This is a study of Blondel's philosophy of the supernatural as it appeared only in the dissertation on Action of 1893. First, it reviews how Blondel brought philosophy to focus concretely on human action and what he focuses on in this action as the principle for its dialectical unfolding. Second, it shows how this focus brings him to a radical critique of superstition and any idea of natural religion, since even the latter is viewed as a kind of superstition. Third, (...) it examines how he proceeds to the affirmation of God as the necessary being of action and how this affirmation places the human being in a position of having to choose between saying yes or no to God at the core of his action. Fourth, it shows how Blondel argues from this existential exigency that the thought of the supernatural necessarily arises with regard to the question of human destiny and that such a thought, if it actualized in human action through a gratuitous initiative on the part of God, necessarily entails a revelation, a mediation, and a religious practice on the part of man. In conclusion it reflects on how this science of practice remains a philosophy, as distinct from theology, even though it has to do with religious practice in the most supernatural sense. /// O presente artigo constitui urn estudo sobre o problema do sobrenatural, tal como Blondel comeca por o tratar em sua tese de doutoramento sobre a Ácção, publicada em 1893. Em primeiro lugar, passa-se em revista não só o modo concreto como Blondel fez do problema da acção assunto para a filosofia, mas também se procura discernir aquilo que, segundo ele, na acção mesma constitui o princípio do seu desdobramento dialéctico. Em segundo lugar, mostra-se como a partir deste ponto de focagem Blondel procede a uma critica radical da superstição bem como de toda e qualquer ideia de religião natural, por ele igualmente vista como uma espécie de superstição. Em terceiro lugar, examina-se o modo como Blondel avança em direcção a uma afirmação de Deus como o ser necessário da acção e como esta mesma afirmação coloca o ser humano numa posicjio de, no fulcro do seu agir, ter de optar entre o dizer sim ou não a Deus. Em quarto lugar, mostra-se o modo como Blondel, partindo desta exigência existencial, argumenta no sentido de que o pensamento do sobrenatural necessariamente se dá em conexão com a questão do destino humano e de como tal pensamento, actualizado na acção humana graças a uma iniciativa gratuita da parte de Deus, necessariamente implica a ideia de revelação, mediação, e prática religiosa da parte do homem. Finalmente, em conclusão, reflecte-se sobre o modo como esta ciência da prática permanece filosofia, distinta da teologia, mesmo quando, enquanto tal, ela tern a ver com uma prática religiosa no sentido mais sobrenatural do termo /// Ceci est une étude de la philosophie du surnaturel de Blondel telle qu'elle parut uniquement dans la thèse sur L'Action de 1893. Premièrement, elle revoit comment Blondel a amené la philosophie à réfléchir concrétement sur l'action humaine et ce sur quoi cette réflexion s'appuie comme principe du déploiement dialectique de cette action. Deuxièmement, elle montre comment ce déploiement amène Blondel à une critique radicale de la superstition et de toute idée de religion naturelle, puisque cette dernière est vue comme une sorte de superstition. Troisièmement, elle examine comment Blondel avance vers une affirmation de Dieu comme Fetre necessaire de l'action et comment cette affirmation amène l'être humain à devoir choisir entre dire oui ou non face à Dieu au plus profond de son action. Quatrièmement, elle montre comment Blondel, à partir de cette exigence existentielle, arrive à poser que la pensée du surnaturel surgit nécessairement par rapport à la question du destin de l'être humain et comment une telle pensée, si elle devient réalite dans l'action humaine par une initiative gratuite du côté de Dieu. entraine du côté de l'homme la nécessité d'une révélation, une médiation et une pratique religieuse. En conclusion, l'étude se demande comment cette science de la pratique reste une philosophie, distincte de toute théologie, même si elle traite de la pratique religieuse dans son sens le plus surnaturel. (shrink)

