Contemporary Darwinian medicine is a still-expanding new discipline whose principal aim is to arrive at an evolutionary understanding of aspects of the body that leave it vulnerable to disease. Historically, there was a precedent; between 1880 and 1940 several scientists tried to develop a general evolutionary theory of disease as arising from deleterious traits that escape elimination by natural selection. In contrast, contemporary Darwinian medicine uses evolutionary theory to consider all the possible reasons why selection has left human vulnerable to (...) a disease. (shrink)

Jacob (history, New School for Social Research) proposes that the science of the 17th and 18th centuries was eventually accepted because it was made compatible with larger political and economic interests. A celebration of the recently concluded 33 volume edition of the Collected works of John Stuart Mill, produced over a period of nearly 30 years, the last 20 under the guiding genius (and hand) of general editor Robson. Following a tributary history of the project itself, essays cover Mill's (...) career as a thinker and as a bureaucrat and public servant, exploring the effects of the various milieu--domestic, political, administrative, religious, and cultural--in which he moved. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR. (shrink)

Internal misconduct is a universal problem in prisons and affects the maintenance of social order. Consequently, correctional institutions often develop rehabilitation programs to reduce the likelihood of inmates committing internal offenses and criminal recidivism after release. Therefore, it is necessary to identify the profile of each offender, both for the appropriate indication of a rehabilitation program and the level of internal security to which he must be submitted. In this context, this work aims to discover the most significant characteristics in (...) predicting inmate misconduct from ML methods and the SHAP approach. A database produced in 2004 through the Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Correctional Facilities in the United States of America was used, which provides nationally representative data on prisoners from state and federal facilities. The predictive model based on Random Forest performed the best, thus, we applied the SHAP to it. Overall, the results showed that features related to victimization, type of crime committed, age and age at first arrest, history of association with criminal groups, education, and drug and alcohol use are most relevant in predicting internal misconduct. Thus, it is expected to contribute to the prior classification of an inmate on time, to use programs and practices that aim to improve the lives of offenders, their reintegration into society, and consequently, the reduction of criminal recidivism. (shrink)

Das Buch untersucht die Bedeutung des Begriffs rationalitas bei Hildegard von Bingen. Zunachst wird die Herkunft des Begriffs von der griechischen Logoslehre uber die fruhchristliche Trinitatsspekulation bis hin zur ratio-Rezeption des Fruhmittelalters beleuchtet. Auf diesem Hintergrund entfaltet der zweite Teil die anthropologisch-theologische Bedeutung von rationalitas fur das Weltbild Hildegards.

This article explores the nature and theoretical import of a hitherto neglected class of fictions which we term ‘self-involving interactive fictions’. SIIFs are interactive fictions, but they differ from standard examples of interactive fictions by being, in some important sense, about those who consume them. In order to better understand the nature of SIIFs, and the ways in which they differ from other fictions, we focus primarily on the most prominent example of the category: video-game fictions. We argue that appreciating (...) the self-involving nature of video-game fictions is key to understanding various otherwise puzzling phenomena concerning the ways in which consumers respond to them. Video-game fictions are, however, far from being the only extant example of this class; and we suggest that the recent philosophical interest in video games would be better focused on the wider class of self-involving interactive fictions. (shrink)

Figurative experience, as a codified system of images, emerges in Europe about 40.000 years ago. Together with the development of a figurative system, Homo sapiens acquired his modern cognitive architecture: an entirely articulated language, as well-developed as our current phonological system is, and others cognitive capacities such as basic drawing skills, self-consciousness and group cohesiveness. “Making sign”, as a complex nonverbal symbolism, is a crucial stage in human evolution: a stage of complex symbolism by means of a non-verbal language. Its (...) value is both eidetic, when it aims at producing metaphoric and shared images, and individual, when it is involved in individual performances, that do not imply spectators. (shrink)

