This paper examines normative elements in Henri Lauener’s “open transcendentalism,” with an eye to evaluate distinctive theses. After setting out some of Lauener’s basic positions in this area, in comparison with related views in Quine’s work, I argue that the views surveyed converge on a normative and contextualist cognitivism in Lauener’s methodological and epistemological perspective. Though he resists similar conclusion in the name of anti-naturalism, I argue that his “open transcendentalism” is plausibly construed as a non reductive (...) naturalism. (shrink)

After setting out some basic elements in Henri Lauener's open transcendentalism, in comparison with related views in Quine and Davidson, the two views surveyed converge on a moderately holistic, normative cognitivism in Lauener's philosophy of science. Though resisting similar conclusions in the name of anti-naturalism, Lauener's "open transcendentalism" is plausibly constmed as a non-reductive naturalism, with important implications for the normative determination of meanings. At the last Lauener's criticism is yet to come to terms with central questions of (...) the naturalist tradition. Crucial in this is the "principle of continuity" in Dewy's (non-reductive) naturalism, the relation of fallibilism to the pragmatic continuity of inquiry, and normative consequentialism in the scientific aims, methods, and meanings. (shrink)

This article seeks to grasp the meaning of Michel Henry's use of the term "transcendental" to understand its specific nature as pure experience that owes nothing to the constituted or the a posteriori. It then considers the methodological consequences and difficulties resulting from such a conception of the transcendental. According to my hypothesis, in order to maintain the "major division" between the empirical and the transcendental, material phenomenology is caught in a form of double bind. One cannot say much (...) about the transcendental without risking contamination by the empirical. As far as the constituted is concerned, it is certainly possible to refer to it, but actually there is nothing to say. This paper tests this interpretative hypothesis against a specific example, namely, the phenomenological description of feeling offered by Henry. The analysis concludes by considering whether material phenomenology does not lapse into what Rudolf Bernet calls a form of "hyper-transcendentalism" in the sense that the totality of empirical reality ends by being "transcendentalized". No basis can be provided for intentionality, as Henry sometimes claims: it becomes a superfluous concept. (shrink)

Wittgenstein's later philosophy is usually characterized as pragmatist, his account of linguistic meaning as conventionalist, and his methodology as naturalistic. Wittgenstein is said to have renounced in the later work his early concern with the Unsayable, and to have relocated philosophy within the realm of discourse. I argue against that picture of Wittgenstein's later philosophy in this dissertation. ;The central insight of Wittgenstein's discussion of rules and language in the Investigations is that meaning is not the result of a cognitive (...) achievement, but that it is grounded in precognitive natural reactions common to all human beings. I show that the appeal to the precognitive is transcendental, for it involves reference to a synthesis that is prior to discursive articulation and presupposed as a necessary condition of meaning. ;I argue against the conventionalist reading of Wittgenstein that the transcendental appeal to precognitive reactions in the discussion of rules is distinct from the appeal to a social context in the Private Language Argument, and that the relation between those two discussions is analogous to that between Kant's Transcendental Deduction and the Refutation of Idealism. ;The parallel with Kant helps to show how the failure to distinguish the empirical and transcendental levels in Wittgenstein's discussion leads to the conventionalist readings of his account of language . . It also shows that Wittgenstein is not subject to the charge of relativism commonly levelled against him . ;The distinction between empirical and transcendental levels, as it appears in the pivotal notion of Form of Life, reveals that Wittgenstein's methodology is not naturalistic but instead depends on a non-discursive mode of awareness. . I argue on this basis that Wittgenstein is closer to intuitive-realists than to pragmatists . ;Wittgenstein's Transcendentalism thus shows a deep continuity between the motivations behind his early and his later thought. In fact, the Unsayable plays a central role in the later work, for it is through non-discursive insight into the Unsayable that philosophy fulfills the therapeutic task that Wittgenstein assigns to it in the Investigations. (shrink)

This article argues that an engagement with the powerful critical insights of Žižek’s theory of ideology and practice of cultural critique is a necessary step for any art historical methodology which aims to fully account for a work of art’s function within the society of its creation and reception, and to explain how it came to play such a role. However, any attempt to situate cultural artefacts within historically contingent networks of social relations requires an account of historical change incompatible (...) with any formalist or transcendentalist methodology. Moreover, if it is to be of any use as an academic discourse, art history must be able to account for the specifities of ‘art’ as a distinct—but not autonomous—sphere of human activity. It is precisely these two issues that a wholesale importation of Žižek’s writing into the domain of art history encounters. A solution must be found whereby the critical lessons of Žižek are not ‘lost in translation’. In this vein, the present article begins by outlining Žižek’s conception of ideology and elucidating the problematic consequences of any straightforward application of its parameters as an art historical methodology. It then reads the interventions of Jacques Rancière and Judith Butler as providing the necessary theoretical tools by which one can construct the possibility of a powerful Žižekian art historical methodology. (shrink)

This paper provides a critical interpretation of the theme, point, and methodological status of Adorno’s so-called negative dialectic. The theme at issue, ‘non-identity’, comes in several varieties; and the point of Adorno’s dialectic, namely reconciliation, is multifaceted. Exploration of those topics shows that negative dialectic seques into substantive doctrines, including a version of transcendentalism and a claim about deformation. The peculiar methodological status of negative dialectic explains that adumbration. In the appraisive register, my principal contentions include these: (...) Adorno’s transcendentalism makes some sense of the aforementioned deformation claim; and negative dialectic qua method avoids mystery and metaphysical excess. (shrink)

E. O. Wilson's fundamental challenge is to bring knowledge and sensibility into an effective working relationship. Both ambivalence and opaqueness characterize his analysis of religion. Ambivalence refers to his conviction on the one hand that religion is essential for societal well‐being and genetically resourced and his prediction, on the other hand, that religion will be superseded by scientific reason; the opaqueness refers to his strange insistence that religion be subjected to tests of literal facticity, whereas, in contrast, the arts are (...) exempted from this test, because they constitute a delivery system that impacts the sensibilities directly, with no particular concern for literalness. Wilson's analysis of religion should be brought into consonance with his view of the arts, thereby recognizing the importance of myth, symbol, metaphor, and analogy in religious formulations and their status as direct delivery systems to the sensibilities. Wilson's distinction between empiricist/materialist and transcendentaliist worldviews is reshaped by distinguishing between metaphysical and methodological transcendentalism. This reshaping enables us to recognize how the action required by human existence depends both on scientific knowledge and symbolic formulations that extend to human action, even though certain knowledge is lacking. (shrink)

E. O. Wilson's fundamental challenge is to bring knowledge and sensibility into an effective working relationship. Both ambivalence and opaqueness characterize his analysis of religion. Ambivalence refers to his conviction on the one hand that religion is essential for societal well‐being and genetically resourced and his prediction, on the other hand, that religion will be superseded by scientific reason; the opaqueness refers to his strange insistence that religion be subjected to tests of literal facticity, whereas, in contrast, the arts are (...) exempted from this test, because they constitute a delivery system that impacts the sensibilities directly, with no particular concern for literalness. Wilson's analysis of religion should be brought into consonance with his view of the arts, thereby recognizing the importance of myth, symbol, metaphor, and analogy in religious formulations and their status as direct delivery systems to the sensibilities. Wilson's distinction between empiricist/materialist and transcendentaliist worldviews is reshaped by distinguishing between metaphysical and methodological transcendentalism. This reshaping enables us to recognize how the action required by human existence depends both on scientific knowledge and symbolic formulations that extend to human action, even though certain knowledge is lacking. (shrink)

A review of U. Mäki (ed.). Fact and Fiction in Economics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. pp. xvi 384. ISBN 0521 00957. As people interested mainly in theory, methodologists and philos...

