In this paper, we intend to discuss if and in what sense semiosis (meaning process, cf. C. S. Peirce) can be regarded as an "emergent" process in semiotic systems. It is not our problem here to answer when or how semiosis emerged in nature. As a prerequisite for the very formulation of these problems, we are rather interested in discussing the conditions which should be fulfilled for semiosis to be characterized as an emergent process. The first step in this work (...) is to summarize a systematic analysis of the variety of emergence theories and concepts, elaborated by Achim Stephan. Along the summary of this analysis, we pose fundamental questions that have to be answered in order to ascribe a precise meaning to the term "emergence" in the context of an understanding of semiosis. After discussing a model for explaining emergence based on Salthe's hierarchical structuralism, which considers three levels at a time in a semiotic system, we present some tentative answers to those questions. (shrink)

: In this paper, we intend to discuss if and in what sense semiosis (meaning process, cf. C. S. Peirce) can be regarded as an "emergent" process in semiotic systems. It is not our problem here to answer when or how semiosis emerged in nature. As a prerequisite for the very formulation of these problems, we are rather interested in discussing the conditions which should be fulfilled for semiosis to be characterized as an emergent process. The first step in this (...) work is to summarize a systematic analysis of the variety of emergence theories and concepts, elaborated by Achim Stephan. Along the summary of this analysis, we pose fundamental questions that have to be answered in order to ascribe a precise meaning to the term "emergence" in the context of an understanding of semiosis. After discussing a model for explaining emergence based on Salthe's hierarchical structuralism, which considers three levels at a time in a semiotic system, we present some tentative answers to those questions. (shrink)

In both scientific and popular circles it is often said that we are in the midst of a sixth mass extinction. Although the urgency of our present environmental crises is not in doubt, such claims of a present mass extinction are highly controversial scientifically. Our aims are, first, to get to the bottom of this scientific debate by shedding philosophical light on the many conceptual and methodological challenges involved in answering this scientific question, and, second, to offer new philosophical perspectives (...) on what the value of asking this question has been — and whether that value persists today. We show that the conceptual challenges in defining ‘mass extinction’, uncertainties in past and present diversity assessments, and data incommensurabilities undermine a straightforward answer to the question of whether we are in, or entering, a sixth mass extinction today. More broadly we argue that an excessive focus on the mass extinction framing can be misleading for present conservation efforts and may lead us to miss out on the many other valuable insights that Earth’s deep time can offer in guiding our future. (shrink)

Harmful but culturally cherished practices often endure in spite of the damages they cause. Meat consumption is increasingly becoming one of such cases and may provide an opportunity from which to observe these phenomena. Growing evidence indicates that current and projected production and consumption patterns are important contributors to significant environmental problems, public health degradation, and animal suffering. Our aim is to contribute to a further understanding of the psychological factors that may hinder or promote personal disposition to change food (...) habits to benefit each of these domains. Drawing from previous evidence, this study explores the proposition that some consumers are motivated to resort to moral disengagement strategies when called upon to consider the impacts of their food habits. Data were collected from six semi-structured focus groups with a sample of 40 participants. Although affirming personal duties towards preserving the environment, promoting public health, and safeguarding animal welfare, participants did not show personal disposition to change their meat consumption habits. Several patterns of response that resonate with the principles of moral disengagement theory were observed while discussing impacts and the possibility of change. Results seem to support the proposition that the process of moral disengagement may play a role in hindering openness to change food habits for the benefit of the environment, public health, and animals, and point towards the relevance of further exploring this approach. (shrink)

Zones of social abandonment are emerging everywhere in Brazil’s big cities—places like Vita, where the unwanted, the mentally ill, the sick, and the homeless are left to die. This haunting, unforgettable story centers on a young woman named Catarina, increasingly paralyzed and said to be mad, living out her time at Vita. Anthropologist João Biehl leads a detective-like journey to know Catarina; to unravel the cryptic, poetic words that are part of the “dictionary” she is compiling; and to trace (...) the complex network of family, medicine, state, and economy in which her abandonment and pathology took form. An instant classic, _Vita_ has been widely acclaimed for its bold fieldwork, theoretical innovation, and literary force. Reflecting on how Catarina’s life story continues, this updated edition offers the reader a powerful new afterword and gripping new photographs following Biehl and Eskerod’s return to Vita. Anthropology at its finest, _Vita_ is essential reading for anyone who is grappling with how to understand the conditions of life, thought, and ethics in the contemporary world. (shrink)

