In his numerous philosophical writings Cicero mostly adapted contemporary Greek sources, but occasionally he took up certain positions of his own. His propensity to scepticism in epistemology and dogmatism in ethics and political philosophy appears to be a further development of the model set forth by Carneades. Though Cicero was influenced by both Antiochus of Ascalon and Philo of Larissa—both of them claimed the heritage of the Platonic Academy—he owed a life-long allegiance to the Academic tradition of Carneades. Very often (...) we are faced with a poor state of his own argument. But it seems to me very likely that in main questions his position was consistent throughout his life, and I consider his own philosophy as the beginning of the rising Middle Platonism. (shrink)

Kritički osvrt na knjigu Milana Kangrge, Etika: Osnovni problem i pravci te na knjigu Ante Čovića, Etika i bioetika: Razmišljanja na pragu bioetičke epohe.

Technophobia is an irrational fear of either technological influence or\ntechnological artifacts. Philosophical interest for technophobia is\nthreefold: epistemological, existential and\nphilosophical-anthropological. In the last five decades, computers have\nchanged in major many areas of human life, including philosophy. The\nauthors have started rendering technophobical issues in philosophy with\nemergence of technophobical objections to each leap forward in\ncommunication medium. Next area of analysis is speculative fiction.\nDetermining the philosophical importance of speculative fiction, authors\noffered an overview of technophobical thesis in some of anthological\nworks.

It is nowadays widely understood that undeclared work cannot be efficiently combated without a holistic view on the mechanisms underlying its existence. However, the question remains whether we possess all the pieces of the holistic puzzle. To fill the gap, in this paper, we test if the features so far known to affect the behaviour of taxpayers are sufficient to detect noncompliance with outstanding precision. This is done by training seven supervised machine learning models on the compilation of data from (...) the 2019 Special Eurobarometer on undeclared work and relevant figures from other sources. The conducted analysis not only does attest to the completeness of our knowledge concerning the drivers of undeclared work but also paves the way for wide usage of artificial intelligence in monitoring and confronting this detrimental practice. The study, however, exposes the necessity of having at disposal considerably larger datasets compared to those currently available if successful real-world applications of machine learning are to be achieved in this field. Alongside the apparent theoretical contribution, this paper is thus also expected to be of particular importance for policymakers, whose efforts to tackle tax evasion will have to be expedited in the period after the COVID-19 pandemic. (shrink)

In the paper authors present, examine, and test elements of the vital idea of the philosophical morphology as a method and a technique of philosophical investigation. The paper consists of some applications mostly concerning the method applied by L. Wittgenstein in PI and related later works, and of a series of examples concerning daily phenomena. In the first part the philosophical morphology is explicated as a method, and in the second and in the third part basic “commandments” of morphological technique (...) are described and examined, namely the first one – which says that one should “look-at exhaustively”, and the second one – which says that one should “see-as and describe synoptically”. In these parts some objections and replies to crucial morphological ideas are provided and accompanied with examples. (shrink)

Danski filozof Søren Kierkegaard duboko je proživljavao i promišljao vjeru, umjetnost i filozofiju pa, premda se umjetnosti i filozofije odrekao u ime vjere, to je samo prividno tako, jer je filozofiju sačuvao svojim izvanrednim filozofiranjem, a umjetnosti je sačuvao značajno mjesto u estetici braka i umjetnosti življenja. Što to znači estetički živjeti, i što znači etički živjeti? Kierkegaard ne polazi od estetičkog života umjetnika, već od etičkog i religioznog samoizbora koji život čini lijepim i umjetničkim djelom. Cilj nije umjetnost umjetničkog (...) djela, već umjetnost življenja, a to je moguće samo u vjeri.Dannish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard deeply lived through and contemplated faith, art and philosophy; althought he got rid of art and philosophy in the name of faith, this was only apparently, because he have preserved philosophy by his extraordinary thinking, and he also preserved important place for the art in the aestehtics of marriage and in the art of living. What does it mean to live aestehtically, and what to live ethically? Kierkegaard does not take the life of an artist as his point of departure, but he takes ethical and religious self-choice as the source of life which makes it artistic work and the work of beauty. The goal is not the art of artistic work, but the art of living, and that is possible only through the faith. (shrink)