The Fifth International Congress of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science was held at the University of Western Ontario, London, Canada, 27 August to 2 September 1975. The Congress was held under the auspices of the International Union of History and Philosophy of Science, Division of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science, and was sponsored by the National Research Council of Canada and the University of Western Ontario. As those associated closely with the work of the Division over the years (...) know well, the work undertaken by its members varies greatly and spans a number of fields not always obviously related. In addition, the volume of work done by first rate scholars and scientists in the various fields of the Division has risen enormously. For these and related reasons it seemed to the editors chosen by the Divisional officers that the usual format of publishing the proceedings of the Congress be abandoned in favour of a somewhat more flexible, and hopefully acceptable, method of pre sentation. Accordingly, the work of the invited participants to the Congress has been divided into four volumes appearing in the University of Western Ontario Series in Philosophy of Science. The volumes are entitled, Logic, Foundations of Mathematics and Computability Theory, Foun dational Problems in the Special Sciences, Basic Problems in Methodol ogy and Linguistics, and Historical and Philosophical Dimensions of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science. (shrink)

It has recently been suggested that Merleau-Ponty’s position in Phenomenology of Perception is a unique form of transcendental idealism. The general claim is that in spite of his critique of “Kantianism,” Merleau-Ponty’s position comes out as a form of transcendental idealism that takes the perceptual processes of the lived body as the transcendental constituting condition for the possibility of experience. In this article I critically appraise this claim. I argue that if the term “idealist” is intended in a sufficiently similar (...) sense to Kant’s usage of the term in naming his position as a “transcendental idealism” then it is a misrepresentation to subsume Merleau-Ponty’s position under that term. This is because Merleau-Ponty rejects the transcendental metaphysics of the reflecting subject that underpins transcendental idealism. In its place he advocates a methodological transcendentalism that, whilst being anti-realist, is not idealist. Thus to call his position “a new kind of transcendental idealism,” as Sebastian Gardner has, is to misunderstand the significance of his existentialist break with what he sees as the “intellectualism” of this position. (shrink)

Either methodologically or ideologically, philosophical development remains incessant. In virtue of this, the paper focuses on the ideological formulation of a synthesis from the remains of Existentialism and some of its inherent themes. This work looks at the possibility of Existentialism, as a philosophical enterprise, progressing into the transcendental realm. It opines that Transcendentalism is surreptitiously imbedded in many existential weltanschauungs and it is dubbed to have some crucial contributions to the philosophical circle. Those weltanschauungs were further captured, categorized (...) and analyZed in a tripartite form in order to fathom a cogent basis for the plausibility of Transcendental Existentialism. Philosophical implications and some concurrent themes were thereby derived to widen the horizon of Transcendental Existentialism as an exquisite supplement to Existence Philosophy. On this wise, Transcendental Existentialism is packaged and presented to the philosophical gild for further assay. (shrink)

At the present time, there are several interpretations and modes of Kant’s transcendental philosophy (TP). Which of these interpretations and modes of transcendentalism most adequately express the spirit of TP, i.e. can claim the title of the transcendental ones? For the explication of the ‘idea of transcendental philosophy’ [KrV, A1], here I distinguish two transcendental shifts: methodological and metaphysical ones, which in their totality predetermine the essence and set the specificity of Kant’s transcendental idealism. The methodological transcendental (...) shift that Kant postulates in his definitions of TP in the Critique of Pure Reason [KrV, A11; B25] represents a shift from studying of objects to the analysis and justification of our mode of cognition of objects. This shift sets a fairly wide range of a la Kantian a priori doctrines and predetermines the transcendental turn (Re–Transcendentalising) of modern philosophy. The metaphysical transcendental shift that can be correlated with “the altered method of our way of thinking [in metaphysics]” [KrV, BXVIII], is associated with the splitting of the “thing” into the actual object (or Kantian thing-in-itself) and object of experience (or Kantian appearance), and involves a transition from the study of thing-in-itself to the analysis of the appearance. More precisely, this shift finds its expression in the transcendental triad “object (thing-in-itself; Ding an sich) – appearance (Erscheinung) – representation (Vorstellung)”, which determines the ‘idea’ (essence) of transcendental idealism/metaphysics. (shrink)

The following represents excerpts from a transcription of the informal discussion that ensued after Stephen Pope and Philip Hefner delivered the preceding papers at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, D.C., 20 February 2000. These excerpts are presented with a minimum of editing, to preserve the extemporaneous, informal, oral character of the conversation. The excerpts end with a fragmentary comment by E. O. Wilson, conveying the spirit of the actual conversation, which was (...) halted when the allotted time had elapsed and the sense of the group was that areas had been opened up for further conversation that could not be continued at this meeting. (shrink)

Although the name of Immanuel Kant has survived in the history of culture as the name of one of the greatest philosophers of modern times, Kant's role as a scientist is also very important. His work in the field of cosmology and physics is directly related to philosophy. Kant's development of the transcendental method was a direct result of thinking about the relationship between mathematics and experiment. Transcendentalism and Kant's theory of subjectivity continue the development of physics from Galileo (...) to Newton and Leibniz. This is especially true of his theory of space and time. All this should have turned transcendental aesthetics into a turning point in the development of mathematical natural science. However, in practice, the alienation of the natural sciences from philosophy has only intensified. An analysis of the scientific revolution at the beginning of the 20th century shows the enormous role of Kant's ideas in it in repulsing scientists from Kantianism. Weinert, a researcher of the relationship of 20th century physics to Kant's philosophy, shows that Einstein, being a Kantian as a philosopher, opposed Kantianism as a physicist. He enthusiastically accepted the Kantian idea of the autonomy of theoretical knowledge, but did not accept the concept a priori. An approach in which experience and theory do not precede each other, but are in constant interaction, is defined in the article as experimental transcendentalism. With the methodological difference between physics and philosophy, the concept of space and time in modern physics has a deep similarity with the transcendental doctrine. The definition of the qualitative structure of space (Analysis Situs), including the theoretical substantiation of its three dimensions, was the subject of reflections of scientists from Galileo, Leibniz and Kant to Einstein and Poincaré. (shrink)

Johann Gottlieb Fichte is a widely known transcendental philosopher and obviously a thinker of the first rank. Yet contemporary interest in and evaluation of "transcendental philosophy" as well as the precise meaning of the terms and its relation to "transcendental method" remains unclear. With renewed attention to German idealism in general and to Fichte in particular, this timely collection of new papers will be of interest to anyone concerned with transcendental philosophy, German idealism, modern German philosophy, and transcendental arguments.