This innovative volume is an extended intellectual conversation about the ways personal lives are being undone and remade today. Examining the ethnography of the modern subject, this preeminent group of scholars probes the continuity and diversity of modes of personhood across a range of Western and non-Western societies. Contributors consider what happens to individual subjectivity when stable or imagined environments such as nations and communities are transformed or displaced by free trade economics, terrorism, and war; how new information and medical (...) technologies reshape the relation one has to oneself; and which forms of subjectivity and life possibilities are produced against a world in pieces. The transdisciplinary conversation includes anthropologists, historians of science, psychologists, a literary critic, a philosopher, physicians, and an economist. The authors touch on how we think and write about contingency, human agency, and ethics today. (shrink)

Zones of social abandonment are emerging everywhere in Brazil’s big cities—places like Vita, where the unwanted, the mentally ill, the sick, and the homeless are left to die. This haunting, unforgettable story centers on a young woman named Catarina, increasingly paralyzed and said to be mad, living out her time at Vita. Anthropologist João Biehl leads a detective-like journey to know Catarina; to unravel the cryptic, poetic words that are part of the “dictionary” she is compiling; and to trace (...) the complex network of family, medicine, state, and economy in which her abandonment and pathology took form. As Biehl painstakingly relates Catarina’s words to a vanished world and elucidates her condition, we learn of subjectivities unmade and remade under economic pressures, pharmaceuticals as moral technologies, a public common sense that lets the unsound and unproductive die, and anthropology’s unique power to work through these juxtaposed fields. _Vita’s_ methodological innovations, bold fieldwork, and rigorous social theory make it an essential reading for anyone who is grappling with how to understand the conditions of life, thought and ethics in the contemporary world. (shrink)

In 2002, Luciano Floridi published a paper called What is the Philosophy of Information?, where he argues for a new paradigm in philosophical research. To what extent should his proposal be accepted? Is the Philosophy of Information actually a new paradigm, in the Kuhninan sense, in Philosophy? Or is it only a new branch of Epistemology? In our discussion we will argue in defense of Floridi’s proposal. We believe that Philosophy of Information has the types of features had by other (...) areas already acknowledge as authentic in Philosophy. By way of an analogical argument we will argue that since Philosophy of Information has its own topics, method and problems it would be counter-intuitive not to accept it as a new philosophical area. To strengthen our position we present and discuss main topics of Philosophy of Information. (shrink)

This paper discusses how to define logics as deductive limits of sequences of other logics. The case of da Costa's hierarchy of increasingly weaker paraconsistent calculi, known as $ \mathcal {C}$n, 1 $ \leq$ n $ \leq$ $ \omega$, is carefully studied. The calculus $ \mathcal {C}$$\scriptstyle \omega$, in particular, constitutes no more than a lower deductive bound to this hierarchy and differs considerably from its companions. A long standing problem in the literature (open for more than 35 years) is (...) to define the deductive limit to this hierarchy, that is, its greatest lower deductive bound. The calculus $ \mathcal {C}$min, stronger than $ \mathcal {C}$$\scriptstyle \omega$, is first presented as a step toward this limit. As an alternative to the bivaluation semantics of $ \mathcal {C}$min presented thereupon, possible-translations semantics are then introduced and suggested as the standard technique both to give this calculus a more reasonable semantics and to derive some interesting properties about it. Possible-translations semantics are then used to provide both a semantics and a decision procedure for $ \mathcal {C}$Lim, the real deductive limit of da Costa's hierarchy. Possible-translations semantics also make it possible to characterize a precise sense of duality: as an example, $ \mathcal {D}$min is proposed as the dual to $ \mathcal {C}$min. (shrink)