In the late 1930's Blondel precipitated a debate over the question of a Christian philosophy in a series of articles on St. Augustine insisting on the philosophical nature of the saint's thought. Rationalist historian of philosophy Bréhier objected to the very idea of a Christian philosophy. Other historians like Gilson allowed that a philosophy could be characterized loosely as Christian when it was associated with Christian thought, as in the Middle Ages. But Blondel argued against both of these positions as (...) presupposing a separation between philosophy and religion that allowed only for a false hybridization between the two when they were juxtaposed. His own approach to philosophy had been to show a necessary intersection between the two in the question about the ultimate meaning of human action as it relates to God in his infinite transcendence, as this had long been understood in the Catholic tradition, that is, as relating to something supernatural in the strictest sense, something bound to appear as scandalous and paradoxical to reason alone. The present article examines how he first came to his philosophical method for dealing with this question in the 1890's and how he later used this method in defending the idea of a philosophy that was integrally rational and Catholic in the strict sense of both terms. /// Na década de 1930, Maurice Blondel desencadeou um importante debate acerca da questão da chamada Filosofia Cristã mediante uma série de artigos sobre Santo Agostinho, os quais insistiam em particular sobre a natureza filosófica do pensamento do grande santo. Bréhier, um historiador da Filosofia de tendência racionalista, objectou à própria ideia de uma Filosofia Cristã. Outros historiadores, tais como E. Gilson, concediam que uma Filosofia poderia ser vagamente caracterizada como Cristã quando a mesma esteja associada com o pensamento cristão, como era o caso na Idade Média. Mas Blondel argumentava contra estas duas posições na medida em que achava que as mesmas pressuponham a separação entre Filosofia e Religião, separação esta que permitia apenas uma falsa hibridização entre as duas quando as mesmas eram justapostas. A sua posição pessoal em relação à Filosofia defendia que entre esta e a Religião existia uma intersecçdo necessária acerca da questão relativa ao sentido ultimo da acçdo humana na medida em que esta remete para Deus na sua infinita transcendência, tal como esta era desde há muito compreendida na tradição Católica, ou seja, enquanto que remetendo para algo sobrenatural no sentido mais estrito, algo destinado a aparecer como escandaloso e paradoxal à razão enquanto que entregue a si mesma. O presente artigo examina de que modo Blondel primeiro chegou ao seu método filosófico no tratamento desta questão na década de 1890 e de como ele mais tarde usou este método para defender a ideia de uma Filosofia que é integralmente racional e católica no sentido mais estrito de ambos os termos. (shrink)

This essay addresses the question of the effect of Russell's paradox on Frege's distinctive brand of arithmetical realism. It is argued that the effect is not just to undermine Frege's specific account of numbers as extensions (courses of value) but more importantly to undermine his general means of explaining the object-directedness of arithmetical discourse. It is argued that contemporary neo-Fregean attempts to revive that explanation do not successfully avoid the central problem brought to light by the paradox. Along the way, (...) it is argued that the need to fend off an eliminative construal of arithmetic can help explain the so-called Caesar problem in the Grundlagen, and that the "syntactic priority thesis" is insufficient to establish the claim that numbers are objects. (shrink)

The effect of contextual information on the resolution of ambiguity was investigated in a group of individuals awaiting dental treatment and a group of control individuals. Participants heard threat/neutral, neutral/neutral and positive/neutral homophones while being simultaneously presented with a context word that was consistent with one of the two meanings of the homophone. Participants then made a lexical decision task on a target word that was one of the two alternate spellings of the homophone. We found that the dental group (...) was more sensitive to context for all types of homophones, and there was no evidence for mood congruency. It also appeared that there might have been an element of mood regulation in the dental group, as they were slower to respond to the emotional targets overall. Our results show that sensitivity to context in state anxiety is a robust phenomenon and one that generalises to naturally occurring anxious moods. (shrink)

