Upshot: The authors offer a theory of agency that is general enough to apply to whole organisms and single cells, and meaningful enough to highlight problems that embodied cognition theory has overlooked. The authors insist that the interesting thing about minds is what goes on in between activities; this leaves unclear what a specifically enactivist empirical program could look like. But the book can be read as a contribution to a broader project of instituting a full-blown post-cognitivist science of the (...) mind. (shrink)

En el presente artículo, se examinan y discuten dos argumentos con consecuencias reduccionistas debidos a Jaegwon Kim y a Theodore Sider respectivamente. De acuerdo con el argumento de Kim, la superveniencia fuerte implicaría la coexistencia necesaria de propiedades (es decir, tal y como normalmente se interpreta, la reducción). De acuerdo con el de Sider, ocurriría lo mismo con la superveniencia global. Uno y otro hacen un uso esencial de sendas nociones de propiedad maximal, las cuales son discutidas aquí a la (...) luz de una interpretación natural e interesante de la teoría de las propiedades implícita en sus argumentos. Bajo esta nueva interpretación, en términos modelo-teóricos (véase apartado 4), obtenemos diversas posibilidades de relaciones formales entre las tesis de superveniencia y la reducción, según la lógica utilizada. Al menos bajo una interpretación interesante, los argumentos de Kim y Sider no son correctos, quedando demos-trado así que dichos argumentos no son válidos en general. We discuss and analyze two reductive arguments due to Jaegwon Kim and Theodore Sider respectively. According to the first one, strong supervenience would imply necessary coextension of properties (i.e., reduction). According to the second, this would be also the case of global supervenience. Kim and Sider make essential use of their respective notions of maximal properties, which we analyze here in the light of a natural and interesting interpretation of the underlying theory of properties. Under this interpretation, in terms of model theory (see § 4), we obtain different possibilities of formal relations between the superveniencie theses and reduction, depending on the logic we use. Under at least one interesting interpretation, the arguments of Kim and Sider are not correct and we become the conclusion that these arguments are not valid in general. (shrink)

Lejos de los tópicos sobre el llamado "oscurantismo" medieval, la dinámica global socio-cultural de los siglos XI-XIII es de signo inequívocamente humanista, aunque su principal problema reside en conservar la tradición cristiana heredada, actualizándola y finalmente enriqueciéndola con las aportaciones de la ciencia árabe y el pensamiento aristotélico conocido en su esplendor. La creación de la Universidad, la reestructuración de los saberes bajo la guía de la ciencia aristotélica, los conflictos recurrentes por mor de mantener la hegemonía de la teología (...) en la formación del hombre medieval, se entienden mejor vistos desde la básica confrontación de dos concepciones del hombre en cuanto "imagen de Dios", una propendiendo a la sumisión y otra conducente a la autonomía. Entre ambas mediarán las grandes figuras: así Anselmo, Tomás o Escoto lo harán en distintos momentos del proceso y desde supuestos distintos, transmitiéndonos un modelo basado en la complementariedad jerarquizada de ambas perspectivas.Far of the topics about the so called medieval "obscurantism", the global sociocultural dynamic of the XI-XIII centuries is unequivocally humanist, although its main problem consists in conserving the inherited Christian tradition, rejuvenating as well as enriching it with the Arabian science and the aristotelian thought, known in their splendour. The creation of the University, the reconstruction of the knowledges with the guide of the Theology in the education of medieval man, can be better understood, looking at them from the basic confrontation of two conceptions of the man as "image of God": one of them, tending to the submission, and the other one tending to the autonomy. Between both tendencies, the great figures as Anselmo, Thomas or Scot will mediate an agreement. They do it in different moments of the process and from different suppositions. But they all transmit to us a model based in the complementary hierarchization of both perspectives. (shrink)