In their paper “How Causal are Microbiomes? A Comparison with the Helicobacter pylori Explanation of Ulcers,” Lynch, Parke, and O’Malley successfully argue that certain causal attributions made to the microbiome have not satisfied Koch’s postulates nor the interventionist framework. However, their argument involves an implicit assumption that cases such as H. pylori are sufficiently similar to cases involving the microbiome, such that causal attributions to both should be evaluated according to the same causal framework. Our commentary targets this assumption. First, (...) we introduce the historical circumstances that led to the formulation of Koch’s postulates in order to differentiate the case of the microbiome from that of infectious bacteria. Then, we introduce the concept of the holobiont, the idea that hosts and their symbionts should be conceptualized as a metaphysical and biological unit. Finally, using the holobiont concept, we argue that Koch’s postulates and the interventionist framework are ill-equipped to handle the microbiome. We conclude by suggesting that a revision of what counts as microbiological causality within the holobiont is justified. (shrink)

This paper examines one aspect of the legacy of the Value-Free Ideal in conservation science: the view that measurements and metrics are value-free epistemic tools detached from ideological, ethical, social, and, generally, non-epistemic considerations. Contrary to this view, I will argue that traditional measurement practices entrenched in conservation are in fact permeated with non-epistemic values. I challenge the received view by revealing three non-epistemic assumptions underlying traditional metrics: (1) a human-environment demarcation, (2) the desirability of a people-free landscape, and (3) (...) the exclusion of cultural diversity from biodiversity. I also draw a connection between arguments for retaining traditional metrics to “scientific colonialism,” exemplified by a fortress conservation model. I conclude by advocating for abandoning the myth of the intrinsic value-freedom of measurement practices and embracing metrics aligned with societal and scientific goals. (shrink)

In many real-life applications of logic it is useful to interpret a particular sentence as true together with its negation. If we are talking about classical logic, this situation would force all other sentences to be equally interpreted as true. Paraconsistent logics are exactly those logics that escape this explosive effect of the presence of inconsistencies and allow for sensible reasoning still to take effect. To provide reasonably intuitive semantics for paraconsistent logics has traditionally proven to be a challenge. Possible-translations (...) semantics can meet that challenge by allowing for each interpretation to be composed of multiple scenarios. Using that idea, a logic with a complex semantic behavior can be understood as an appropriate combination of ingredient logics with simpler semantic behaviors into which the original logic is given a collection of translations preserving its soundness. Completeness is then achieved through the judicious choice of the admissible translating mappings. The present note provides interpretation by way of possible-translations semantics for a group of fundamental paraconsistent logics extending the positive fragment of classical propositional logic. The logics PI, Cmin, mbC, bC, mCi and Ci, among others, are all initially presented through their non-truth-functional bivaluation semantics and sequent versions and then split by way of possible-translations semantics based on 3-valued ingredients. (shrink)

We analyze axioms and postulates as speech acts. After a brief historical appraisal of the concept of axiom in Euclid, Frege, and Hilbert, we evaluate contemporary axiomatics from a linguistic perspective. Our reading is inspired by Hilbert and is meant to account for the assertive, directive, and declarative components of modern axiomatics. We will do this by describing the constitutive and regulative roles that axioms possess with respect to the linguistic practice of mathematics.

An overcomplete logic is a logic that ‘ceases to make the difference’: According to such a logic, all inferences hold independently of the nature of the statements involved. A negation-inconsistent logic is a logic having at least one model that satisfies both some statement and its negation. A negation-incomplete logic has at least one model according to which neither some statement nor its negation are satisfied. Paraconsistent logics are negation-inconsistent yet non-overcomplete; paracomplete logics are negation-incomplete yet non-overcomplete. A paranormal logic (...) is simply a logic that is both paraconsistent and paracomplete. -/- Despite being perfectly consistent and complete with respect to classical negation, nearly every normal modal logic, in its ordinary language and interpretation, admits to some latent paranormality: It is paracomplete with respect to a negation defined as an impossibility operator, and paraconsistent with respect to a negation defined as non-necessity. In fact, as it will be shown here, even in languages without a primitive classical negation, normal modal logics can often be alternatively characterized directly by way of their paranormal negations and related operators. So, instead of talking about ‘necessity’, ‘possibility’, and so on, modal logics could be seen just as devices tailored for the study of (modal) negation. This paper shows how and to what extent this alternative characterization of modal logics can be realized. (shrink)