Background: Family members are often required to act as substitute decision-makers when health care or research participation decisions must be made for an incapacitated relative. Yet most families are unable to accurately predict older adult preferences regarding future health care and willingness to engage in research studies. Discussion and documentation of preferences could improve proxies' abilities to decide for their loved ones. This trial assesses the efficacy of an advance planning intervention in improving the accuracy of substitute decision-making and increasing (...) the frequency of documented preferences for health care and research. It also investigates the financial impact on the healthcare system of improving substitute decision-making.Methods/DesignDyads (n = 240) comprising an older adult and his/her self-selected proxy are randomly allocated to the experimental or control group, after stratification for type of designated proxy and self-report of prior documentation of healthcare preferences. At baseline, clinical and research vignettes are used to elicit older adult preferences and assess the ability of their proxy to predict those preferences. Responses are elicited under four health states, ranging from the subject's current health state to severe dementia. For each state, we estimated the public costs of the healthcare services that would typically be provided to a patient under these scenarios. Experimental dyads are visited at home, twice, by a specially trained facilitator who communicates the dyad-specific results of the concordance assessment, helps older adults convey their wishes to their proxies, and offers assistance in completing a guide entitled My Preferences that we designed specifically for that purpose. In between these meetings, experimental dyads attend a group information session about My Preferences. Control dyads attend three monthly workshops aimed at promoting healthy behaviors. Concordance assessments are repeated at the end of the intervention and 6 months later to assess improvement in predictive accuracy and cost savings, if any. Copies of completed guides are made at the time of these assessments.DiscussionThis study will determine whether the tested intervention guides proxies in making decisions that concur with those of older adults, motivates the latter to record their wishes in writing, and yields savings for the healthcare system.Trial RegistrationISRCTN89993391. (shrink)

In Frege's Conception of Logic Patricia A. Blanchette explores the relationship between Gottlob Frege's understanding of conceptual analysis and his understanding of logic.

AimRapid eye movement (REM) sleep, non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep, and sleep spindles are all implicated in the consolidation of procedural memories. Relative contributions of sleep stages and sleep spindles were previously shown to depend on individual differences in task processing. However, no studies to our knowledge have focused on individual differences in experience with Vipassana meditation as related to sleep. Vipassana meditation is a form of mental training that enhances proprioceptive and somatic awareness and alters attentional style. The goal (...) of this study was to examine a potential role for Vipassana meditation experience in sleep-dependent procedural memory consolidation.MethodsGroups of Vipassana meditation practitioners (N = 22) and matched meditation-naïve controls (N = 20) slept for a daytime nap in the laboratory. Before and after the nap they completed a procedural task on the Wii Fit balance platform.ResultsMeditators performed slightly better on the task before the nap, but the two groups improved similarly after sleep. The groups showed different patterns of sleep-dependent procedural memory consolidation: in meditators, task learning was positively correlated with density of slow occipital spindles, while in controls task improvement was positively associated with time in REM sleep. Sleep efficiency and sleep architecture did not differ between groups. Meditation practitioners, however, had a lower density of occipital slow sleep spindles tha... (shrink)

Esta dissertação encontra-se construída em torno de um núcleo central - a exposição, aná-lise e discussão do chamado 'Argumento da linguagem privada', de Wittengstein. A dinâmica própria da abordagem e discussão do tema leva necessariamente a percorrer o conjunto da obra de Wittengstein, o que motiva um notável aprofundamento do assunto e torna ainda mais aliciante este ensaio.

This is the first modern, annotated and scholarly edition of Jean-Baptiste Du Bos’ _Critical Reflections on Poetry and Painting_, one of the seminal works of modern aesthetics in any language.

National Book Award Finalist. How did humanity originate and why does a species like ours exist on this planet? Do we have a special place, even a destiny in the universe? Where are we going, and perhaps, the most difficult question of all, "Why?" In The Meaning of Human Existence, his most philosophical work to date, Pulitzer Prize–winning biologist Edward O. Wilson grapples with these and other existential questions, examining what makes human beings supremely different from all other species. Searching (...) for meaning in what Nietzsche once called "the rainbow colors" around the outer edges of knowledge and imagination, Wilson takes his readers on a journey, in the process bridging science and philosophy to create a twenty-first-century treatise on human existence—from our earliest inception to a provocative look at what the future of mankind portends. Continuing his groundbreaking examination of our "Anthropocene Epoch," which he began with The Social Conquest of Earth, described by the New York Times as "a sweeping account of the human rise to domination of the biosphere," here Wilson posits that we, as a species, now know enough about the universe and ourselves that we can begin to approach questions about our place in the cosmos and the meaning of intelligent life in a systematic, indeed, in a testable way. Once criticized for a purely mechanistic view of human life and an overreliance on genetic predetermination, Wilson presents in The Meaning of Human Existence his most expansive and advanced theories on the sovereignty of human life, recognizing that, even though the human and the spider evolved similarly, the poet's sonnet is wholly different from the spider's web. Whether attempting to explicate "The Riddle of the Human Species," "Free Will," or "Religion"; warning of "The Collapse of Biodiversity"; or even creating a plausible "Portrait of E.T.," Wilson does indeed believe that humanity holds a special position in the known universe. The human epoch that began in biological evolution and passed into pre-, then recorded, history is now more than ever before in our hands. Yet alarmed that we are about to abandon natural selection by redesigning biology and human nature as we wish them, Wilson soberly concludes that advances in science and technology bring us our greatest moral dilemma since God stayed the hand of Abraham. (shrink)

