Na úvod připomínám medailon Josefa Zumra k Lubošovým šedesátinám ve Filosofickém časopisu 1995, jako doklad, že našeho tehdejšího vedoucího katedry si vážili nejen filosofové z Brna. Luboš se narodil ve stejném roce jako já, ale středoškolská studia stihl dokončit o rok dříve. Tak se stalo, že jsem se s ním v roce 1950 na Filosofické fakultě setkal jako s učitelem- -asistentem (na jeho přednášce z etiky) a on se mnou jako s jedním ze svých prvních univerzitních posluchačů filosofie. Když jsem (...) s ním od roku 1954 působil na jedné katedře, setkávali jsme se nejen „služebně”, ale i jako kamarádi mimo školu; nezapomenutelné mi zůstávají např. naše zájezdy na slovenskou chalupu k Pavlu Páclovi, kde jsem se utvrzoval v poznání, jak přirozeně Luboš umí být výborným společníkem i v takovém prostředí (nejen při karetních hrách, ale i když jsme se snažili přispět k údržbě Pavlovy chalupy a k její přípravě na zimní období). Pokusil jsem se povědět pár slov o Lubošově vztahu k rodině, v níž se narodil, k jeho vlastní rodině, k rodnému kraji, a ovšem i Lubošovi učiteli, všemi studenty oblíbeném a váženém. Muselo - bohužel - nakonec dojít i na slova obdivu k jeho statečnému zápasu s nemocí, které posléze podlehl. (shrink)

Abstrakt/Abstract Článek pojednává o buddhistické logice a jejím vztahu k logice aristotelské, zejména k principu sporu a principu vyloučeného třetího. Dotkne se také dialetheismu a parakonzistentních logik, které se v souvislosti s interpretacemi buddhismu objevují. The article deals with the Buddhist logic and its relation to Aristotle’s logic, in particular, to the principle of non-contradiction and the principle of exluded middle. It also tackles the topic of dialetheism and paraconsistent logics, which are sometimes mentioned in connection with the interpretations of (...) Buddhism. (shrink)

Cílem této studie je představení základních tezí sociálně-politické filosofie Karla Raimunda Poppera (jak je zachycena zejména v dílech Bída historicismu a Otevřená společnost a její nepřátelé) a dále kritické zhodnocení aplikace těchto tezí při výkladu Platónovy filosofie. Je probíráno zejména Popperovo obvinění Platóna z tzv. „biologického historicismu“, dále jeho označení platónské teorie spravedlnosti jako „totalitní“ a v neposlední řadě jeho interpretace dialogu Ústava jakožto Platónova „politického programu“ určeného k přímé implementaci v praxi vyvoleným filosofem-králem. V druhé polovině této studie je (...) pak nabídnuto alternativní čtení, v němž se Platónova Ústava vyjeví ve zcela odlišném světle, než v jakém ji vidí Popper. (shrink)

Existentialism became one of the most fashionable philosophical currents in postwar Czechoslovakia. Whereas the orthodox Marxism of the 1950s, following Lukács’s Marxism or existentialism?, hastily condemned existentialism as an offshoot of bourgeois idealism, Marxists of the 1960s viewed existentialism as a philosophical current that deserved, at the least, serious examination. During the subsequent era of Czechoslovak “real” socialism of the 1970s and 1980s, existentialism was, as a result, interpreted as one of the sources of the 1968 “counterrevolution.” This article maps (...) and analyzes the official Marxist reception of existentialism in the course of the Stalinist, post-Stalinist and so-called real socialist periods of Czechoslovak history. However, its main focus is on the post-Stalinist period, when Czechoslovak philosophy benefited from a lively debate between Marxism and existentialism. Some participants in this debate considered existentialism to be an important rival to Marxism, one that posed the very same questions yet offered slightly different answers. At the center of the polemics lay the existentialist categories of being, existence, and freedom. (shrink)

[Physical premotion and self-determination].

The paper deals with the problematic of concept and image as independent forms of mediating the thought. A specific role in incorporating the media of concept and image into the system of thought is played by the mediality itself, which operates as an entity mediating between heterogeneous worlds. The symbolized messages of the concept and image thus represent using the dispositive of representation between the visual and intellectual worlds. The author takes the concept as the initial form of thought, which (...) describes the object from the perspective of its being without making any propositions about it; the image, on the other hand, is taken as a sensory representation of the object. However, each of them is only a particular form of mediation. Representing a concept thus means taking the thought as a conceptual representation. (shrink)

Článek ukazuje, jaká je role tradiční role logické analýzy v rámci filosofického bádání. Naznačuje rovněž, že současné logické metody začínají otevírat cestu k modelování procesů, které filosofie tradičně zkoumá.