Focused on city-scale automation, and using self-driving cars (SDCs) as a case study, this article reflects on the role of AI—and in particular, computer vision systems used for mapping and navigation—as a catalyst for urban transformation. Urban research commonly presents AI and cities as having a one-way cause-and-effect relationship, giving undue weight to AI’s impact on cities and overlooking the role of cities in shaping AI. Working at the intersection of data science and social research, this paper aims to counter (...) this trend by exploring the reverse perspective: how do cities affect the development, and expose the present limits, of SDCs? The contribution of this paper is threefold. First, by comparing urban and nonurban environments and thoroughly examining the relationship between computer vision and city-specific sociality and form, it defines machine autonomy/automation as a function of the sociotechnical milieu in which an AI system operates. Second, and related, the paper problematizes the notion of SDCs as autonomous technologies and the role it plays in envisioning contending policy arrangements and technical solutions for achieving full driving automation. Finally, the article offers insight into a materialist and spatialized understanding of AI—namely, not as an abstract quality susceptible to replication within discrete machines, but rather as a distributed property emerging through embodied interactions among a multiplicity of agents (human, non-human, and technological) within/with their environments. (shrink)

Sacred Landscape and Visual Culture. The Paintings of the Lower Church of the Sacro Speco at Subiaco - The purpose of this article is to investigate the emergence of landscape in visual discourses. The subject of this research is the territory of Subiaco and - more specifically - the monastery of the Sacro Speco, built on the site of St Benedict’s hermitage. It is here, in the vast decorative cycle directed by Magister Conxolus at the end of the thirteenth century, (...) that the “sacred landscape” of Subiaco is bent by the monastic community to claim its possession. Benedict is always portrayed inside his Grotto - which becomes a veritable “attribute” of the saint - and the same discourse also includes the portrayal of Chelidonia, a Benedictine hermit nun who lived between the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Through the experiences of the two saints, the landscape becomes sacralised and acquires an identity value for the Benedictine community which lives there. In this context, the figures of Benedict and Chelidonia create a visual bridge to Francis and Clare, and the frescoes becomes a Benedictine response to the “Franciscan challenge”. (shrink)

Background The field of bioethics has evolved over the past half-century, incorporating new domains of inquiry that signal developments in health research, clinical practice, public health in its broadest sense and more recently sensitivity to the interdependence of global health and the environment. These extensions of the reach of bioethics are a welcome response to the growth of global health as a field of vital interest and activity. Methods This paper provides a critical interpretive review of how the term “global (...) health ethics” has been used and defined in the literature to date to identify ethical issues that arise and need to be addressed when deliberating on and working to improve the discourse on ethical issues in health globally. Results Selected publications were analyzed by year of publication and geographical distribution, journal and field, level of engagement, and ethical framework. Of the literature selected, 151 articles were written by authors in high-income countries, as defined by the World Bank country classifications, 8 articles were written by authors in low- or middle-income countries, and 13 articles were collaborations between authors in HIC and LMIC. All of the articles selected except one from 1977 were published after 1998. Literature on global health ethics spiked considerably from the early 2000s, with the highest number in 2011. One hundred twenty-seven articles identified were published in academic journals, 1 document was an official training document, and 44 were chapters in published books. The dominant journals were the American Journal of Bioethics, Developing World Bioethics, and Bioethics. We coded the articles by level of engagement within the ethical domain at different levels: interpersonal, institutional, international, and structural. The ethical frameworks at use corresponded to four functional categories: those examining practical or narrowly applied ethical questions; those concerned with normative ethics; those examining an issue through a single philosophical tradition; and those comparing and contrasting insights from multiple ethical frameworks. Conclusions This critical interpretive review is intended to delineate the current contours and revitalize the conversation around the future charge of global health ethics scholarship. (shrink)