While scholars and policy practitioners often advocate for science and technology transfer as a motor for economic growth, many in Latin America have long warned of the pitfalls of such top-down, North-South transfers. To many in Latin America, scientific aid or cooperation from the North has often reproduced hierarchies that perpetuate dependency. Large astronomy observatories located in Chile – with a high price tag, cutting-edge technology, and seen to answer seemingly arcane research questions – seem ripe for reproducing precisely these (...) kinds of hierarchical relationships. Using data from documents, interviews, and a site visit to Gemini South, one of several large telescopes in Chile, this paper takes a historical perspective to examine how resilient these hierarchical relationships are. Over forty years, astronomy in Chile grew thanks to new policies that fostered cooperation among universities and gave locals privileged access to the telescopes. But the community also grew in ways that reproduced dependency: foreign science benefits significantly, the Chilean state operates in top-down ways, and its support for science leaves it blind to the benefits high-tech telescopes deliver to Chile, which are not linked to export-led growth. The state appears as both an obstacle and an enabler to the growth of a national scientific community. (shrink)

El nacionalismo es, por un lado, un fenómeno socialmente muy variado, del que hay que detectar las "convergencias" que dan razón de lo que es. Y, por otro, es un fenómeno confrontado con mucha frecuencia con prejuicios valorativos cargados emocionalmente, que empujan a moldear las definiciones para acomodarlas a ellos.

Siendo Genet un apestado, un expulsado, un maldito de la cultura europea, alguien que en Europa (y no solo en Europa) fue perseguido y encarcelado por sus delitos, alguien que nunca se cansó de aguijonear, maltratar y maldecir la cultura oficial europea, siendo el verdadero crítico de la misma, hemos de concluir que fue la cultura oficial europea la que se alejó, la que le dio la espalda a Genet y, así, a Hegel; y, así, a sí misma. Esta habría (...) sido la verdadera tragedia europea: haber traicionado su propia vocación, su destino, que era seguir el camino que Hegel diseñó. (shrink)

En el terreno teórico y más normativo, el posracionalismo parece una propuesta razonable orientada a superar la base étnica de los órdenes políticos modernos. En una lectura más práctico-política es una propuesta, cuya razonabilidad es más discutible, orientada a diluir los nacionalismos periféricos en beneficio del central. Emparentado indirectamente con el patriotismo constitucional, comparte con éste el deseo de minimizar y neutralizar la omnipresencia del condicionamiento étnico, porque el patriotismo constitucional solicita una transferencia de lealtad del nosotros étnico a la (...) "cultura cívica" democrática y a sus instituciones políticas concomitantes, una lealtad que debe cambiar de dosel: del "ethnos" cultural al demos cívico. (shrink)

In this chapter, we will take a trip around several hot-spots where Bohmian mechanics and its capacity to describe the microscopic reality, even in the absence of measurements, can be harnessed as computational tools, in order to help in the prediction of phenomenologically accessible information (also useful for the followers of the Copenhagen theory). As a first example, we will see how a Stochastic Schrödinger Equation, when used to compute the reduced density matrix of a non-Markovian open quantum system, necessarily (...) seems to employ the Bohmian concept of a conditional wavefunction. We will see that by dressing these conditional wavefunctions with an interpretation, the Bohmian theory can prove to be a useful tool to build general quantum simulation frameworks, such as a high-frequency electron transport model. As a second example, we will explain how a Copenhagen “observable operator” can be related to numerical properties of the Bohmian trajectories, which within Bohmian mechanics, are well-defined even for an “unmeasured” system. Most importantly in practice, even if these numbers are given no ontological meaning, not only we will be able to simulate (thus, predict and talk about) them, but we will see that they can be operationally determined in a weak value experiment. Therefore, they will be practical numbers to characterize a quantum system irrespective of the followed quantum theory. (shrink)