What is the fundamental insight behind truth-functionality ? When is a logic interpretable by way of a truth-functional semantics? To address such questions in a satisfactory way, a formal definition of truth-functionality from the point of view of abstract logics is clearly called for. As a matter of fact, such a definition has been available at least since the 70s, though to this day it still remains not very widely well-known. A clear distinction can be drawn between logics characterizable through: (...) (1) genuinely finite-valued truth-tabular semantics; (2) no finite-valued but only an infinite-valued truthtabular semantics; (3) no truth-tabular semantics at all. Any of those logics, however, can in principle be characterized through non-truth-functional valuation semantics, at least as soon as their associated consequence relations respect the usual tarskian postulates. So, paradoxical as that might seem at first, it turns out that truth-functional logics may be adequately characterized by non-truth-functional semantics . Now, what feature of a given logic would guarantee it to dwell in class (1) or in class (2), irrespective of its circumstantial semantic characterization? (shrink)

We extend meet-combination of logics for capturing the consequences that are common to both logics. With this purpose in mind we define meet-combination of consequence systems. This notion has the advantage of accommodating different ways of presenting the semantics and the deductive calculi. We consider consequence systems generated by a matrix semantics and consequence systems generated by Hilbert calculi. The meet-combination of consequence systems generated by matrix semantics is the consequence system generated by their product. On the other hand, the (...) meet-combination of consequence systems generated by Hilbert calculi is the consequence system generated by their interconnection. We investigate preservation of several properties. Capitalizing on these results we show that interconnection provides an axiomatization for the product. Illustrations are given for intuitionistic and modal logics, Łukasiewicz logic and some paraconsistent logics. (shrink)

Our present moral traits are unable to provide the level of large-scale co-operation necessary to deal with risks such as nuclear proliferation, drastic climate change and pandemics. In order to survive in an environment with powerful and easily available technologies, some authors claim that we need to improve our moral traits with moral enhancement. But this is prone to produce paradoxical effects, be self-reinforcing and harm personal identity. The risks of moral enhancement require the use of a safety framework; such (...) a framework should guarantee practical robustness to moral uncertainty, empirical adequacy, correct balance between dispositions, preservation of identity, and be sensitive to practical considerations such as emergent social effects. A virtue theory can meet all these desiderata. Possible frameworks incorporate them to variable degrees. The social value orientations framework is one of the most promising candidates. (shrink)

We say that things happen accidentally when they do indeed happen, but only by chance. In the opposite situation, an essential happening is inescapable, its inevitability being the sine qua non for its very occurrence. This paper will investigate modal logics on a language tailored to talk about essential and accidental statements. Completeness of some among the weakest and the strongest such systems is attained. The weak expressibility of the classical propositional language enriched with the non-normal modal operators of essence (...) and accident is highlighted and illustrated, both with respect to the definability of the more usual modal operators as well as with respect to the characterizability of classes of frames. Several interesting problems and directions are left open for exploration. (shrink)

O artigo tenta reconstruir alguns elementos acerca da passagem da Lógica da essência para a Lógica do conceito, da necessidade para a liberdade, na Ciência da Lógica hegeliana. No contexto da publicação dos duzentos anos dessa obra filosófica, a explicitação dessa passagem é referencial para a compreensão da Ciência da Lógica e de todo o pensamento hegeliano. O artigo procura sustentar que o binômio necessidade/contingência, um dos pares categoriais da Lógica da essência, não é adequado para a articulação da filosofia (...) hegeliana. Como Hegel afirma reiteradas vezes, é preciso superar a dura necessidade para dar lugar à lógica da liberdade. Para a discussão da problemática, a confrontação entre algumas categorias da essência, tais como substancialidade, necessidade, contingência e causalidade, e algumas categorias do conceito, tais como universalidade, particularidade e singularidade é o foco da exposição. Dessa discussão brota a noção hegeliana de liberdade e a sua relação com o sistema. (shrink)