Era Nietzsche um relativista conservador ou, pelo contrário, seria possível alocar o filósofo no sítio teórico do pensamento crítico? Tal pergunta-problema delimita o presente artigo. Ela se refere a uma conhecida querela entre modelos interpretativos (SEBOLD, [20--?]) pós-modernos e naturalistas e, especificamente, deriva da revisão de literatura de uma pesquisa em andamento, realizada no âmbito do curso de doutorado do Programa de Pós-Graduação em Educação da Universidade Federal do Espírito Santo, a partir da qual observamos uma ausência, talvez um esquecimento (...) em relação à contribuição de Nietzsche para a filosofia crítica no campo da Educação, espaço acadêmico no qual as pesquisas, em grande medida, alinham-se à recepção relativista de seu pensamento. A hipótese central, comprovada pela análise de posições filosóficas de Nietzsche (1979; 1992a; 1992b; 1998; 2000; 2003; 2004) e de alguns de seus comentadores, considera que o filósofo é um pensador crítico (HEIT, 2018; HEIT; PICHLER, 2015), não relativista (MARTON, 2011), perspectivista (CORBANEZI, 2013; MATTOS, 2013) e adepto a um tipo perspectivístico de naturalismo (CARVALHO, 2018; HEIT, 2016; HEIT, 2015; ITAPARICA, 2018), traços que de certa forma tendem a impactar a cosmovisão, quase hegemônica, no que diz respeito à recepção nietzschiana no campo da educação. O objetivo central do artigo é destacar que a discussão destes aspectos pode levar a um reposicionamento da filosofia de Nietzsche no universo do pensamento contemporâneo, incluindo-se aí a pesquisa em educação, bem como compreender em que medida a perspectiva crítica se choca com a perspectiva relativista no que diz respeito à teorização de uma formação de caráter emancipatório. Em termos metodológicos, a análise da revisão de literatura recorre à hermenêutica crítica. (shrink)

Solidarity can be conceived in multiple ways. This article probes possible underlying ontological and normative assumptions of solidarity. In order to conceptually clarify the notion of solidarity, we distinguish between five types of solidarity. We suggest that solidarity is either grounded in the Enlightenment ideas of liberty, or a category of loyalty and allegiance. If the former is the case, solidarity can be justified on rational grounds. If the latter is the case, it is contingent on narratives of historical continuity (...) and a non-rational sense of belonging. Moreover, we show that different types of solidarity can be derived from Anglo-Saxon and continental thought, which hints at different conceptions of community. (shrink)

Este artigo objetiva identificar e analisar as múltiplas presenças do filósofo francês contemporâneo Gilles Deleuze no arranjo teórico-conceitual da Teoria da Dança Imanente. A Teoria da Dança Imanente, criada pela pensadora do corpo e da dança Ana Flávia Mendes, pretende atribuir um caráter de pessoalidade, idiossincrasia e subjetividade à obra coreográfica que se insere nos terrenos discursivos do corpo, das artes performativas e da ontologia da arte. Os conceitos-cernes abordados nesta investigação estão aliançados aos pressupostos contemporâneos dos estudos do corpo (...) e da dança especialmente no elo entre corpo, cena e vida. Para tanto, perpassaremos os conceitos de Corpo Imanente, Corpo como sujeito rizomático, Corpo sem Órgãos e a concepção de imanência como vida, de Mendes, os quais encontram-se intimamente relacionados com o panorama filosófico deleuziano. (shrink)

Heidegger has never been the darling of analytic philosophy. From Carnap’s (1931) dismissal of ‘the nothing noths’ and other remarks of Heidegger’s as paradigmatic examples of the kind of nonsense...

The present text deals with some of the ways used to argue in favor of the existence of God. It seems, however, that an appeal to the arrangement of the world in order to evidence the truth of theism faces a number of limitations. The central hypothesis of theistic worldview, however, is consistent with the assumption of science itself, an intelligible universe being what one would expect from a reality created by someone intelligent with purpose. The approach of focusing on (...) the cognoscibility of the world, although not eliminating the doubt about the existence of God, seems to be a more promising proposal, in the context of the dialogue between science and theology, than the proposal that focuses on gaps in human knowledge, in order to fit God in these gaps, since the previous one, contrary to this, can’t be eroded by the progress of scientific knowledge. (shrink)

Nas ciências naturais comumente se aceita que apenas os profundamente imersos nos seus problemas são reconhecidos pesquisadores competentes para emitir comentários sobre estes campos de investigação. Paradoxalmente, parece que estes cientistas são os que encontram maior dificuldade para relacionar sua formação profissional e atividades acadêmicas com seu papel na sociedade. Um exemplo é a dificuldade em determinar a natureza e a origem de um evento científico, como a consciência humana. Dominique Pestre caracteriza o Science Studies na década de 1970 e (...) dá tons políticos ao seu discurso. A mudança de opinião desse historiador da ciência seria suficiente para sinalizar uma reviravolta neste movimento? (shrink)

A hermenêutica pode contribuir para uma reflexão filosófica na escola, propiciando ao estudante uma noção de conjunto. O papel da hermenêutica é tornar o estudante consciente dos pré-conhecimentos que possui e que configuram todo o compreender.

