En su defensa del Principio de no-contradicción, Aristóteles discute con varios interlocutores, desde los presocráticos hasta el sofista Protágoras, este último ampliamente conocido en la Antigüedad por trastocar el concepto de verdad con su doctrina del “homo mensura”, declarando así la imposibilidad del discurso falso. Consideramos que una lectura atenta del Libro Γ que rescate la figura del abderita puede mostrar cómo la crítica del sofista es clave para la constitución del pensamiento aristotélico en torno al problema de la verdad. (...) En la primera sección expondré algunas consideraciones sobre el PNC que son relevantes para entender las motivaciones detrás de las críticas aristotélicas al sofista. A continuación, analizaré dos de los argumentos aristotélicos contra los adversarios que discuten de mala fe: por una parte, la “refutación” de Metaph. Γ. 4 y, por otra parte, el “argumento de las apariencias contrarias” de Metaph. Γ. 5. Mi hipótesis es que algunos elementos teóricos esbozados en Γ. 4 permiten reconstruir una crítica aristotélica seria contra Protágoras en Γ. 5. Finalmente expondré una síntesis del camino recorrido y ofreceré algunas conclusiones. (shrink)

The inclusion of De astrologia in the Lucianic corpus has been disputed for centuries since it appears to defend astrological practices that Lucian elsewhere undercuts. This paper argues for Lucian’s authorship by illustrating its masterful subversion of a captatio benevolentiae and subtle rejection of Stoic astrological practices. The narrator begins the text by blaming phony astrologers and their erroneous predictions for inciting others to “denounce the stars and hate astrology” (ἄστρων τε κατηγοροῦσιν καὶ αὐτὴν ἀστρολογίην μισέουσιν, 2). The narrator assures (...) readers that he, the knowledgeable astrologer, will correct for the “stupidity and laziness” (ἀμαθίῃ καὶ ῥαθυμίῃ, ibid.) that bring about false predictions. The narrator’s credibility quickly decays when he attempts to recast Orpheus, Bellerophon, Icarus, Daedalus, and a host of other mythological figures as Greek astrologers. Lucian’s audience would expect such far-fetched interpretations of myth from the stereotypical Stoic philosopher, a character lampooned elsewhere in the Lucianic corpus. (shrink)

The present essay offers a first, systematic reconstruction of Husserl’s understanding of Socrates’ philosophical position in the Ideengeschichte with a special focus on the Socratic method. Our goal is twofold. On the one hand, we aim to provide a clear presentation of the way in which Husserl himself conceives of the “beginning” of Western philosophy by tackling the specifically Socratic contribution to it. On the other hand, we will clarify in what sense, and to what extent, the assessment of Husserl’s (...) Socrates helps shed some light upon the properly Husserlian conception of philosophy, notably, his twofold notion of “rationality.”. (shrink)

Modern thought would present only an incomplete and fragmentary picture of philosophy to us if we were to regard it as being completely disconnected from the elemental forces and sources of Greek philosophy. The corrective aspect that protects it from any such attempt at unmethodical isolation is, however, given within itself and in its own content. Its own inner progress necessarily leads it back to the principles and questions that distinguished Greek speculation, which it embodied in typical forms. The thought (...) of the modern age proves its specificity in the fact that, notwithstanding the richness of content that it gains, it remains conscious of its relatedness to these basic logical forms and strives to return to them of its own accord. They will thus themselves appear to us of their own accord and incite us to regard their contents, if we just allow ourselves to follow the course of the investigation. (shrink)

Zeno’s arguments are generally regarded as ingenious but downright unsound paradoxes, worth of attention mainly to disclose why they go wrong or, alternatively, to recognise them as clever, even if crude, anticipations of modern views on the space, the infinite or the quantum view of matter. In either case, the arguments lose any connection with the scientific and philosophical problems of Zeno’s own time and environment. In the present paper, I argue that it is possible to make sense of Zeno’s (...) arguments if we recognise that Zeno was indeed a close follower of Parmenides, who wanted to show that, if the plurality of beings existed, then various absurd consequences would follow. He intended to highlight the compact and inarticulate nature of the being, and the human character of the system of world partitions producing the entities and the objects on which our knowledge is based. (shrink)

Within the framework of the discussion about the existence of a spokesman in the Platonic dialogues, we look, in the first part, into the possible transfer of this spokesman’s function from Socrates to the Eleatic Stranger, identifying the contact and divergence points between both characters. In the second part, we try to show that this transfer has a dramatic staging at the beginning of the Sophist dialogue, where Socrates makes a demand that enables the Stranger to demonstrate his genuine philosophical (...) condition. (shrink)

The present PhD dissertation aims to examine the relation between modality and change in Aristotle’s metaphysics. -/- On the one hand, Aristotle supports his modal realism (i.e., worldly objects have modal properties - potentialities and essences - that ground the ascriptions of possibility and necessity) by arguing that the rejection of modal realism makes change inexplicable, or, worse, banishes it from the realm of reality. On the other hand, the Stagirite analyses processes by means of modal notions (‘change is the (...) actuality of what is virtual insofar as it is virtual’). In other words: to grasp what change is, one has to resort to the modal idiom of potentialities, while the fact that there is change is indicative of the fact that nature is full of modal properties. -/- Aristotle’s modal and kinetic realism finds a negative in the figure of the Megaric Diodorus Kronus. The polemical situation of Greek philosophy has indeed the dialectical advantage of not opposing the Aristotelian position to a sui generis straw man. Both in its reduction of modal judgements to temporal quantifications and in its dissolution of the reality of the state-of-being-in-motion in favour of a cinematographic view of processes, the philosophical figure of reductionist antirealism embodied by Diodorus constitutes an alternative that takes the opposite view of Aristotle’s realism. -/- The present study is structured as a discussion between these two positions. In the face of Diodorus’ antirealist challenges, Aristotle articulates modal and kinetic considerations: the answers he gives to Diodorus’ puzzles thus provide valuable insight into his metaphysics. Moreover, the examination of Aristotle’s and Diodorus’ metaphysics, because of their insight and originality, will not fail to interest the philosopher concerned with the metaphysical foundations of modern physics, insofar as the entanglement between modalities and processes is nowadays at the core of mechanics (phase spaces, path integrals, etc.). (shrink)