Democracy - hope or illusion? Blooming, failing or declining? Our doubts and hesitation make part of unbending efforts to endorse and explain democracy. Who is right - the custodians of promise or the prophets of decline? The book concentrates on doubts. The author tries to explore «the other side of the moon», emphasizing the role of critical thinking, opposing a main-current optimism. Defending democracy we want to generate hope, but hoping may be a dangerous craft. Protecting our hope we are (...) prone to believe that democracy - even if it is not a full success story - is justified in its nature and out of question. How much do we have to forget to sanction this view? This is, in fact, the main question the book raises. It gives voice to those who never, in their writing on democracy, used a flattering tone. Starting with Greek giants - Plato and Aristotle - up to modern and most recent times, going through a broad field of revealing criticism, leaving us with an unsettling feeling that democracy is rather something to be explained than something to be celebrated. Living in democracy, lamenting its underperformances, we must not overlook a fundamental question - in what part do our disappointments reflect the «art of forgetting», allowing us to cast into oblivion all serious doubts originating in a critical discourse on modernity and democracy? (shrink)

The book by professor Stanisław Kowalczyk, renowned scholar in the field of social philosophy, is, without doubt, one of the most important studies on the idea of freedom. The concept of freedom is as old as mankind. It has many meanings and has been interpreted in many different ways. For instance, we also have the word „liberty," which means „freedom or right" and is synonymous with the word freedom, which means „the condition of being free." The author indicates that (...) in our times the notion of freedom is most frequently used; however, it is often misused or deceptive. Mass media and people of all walks of life talk of liberty; everyone talks of freedom and, for many, it is the highest value. Longing for freedom is rooted in the heart of every human being, for freedom is an existential correlate and the fulfilment of the rational human being. The semantic confusion about the notion of freedom leads to many misuses of the concept. Personalism, as a philosophical concept in which a person stands in the centre of all discussion, serves as a framework for the author's delineation on the concept of freedom. He further states that the appropriate understanding of this value is possible in the context of the personalistic interpretation of a human being. This is the focus of this informative and insightful book. (shrink)

In the first part I focus on the issue of progress, in particular progress in philosophy. Philosophical progress has a special property that it shares with the process of becoming a better person. It is constantly finding yourself “on the way”. This path is not only anchored in the Absolutely Perfect but it conditions and stimulates the reflection towards the truth about the relationship between Him and us. We can assume that the core of this reflection is philosophy. The second (...) part is devoted to the paradoxical nature of the most generally understood memory. I assume that the condition of awareness of a certain content is its outdatedness, that is, its transfer to the sphere of memory. Memory is a constantly updated and constantly re-ordered picture of everything that the subject has ever relegated from being, so that it can be replaced by something else. The foundation of this order is a certain axiology. In the third part I show how the sketched concept of memory is used to describe the mechanism of the evolution of philosophical thought. The “on the way” philosophy would consist of two constantly repeated activities: on reconstructing what is to be denied, and thus on the recognition of the previous philosophical achievements in its totality, and on its negation. This denial would concern the whole of this achievement as an axiologically reconstructed unity. The new system is only realized as a series of consequences of the negation of the current state. The vast majority of philosophical reflection focuses on the constitution of this current state, its supposed unity. In the short part of the fourth, I draw up prospects for further deliberations. (shrink)

The book is devoted to the thought of one of the 20th century's most interesting philosophers of religion. Heschel, a traditional Polish Jew who became a modern thinker, was also an impressive prophet of interreligious dialogue.

Context is essential in virtually all human activities. Yet some logical notions seem to be context-free. For example, the nature of the universal quantifier, the very meaning of “all”, seems to be independent of the context. At the same time, there are many quantifier expressions, and some are context-independent, while others are not. Similarly, purely logical consequence seems to be context-independent. Yet often we encounter strong inferences, good enough for practical purposes, but not valid. The two types of examples suggest (...) a general problem: how to characterise the context-free logical concepts in their natural environment, that is, in the field of their context-dependent associates. A general Thesis on Quantifiers is formulated: among all quantifiers, the context-free ones are just those definable by the universal quantifier. The issue of inferences is treated following the approach introduced by Richard L. Epstein: valid ones are an extreme case, the result of the disappearance of context-dependence. This idea can be applied to an analysis of a form of abduction, called “reductive inference” in Polish literature on logic. A tentative Thesis on Inferences identifies the validity of a strong inference that is context-independent. (shrink)

In this book the author poses questions about the origin of human life, the place of humankind in the universe and perspectives, which the rapid development of medical knowledge and technological possibilities opens before humanity.

Stosunek polskiej filozofii katolickiej do Augusta Cieszkowskiego był ambiwalentny. Z jednej strony, uważano go za wybitnego filozofa polskiego, żarliwie religijnego i inspirowanego tradycją chrześcijańską, z drugiej strony, jego myśl budziła liczne zastrzeżenia doktrynalne (ewolucyjna perspektywa religii, możliwość realizacji Królestwa Bożego na ziemi, wątki panteizujące, ograniczanie wolnej woli, uzurpowanie sobie prawa do absolutyzmu poznawczego, jeśli chodzi o "Boże plany", uznanie Boga przed stworzeniem świata za nierozwiniętą jeszcze Możność, "elitarna" koncepcja nieśmiertelności jednostkowej za zasługi). Z dzisiejszej perspektywy filozofia Cieszkowskiego budzi opór ze (...) względu na próbę "totalizacji" rzeczywistości i eksponowanie utopijnego modelu ustroju teokratycznego. (shrink)