Resumo Apresentaremos neste artigo uma breve discussão acerca das influências do comunitarismo cristão na vida social e política brasileira. Trata-se de um ensaio exploratório. O objetivo é uma revisão bibliográfica sobre o tema. A partir daquilo que foi possível selecionar, tentamos elaborar algumas ideias, no sentido de apresentar, mesmo que sucintamente, tópicos que podem indicar a importância do comunitarismo cristão, tradição forte e influente não somente nas décadas de 1960 e 1970, mas que, sobretudo no atual contexto político, ainda desempenha (...) um papel central na sociedade brasileira. Recorte especial é a análise sobre as influências do comunitarismo nas ações da Igreja Católica, no Brasil. Assim, a Teologia da Libertação e as Comunidades Eclesiais de Base (CEBs) derivariam do pensamento comunitarista. Por fim, o comunitarismo cristão é apresentado como uma reação ao neoliberalismo, por priorizar "o valor inelutável da dignidade e da transcendência humana e uma resistência insuperável a deixar engolfar o destino humano em uma lógica mercantil, de individualismo possessivo. Essa tradição, em grande medida identificada com as posições hoje encarnadas pela CNBB, é responsável por vastas experiências de solidariedade entre os pobres e oprimidos brasileiros". Palavras-chave: Comunitarismo cristão; Igreja Católica; Ação social; Política; Movimentos sociais.This article discusses briefly the influences of Christian Communitarianism on Brazilian social and political life. It is an exploratory essay aimed at a bibliographical review of the subject. Based on what was possible to select, we tried to elaborate some ideas to present topics that may indicate the importance of Christian Communitarianism, a strong and influent tradition, not only in the 1960s and 1970s, but especially in the current political context, still playing a central role in Brazilian society. A special point is the analysis of the influences of Communitarianism on actions of the Catholic Church in Brazil. Thus, the Theology of Liberation and the Base Ecclesial Communities (BECs) could have derived from the communitarian thought. Finally, Christian Communitarianism is presented as a reaction against neoliberalism, as it gives priority to "the inestimable value of human dignity and transcendence and an insuperable resistance to let human destiny be engulfed by a mercantile logic of possessive individualism. This tradition, largely identified with the positions assumed by CNBB, is responsible for vast experiences of solidarity between the Brazilian poor and oppressed". Key words: Christian Communitarianism; Catholic Church; Social action; Politics; Social movements. (shrink)

Um dos principais problemas sociais da atualidade é o assustador crescimento de várias modalidades de crimes violentos em várias cidades brasileiras. O retrato atual da violência no Brasil pode ser assim exposto: crescimento da delinqüência urbana, com espantoso aumento dos homicídios em torno do tráfico de drogas nas grandes cidades; consolidação da criminalidade organizada, através de redes de tráfico internacional, tráfico de órgãos e seres humanos, máfias internacionais de contrabando e pirataria; aumento das violações de direitos humanos, comprometendo a ordem (...) social e política e, no campo, a explosão de conflitos motivados pela estrutura agrária concentradora e historicamente violenta. Como a religião, enquanto instrumento de coesão social, pode contribuir para a reversão dessa perversa onda de criminalidade e violência? É o que pretendemos apresentar. Palavras-chave: Religião; Violência urbana; Criminalidade; Coesão social; Doutrina Social da Igreja; Cultura da paz. ABSTRACT One of the main current social problems is the appalling growth of various kinds of violent crime in many Brazilian cities. The current portrait of violence in Brazil can be thus designed: the growth of urban delinquency, with a remarkable increase in the number of murders connected to drug traffic in big cities; the consolidation of organised crime, through nets of international traffic, organs and human beings’ traffic, international smuggling and piracy mafias; an increase in the violation of human rights, jeopardising social and political order; and, in the rural area, the explosion of conflicts motivated by an agrarian structure of concentration and historical violence. How can religion, as an instrument of social cohesion, contribute to revert that hideous wave of criminality and violence? This is our scope. Key words: Religion; Urban violence; Criminality; Social cohesion; Social doctrine of the Church; Culture of peace. (shrink)