In this paper I try to indicate particular elements of Socrates’ philosophy by which educational practice should be guided, as well as certain harmful implications of Sophistic approach to education. In analysis of Socrates’ position, I especially rely on Vlastos’ interpretations, and particularly I refer to Socrates’ thesis that virtue cannot be taught. Among other things, it suggests a non-doctrinal approach to moral-educational practice, which cannot result from Protagoras’ opposite beliefs. Nowadays Sophistic particular- and utilitarian-oriented education occurs especially in the (...) educational (or better: manipulative) transmission of national, business and similar so-called ethics, which are not able for recognizing and overcoming of the existing socio-economic framework, and for which Socrates’ moral-educational philosophy contains critical force, arising primarily out of the emphasis on autonomy. (shrink)

In this paper I examine the role of anthropomorphic thinking today, especially in bioethics. In this context, the ban on anthropomorphism, which was until recently considered almost as an axiom, is particularly significant. The first part of the presentation considers the justification and consequences of this ban, where I especially refer to the insights of Hans Jonas. The second part of the presentation tries to offer answers to the issue of justification of anthropomorphism in bioethics, where the connection between anthropomorphism (...) and anthropocentrism is also examined. Anthropocentrism is often considered as one of the main premises of in some way already actual ecological apocalypse. By playing with metaphors, one can set the fundamental question of this presentation as follows: does anthropomorphism originate from the “heart of darkness” that spawned the “apocalypse now”? (shrink)

The responsibility for the COVID-19 pandemic was first ascribed to persons associated with the Huanan Seafood Market. However, many scientists suggest that this pandemic is actually a consequence of human intrusion into nature. This opens up a whole new perspective for an examination of direct and indirect, individual and collective responsibility concerning this particular pandemic, but also zoonotic pandemics as such. In this context, one of the key issues are the consequences of factory-farming of animals, which contributes to circumstances in (...) which zoonotic pandemics emerge. Moreover, it is part of a larger economic system, global capitalism, whose logic implies certain coercion toward its participants to keep it essentially unchanged and therefore to make sure that livestock health remains?the weakest link in our global health chain?. However, even though the precise answer to the issue of moral responsibility for zoonotic pandemics outbreaks in general and the COVID-19 pandemic in particular cannot be given, it is possible to list certain indicators and make a framework helpful in ascribing moral responsibility to certain persons. The paper intends to do so by examining the notion of responsibility and by applying it to the issues mentioned. The results of this analysis show that it is misleading to place moral blame on people involved in actions that directly caused the animal-to-human transmission of a certain virus or on humanity as a whole. (shrink)

The paper attempts to point out Paulo Freire’s thoughts that could be fruitful in the context of bioethical consideration of the human relationship toward nature, i.e., non-human living beings, especially with regard to the development of bioethical sensibility, in particular present in children. Given that certain childhood traits, compatible with the idea of bioethical sensibility, form the core of Freire’s philosophy of education, this is an area in which the bioethicisation of Freire’s thought can be particularly fruitful. In addition, the (...) paper presents his views associated with moral regard toward non-human living beings, as well as those that are somewhat contradictory to due regard toward living beings, given that the latter views provide impoverished insights into the richness of the non-human living beings’ self-realisation. Prior to these considerations, the notion of bioethicisation of philosophy is further clarified, especially regarding the closely related (programmatic) notion of Europeanisation of bioethics. Both of these terms are used in the context of integrative bioethics. The last chapter explains the potential contribution of Freire’s dialogical method to the development of a pluri-perspective methodology of integrative bioethics. (shrink)