Aquinas employs formal abstraction to secure the possibility of mathematics conceived as a theoretical Aristotelian science. Mathematics is a science that investigates real quantity and it grasps its necessary, universal, and changeless properties by means of formal abstraction. In accord with it the paper is divided into two parts. In the first part Aquinas’s conception of (formal) abstraction is explicated against the background of the Aristotelian theory of science and mathematics. In the second part the problems associated with formal abstraction (...) in mathematics are critically assessed. (shrink)

In the late 19th century, T. G. Masaryk presented his national programme. This vision of modern Czech society rested on the ideals of humanity, thus infusing the national ethos with a universal dimension. The significance of T. G. Masaryk's thought is investigated by current Czech thinkers in this volume.

The successful early acquisition of reading literacy represents a crucial learning process determining the further course of academic development (Stanovich, 2009). During this process, interactions between children and their proximal social environment are of utmost importance. Therefore, we introduce a systemic framework for the development of learning potential (e.g., Mudrak et al., 2015, 2019, 2019b; Ziegler & Stoeger, 2017) and explore the interactions between the social and motivational processes associated with reading literacy development in school-age children. We base our analysis (...) on a representative Czech sample of fourth-grade pupils involved in the Progress in International Reading Literacy study (PIRLS, Martin et al., 2016). On the basis of the systemic framework, we hypothesized hierarchical relationships among family socioeconomic status, related developmental resources (including parental support, expectations, and reading resources), children’s reading motivation (including reading engagement and reading confidence), and manifested learning outcomes (including school grades and reading competence). We implemented three structural equation models to test the hypothesized relationships. The first model tested the direct effect of developmental resources on reading competence. The second model included the motivational variables as mediators between resources and competence. The third model included school grades as mediators between resources and motivational variables. Our analyses indicated the good fit of the proposed models. The final model explained 37.8 % of the variance in children’s school grades and 46.5 % of the variance in reading literacy test scores (compared to 34.8 % in the first model). Moreover, parental socioeconomic status was strongly associated with parental expectations, which were associated with reading confidence, partially through the effect of parental expectations on children’s school grades. Reading confidence was the main predictor of reading literacy within the model, followed by the direct effects of parental resources. The results illustrate complex processes through which the family environment affects the development of learning competencies such as reading literacy by providing children with the relevant social and material resources associated with their motivation and school outcomes. We discuss some of the reasons that these relationships may take place and consider their implications for educational practice. (shrink)

We study search problems and reducibilities between them with known or potential relevance to bounded arithmetic theories. Our primary objective is to understand the sets of low complexity consequences of theories Si2 and Ti2 for a small i, ideally in a rather strong sense of characterization; or, at least, in the standard sense of axiomatization. We also strive for maximum combinatorial simplicity of the characterizations and axiomatizations, eventually sufficient to prove conjectured separation results. To this end two techniques based on (...) the Herbrand's theorem are developed. They characterize/axiomatize Σb1-consequences of Σb2-definable search problems, while the method based on the more involved concept of characterization is easier and gives more transparent results. This method yields new proofs of Buss' witnessing theorem and of the relation between PLS and Σb1, and also an axiomatization of Σb1. (shrink)

Deschamps, Léger Marie,1716-1774; enlightenment; utopias; art and philosophy; philosophy, modern; 18th century.

The aim of the article is to point out the problem that started in the 2018 US Open final between Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams. During this final match, there was a conflict between the player S. Williams and the chair umpire C. Ramos, which involved a violation of rules related to coaching during the match. Subsequently, C. Ramos was banned from officiating the Williams sisters' matches at the next 2019 US Open. The authors of the article believe that the (...) tennis organizations USTA and WTA did not judge the dispute between chair umpire C. Ramos and S. Williams in accordance with their rules, as the rules allow for the sanctioning of a player who is coached during a match. While the written rules and their application during play must be taken into consideration, so must the subjective interpretation and application of the rules by a particular umpire. If our arguments are correct, C. Ramos's application of the rules during this game was in no way inconsistent with his past practice or the rules themselves. Thus, C. Ramos was a victim of the entire incident, which was also influenced by the gender narrative after the match. (shrink)