"Time. Perception. Imagination. Phenomenological Studies on the Question of Time by Augustine, Kant and Husserl". (rus), SPb, 2013. Summary: The monograph is devoted to the key elements of the philosophy of time which determine the necessity of historicism in the analysis of subjectivity. The main idea which defined the composition and design of this work is to trace how the Kantian definition of time as the “form of inner sense” is revealed in Husserl’s phenomenology. The original intention was to understand (...) all three components of this definition. Firstly, what is the inner form, in terms of phenomenology, what are the principles of its constitution and how one can talk about the property of formation? Secondly, what is the meaning of the term "inner" in philosophy, where the division into internal and external has always been a formality, not affecting the essence of things? And finally, what sort of “sensibility” is assumed in transcendental science, bound to become the basis of understanding the history and culture. Presumably, these three Kantian concepts constituted the original plan to analyze the nature of cognitive capabilities of the subject, claiming the gnoseological stage on which the philosophy of time is unfolded. In other words, this work deals with the historical and philosophical analysis of the phenomenological principles by which the concept of time as developed in the twentieth century emerged in the framework of phenomenology. The analyze of the structure of the subject assumes that time, perception and imagination combine in a special type of inner synthesis, which may not be relevant to certain aspects of the method but maintain the basis for a kind of anthropology of time, in continuation of the traditional “inner” contemplation. I consider the inner structure of time with the account of philosophy of St. Augustine, who in many respects not only anticipated the conclusions of phenomenology, but also in his reflections encompassed deeper layers of inner experience. The first chapter is devoted to the doctrine of St. Augustine, in which the theory of time is analyzed in conjunction with the doctrine of “inner word”, specifics of memory representations and notion of inner sense. Additionally, I consider St. Augustine’s reflections about numbers that constitute the basis of aesthetic perception of music (De Musica). Thus, the philosophy of St. Augustine already covers the whole spectrum of anthropology of time, including the question of relation between time and eternity, which remains practically unexplored in phenomenology and serves as the proof of that in interactions between philosophy and theology the tradition remains important. The second chapter of this study is devoted to analysis of the transcendental aesthetic of Kant, which includes all the methodological possibilities of considering the category of time as a formal condition for any experience, consequentially serving as a foundation for further logical development by Husserl, which includes the critical disengagement of the founder of phenomenology from Kant's transcendentalism. Particular attention is paid to the origin of the concept of inner sense, as well as possible interpretations of the function of imagination, which as a transcendental ability remains the most interesting type of synthesis. Handwritten fragments of Kant’s works are also of interest to the character of the imagery as considered in detail by Husserl. Chapter three discusses the phenomenology of inner time consciousness, represented in those important aspects, without which it is impossible to speak about the internal structure of temporal experience - the subjectivity of time, retention, "living present", and the character of synthesis. Particular attention is paid to Husserl's polemics with those representatives of psychological branch in the studies of consciousness, whose ideas greatly influenced the very motivation for creating the method. Apart from the well-known criticism of Brentano, the third chapter highlights the rarely analyzed psychological ideas that motivated the choice of Husserl’s terminology - the "Präsenzzeit” by W. Stern, the "psychological analysis" by A. Meinong, and the “fusion” (Verschmelzung) by K. Stumpf. Chapter four deals with the need to analyze the specifics of image as an element of consciousness and imagery as such, which includes a system of objectified acts. Thus is revealed the very nature of synthetic connections in the acts of consciousness, as well as the presumably imaginative character of the constitution of temporal form. (shrink)

This book sets out a Kant-inspired theory of modality, driven by a methodology which takes seriously questions about the function of modal judgment as a guide to a metaphysics of modality. It argues that we need logical modal concepts as a condition on our ability to think, and metaphysical modal concepts as a condition on our ability to think objectively. Concordant with this, it argues that logical necessity has its source in the laws of thought and that metaphysical necessity is (...) relative to conditions on objective thought. This this account of metaphysical necessity, which is termed “Modal Transcendentalism”, is then further developed, covering questions concerning necessary and contingent existence, de re necessity, essentialism, and modal epistemology. (shrink)

This article has two general aims. It first of all critically reconsiders the empirical turn’s dismissal of transcendentalism in the philosophy of technology, in particular through the work of Ihde and Verbeek, and defends the continuing relevance of the notion of the transcencental in thinking about technology today, illustrating this mainly through a reading of Stiegler’s understanding of the human condition as a technical condition and his view of human (noetic) evolution as proceeding from a process of technical exteriorization. (...) The crucial issue that is missed by postphenomenology and the empirical turn is that technology itself in its empiricity occupies the (periodically changing) place of the transcendental. It thus fails to consider the transcendental operativity of technical artifacts within its own empiricist stance. Secondly, it argues for the continuing importance and usefulness of the idea of Technology with a capital T, equally discarded by the representatives of the empirical turn, in particular against the emerging backdrop of the Anthropocene as the age of decisive anthropogenic forcing of the planet and the growing dominance of what has recently been called the technosphere in Earth system science. With Stiegler I show that a proper, inherent dynamic of technology must be acknowledged historically, anthropologically, techno-evolutionarily as well as (techno)phenomenologically. I conclude by demonstrating that our time of planetary crisis summons us to redirect our attention to technology from the empirical to the transcendental, and from the micro-level to the macro-level again. (shrink)

In this article I take on the “Transcendentalist Challenge” to naturalized phenomenology, highlighting how the ontological and methodological commitments of Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy point in the direction of an integration of the transcendental and the scientific, thus making room for a productive exchange between philosophy and psychological science when it comes to understanding consciousness and its place in nature. Discussing various conceptions of naturalized phenomenology, I argue that what I call an “Integrationist View” is required if we are to make (...) sense of the possibility of productive exchange between phenomenology and the sciences. My main argument is that if we conceive of consciousness as a structure of behavior ontologically prior to the distinctions between objectivity and subjectivity and third- and first-person perspectives, we arrive at a view of the transcendental as not essentially separate from the domain of science, but rather as contingent organizational norms of empirical nature that are best illuminated through a dialectical exchange between phenomenological and scientific approaches. I end by showing how Merleau-Ponty’s engagement with the “Schneider case” in an example of such an integration. (shrink)