Gottlob Frege famously rejects the methodology for consistency and independence proofs offered by David Hilbert in the latter's Foundations of Geometry. The present essay defends against recent criticism the view that this rejection turns on Frege's understanding of logical entailment, on which the entailment relation is sensitive to the contents of non-logical terminology. The goals are (a) to clarify further Frege's understanding of logic and of the role of conceptual analysis in logical investigation, and (b) to point out the extent (...) to which his understanding of logic differs importantly from that of the model-theoretic tradition that grows out of Hilbert's work. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to analyze the variability of the "Self-made-man" idea in the context of the Christian Middle Ages in its primarily historical and philosophical presentation. Research is based on the historical and philosophical analysis of the medieval philosophy presented foremost by the works of Aurelius Augustine, P. Abelard, Thomas Aquinas, and also by the modern researches of this epoch. Theoretical basis. Historical, comparative, and hermeneutic methods became fundamental for this research. Originality. The conducted analysis allowed to (...) draw a conclusion that, despite the still existing view of the Middle Ages as a kind of an ideological gap in the formation of the self-determination idea, the Christian philosophy of this period not only does not reject but also gives essentially the universal character of the ancient intention to recognize the individual’s right to self-determination and self-government, makes it not only religiously acceptable but also obligatory. Conclusions. Despite to general theocentrism, providentialism and fatalism of Christian medieval philosophy and culture in general, at its epicenter there is a man of a special type, focused on preserving spiritual autonomy and identity in the social dimensions of their existence, and at the same time, on personal responsibility for their own destiny. Such focus became a logical and somewhat unexpected result of the complex interaction of numerous factors of medieval culture, as well as the ideas and intentions inherited from Antiquity. In particular, the idea that a person who does not act freely cannot be morally responsible for what he does, as well as the intentions of the ancient sage to autonomy, autarky, and apoliticism. In the Middle Ages, this intention became essentially universal, as it became a right, even an obligation of every Christian to be free, at least from the worldly, in determining and realizing his own destiny. The gradual compromise recognition that personal salvation is possible only as a result of synergy, i.e. the co-participation of God’s grace and human freedom, legitimizes and strengthens its focus on active personal efforts and personal responsibility for one’s own salvation, in fact for one’s own destiny. All this in historical perspective was found in its radicalized and purified from all sorts of mystical and religious layers of expression in the idea of "Self-made-man". (shrink)

Common‐sense morality seems to dictate that newborn babies strictly outrank non‐human animals on an ordered list of subjects of moral consideration. This is best described as the view that newborn babies have a higher moral status than any non‐human animal. In this article, I will argue that this common‐sense claim about the special moral status of newborn babies makes it hard to avoid the conclusion that fetuses, including pre‐conscious fetuses, also have a higher moral status than any non‐human animal—indeed, as (...) high as newborn babies. While this conclusion does not quite entail that abortion is generally seriously immoral, it does seem to follow that it would be no less difficult to justify (even relatively early) abortion than it would be to justify killing a newborn. (shrink)