In Fechner's psychophysics, the 'mental' and the 'physical' were conceived as two phenomenal domains, connected by functional relations, not as two ontologically different realms. We follow the path from Fechner's foundational ideas and Mach's radical programme of a unitary science to later approaches to primary, psychophysically neutral experience (phenomenology, protophysics). We propose an 'integral psychophysics' as a mathematical study of law-like, invariant structures of primary experience. This approach is illustrated by a reinterpretation of psychophysical experiments in terms of perceptual situations (...) involving a constructed apparatus and an instructed subject. The problematic notion of 'measurement of sensation' is thus eliminated: 'sensations' are merely indices for classes of perceptually equivalent configurations (states of the apparatus) specified by the instruction. The locus of the measured is in the inter-subjectively shared, communicable world—not inside the subject's mind. Finally we discuss the role of integral psychophysics as a scientia prima , logically and methodically preceding physics and psychology. (shrink)

In this book, Jiri Benovsky takes a stand for a variant of panpsychism as being the best solution available to the mind-body problem. More exactly, he defends a view that can be labelled 'dual-aspect-pan-proto-psychism'. Panpsychism claims that mentality is ubiquitous to reality, and in combination with dual-aspect monism it claims that anything, from fundamental particles to rocks, trees, and human animals, has two aspects: a physical aspect and a mental aspect. In short, the view is that the nature of reality (...) is 'phental' (physical-mental). But this does not mean, according to the author, that rocks and photons think or have conscious experiences, in the sense in which human animals have experiences. This is where pan-proto-psychism enters the picture as being a better theoretical option, where the mental aspects of fundamental particles, rocks, and trees are not experiential. Many hard questions arise here. In this book, Benovsky focuses on the combination problem: in short, how do tiny mental aspects of fundamental particles combine to yield macro-phenomenal conscious experiences, such as your complex experience when you enjoy a great gastronomic meal? What makes the question even harder is that the combination problem is not just one problem, but rather a family of various combination issues and worries. Benovsky offers a general strategy to deal with these combination problems and focuses on one in particular – namely, the worry concerning the existence of subjects of experience. Indeed, if standard panpsychism were true, we would need an explanation of how tiny micro-subjects combine into a macro-subject like a human person. And if panprotopsychism is true, it has to explain how a subject of experience can arise from proto-micro-mental aspects of reality. Benovsky shows that understanding the nature of subjectivity in terms of the growingly familiar notion of mineness in combination with a reductionist/eliminativist view of the self, allows us to have a coherent picture, where this type of combination problem is avoided, without throwing the baby out with the bathwater. (shrink)

Finitary quasivarieties are characterized categorically by the existence of colimits and of an abstractly finite, regularly projective regular generator G. Analogously, infinitary quasivarieties are characterized: one drops the assumption that G be abstractly finite. For (finitary) varieties the characterization is similar: the regular generator is assumed to be exactly projective, i.e., hom(G, –) is an exact functor. These results sharpen the classical characterization theorems of Lawvere, Isbell and other authors.

Many experimental found footage films base their meanings and effects on an interaction between the figurative content of the image and its material-technological underpinnings. Can this interaction arise accidentally without artistic appropriation? A recently digitised film by the Czech cinema pioneer Jan Kříženecký, Opening Ceremony of the Čech Bridge (1908), presents such an exercise in accidental aesthetics. At one point, the horizontal and vertical trembling of the cinematograph – obtained from the Lumière brothers – translates into a trembling of the (...) figures on the bridge so precisely that the figurative and material spheres appear to cooperate towards a common aesthetic goal. To account for such phenomena, film theory, found footage filmmaking, and archival practice need to join forces with philosophy. More specifically, Gilbert Simondon's notion of transduction, a process based on the intersection of diverse realities within a domain, allows us to conceptualise the paradoxical interaction between the figurative and material dimensions and the unintentional meanings that arise out of it. Transduction enables the distribution of elements between these heterogeneous spheres while maintaining a certain stability within a system. In the case of archival films in which transduction occurs without prior intention or expectation, transduction can be foregrounded and prolonged. The connection between transduction and the “trembling meaning” of Opening Ceremony, understood within the wider context of camera instability in experimental found footage, will uncover the aesthetic potentialities held by the autonomous creativity of film matter and its interferences with the figurative content. (shrink)