The article discusses the relevance of ontology, the metaphysical study of being, in social sciences through a comparison of three distinct outlooks: Roy Bhaskar's version of critical realism, a pragmatic realist approach the most renowned representatives of which are Rom Harré and Hilary Putnam, and the authors’ own synthesis of the pragmatist John Dewey's and the neopragmatist Richard Rorty's ideas, here called methodological relationalism. The Bhaskarian critical realism is committed to the heavy ontological furniture of metaphysical transcendentalism, resting (...) on essentialist presumptions of causality and social structures, tacitly creating a dualism between individuals and society. Pragmatic realists, for their part, carry much lighter metaphysical baggage than critical realists and, much in a pragmatist vein, accept the idea that social scientists should study society by studying social life—the interwoven activities of individuals. Nevertheless, pragmatic realists only reluctantly, if at all, renounce the subject–object dualism and its ontological implications. Drawing on the ideas of Donald Davidson and Richard Rorty, the writers outline their own antirepresentationalist, antiessentialist approach to social sciences. The proposed methodological relationalism is a pragmatist approach of Deweyan origin. Based on a Darwinian understanding of human beings as organisms trying to cope with their environment, it emphasises the insight that one can neither step outside one's own action, nor withdraw from the actor's point of view, just as one cannot cognitively step outside language. (shrink)

This paper aims to address the relevance of the natural sciences for transcendental phenomenology, that is, the issue of naturalism. The first section distinguishes three varieties of naturalism and corresponding forms of naturalization: an ontological one, a methodological one, and an epistemological one. In light of these distinctions, in the second section, I examine the main projects aiming to “naturalize phenomenology”: neurophenomenology, front-loaded phenomenology, and formalized approaches to phenomenology. The third section then considers the commitments of Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology (...) with respect to the three varieties of naturalism previously discussed. I argue that Husserl rejected strong and weak forms of epistemological naturalism, strong methodological naturalism, and ontological naturalism. The fourth section presents the argument that Husserl endorsed a weak, conditional form of methodological naturalism. This point is illustrated with Husserl’s proposal of “somatology,” a natural science apt to study the corporeality of the lived body. The final section addresses the complementarity and respective limits of the transcendental phenomenological and the natural scientific frameworks. I argue that, on Husserl’s account, the function of transcendental phenomenology with respect to the natural sciences is to provide them with an epistemological foundation and an ontological clarification. I suggest that certain natural sciences can be understood, within the transcendental phenomenological framework, as “sciences of constitution,” that is, as sciences investigating the contribution of real structures acting as conditions of possibility for the occurrence of certain kinds of comprehensive unities in lived experience. (shrink)

The paper addresses the problem of the place of deconstruction in the history of transcendental philosophy. J. Derrida’s project is considered as one of the most representative and consistent realizations of theoretical foundations of transcendentalism along with prominent conceptions such as Kant’s critique and Husserl’s phenomenology. The author suggests a number of attributes of transcendental thinking that allow historical reconstruction of the transcendental paradigm. Derridian approach is considered as a turn towards this tradition, conceived as a transcendental tradition par (...) exellence, guided by the attitude of «turning. Historical legacy of deconstructive «turning» is analyzed with respect to Husserlian Rückfrage: return-inquiry as method, idea and attitude, reproducing in deconstructive strategy of interpretative critique. A concept of hyperbolic transcendentalism is introduced in order to (1) define a deconstructive version of transcendental philosophy and (2) indicate an immanent tendency in the transcendental thought, constitutive for both Kantian critical project and Husserlian strive towards intellectual radicalism extending from methodological hyperboles (reduction and epoche) to radicalization of «transcendental motive». The author relies upon the concept of quasi-transcendental (thematized by Derrida himself), which defines a mode of de-dogmatization, critical purifying and preservation of proper transcendental foundations of philosophical thinking. (shrink)

SummaryMethodological questions are discussed from a point of view which the author calls open transcendentalism. In the first paragraphs the importance of normative practices is stressed and the application of the method to philosophical problems concerning ontology, analyticity and necessity is illustrated. Against Quine's holism a truely pluralistic view is defended according to which various logical or linguistic systems may be used with regard to the needs in different human activities.In the second part, arguments in favor of a instrumentalistic (...) conception of logic are advanced. Several objections against possible‐worlds‐semantics and proposals for an adequate treatment of counterfactuals suggest that contexts must be taken into account and that a distinction must be made between a descriptive and a fictional use of languages. Accordingly, fictitious entities have to be introduced in the ontology. A notion of counterpart is developped which, in contrast to D. Lewis'one, creates no difficulties with regard to identity.RésuméL'auteur traite de quelques questions de méthode d'un point de vue qu'il nomme transcen‐dantalisme ouvert. Dans les premiers paragraphes, il met en évidence l'importance de certaines activités normatives et il illustre l'application de sa méthode à des problèmes de philosophie en donnant quelques exemples tirés des domaines de l'ontologie, de la sémantique et de la métaphysique . Contre l'holisme de Quine il défend une position authentiquement pluraliste qui nous permet d'investir, selon les besoins du moment, des systèmes linguistiques ou logiques très divers.Dans les parties ultérieures, il avance des arguments en faveur d'une conception instrumentaliste de la logique. Plusieurs objections envers la sémantique des mondes possibles et un traite‐ment approprié des propositions conditionnelles suggèrent qu'il est indispensable de tenir compte du contexte tout en faisant une distinction marquée entre un usage des‐criptif et fictif de la langue. Nous sommes ainsi obligés d'accepter des entités fictives dans notre univers. Une notion de pendant est introduite qui, contrairement à celle proposée par D. Lewis, ne crée aucune difficulté quant au critere d'identityé.ZusammenfassungMethodische Fragen werden von einem Standpunkt angegangen, den der Verfasser offenen Transzendentalismus nennt. In den ersten Abschnitten wird die Wichtigkeit normativer Prakti‐ken hervorgehoben, um dann die Anwendung der Methode an philosophischen Fragen, die dieOntologie, die Analytizität und den Begriff der Notwendigkeit betreffen, zu illustrieren. Gegen Quines Holismus wird eine echt pluralistische Auffassung vertreten, wonach je nach Bedarf sehr verschiedenartige logische oder linguistische Systeme für das Fortkommen auf alien Gebieten menschlicher Tätigkeit eingesetzt werden können.Im zweiten Teil werden Argumente zugunsten einer instrumentalistischen Konzeption der Logik angeführt. Einwände gegen die Mögliche‐Welten‐Semantik und Vorschläge für eine adäquate Behandlung von irrealen Konditionalsätzen legen die beiden zentralen Anliegen der Berücksichtigung von Kontexten sowie der Unterscheidung von deskriptiven und fiktionalen Sprachverwendungen nahe, wobei entsprechend in der Ontologie die Annahme von fiktiven Entitäten erforderlich wird. Es wird ein Begriff des Gegenstücks oder Duplikats eingeführt, der im Gegensatz zu D. Lewis'Aufsatz bezüglich des Identitätskriteriums keine Schwierigkeiten bereitet. (shrink)