New paradigms in the psychology of reasoning have included a consideration for general contextual factors that may impact on the reasoning process, including individuals’ goals and motivations. We suggest that emotions are one such important contextual factor that influences reasoning. The classic literature on thinking and reasoning has typically ignored the possible influence of emotion, except to consider it a source of disruption. We review findings from studies where participants were asked to reason about personally relevant emotional experiences such as (...) sexual abuse, war, and terrorist attacks. While some findings are consistent with the view that incidental emotions have a deleterious effect on reasoning, a number of findings also suggest a beneficial impact of emotion. For instance, veterans reasoned more logically about combat-related syllogisms than structurally identical syllogisms with neutral contents; victims of sexual abuse reporting more negative emotions following the events also reasoned more logically on abuse-related contents, relative to neutral contents. This may be associated with integral emotions, when the affective reaction is relevant to the semantic contents reasoned about. We propose that the positive impact of integral emotions on reasoning can be explained by increased utility of problem content and increased utility of reasoning. (shrink)

. History of the concept of economic efficiency . INTRODUCTION James Buchanan won the Nobel Prize by proving that the process by which elected officials ...

This paper examines the connection between model-theoretic truth and necessary truth. It is argued that though the model-theoretic truths of some standard languages are demonstrably ''''necessary'''' (in a precise sense), the widespread view of model-theoretic truth as providing a general guarantee of necessity is mistaken. Several arguments to the contrary are criticized.

In the early years of the twentieth century, Gottlob Frege and David Hilbert, two titans of mathematical logic, engaged in a controversy regarding the correct understanding of the role of axioms in mathematical theories, and the correct way to demonstrate consistency and independence results for such axioms. The controversy touches on a number of difficult questions in logic and the philosophy of logic, and marks an important turning-point in the development of modern logic. This entry gives an overview of that (...) controversy and of its philosophical underpinnings. (shrink)

Peter Geach famously holds that there is no such thing as absolute identity. There are rather, as Geach sees it, a variety of relative identity relations, each essentially connected with a particular monadic predicate. Though we can strictly and meaningfully say that an individual a is the same man as the individual b, or that a is the same statue as b, we cannot, on this view, strictly and meaningfully say that the individual a simply is b. It is difficult (...) to find anything like a persuasive argument for this doctrine in Geach's work. But one claim made by Geach is that his account of identity is the account most naturally aligned with Frege's widely admired treatment of cardinality. And though this claim of an affinity between Frege's and Geach's doctrines has been challenged, the challenge has been resisted. William Alston and Jonathan Bennett, indeed, go further than Geach to argue that Frege's doctrine implies Geach's. If Alston and Bennett are right, then those who favor a broadly Fregean treatment of cardinality have no choice but to adopt Geach's doctrine of relative identity. And because contemporary set-theoretic accounts of cardinality are essentially Fregean in all respects relevant to this issue (see §11 below), it follows from Alston and Bennett's claim that virtually every standard modern treatment of cardinality requires a 'relativized' treatment of identity. The purpose of this paper is to argue against the implication claimed by Alston and Bennett. Despite some superficial similarities between Frege's treatment of cardinality and Geach's treatment of identity, the two doctrines are fundamentally opposed. Frege's account of cardinality, and its set-theoretic descendants, are all inconsistent with the claim that identity is 'relative' in Geach's sense. (shrink)

This paper defends the view that Frege’s reduction of arithmetic to logic would, if successful, have shown that arithmetical knowledge is analytic in essentially Kant’s sense. It is argued, as against Paul Benacerraf, that Frege’s apparent acceptance of multiple reductions is compatible with this epistemological thesis. The importance of this defense is that (a) it clarifies the role of proof, definition, and analysis in Frege’s logicist works; and (b) it demonstrates that the Fregean style of reduction is a valuable tool (...) for those who would investigate the nature of arithmetical knowledge. (shrink)