Este trabalho visa mostrar a forma em que o filósofo Kant percebe o conceito de ciência e interage com ele na escrita da Crítica da Razão Pura, por essa razão, é necessário recorrermos a textos do período pré-crítico onde poderemos perceber como foi construído o conceito de ciência em Kant a partir daquilo que ele vivia no século XVIII. Assim, esse texto possui seis alíneas descritivas, quais sejam: a primeira norteia o leitor a entender o ponto de onde partimos e (...) o caminho a ser percorrido, seguido pela descrição do problema que envolve a ciência em suas nuances. A terceira alínea descreve a formação Kantiana, em sua historicidade, desde o que se estudava na Alemanha, seguido pela forma em que Kant apresenta o conceito de ciência como condição de possibilidade e a última aponta uma possibilidade de reflexão à luz daquilo que Kant entende sobre ciência. (shrink)

Populism is widely thought to be in tension with liberal democracy. This article clarifies what exactly is problematic about populism from a liberal–democratic point of view and goes on to develop normative standards that allow us to distinguish between more and less legitimate forms of populism. The point of this exercise is not to dismiss populism in toto; the article strives for a more subtle result, namely, to show that liberal democracy can accommodate populism provided that the latter conforms to (...) particular discursive norms. What the article calls a ‘liberal ethics of populism’ turns out to be closely bound up with a broader ethics of peoplehood, understood as a way of articulating who ‘the people’ are in a way that is compatible with liberal–democratic principles of political justification. Such an ethics, concludes the article, inevitably has a much wider audience than populist political actors: its addressees are all those who seek legitimately to exercise power in the name of the people. (shrink)

Jacques Derrida has died recently. He leaves us his work and it lets us with a name that it is more than his work. Derrida names, as any name does, somebody. This text tries to show that the own name of Derrida, now somebody beyond life, is also another impossibility of the ontology and anot.

En el presente artículo analizamos cuáles son las posibilidades de una nueva democracia basada en las condiciones de producción de la sociedad y no en la representación política del Estado. Desarrollamos así el concepto negriano de La República constituyente, como democracia real de la multitud global, en contraposición a las ideas, intrínsecamente totalitarias, de pueblo y soberanía. Palabras clave: Antonio Negri; democracia real; república constituyente; multitud global; ideas totalitarias. Antonio Negri, the constituent Republic and the democracy to comeIn this paper (...) we analyze what are the possibilities for a new democracy, based on society’s production conditions rather than on the State’s political representation. We thereby develop Negri’s concept of constituent Republic as real democracy of the global multitude, as opposed to the intrinsically totalitarian ideas of people and sovereignty. Keywords : Antonio Negri; real democracy; constituent Republic; global multitude; totalitarian ideas. (shrink)

Recientemente ha muerto Jacques Derrida. Nos deja su obra y nos deja con un nombre que es más que su obra. Su nombre que, como todo nombre, es el nombre de alguien. Este texto trata de mostrar que el propio nombre de Derrida, ahora un alguien más allá de la vida, es también otra imposibilidad de la ontología y otra desconstrucción de la pretensión del juego metafísico de la presencia y su representación. Tratamos de mostrar aquí cómo este alguien ausente (...) cuestiona, en su imposibilidad, todas las posibilidades de su representación, incluyendo los epitafios del signo. (shrink)

Analisaremos alguns elementos constituintes da profissão de jornalista e possíveis contrastes com os modelos analíticos apresentados pela Sociologia das Profissões em busca de níveis de adesão ao trabalho jornalístico. No texto, a relação do jornalista com o labor é classificada em quatro categorias como sendo: sacerdócio (missão a ser cumprida); negócio (venda da mão-de-obra no mercado de trabalho); profissão (trabalho especializado com uma identidade específica); e emprego (trabalho apenas remunerativo sem vínculo identitário). O intuito é o de um breve panorama (...) sobre as conceituações e modelos analíticos que propiciem o entendimento da especialização do trabalho jornalístico. Abordaremos a relação do jornalista com o trabalho utilizando também as tipologias: vocação e trabalho; profissão e emprego; sacerdócio e negócio, da Sociologia das Profissões. (shrink)