Polish conservative thinker Władysław Leopold Jaworski developed an interest for the theories of Austrian philosopher Othmar Spann. Both accepted universalism, both also believed that universalism was inspired by romantic tradition, although Spann sought its roots much further back in history, even as far as Aristotle. Both authors staunchly criticized modern-day individualism and liberalism, which they considered fatal. In their opinion individualism and liberalism upset the primacy of totality in social thought, which led to multiple pathologies. Despite their accentuation of totality, (...) both philosophers displayed very decided anti-totalitarian convictions typical for many conservatives. (shrink)

The purpose of the essay is to critically analyze the influence of J. Derrida’s deconstruction on David J. Gunkel’s book Deconstruction (MIT Press 2021). Gunkel’s handbook is aimed at making deconstruction a tool of critical thinking accessible to non-professionals. It turns out that accomplishing this task comes at the expense of precisely the critical potential of deconstruction itself. Gunkel is well aware that his arguments are sometimes superficial and overlook deeper problems that should be addressed. Such a failure takes the (...) form of a fetishistic denial, which in psychoanalysis is summarized by the formula “I know well, but all the same.” In turn, deconstruction itself, insofar as it is separated from Kant’s transcendental philosophy and Hegel’s dialectics, becomes an academic ideology. Restoring its proper subversive potential can only be done by returning to a philosophy of reflection, in which the thinker himself must ultimately consider his own position as an author and bring it under criticism. This is the path that Gunkel avoids, because he could then no longer be the author of a handbook on deconstruction, rather than someone who practices deconstruction. -------------------------- Received: 4/11/2022. Reviewed: 13/12/2022. Accepted: 20/12/2022. (shrink)

Decision-making is a complex action requiring efficient information processing. Specifically, in movement in which performance efficiency depends on reaction time, e.g., open-loop controlled movements, these processes may play a crucial role. Information processing includes three distinct stages, stimulus identification, response selection, and response programming. Mainly, response selection may play a substantial contribution to the reaction time and appropriate decision making. The duration of this stage depends on the number of possible choices an individual has to “screen” to make a proper (...) decision. Given that reaction time is crucial in many sports, the possibilities of reducing it through practice are very tempting. The information processing and its relationship to the manner an individual is practicing are discussed. Especially the variability of practice issues will be explored. In variable practice conditions, an individual has to react to one or more stimuli and has to produce one of the many variations of the same movement or different movements they learned. One has to identify a stimulus appropriately and has to select a response optimally, i.e., choosing from as few choices as possible to reduce the reaction time. On the other hand, in constant practice conditions, an individual can be exposed to one or many stimuli. Still, there is only one variation of the movement that can be executed in the presence of a learned stimulus. Based on the information processing theory and the results of the research focusing on variability of practice, I discuss how the practice conditions may affect reaction time and, as a result, the decision-making process. I conceptually frame the possible implications of practice conditions on decision making related to information processing. In this review, a possible mechanism and relationship between practice conditions and decision-making are presented. Future research directions are presented. (shrink)

We show that for every enumeration degree $a there exists an e-degree c such that $a \leq c , and all degrees b, with $c \leq b , are properly Σ 0 2.

The Cognitive Science of Religion represents a contemporary attempt at a naturalistic explanation of religion. There is debate as to whether its account of how religious beliefs arise is reconcilable with the religious account, which holds that religious beliefs are caused by God. In my paper, I argue that these two accounts cannot be reconciled when it comes to the specific question of how Christian religious beliefs arise if one accepts an important theological doctrine of the supernaturality of Christian belief. (...) This doctrine implies that there can be no natural explanation for how Christian beliefs arise because they are a gift of divine grace. This leads to a conundrum for Christian theists: they can either reject the CSR account of how their religious beliefs arise, or they can reject the supernaturality of Christian belief. I argue that the latter is preferable. I then draw on the work of the theologian Denis Edwards to illustrate how one can drop this doctrine without abandoning some other fundamental tenets of Christian theology. (shrink)

In his book Między ukryciem a jawnością [Between Hiddenness and Openness] (2023), Professor Jacek Wojtysiak argues that on the assumption of atheistic naturalism, no convincing explanation can be given for the ‘great fact of faith,’ that is, the phenomenon of the historical persistence and universality of the belief in the existence of God. The purpose of this paper is to challenge this thesis. Drawing on selected theories from the field of the Cognitive Science of Religion, I sketch a naturalistic explanation (...) of how religious belief arises. (shrink)

The article reviews the book Philosophia Vitam Alere. Prace dedykowane Profesorowi Romanowi Darowskiemu SJ z okazji 70-lecia urodzin, edited by Stanisław Ziemiański S.J.

What is the meaning of the “Europe” and the idea of unity? For when did a “united” Europe exist? Back when German emperors ineffectively tried to enforce their rule on a territory which was none too large anyway? Or when they were entangled in a dispute with the papacy? Or during the crusades against the Catharists? Or maybe during the Reformation or during the French Revolution when new coalitions of opponents arose? During the Napoleonic Wars which in themselves pay testimony (...) to ruptures and conflicts? The 20th century alone brought two wars. The first already signified, as Jan Patocka once declared, the suicide of Europe. Perhaps, then, Europe does not exist at all anymore? Maybe the politicians’ visions are less than credible? There is no doubt that the idea of a united Europe is a project which affirms the great, creative power of the imagination. Modernity has given birth to very strong temptations which glorify the imagination. (shrink)

Demokracja i erozja tradycji Oświecenia -- Mit, polityka, popkultura -- Przyjaźń i mizantropia : czego uczy nas liberalizm?