This essay tries to account for a certain “speculative turn” in contemporary philosophy (Q. Meillassoux, G. Harman, M. Gabriel, etc.) from a phenomenological point of view . A first objective of it will consist in exposing the link between, on the one hand, the methodological sense of Husserl’s concrete phenomenological analyses (concerning, for example, time and intersubjective structure of transcendental subjectivity,) and on the other hand, the consequences that follow from the grounding of phenomenology as first philosophy. This will (...) allow a largely underestimated research angle to be opened up, one that I call a “constructive phenomenology,” that constitutes an essential and original figure of transcendental philosophy in general. A second objective will then consist in the attempt to sketch the foundation of knowledge as knowledge , the core of a “phenomenological metaphysics.” Whereas the first part will remain within a Husserlian framework, the second will develop some elements of a “speculative transcendentalism” in a phenomenological perspective. (shrink)

Together with other influential psychologists of the time, Wundt considers internal data as absolute evidence, grounding psychology on this assumption. In opposition to his former mentor, Külpe aims at rehabilitating Kant’s transcendental aesthetics. Yet, he is far from embracing transcendentalism and rejects Kant’s skepticism as to the possibility of a scientific psychology. Nevertheless, Külpe believes that Kant is right in considering internal data as unreliable for scientific purposes: accordingly, psychology should share the same scientific methodology of any other science.

Contends that Heideggerian “fundamental ontology” and Husserlian phenomenology, while linked by methodological affinities (hermeneutics would be the operational correlative to phenomenology’s transcendental embrace), are thematically incongruent. It also holds that the self-display of Being clashes with the un-methodical dimension assigned to immediacy by the phenomenological tradition. Through reshaping Husserl’s presentialist transcendentalism, Heidegger cast anew the methodology grounded upon “presentifying intuitiveness” and tailored it to an expanded notion of “phenomenon”.

Attempts to close the mind-body gap traditionally resort to a priori speculations. Motivated by dissatisfaction with such accounts, neurophenomenology constitutes one of the first attempts to close the mind-body gap non-metaphysically. Nonetheless, it faces significant challenges. Many of these challenges arise from its abandoning of transcendentality and its dim view of bioinformation. In this paper, I propose a superior non-metaphysical alternative: a combination of a reformed biosemiotics and transcendental phenomenology. My approach addresses the difficulties of neurophenomenology, while retaining the merit (...) of mutual constraints. Biosemiotics pays respect to bioinformation while imposing the sign-meaning duality on primitive forms of life, which is a relic of anthropomorphism. To avoid this unjustified commitment, I argue for a sign-free biosemantics which replaces Peirce’s semiotics with Husserl’s theory of meaning and exchanges naturalism for transcendentalism. Meaning, according to the resulting account, is the “intended as such”. The irreality of meaning results from what I term the ‘higher visibility’ of intentionality. I argue that the mind-body gap can be locally closed in a non-metaphysical manner as the result of reflection upon empirical biological investigations. Sign-free biosemantics uncovers the meanings for the organism that are implicit in biological research, while transcendental phenomenology analyses the experiences that biologists undergo when associating the physical with the biological level, while at the same time also analysing the very framework within which they work. Meanwhile, biosemiotics frees phenomenology from its methodological limitations, and the two domains establish mutual constraints in a more radical form than neurophenomenology. (shrink)

The German-Hungarian phenomenologist became one of the few philosophers at the beginning of the 21st century who analyzed the foundations of transcendentalism in terms of the continental tradition. As a philosopher working within the framework of the Cartesian attitude, he posed the same questions as other philosophers after Heidegger - is it possible an alternative to ontotheology, is metaphysics possible after the rejection of metaphysics? But his answer quite accurately reflects both the internal contradictions of phenomenology and the heuristic (...) possibilities of modern non-classical ontology. The purpose of this article is to analyze the idea of L. Tengelyi's metaphysical phenomenology as a methodological project, with an emphasis on the concept of infinity. His work “World and Infinity. Towards the Problem of Phenomenological Metaphysics ”concentrates in itself an analysis of both the prehistory and the prospects of the phenomenological method at the beginning of the 21st century regarding post-metaphysical thinking. (shrink)