This paper reflects on the complex methodological and ethical issues encountered in an exploratory research study on young carers in Zimbabwe. Several interviews were distressing for the young people interviewed and for the social worker conducting the interviews. The dilemmas raised by interview distress and subsequent withdrawal of co-operation are explored in reflections on the methodology and ethics of researching young people who care.

This paper reflects on the complex methodological and ethical issues encountered in an exploratory research study on young carers in Zimbabwe. Several interviews were distressing for the young peop...

In a recent paper, Pruss proves the validity of the rule beta-2 relative to Lewis’s semantics for counterfactuals, which is a significant step forward in the debate about the consequence argument. Yet, we believe there remain intuitive counter-examples to beta-2 formulated with the actuality operator and rigidified descriptions. We offer a novel and two-dimensional formulation of the Lewisian semantics for counterfactuals and prove the validity of a new transfer rule according to which a new version of the consequence argument can (...) be formulated. This new transfer rule is immune to the counter-examples involving the actuality operator and rigidified descriptions. However, we show that counter-examples to this new rule can also be generated, demanding that the Lewisian semantics be generalized for higher dimensions where counter-examples can always be generated. (shrink)

This article deals with the feeling of strangeness in the human being. When it comes to being human, it is traditionally understood as beings containing reasons and emotions. Thus, to better understand the feeling of the foreigner, its context is analyzed on the perspective of humean moral sentimentalism and on the intertwining, proposed by Husserl, between the intellectual and affective spheres. From these philosophers one can see the convergence between the intellectual and affective spheres, as well as between reason and (...) emotion. Therefore, contemporary emotional theories bring an explanatory gain for understanding the feeling of the foreigner in the face of new environments and cultures, as both cognitive and non-cognitive elements are perceived. Therefore, Goldie and Husserl contribute to the analysis of the foreigner's feeling of strangeness in its various peculiarities. (shrink)

We are subject with consciousness. For this we have to have self-consciousness so that consciousness can exist. In this way, there is the possibility of self-knowledge of one's own mental states. Thus, the article aims at investigating the possibility of self-knowledge of one's own mental states, their applicability and consequences in relation to Kantian moral theory. Therefore, it reflects on how self-knowledge of one's own mental states and the characteristics of Kantian moral theory occur. Finally, there is the possibility of (...) moral responsibility for one's own mental states related to Kantian morality and the method of self-knowledge of the very action of the moral agent. (shrink)

This short piece discusses Hélène Landemore’s proposal of an ‘open democracy’, as outlined in her recent book _Open Democracy: Reinventing Popular Rule for the Twenty-First Century_. Acknowledging the value of Landemore’s radical and ambitious proposals, I draw attention to a number of shortcomings and blind spots that have to do with how the case for an ‘open democracy’ is made: through an unduly brief and dismissive treatment of political parties; a methodological insensitivity to empirical variations of democratic performance and citizens’ (...) evaluations of the latter; a failure to distinguish between higher and ordinary law-making in the discussion of the central Icelandic case; and, finally, a surprising concession that realising an open democracy is all but infeasible in established constitutional democracies. If open democracy is to be an attractive ideal, these issues must arguably be addressed. (shrink)

that wilfrid sellars was a more subtle and sophisticated philosopher than his father, Roy Wood Sellars, is, I believe, a rather uncontroversial assessment, one which, with fatherly pride, Roy1 would most probably have endorsed. Even considering the radical shift in philosophical methods and attitude which took place in the United States in the decades of Wilfrid's philosophically formative years, Wilfrid's unrelenting philosophical acumen and imagination, his unflinching resolve to doggedly pursue a problem on a variety of fronts at once (arguably (...) the cause of his... (shrink)

