenario, se argumenta (...) para mostrar que la filosofía de la educación sí resulta atingente en el contexto de la formación inicial docente, que lejos de desempeñar una función meramente complementaria en dicha formación, ésta debe cumplir un papel fundamental y, por tanto, articulador de los diversos saberes y competencias propios de un profesor, y que de nada sirve defender el valor fundamental de la filosofía de la educación, si éste no es comprendido como tal por los futuros profesores, por lo que resulta vital pensar cuidadosamente los contenidos, metodologías y momentos adecuados para impartir esta materia.This paper examines the role of the teaching of the philosophy of education in the initial teacher training, taking as a starting point the tension that can be noted between, on the one hand, the discourse of most of the faculties in charge to prepare teachers, who rescue the need to train critical and reflective teachers, and, on the other hand, the praxis of teacher training that seems to have a markedly technical accent. Given this scenario, it is argued to show that the philosophy of education is relevant in the context of initial teacher training, far from playing a purely complementary role in such training, it must play a fundamental role that lets it organize the diverse knowledge and competences of a teacher, and that it is useless to defend the fundamental value of the philosophy of education, if it is not understood as such by prospective teachers, so that it is crucial to think carefully about the contents, methodologies and appropriate moments to impart this subject. (shrink)

Social identity poses one of the most important challenges to rational choice theory, but rational choice theorists do not hold a common position regarding identity. On one hand, externalist rational choice ignores the concept of identity or reduces it to revealed preferences. On the other hand, internalist rational choice considers identity as a key concept in explaining social action because it permits expressive motivations to be included in the models. However, internalist theorists tend to reduce identity to desire—the (...) desire of a person to express his or her social being. From an internalist point of view, that is, from a viewpoint in which not only desires but also beliefs play a key role in social explanations as mental entities, this article rejects externalist reductionism and proposes a redefinition of social identity as a net of beliefs about oneself, beliefs that are indexical, robust, and socially shaped. (shrink)

We show that in the lattice E Π of Π 0 1 classes there are initial segments [ $\emptyset$ , P] = L(P) which are not Boolean algebras, but which have a decidable theory. In fact, we will construct for any finite distributive lattice L which satisfies the dual of the usual reduction property a Π 0 1 class P such that L is isomorphic to the lattice L(P)*, which is L(P), modulo finite differences. For the 2-element lattice, we obtain (...) a minimal class, first constructed by Cenzer, Downey, Jockusch and Shore in 1993. For the simplest new Π 0 1 class P constructed, P has a single, non-computable limit point and L(P)* has three elements, corresponding to $\emptyset$ , P and a minimal class P $_0 \subset$ P. The element corresponding to P 0 has no complement in the lattice. On the other hand, the theory of L(P) is shown to be decidable. A Π 0 1 class P is said to be decidable if it is the set of paths through a computable tree with no dead ends. We show that if P is decidable and has only finitely many limit points, then L(P)* is always a Boolean algebra. We show that if P is a decidable Π 0 1 class and L(P) is not a Boolean algebra, then the theory of L(P)interprets the theory of arithmetic and is therefore undecidable. (shrink)

This article aims to shed light on both the foundations and the consistency of the position regarding akrasia Xenophon attributes to Socrates in the Memorabilia. As does Plato's Socrates, Xenophon's Socrates maintains that akrasia is impossible in the presence of knowledge. On the other hand, he differs from the platonic Socrates by granting to enkrateia, instead of knowledge, the role of foundation for virtue. If enkrateia is the very condition for acquiring knowledge and virtue, consequently the responsibility for countering (...) akrasia falls to enkrateia. (shrink)

In this study an attempt has been made to understand nationalism, notably as the particular political conviction by which the realm of public and civic concern is required to coincide with a culturally and ethnically specified nationality. While exploring the idea of a nation state in its varying developments during the past few centuries, two interpretations are discovered, the revolutionary and the romantic understanding of a nation. This leads, through analysis, to contrast the specific modes of nationalistic logic to which (...) both of them gave rise. The investigation of Jacobin nationalism leads the author to assume the existence of a secret link between the Rousseauian conception of absolute democracy and popular sovereignty, on the one hand, and the rise of nationalism, on the other hand. In conclusion, the author argues for the necessity of a different, pluralistic conception of democracy in order to prevent national feelings from degenerating into crude nationalism. (shrink)