O jornal Tribuna Criciumense foi o único impresso publicado na cidade de Criciúma no período deste escrito. Fundado em 1955, ele passou por três fases. Na primeira, produziu um discurso anticomunista, mas de maneira um pouco tímida. Na segunda fase, com curta duração, o impresso passou a valorizar a ideologia comunista e, ao mesmo tempo, a defesa do presidente João Goulart. A última fase foi marcada por ataques violentos contra o comunismo, em defesa do golpe civil-militar e da ditadura (...) implantada. Analisar essas fases e como os discursos anticomunista e pró-comunismo reverberaram no jornal se configura no objetivo deste escrito. (shrink)

In this paper, we investigate the rules that should underlie a computer program that is capable of revising its beliefs or opinions. Such a program maintains a model of its environment, which is updated to reflect perceived changes in the environment. This model is stored in a knowledge base, and the program draws logical inferences from the information in the knowledge base. All the inferences drawn are added to the knowledge base. Among the propositions in the knowledge base, there are (...) some in which the program believes, and there may be others in which the program does not believe. Inputs from the outside world or reasoning carried out by the program may lead to the detection of contradictions, in which case the program has to revise its beliefs in order to get rid of the contradiction and to accommodate the new information. (shrink)

Karl R. Popper: The open society and its enemies -- Ralf Dahrendorf: Liberty and civil society -- Raymond Plant: Social welfare without class warfare -- Gertrude Himmelfarb and Irving Kristol: The moral imagination -- Raymond Aron: The opium of the intellectuals -- Friedrich A. Hayek: The constitution of liberty -- Isaiah Berlin: Liberty and pluralism -- Michael J. Oakeshott: The conservative disposition -- Leo Strauss: Relativism and the crisis of modernity -- Edmund Burke: Liberty and duty -- James Madison vs. (...) Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Two views of self-government -- Alexis de Tocqueville: Democracy in America -- Winston S. Churchill: The English-Speaking Peoples and the Free World -- Limited and accountable Government -- Two kinds of rationalism -- Liberty as conversation. (shrink)

O texto é uma resenha da Doutrina do Conceito hegeliana recém editada e publicada em português. O terceiro livro da Ciência da Lógica é estruturado em subjetividade, objetividade e ideia, com cada uma destas partes também desenvolvida numa estrutura tripartite. Nesta exposição, merece destaque o movimento contraditório de autodeterminação do conceito, no qual a universalidade se autodiferencia imanentemente em particularidade e o conceito retorna a si mesmo na forma da universalidade concreta. O conceito passa pelas diferentes formas de mediação na (...) teoria do silogismo, especialmente com a mediação da universalidade, quando o conceito se transforma em objetividade. Esta começa com a relação externa do mecanismo, avança para a relação interna do quimismo e conclui na teleologia, onde a liberdade é mais elevada que a necessidade. A Ideia, última parte da Doutrina do Conceito, é a unidade sintética entre conceito e objetividade, com destaque no capítulo da Ideia absoluta na qual Hegel formula uma noção de método como estrutura e movimento do conteúdo e da racionalidade. (shrink)

Resenha de: Hegel, G. W. F. Ciência da lógica: 1. A doutrina do ser. Tradução deChristian Iber, Marloren L. de Miranda, Federico Orsini e Agemir Bavaresco. Petrópolis, RJ: Vozes; Bragança Paulista, SP: Ed.Universitária São Francisco, 2016. 464 p. ISBN 9788532653086.************************************************************************************** ************************************ Com a tradução, os falantes da língua portuguesa têm em mãos uma obra filosófica estruturante do pensamento moderno e uma das mais importantes da História da Filosofia. Temos agora e nossas mãos, em língua portuguesa, uma obra de difícil acesso do (...) pensamento hegeliano e que um filósofo de língua portuguesa leria com muita dificuldade. A tradução, ora disponibilizada, tenta conciliar a difícil linguagem hegeliana escrita em alemão com a fluência típica do nosso português, permitindo uma compreensão mais ou menos fácil por parte do falante da língua portuguesa. (shrink)