Populist movements have become key players in European politics. These movements are readily criticized by journalists or political rivals, yet none of the common objections to populism seems to arrest their success. This article turns to normative political theory to cultivate sensitivity to problems arising from some existing arguments against populism, and to explore possible alternatives. It offers a critical reading of prototypical liberal and conservative arguments against populism, and proposes that the principles of solidarity and procedure provide good grounds (...) for a sustainable critique of populism. (shrink)

This article is about self-knowledge on one's own mental states. Considering human as rational beings, this study aims to problematize the position of subject in process of self-knowledge, as well as to realize the state of knowledge about self-knowledge. In this way, Richard Moran constitutes the method of transparency about the knowledge of one's own mental states. Such a method receives some criticism from the philosopher Quassim Cassam and the philosopher Brie-Gertler. In the same extent, both authors problematize some characteristics (...) of self-knowledge, in which criticism reaches some points studied by Brazilian philosophers, namely Paulo Farias, Waldomiro Silva Filho and André Abath. The latter two authors are based on Moran's methodology and thus constitute his reflections on conditions of daily life as well as the incomplete understanding of human beings. (shrink)

Popular sovereignty requires that citizens perceive themselves as being able to act and implement decisions, and that they are de facto causally connected to mechanisms of decision making. I argue that the two most common understandings of the exercise of popular sovereignty—which center on direct decision making by the people as a whole and the indirect exercise of democratic agency by elected representatives, respectively—are inadequate in this respect, and go on to suggest a complementary account that stresses the central role (...) of internally democratic and participatory political parties in actualising popular sovereignty, drawing on the democratic theory of Hans Kelsen. (shrink)

Populism is widely thought to be in tension with liberal democracy. This article clarifies what exactly is problematic about populism from a liberal–democratic point of view and goes on to develop...

We present a sound and complete Fitch-style natural deduction system for an S5 modal logic containing an actuality operator, a diagonal necessity operator, and a diagonal possibility operator. The logic is two-dimensional, where we evaluate sentences with respect to both an actual world (first dimension) and a world of evaluation (second dimension). The diagonal necessity operator behaves as a quantifier over every point on the diagonal between actual worlds and worlds of evaluation, while the diagonal possibility quantifies over some point (...) on the diagonal. Thus, they are just like the epistemic operators for apriority and its dual. We take this extension of Fitch’s familiar derivation system to be a very natural one, since the new rules and labeled lines hereby introduced preserve the structure of Fitch’s own rules for the modal case. (shrink)

In a recent article, P. Roger Turner and Justin Capes argue that no one is, or ever was, even partly morally responsible for certain world-indexed truths. Here we present our reasons for thinking that their argument is unsound: It depends on the premise that possible worlds are maximally consistent states of affairs, which is, under plausible assumptions concerning states of affairs, demonstrably false. Our argument to show this is based on Bertrand Russell’s original ‘paradox of propositions’. We should then opt (...) for a different approach to explain world-indexed truths whose upshot is that we may be morally responsible for some of them. The result to the effect that there are no maximally consistent states of affairs is independently interesting though, since this notion motivates an account of the nature of possible worlds in the metaphysics of modality. We also register in this article, independently of our response to Turner and Capes, and in the spirit of Russell’s aforementioned paradox and many other versions thereof, a proof of the claim that there is no set of all true propositions one can render false. (shrink)

In recent times, it has become increasingly common that elected parties and leaders systematically undermine democracy and the rule of law. This phenomenon is often framed with the term democratic backsliding or democratic regression. This article deals with the relatively little-studied topic of resistance to democratic regressions. Chief amongst the things it discusses is the rather central ethical issue of whether resisters may themselves, in their attempts to prevent a further erosion of democracy, transgress democratic norms. But the argument advanced (...) in the article is not merely about the ethics of resistance. It begins, perhaps unconventionally, by addressing the affective dimension of resistance to democratic regressions, looking in particular at the powerful feelings of anger and despair that pro-democratic citizens living under a regressive government are likely to experience. As the article argues, these feelings have not only motivational but also epistemic potential, which must be adequately theorized in order to understand how resisters can respond to the ethical challenges facing them. (shrink)