The paper addresses the problem of the place of deconstruction in the history of transcen-dental philosophy. J. Derrida’s project is considered as one of the most representative and con-sistent realizations of theoretical foundations of transcendentalism along with prominent con-ceptions such as Kant’s critique and Husserl’s phenomenology. The author suggests a number of attributes of transcendental thinking that allow historical reconstruction of the transcenden-tal paradigm. Derridian approach is considered as a turn towards this tradition, conceived as a transcendental tradition par (...) exellence, guided by the attitude of «turning». Historical legacy of deconstructive «turning» is analyzed with respect to Husserlian Rückfrage: return-inquiry as method, idea and attitude, reproducing in deconstructive strategy of interpretative critique. A concept of hyperbolic transcendentalism is introduced in order to define a deconstructive version of transcendental philosophy and indicate an immanent tendency in the transcen-dental thought, constitutive for both Kantian critical project and Husserlian strive towards in-tellectual radicalism extending from methodological hyperboles to radicalization of «transcendental motive». The author relies upon the concept of quasi-transcendental, which defines a mode of de-dogmatization, critical purifying and preservation of proper transcendental foundations of philosophical think-ing. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.2 (2003) 280-281 [Access article in PDF] Maria Dimova-Cookson. T. H. Green's Moral and Political Philosophy: A Phenomenological Perspective. New York: Palgrave, 2001. Pp. xiii + 175. Cloth, $60.00 Like most today who study Green's idealism, Dimova-Cookson finds only his ethics to be still relevant. She rejects his metaphysical epistemology and consequently his teleology, but offers an alternative. Dimova-Cookson proposes a Husserlian analysis (...) of Green's positions on goodness and a critical defense that attempts to rectify his apparently inconsistent formulations of that concept. Provided we recall that Husserl's method is not unproblematic and resist the tendency to adjust the doctrine analyzed for the sake of methodological fidelity, there is reason to be open to the author's proposal. Several of Husserl's ideas seem relevant to Green's thought: intentionality; "noematic content of the determinable X" and "horizon" developed in Ideas; intersubjectivity; and Husserl's teleological descriptions of phenomenological consciousness. But Dimova-Cookson pursues none of these. She employs Husserl's problematic "epoche" and a "necessary feature of human practice" she calls "the phenomenological circle" (69, hereafter, PC).Dimova-Cookson uses PC to resolve certain confusions imputed to Green. Green himself anticipates the charge of vicious circularity concerning the moral ideal when he reasons that "the unconditional good for man" is the good will and that the good will is to will the unconditional good. He subsequently explains that the circularity is not logically vicious for the two terms describe different states of one teleological process of a will actualizing its potential for perfection, and are distinguished "as the complete from the incomplete." According to Dimova-Cookson, Green hasn't escaped the charge and needn't try. Rather, he has unwittingly stumbled upon PC, but confused matters by carelessly conflating perspectives on the senses of "good" which she believes are two different definitions of two different things, elements in PC. "Circularity in explaining morality can be legitimized," she says, provided one rigorously clarifies the shift in perspective between the two elements in PC (70ff.). This move, she holds, can resolve certain contemporary criticisms. But note that if Green hasn't escaped the charge, and it is a genuine logical circle, then, as Husserl recognized, it cannot be avoided simply by making a rigorously clear shift in perspective. That would be a psychologistic response to a logical problem. Moreover, even if clarity of perspectival shift is useful here, it fails to capture the continuity in the moral progress of the self-actualization of moral agent to moral citizen. Finally, had Green represented his distinction in such dichotomous fashion, this would have compromised the teleological component of his explanations and made it more difficult to keep his theory from being conflated with utilitarianism. Green is far-sighted here, given recent tendencies to confuse utilitarianism and teleology on the basis that both can be represented as versions of consequentialism, a confusion based on the fallacy of undistributed middle.Most of Dimova-Cookson's connections are highly suggestive and many of her distinctions useful. She teases out several possible meanings of Green's conception of good, and is to be commended for having tried to answer some of his critics and calling attention to the valuable content of Green's doctrine. Her attempt at a phenomenological approach is novel.It is troubling, though, that Dimova-Cookson thinks it is also transcendental, for her words reveal a grave confusion about what this means. When discussing what she thinks is either transcendental or phenomenological, she uses the language of contingent psychological experience; e.g., "storing experience" (44), and projecting and relating to one's self-image (65). The process of learning she describes is more reminiscent of Piaget's "assimilation-accommodation" model than anything Husserlian or transcendental. Yet the author considers this an "advanced transcendentalism" wherein "our experience is preconditioned—that is, made possible—by the conceptual baggage that has accumulated and is always present at the back of our minds" (27). If one holds that we accumulate... (shrink)

As widely acknowledged, the epistemological turn of early modernity was based on the Cartesian method of doubt and negation, which primarily relates to the world of objects. The methodological negation and separation of sensible qualities and subjective attributes of objects left behind residual entities, which, from the Cartesian res extensa to the Kantian thing-initself, explicates an important basic feature of a historically unfolding transcendentalism: the reduction of objects to a mere givenness and the directional conditionality of epistemology that (...) presupposes it. The following paper examines how and to what extent modern epistemology tacitly assumes an epistemic directionality, and accordingly reduces the world of objects to its mere givenness by subordinating the objects to a hierarchical structure of cognition. The investigation is carried out both in a theoretical-philosophical as well as in a historical framework. (shrink)

In what respect, if any, is Kant a distinctively “critical” thinker? How does Kant’s “transcendentalism” differentiate his practice in metaphysics from that of the philosophers of the Cartesian tradition? How much does the success of Kant’s enterprise depend on the viability of the idea of the synthetic a priori? The issues that these questions raise came to a head for Kant in the attack on his novelty by the Leibnizean Johann August Eberhard, an attack to which Kant responded at (...) length in the sarcastically titled On a discovery according to which any new critique of pure reason has been made superfluous by an earlier one. Unfortunately, Kant’s apology is quite inconclusive. In this discussion, in an effort to shed some light on the murk, I supply text-sensitive analyses of the various key notions. It emerges that while, as Eberhard complained, the “critical” turn is not at all a methodological novelty, Kant’s procedure does mark a departure from traditional metaphysics, though not one that he himself describes at all clearly. Kant’s “transcendentalism” ultimately constitutes an open-ended and ever-widening interrogation of logical possibility; hence an interrogation that, contrary to what Kant himself claims, can never furnish what legitimately counts as “proof.”. (shrink)

Inhaltsverzeichnis/Contents: H.G. CALLAWAY: Open Transcendentalism and the Normative Character of Methodology. Roger F. GIBSON: Two Conceptions of Philosophy. Jürg FREUDIGER: Quine und die Unterdeterminiertheit empirischer Theorien. David PEARS: The Ego and the Eye: Wittgenstein's Use of an Analogy. Guido KÜNG: Welterkennen und Textinterpretation bei Roman Ingarden und Nelson Goodman. Barry SMITH: Putting the World Back into Semantics. Herbert STACHOWIAK: Offen für Ophelia? Paul GOCHET & Michel KEFER: Henri Lauener's Open Transcendentalism. Rudolf HALLER: Zum Problem des Relativismus in der (...) Philosophie. Andreas GRAESER: Analytic Philosophy and Hermeneutic Philosophy. Toward Reunion in Philosophy? Avrum STROLL: That Puzzle We Call the Mind. Wolfgang RÖD: Humes Skeptizismus als Entwurf eines neuen philosophischen Paradigmas. Henry E. ALLISON: Apperception and Analyticity in the B-Deduction. Peter SIMONS: Who's Afraid of Higher-Order Logic? Wilhelm K. ESSLER: Gorgias hat Recht! Alex BURRI: Relativismus, Realismus, Mathematik. (shrink)

In the XXth century naturalism and anti-naturalism, including the ideas of transcendentalism and a priori in Kant’s sense, considered as a kind of conceptual antipodes, conceptual oppositions in relation to the antagonism of their methodological attitudes and principles. However, at the turn of the XXIth century, the intensive development of cognitive studies, accompanied by the expansion of the empirical base, pushed the need to revise the traditionally accepted incompatibility of naturalism and anti-naturalism. The article has the goal to (...) assess the possibility of synthesis of naturalism and anti-naturalism in the context of the idea and methodology of biocultural co-constructivism. Such a synthesis presupposes the rejection of biophobia, inherent for social science and humanities, the recognition of the heuristic significance of the idea of activity-type transcendentalism developing original Kantian ideas, as well as ascribing the ontological status to the previously considered a priori categories (the discovery of the brain’s navigation system, neural networks responsible for the “sense of number”, etc.). We claim that non-biological and non-genetic – social and cultural in their status – factors have a noticeable effect on the functions of neural structures, and the activity of various areas of the brain as a whole. The biological trajectory of the evolution of living creatures, which has traditionally been described in terms of naturalism, turns out to be closely intersecting with the socio-cultural trajectory of its development, previously described in terms of anti-naturalism. Therefore, a synthesis of naturalism and anti-naturalism is quite acceptable, which does not allow the concept of “naturalized apriorism” to be considered an oxymoron. (shrink)

This essay examines the presence of Kant, Fichte, Schelling and Hegel in Merleau-Ponty’s thought. The perspective adopted here is methodological. Central to this is the choice of “transcendental phenomenology,” understood as a rehabilitation of the idealism and subjectivism proper to the transcendentalism of Kant and Fichte—the choice by which Merleau-Ponty refuses to abandon transcendental philosophy, like Hegel on the contrary did with his dialectical-speculative philosophy, and follows instead the phenomenological perspective suggested for the first time by Schelling.