Este artigo tem como objeto de investigação os principais níveis de fundamentação enquanto momentos estruturantes do sistema filosófico hegeliano. No contexto filosófico da comemoração dos duzentos anos de publicação da Enciclopédia das Ciências Filosóficas, o objeto do trabalho é a reconstrução dos momentos estruturantes da passagem da Ciência da Lógica para a Filosofia da Natureza, da Filosofia da Natureza para a Filosofia do Espírito e dessas para a esfera do Espírito Absoluto. O artigo não tem como meta a discussão de (...) tópicos intrínsecos à Ciência da Lógica ou à Filosofia do Espírito, mas visa à exposição de círculos da passagem dialética de uma esfera para a outra como um autodesenvolvimento sistemático qualitativo. Mesmo de caráter genérico, não aponta para a possível substantividade de uma parte do sistema, mas para as relações fundamentais entre os círculos. O texto é perpassado por uma chave interpretativa da filosofia hegeliana no sentido de que não é formado por partes fixas e estanques, mas é articulado na perspectiva de relações fundamentais caracterizadoras das interfaces entre as esferas. (shrink)

Brazil is among the approximately 100 countries that recognize a constitutional right to health that includes access to medicines. All over Brazil, patients are turning to courts to access prescribed medicines. Although lawsuits secure access for thousands of people, at least temporarily, this judicialization of the right to health generates intensely complex sociomedical realities and significant administrative and fiscal challenges that, officials argue, have the potential to widen inequalities in health-care delivery. In this article, we explore how right-to-health litigation became (...) an alternative pathway for Brazilians to access health care, now understood as access to medicines that are either on government lists for pharmaceutical distribution or are only available through the market. Is the judicial system an effective venue to implement socioeconomic rights? Which practices of citizenship and governance are crystallized in these struggles over drug access and administrative accountability? (shrink)

RESUMO O presente artigo propõe um diálogo entre a educação performativa e a perspectiva bakhtiniana, a partir de reflexões sobre o corpo dançante como potência transformadora na/da/sobre a escola. Ao se compreender a comunicação do corpo como materialidade da consciência individual que, ao dançar enuncia por cadeias dialógicas infinitas, é imprescindível conceber o movimento como texto sígnico, carregado de vozes passíveis de leitura e interpretação. Ao investigar pressupostos de base da educação performativa em relação com uma abordagem dialógica de um (...) corpo que enuncia dançando, este ensaio, de cunho estritamente teórico, busca apontar possíveis caminhos para pensar as práticas a respeito de formas de comunicação e expressão do corpo na escola. ABSTRACT This article proposes a dialogue between performative education and the Bakhtinian perspective based on reflections on the dancing body as a transformative force in/of/about the school. In understanding the communication of the body as a materiality of the individual consciousness that enunciates infinite dialogic chains through dancing, it is essential to conceive movement as a sign text, filled with voices that can be read and interpreted. By investigating basic assumptions of performative education in a dialogical approach to a body that enunciates through dancing, this strictly theoretical article seeks to point out possible paths to think practices regarding the communication and expression of the body at school. (shrink)