The Perfection of the Universe gives an account of the idea of the universe and its perfection in Aquinas's philosophy, but at the same time it provides an example of how a cosmology can be developed in a teleological framework. Although this is the cosmology of one who was first and foremost a theologian, the book tries to show how it was articulated philosophically and in relation to a particular model of the universe. As a contribution to the history of (...) philosophy, and Thomistic studies in particular, it seeks to draw more attention to Aquinas's view of the world, which has been relatively neglected in favor of emphasis on his theory of knowledge and theory of being, and at the same time to show how it is integral to his very understanding of being. The book thereby brings out a dimension of rationality in Aquinas's philosophy that is often ignored, especially as it concerns creation as a whole and what Aquinas refers to as convenientia in this whole. The systematic nature of Aquinas's conception of the universe is highlighted by the author's attempt to reconstruct the movement of his thought. Thus Oliva Blanchette focuses not just on the universe or on perfection but on the perfection of the universe as a unified idea that recurs frequently in both the philosophy and the theology of Aquinas and that has its own philosophical dynamic both as a logic and as an actuality. In doing so, he endeavors to correct misconceptions about Aquinas's idea of the universe, such as that found in Lovejoy's Great Chain of Being, and to show how the idea stands up philosophically even while being connected with a scientific model of the universe now viewed as obsolete. (shrink)

The Implicit Association Test (IAT) was used to measure population levels of conceptual alignment among two polar sensory metaphors and clusters of concepts to which they are commonly applied. A total of 873 participants were tested online, to compare within- and between-cluster alignments of concepts associated with two different polar sensory metaphors (up/down and black/white). IAT results were sensitive to semantic alignments that were also picked up by Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) using a large-scale corpus of English. However, even with (...) these semantic alignments taken into account, the dual categorization results demonstrated strong metaphor-cluster alignments over and above the predictions of LSA. It is proposed that, rather than ontogenetic development of metaphoric concepts based on sensorimotor experience, conventionalized sensorimotor metaphors in language may be cognitive tools that provide language learners with insights supported by conceptual properties of a phylogenetically evolved perceptual interface. (shrink)

Purpose. Romanticism as a movement developed in Germany, where, becoming the philosophy of time in the 18th-19th centuries, spread to all European countries. The "mobility" of the Romantic doctrine, its diversity, sometimes contradictory views, attitude to man as a free, harmonious, creative person led to the susceptibility of this movement by ethnic groups, different in nature and mentality. Its ideas found a wide response in Ukraine with its "cordocentric" type of culture in the early nineteenth century. Since the peculiarity of (...) "Ukrainian Romanticism" was its "literary-centric" nature, the purpose of this study is to analyse and comprehend the place of man in the national philosophy and literature of this period. Accordingly, the main tasks of the work are as follows: to determine the main features, the nature of Ukrainian Romanticism; to trace the main vectors of comprehension and image of man in the literature of this time. Theoretical basis. The ideas of European Romanticism were creatively rethought and assimilated during the emergence of new Ukrainian literature. It provided samples of highly artistic works, unique names of talented writers – creators and thinkers, who in their works reflected the philosophy of time. Based on the works of F. Schlegel, partly E. Husserl, M. Heidegger, K. Jaspers, Romanticism in the Ukrainian humanities, in terms of philosophy, culturology, as well as at the intersection with literature, was studied by T. Bovsunivska, Y. Hrybkova, S. Efremov, N. Kalenichenko, S. Kozak, T. Komarynets, D. Nalyvayko, Y. Nakhlik, I. Ogorodnyk, V. Ogorodnyk, A. Sinitsyna, D. Chyzhevsky, M. Yatsenko, E. Kyryliuk, M. Biletsky, D. Dontsov, S. Efremov, G. Kostyuk, S. Krymsky, Y. Sherekh and others. Originality. The authors of the article prove that Romanticism in Ukraine, being "literary-centric" inherently, having absorbed the main ideas and features of European Romanticism, has its own features and vectors of formation and development. Man in this kind of movement, thanks to the means of art, appears very clearly as a spiritually rich, sensitive, vulnerable and strong person. For him or her, the highest value is freedom, the ability to make freely independent fateful decisions. Conclusions. Ukrainian writers, reflecting the philosophical ideas of Romanticism, saw in man a harmonious combination of "natural" and "social", through which he indirectly carries out his own national existence. In addition to the objective realities of the external world, in their works, Romantic writers appeal to the subjective, internal, spiritual, "ideal" world of the hero, who interacts with reality through his own system of values. At each level of development of the humanities and methodology of cognition, this allows a new reading of these works. (shrink)