Introduction. The increasing mediation of human life by medicine necessarily raises the question of philosophical understanding the phenomenon of culture medicalization, since today the vector of growing powerful influence of medicine on forming sociocultural processes has clearly emerged. Along with the positive phenomena of the medicalization of life, the volume of “excessive” phenomena of its medicalization is growing. The purpose of the article is to clarify the philo- sophical foundations of the progressive medicaliza- tion of modern culture. Methods. The (...) class='Hi'>methodological basis of the study is presented by dialectical, epistemological, axiologi- cal, philosophical-anthropological, and socio-phil- osophical approaches. The study is based on E. Cassirer’s transcendental philosophy, the phenom- enological transcendentalism of E. Husserl; V.S. Stepin’s concept about the system of informational social codes; and P.D. Tishchenko’s concept on the transformation of bio-power in modern culture. Scientific novelty of the research. The author outlines fundamental foundations of modern cul- ture medicalization as a result of mutually similar processes of transforming bio-power and the progress of biomedical sciences. Results. Unfolding, culture compensated for the bodily weakness of a person with the power of his technical inventions, but today they have surpassed the intellectual capabilities of their creator - the individual has to permanently adapt to the grow- ing volume of mass technogenic innovations. The historically formed human need to master the world through its “humanization” is suppressed, and, as a result, the problem of a modern indi- vidual’s request for self-realization through the creative transformation of the social environment is actualized. In this regard, one of the philosophi- cal and anthropological foundations of modern culture can be recognized as a technogenically determined desire of a person to transform his own corporeality, aimed at expanding the capabili- ties of a natural person. Biomedical sciences, as a result of biotechnological progress, turned out to be exactly the social and scientific sphere, which, building up practical activities within the framework of healthcare, considers the person to be both the subject and the object of the biosocial transforma- tion demanded by cultural evolution. Conclusions. The process of medicalization of culture occurs on the basis of two reciprocal fundamental processes: first, the strengthening of the principles of bio-power as “care for all forms of life”; secondly, the progress and technologization of scientific medicine, which in practice provides a socio-cultural demand for a modern prosperous individual. (shrink)

There is a certain tangle of philosophical questions around which much philosophy, especially in our time, has circled, to the point where now there is something that deserves to be called a holding pattern around these issues: What are causes? How do they compare with reasons? What is Reason, with a capital R? How does it participate in the production of intentions that lead to action, particularly in arenas rife with uncertainty? Where do formal systems of symbols come into all (...) of this? And how - if at all - can formal methods be harnessed to serve science and public policy, through guiding belief formation and decision-making? Henry Kyburg, Jr., has himself circled around this tangle of questions, at least once or twice. And so in his honor, and in the no-nonsense spirit of empiricism that marks his work as the work of a scientist, I'd like to sketch a way to cut through some of the Gordian knots at the center of this tangle. The theme will be that natural science has much of value to offer that has been willfully neglected by philosophers. This by itself is nowise surprising, as philosophy, particularly in the most exclusive parts of the academy, has suffered from an excessive transcendentalism - a theme to which I will return in this piece periodically. Now Kyburg has not been guilty of contributing to the causes for the decline of philosophy. He has, instead, been courageously working out the implications of his convictions regarding the virtues of vigorous formal systems, contributing to the advancement of empiricist methodologies, and generously supporting the causes of realism. In emulation of that courage, I offer this essay in the service of bold and vigorous formal systems, realism and - most emphatically - empiricism. (shrink)

Kick off the year right... and you will find yourself capable of recognizing the depth and breadth of John's genius. This event, commented on by Bujar Hoxha (South-East European University) chaired by Elma Berisha (Lyceum Institute), is part of the activities of the 2022 International Open Seminar on Semiotics: a Tribute to John Deely on the Fifth Anniversary of His Passing, cooperatively organized by the Institute for Philosophical Studies of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Coimbra, (...) the Lyceum Institute, the Deely Project, Saint Vincent College, the Iranian Society for Phenomenology at the Iranian Political Science Association, the International Association for Semiotics of Space and Time, the Institute for Scientific Information on Social Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Semiotic Society of America, the American Maritain Association, the International Association for Semiotic Studies, the International Society for Biosemiotic Studies, the International Center for Semiotics and Intercultural Dialogue, Moscow State Academic University for the Humanities and the Mansarda Acesa with the support of the FCT - Foundation for Science and Technology, I.P., of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education of the Government of Portugal under the UID/FIL/00010/2020 project. *** Eero Tarasti, professor of musicology at the University of Helsinki (chair) in 1984-2016. He was President of the IASS/AIS - International Association for Semiotic Studies, 2004-2014 and is now its Honorary President. In 2016 he has founded the Academy of Cultural Heritages. He studied music in Sibelius Academy, Helsinki, and then in Vienna, Paris, Rio de Janeiro and Bloomington. He got his PhD from the University of Helsinki (1978) after studies in Paris with Claude Lévi-Strauss and A. J. Greimas. He is one of the founders and the director of the international research group Musical Signification since 1984.Tarasti has become Honorary Doctor at Estonian Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, New Bulgarian University (Sofia), Indiana University (Bloomington), University of Aix-Marseille, and Gheorghe Dima National Music Academy in Cluj-Napoca, Rumania. He has published about 400 articles, edited 50 anthologies, and written 30 monographs; among them one finds: Myth and Music (1979), A Theory of Musical Semiotics (1994), Heitor Villa-Lobos (1996), Existential Semiotics (2000), Signs of Music (2003), Fondéments de la sémiotique existentielle (2009), Fondamenti di semiotica esistenziale (2010), Semiotics of Classical Music (2012, in French 2016), Sein und Schein, Explorations in Existential Semiotics (2015), and Transcending Signs: Essays in Existential Semiotics (2023); two novels: Le secret du professeur Amfortas (2002) and Retour à la Villa Nevski (2014, in Italian L’heredità di Villa Nevski 2014, in Finnish Eurooppa/Ehkä 2016). He has supervised 150 PhDs in Finland and abroad. *** Dr. Bujar Hoxha is a full professor of Communication Sciences at the South-East European University in Tetovo and Skopje, North Macedonia. His teaching courses include communication theory, introduction to communication sciences, and Semiotics of Mass Communication. His main scientific interests are structural semiotics, semiotics of passions, semiotics of disabilities, and existential semiotics. He gained his PhD from the University of Skopje in 2008 on the semiotics of Umberto Eco. Out of his creative and intellectual work, one can number two published novels, a book, as well as several scientific articles published in prestigious scientific journals, such as: “Semiotics of Precision and Imprecision” (2016) and “Multilingualism and Sameness vs Otherness in a Semiotic Context”, (2018) both in de Gruyter Mouton's Semiotica, Berlin and Boston, as well as “On the Applicability of the Semiotics of Passions” (2018) and “The Signs’ Behavior in Autistic Children: Semiosis of an Unspoken Language” (2021), both in the Humanities Bulletin, issued by London Academic Publishing, London, United Kingdom. Recently, Dr. Hoxha has published a monograph entitled: Umberto Eco’s Semiotics: Theory, Methodology and Poetics, issued by Cambridge Scholars Publishing in January 2022, New Castle upon Tyne, UK. *** Homepage: https://www.uc.pt/fluc/uidief/io2s Auditorium: https://www.uc.pt/fluc/uidief/io2s/auditorium *** Technical support assured by Robert Junqueira. The cover image for the video was designed by Zahra Soltani. (shrink)