Exposure to environmental contextual changes, such as those occurring after an earthquake, requires individuals to learn novel routes around their environment, landmarks, and spatial layout. In this study, we aimed to uncover whether contextual changes that occurred after the 2009 L’Aquila earthquake affected topographic memory in exposed survivors. We hypothesized that individuals exposed to environmental changes – individuals living in L’Aquila before, during and after the earthquake (hereafter called exposed participants, EPs) – improved their topographic memory skills compared with non-exposed (...) participants (NEPs) who moved to L’Aquila after the earthquake, as only EPs had to modify their previous cognitive map of L’Aquila. We also hypothesized that memory improvement was selective for the navigational space and did not generalize across other spatial and verbal domains. To test these hypotheses, we compared the topographic and spatial memory skills of 56 EPs without post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms to the skills of 47 NEPs using the Walking Corsi Test (WalCT; memory test in the navigational space) and the Corsi Block-Tapping Test (CBT; visuospatial memory test in the reaching space); EPs and NEPs were matched for gender, education and general navigational skills. A sub-group of participants also underwent the Rey-Auditory Verbal Learning Test (verbal memory test). The results showed that EPs, in contrast to NEPs, showed better performances on topographic learning assessed using the WalCT rather than spatial learning assessed by the CBT. This outcome suggests the possibility that EPs specifically improved topographic memory. This effect may be due to continuous exposure to environmental changes that have required individuals to learn novel paths within the city and integrate novel information, such as “new towns”, into their pre-existing mental representation of the city. Implications and limitations of the study are discussed. (shrink)

Desde o início da teorização freudiana, inibição, defesa e censura são processos que devem incidir sobre as pulsões. O primitivo pulsional precisa ser reprimido ou transformado. Este artigo problematiza a relação entre as pulsões sexuais e a defesa psíquica, ao longo do período pré-psicanalítico e da primeira tópica freudiana. Situamos o conflito entre sexualidade e repressão, apontado por Freud como característico das psiconeuroses, enquanto que nas neuroses atuais a angústia está relacionada a um registro quantitativo e não exatamente a um (...) conflito psíquico. Nesse caso, revela-se desencontros entre um sexual corpóreo e sua representação psíquica. Pretende-se, neste trabalho, evidenciar o caráter negativo das pulsões e pôr em relevo a natureza do antagonismo que se opõe às pulsões sexuais. A formulação das pulsões de autoconservação como aquilo que deve se contrapor às pulsões sexuais não esclarece completamente porque é imperativo que algo aconteça face às vivências pulsionais fundantes do aparelho. A satisfação em estado bruto acarreta prejuízos, tanto do ponto de vista psíquico quanto social; logo, a repressão das pulsões sexuais é condição necessária para a existência individual e coletiva. Evidencia-se assim algo específico do humano, afinal, se toda a natureza funciona afirmando o instinto, a espécie humana somente se desenvolve a partir de sua negação. A partir de tais construções teóricas, questiona-se se a psicanálise ainda permanece demasiadamente tributária de uma concepção de natureza revestida de pressupostos morais, sustentando a noção de que tenha que ser continuamente negada, afastada, coagida e domesticada, em prol de construções sociais bastante questionáveis, porém acatadas como necessárias. (shrink)

This article is currently available as a free download on Ingenta Connect.

The task of mapping the reception of mimetic theory in Latin America presents two challenges. On the one hand, rather than looking at just one country, this study has to take into account a mosaic of nations making up a continent, each with their own local diversities and particular complexities. Such circumstances impose specific rhythms onto the assimilation of Girardian thought, and being aware of these rhythms is vital to understanding the precise impact of mimetic theory. On the other hand, (...) such a study also has to cover two languages, Spanish and Portuguese, which means identifying the translations of his work and the impact of Girard’s ideas in both of the languages.And that is not all: such a mapping .. (shrink)

The Foundations of Cognitive Science is a set of thirteen new essays on key topics in this lively interdisciplinary field, by a stellar international line-up of authors. Philosophers, psychologists, and neurologists here come together to investigate such fascinating subjects as consciousness; vision; rationality; artificial life; the neural basis of language, cognition, and emotion; and the relations between mind and world, for instance our representation of numbers and space. The contributors are Ned Block, Margaret Boden, Susan Carey, Patricia Churchland, Paul Churchland, (...) Antonio Damasio, Hanna Damasio, Donald Davidson, Daniel Dennett, Ilya Farber, James Higginbotham, Christopher Peacocke, Will Peterman, Zenon Pylyshyn, John Searle. Anyone interested in the exploration of the human mind will enjoy this book. (shrink)