The article presents an overview concerning Heidegger's work and life, especially with respect to the contemporary state of publishing of his texts. The article aims at showing a continuity in Heidegger's Thinking of Being on one hand, but, on the other hand, stresses also necessity of a new assessment of his thought, if we take into consideration some recently published manuscripts (especially vol. 65 and 66). The necessity of a new assessment concerns also his personal standpoints during the time of (...) his rectorate in 1933-34. The new documents are presented in volume 16 (published in 2000). The author is convinced that Heidegger is a philosopher of our future. We are still waiting for a truly philosophical assessment and exploiting of his work. (shrink)

Příspěvek připomíná filosofii „posledního Římana a prvního scholastika“ Anicia Bo­ethia, který je nejznámější díky své filosofické básni Útěcha z filosofie. Tento článek se soustředí na jinou stránku Boethiovy tvorby, na jeho překladatelské úsilí z řečtiny do latiny, kdy vytvořil novou terminologii a tak mohl syntetizovat filosofickou roztříš­těnost názorů jeho současníků pomocí exaktní metodologie. Ve svém vědeckém jazyce používal umění i logiku dohromady, s důrazem na větší srozumitelnost.Boethius sjednotil díky svému filosofickému jazyku mnoho rozdílných filosofic­kých škol – Platóna, Aristotela, pythagorejce, novoplatonismus (...) a křesťanskou teologii. Zformalizoval vědecký výzkum podle aritmetiky, dokázal reformovat svobodná umění do křesťanského světa a sjednotit vědu a filosofii pomocí matematiky. Svoji metodu nazval quadrivium, tedy čtyři cesty k moudrosti, jako součást Sedmi svobodných umění (lat. Septem artes liberales). Quadrivium se sestávalo z aritmetiky, geometrie, astronomie a hudby. Tyto čtyři způsoby považoval Boethius za nejlepší pe­dagogickou cestu k poznání fyzikálních zákonitostí našeho světa (lat. naturalia). Díky abstraktnosti této matematické cesty preferoval i důležitost jazyka a terminologie, která se používá. I přes logickou koherentnost je dle něj možné používat umělecká vyjádření pro větší srozumitelnost.Článek ukazuje i obtíže současné vědy, která je také limitována jazykem. Protože v minulosti filosofové stáli před podobným problémem, může Boethius svým důrazem na svobodnou cestu filosofie stále inspirovat. (shrink)

Přehledová studie sleduje a analyzuje proměny pojmu sociální inovace. Na základě silné společenské poptávky se z původně dílčí, teoreticky nediskutované a nefixované kategorie stává kategorie obecná. Pokrývá širokou oblast nemateriálních inovací a zároveň se profiluje jako aktivita normativní a intencionální, zaměřená na obecně uznávané sociální cíle. Co do ideově-hodnotových orientací současných koncepcí sociálních inovací studie identifikuje kromě mainstreamu, který zůstává u otevřených hodnotových charakteristik, ještě směr emancipačně-mobilizační a sociálně-tržně odpovědný. V epistemologické rovině se teoretici sociálních inovací hlásí především k praktickému (...) experimentování, pragmatismu, teorii komplexnosti a principům transdisciplinarity. (shrink)

During the Czechoslovak normalization era (roughly from the 1970s to the 1980s), the Czech lawyer Vladimír Čermák, who later became a Justice of the newly established Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic after the breakdown of the Communist regime, authored a monumental piece called The Question of Democracy. Although this ambitious work has no equal in the Czech context, no attention has been paid to it in the English-speaking world. The present article aims to fill this gap by analyzing the (...) most original aspects of Čermák’s political thought. First, I present Greek tragedy, Plato, and Augustine as the main influences on his thought, which was further shaped by Čermák’s experience with the First Czechoslovak Republic and the Communist era. Second, I show that the most important category permeating all of his intellectual project is the principle of polarity, combined with the concept of polémos as derived from Greek tragedy. Third, I focus on the consensually anchored value order of society, which is created through an interplay between positive and negative forces. Čermák’s idea that all law must be measured against the value order has deeply influenced the value-based jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court. Finally, I position Čermák’s thought in the context of contemporary political theory, arguing that the contrast with the work of the radical political theorist Chantal Mouffe is particularly illuminating. Even though Čermák and Mouffe share a similar attitude to democracy—in that the primacy of strife renders universal rational consensus impossible—I maintain that Čermák’s theory, due to its emphasis on the categories of good and evil, can be more usefully described as “secular Augustinianism”. (shrink)