One of the most often explored, repeatedly interpreted, and recognized again and again as a valuable achievement of Kant’s philosophy, is his transcendental philosophy, a new methodological approach that – as Kant believed – will allow philosophy (metaphysics) to enter upon a secure path of science. In this paper, I explore Nicolai Hartmann’s reinterpretation and development of this methodology in both the historical and systematic context of his thought. First, I will deal with the Neo-Kantian’s understanding of the transcendental (...) method as a starting point of Hartmann’s own understanding of it. Then I will analyze in detail his only paper devoted entirely to the problem of the method, (Hartmann, 1912), to present how he understands the necessary development of this methodology. I will claim that despite the fact that Hartmann – following Kant – never denied that the real essence of philosophy is the transcendental method, he tried to show that this methodus philosophandi cannot be reduced to the Neo-Kantian’s understanding of it. He argued that the core of all true philosophical and scientific research is the transcendental method, but only insofar as it is accompanied by two other methods that are needed to complete it: descriptive and dialectical method. I will close by presenting the relations between these three methods. (shrink)

David Carr’s Paradox of Subjectivity is a brilliant and challenging defense of the legitimacy and distinctiveness of the transcendental tradition in modern philosophy. Carr’s central claim is that the transcendental tradition is defined not by a metaphysical position, but rather by a methodological stance. Indeed, transcendentalism, he argues, involves no metaphysical commitments of any kind. He focuses this thesis by using it to address the later Heidegger’s charge that modern philosophy, from Descartes through to Nietzsche, and maybe Husserl (...) too, is essentially a metaphysics of the subject. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Cognition and Practice: Li Zehou's Philosophical Aesthetics by Rafal BankaJana S. Rošker (bio)Cognition and Practice: Li Zehou's Philosophical Aesthetics. By Rafal Banka. Albany, New York: SUNY, 2022. Pp. vii+ 230. Hardcover $95,00, isbn 978-1-4384-8923-4. In his book Cognition and Practice: Li Zehou's Philosophical Aesthetics, Rafal Banka delves into the cognitive philosophy of Li Zehou, one of the most significant and influential Chinese philosophers of our time. Banka not (...) only provides a deeper understanding of Li's work, but he also places his studies on beauty and aesthetic experience in close proximity to current international research in philosophical aesthetics that places great importance on the embodiment and embeddedness of the subject. By delving into Banka's analysis of the cognitive dimensions of Li Zehou's aesthetics, readers can gain a deeper understanding of how this philosopher approaches the intersection of aesthetics and cognition. Through Banka's interpretation, Li's specific view on the intricate relationship between sensory perception and mental processes is highlighted, offering readers the potential for a more nuanced conception of his philosophical perspective. Banka's contribution to our understanding of Li's theories of cognition is deeply intertwined with the methodological framework and theoretical approach used in his work. The former is based upon an analytical perspective that enables him to identify key themes and concepts in Li's cognition theory, as well as to critically evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of his approach. By employing this framework, Banka provides a comprehensive and nuanced analysis of Li's cognitive dimensions that is grounded in rigorous examination. In addition to the methodological framework, the comprehensive theoretical approach that Banka applies in his study is also integral to understanding Li Zehou's contribution to the theory of perception on an international level. The book is divided into three distinct parts, each of which explores a different aspect of Li's philosophy. In the first part, Banka examines Li's main sources of inspiration, specifically the philosophers and philosophies that have significantly influenced and contributed to his own work. This section primarily focuses on classical Confucianism, Marxist historical materialism, and Li's unique reinterpretations of Immanuel Kant's philosophies, particularly those presented in his second and third critiques. [End Page 1]In the first three chapters that constitute this first part, Banka offers a clear and comprehensive analysis of how Li Zehou has viewed Kant's apriorism through the lens of Confucianism and integrated it with Marxist materialist foundations, revealing the coherence with his theory of anthropological ontology. By highlighting the interconnectedness of these diverse influences, Banka illuminates the unique synthesis of ideas that form the foundation of Li's philosophy. Through his detailed analysis, Banka shows how Li Zehou managed to create a synthesis between the dynamic elements of historical materialism on the one hand, and Kant's transcendentalism on the other. In Li's system, the concepts of the empirical and the transcendental are interacting in a dynamic, correlative and mutually complementary way. They are both parts of a processual philosophy in which movement is always followed by a standstill. In such a worldview, they always appear as essentially interrelated and interdependent realms of life. Banka provides a comprehensive explanation of the theoretical foundations that underpin the interactive and complementary nature of these two systems. This has culminated in the development of Li's groundbreaking new theory on the transformation of the empirical into the transcendental. In the second part of the book, the author delves into Li's own philosophical system, specifically focusing on his concepts of "subjectality" and beauty. These concepts are not axiologically theorized but instead arise from subjective interactions between human beings and the external world. Through a detailed and logically consistent analysis, the author demonstrates how Li's aesthetics is compatible with contemporary experience-oriented theories that are redefining the discipline on an international level. In chapters 4 and 5, the much-discussed concept of subjectality is viewed from a highly productive perspective, starting from the very center of the notion itself, where a subject actively interacts with the external reality, which in turn shapes its inwardness. The author convincingly demonstrates... (shrink)