DISCOURSE, INTERACTION, AND COMMUNICATION Co-organized by the Department of Logic and Philosophy of Science and the Institute for Logic, Cognition, Language, and Infonnation (ILCLI) both from the University of the Basque Country, tlle Fourth International Colloquium on Cognitive Science (ICCS-95) gathered at Donostia - San Sebastian ti'om May 3 to 6, 1995, with the following as its main topics: 1. Social Action and Cooperation. 2. Cognitive Approaches in Discourse Processing: Grammatical and Semantical Aspects. 3. Models of Infonnation in Communication Systems. (...) 4. Cognitive Simulation: Scope and Limits. More tllan one hundred researchers from all over the world exchanged their most recent contributions to Cognitive Science in an exceptionally fruitful annosphere. In this volume we include a small though representative sample of tlle main papers. They all were invited papers except the one by Peter Juel Henrichsen, a contributed paper tllat merited tlle IBERDROLA - Gipuzkoako Foru Aldundia: Best Paper Award, set up in ICCS-95 for the first time. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Epistemic social oppressions such as ‘epistemic partiality’, ‘epistemic injustice’, ‘epistemic harms and wrongs’, ‘epistemic oppression’, ‘epistemic exploitation’, ‘epistemic violence’, or ‘epistemicide’ are terms with increasing theoretical importance and empirical applications. However, less literature is devoted to social strategies to overcome such oppressions. Here the Sorelian and Gramscian concept of social myth is considered in that sense. The empirical case is the myth of ‘The last Indigenous peoples of Europe’ present in the Basque Country, divided between France and Spain and (...) with a historical national culture under their statist powers. The myth has a renewal in a recent social movement, the Biltzarre platform and its Basque Cultural Instinct Team, currently followed through a Participatory Action Research. The results show how such social myth gives coherence and empowers the Basque identity against the loss of identity caused by the French and Spanish powers. Finally, progress is being made on how epistemic oppressons can end, ironically, because of the success of an epistemicide. Presumably, social myths counteract epistemic oppression, strengthening the social identity and self-esteem of the subject, as a form of empowerment in social and political issues. (shrink)

El presente documento aborda el tema enunciado en el título de manera general; ofrece los principios de un tratado más externo, que habrá de hacerse estudiando mejor las aportaciones de las Escrituras y de la tradición cristiana. Sin embargo, más que un estudio abstracto, lo importante es el estudio de la vida, del compromiso de amor y gracia, en el Espíritu de Cristo.

La filosofía ha perdido la garra que tenía desde el siglo XIX. Este proceso conlleva también un desencanto cada vez mayor de un mundo vacío, un mundo que no encuentra su norte, que se ahoga en su propia abundancia. La neoliberización de dicho mundo es la forma que ahora debe ser pensada y combatida también por la filosofía, que puede y debe aportar una reflexión crítica, debe personarse en las barricadas de la lucha actual, que es muy distinta a la (...) forma de lucha del siglo XX. El siglo XXI se abre con nuevas propuestas de todo tipo y la filosofía tendrá que estar muy atenta para no quedarse fuera. Aquí la figura del búho de Minerva es pertinente: sale después de la batalla a dar cuenta de ella, pero también va por delante marcando el camino. Ambas visiones son necesarias. Este libro cumple una doble función: repasa y analiza el impacto que las ideas de los máximos exponentes de la Teoría Crítica ha tenido en la filosofía contemporánea al tiempo que trata de recuperar una mirada que ayude a pensar con esperanza soluciones críticas para el complejo mundo actual. (shrink)

When Susan Sontag addresses the problem of pornography and relates it to Hegel, she is not merely describing a path in European philosophy aimed to construct a new language, but she is also committing this aim to the importance of re-reading culture. The fashion in which pornography describes reality is meaningful when we are trying to approach Hegel in his aim to construct a post-religious language that finally will make ready-to-hand life as life. Politics, and society, being two essential elements (...) to understand reality, become singularly interesting when analyzed through the gaze of Sontag in combination of Hegel’s philosophy. The conservative morals that reign over what we understand as pornography, and the cultural moment of Europe since the most progressive moments of the 19 th century, describe a fatalist landscape for the future of society and politics. Yet, the learnings from Hegel remain meaningful. In this paper I examine how a post-religious philosophy, aimed long ago by Hegel’s contribution to philosophy, can serve to the understanding of a post-pornographic society: a society that is able to learn from the contributions of Frankfurt’s school with regards to an efficient cultural tissue, and defeat the old religious morals that are inserted in the backbone of politics and philosophy still today. (shrink)