In this book, Jiri Benovsky defends the view that he doesn't exist. In this book, he also defends the view that this book itself doesn't exist. But this did not prevent him to write the book, and although in Benovsky's view you don't exist either, this does not prevent you to read it. Benovsky defends a brand of non-exceptionalist eliminativism. Some eliminativists, typically focusing on ordinary material objects such as chairs and hammers, make exceptions, for instance for blue whales (that (...) is, living beings) or for persons (that is, conscious organisms). Benovsky takes one by one all types of allegedly existing objects like chairs, whales, and persons and shows that from the metaphysical point of view they are more trouble than they are worth – we are much better off without them. He thus defends an eliminativist view about ordinary objects as well as the 'no-Self' view, where he explores connections between metaphysics, phenomenology, and Buddhist thought. He then also considers the case of aesthetic objects, focusing on musical works and photographs, and shows that the claim of their non-existence solves the many problems that arise when one tries to find an appropriate ontological category for them, and that such an eliminativist view is more natural than what we might have thought. The arguments provided here are always topic-specific: each type of entity is given its own type of treatment, thus proving a varied and solid foundation for a generalized, non-exceptionalist, full-blown eliminativist worldview. (shrink)

Un des problèmes persistants pour la philosophie pratique est de découvrir un procédé adéquat pour justifier des lois dont la finalité est de réguler le fonctionnement des démocraties constitutionnelles. Les libéraux partisans de la raison publique nient que cette justification puisse provenir de doctrines substantielles, étant donné que les lois doivent pouvoir être justifiées par tous les citoyens (raisonnables). La tradition de la loi naturelle offre un test utile quant à la plausibilité de cette thèse. L’article montre comment les deux (...) versions du libéralisme de la raison publique diffèrent quant à leur acceptation de raisons tirées du droit naturel, et pourquoi, étant donné l’influence de leurs points de départs disparates sur les critères normatifs par lesquels elles évaluent les lois, les partisans du droit naturel ont de bonnes raisons de les rejeter toutes les deux. (shrink)

We investigate the interactions of formula complexity in weak set theories with the axioms available there. In particular, we show that swapping bounded and unbounded quantification preserves formula complexity in presence of the axiom of foundation weakened to an arbitrary set base, while it does not if the axiom of foundation is further weakened to a proper class base. More attention is being paid to the necessary axioms employed in the positive results, than to the combinatorial strength of the positive (...) results themselves. (shrink)

The classical liberal approach to deregulation is based on the consecutive elimination of state regulatory activities and their substitution by competitive market structure. Increasing competition accompanied with decreasing arbitrary state agencies’ interventions will undoubtedly cultivate the behaviour of market agents and bring benefits to consumers.The classical liberal approach to deregulation is incompatible with the EU deregulation model, which in case of network industries is still based on the permanent existence of regulatory agencies, Third-Party-Access, public service liability, centralized control of investments (...) and the negative reciprocity. The adoption of these principals will at least delay deregulation process in transition economies but will likely preserve the cartel structure on the utility markets.Economics of regulation and implicitly economics of deregulation is a product of the Chicago School of Economics. Since current “deregulation process” leads to tighter regulation, the adequate term for it should be the reregulation.L’approche libérale classique de la réglementation repose sur l’élimination de la réglementation étatique et leur substitution par des structures marchandes concurrentielles. Une concurrence accrue et une diminution des interventions arbitraires de l’état ne pourront que modifier le comportement des agents sur le marché et engendrer des bénéfices pour les consommateurs.L’approche de la déréglementation du libéralisme classique est incompatible avec le modèle de déréglementation de l’Union Européenne : dans le cas des industries en réseau, ce dernier demeure fondé sur l’existence continue d’agences de réglementation, la responsabilité du service public, le contrôle centralisé des investissements et la réciprocité négative. L’adoption de ces principes aura pour effet au moins de retarder le processus de déréglementation dans les économies en transition et probablement aussi de préserver la structure cartellisée des marchés de services publics.L’économie de la réglementation, et par implication, l’économie de la déréglementation est une contribution émanant de l’Ecole d’Economie de Chicago. Parce que les “processus de déréglemen- tation” en vigueur induisent des réglementations plus drastiques, l’expression appropriée devrait plutôt être la re-réglementation. (shrink)