In programs of acoustic survey, the amount of data collected and the lack of automatic routines for their classification and interpretation can represent a serious obstacle to achieving quick results. To overcome these obstacles, we are proposing an ecosemiotic model of data mining, ecoacoustic event detection and identification, that uses a combination of the acoustic complexity indices and automatically extracts the ecoacoustic events of interest from the sound files. These events may be indicators of environmental functioning at the scale of (...) individual vocal species, the acoustic community, the sound marks, or the soundscape. The EEDI model is represented by three procedural steps: 1) selecting acoustic data according to environmental variables, 2) detecting the events by creating an ecoacoustic event space produced by plotting ACIft and its evenness, 3) identifying events according to the level of correlation between the acoustic signature of the detected events and an ad hoc library of previously identified events. The EEDI procedure can be extensively used in basic and applied research. In particular, EEDI may be used in long-term monitoring programs to assess the effect of climate change on individual vocal species behavior, population, and acoustic community dynamics. The EEDI model can be also used to investigate acoustic human intrusion in natural systems and the effect in urban areas. (shrink)

In his 1994 paper, neuroscientist Benjamin Libet affirmed that he found a way to test the interaction between the mind and the brain. He believed that this procedure would also test the reality of a non-physical mind, emerging from neural activity. In 2000 John Searle objected to Libet’s evident dualism, affirming that the mind is not a hypothesis to test but a datum to be explained. According to Searle, Libet’s problem arose from accepting the Cartesian distinction of ‘mind’ and ‘body’, (...) obsolete categories from an old philosophy. Searle’s solution implied the rejection both of dualism and reductive materialism, suggesting a non-reductive materialism. This first-person ontology, as Searle calls it, aims at preserving, against reductive materialism, the essential features of consciousness, i.e. subjective, qualitative and unified. Searle argued, however, that the nature of consciousness remained biological. Dan Zahavi’s thesis is that a phenomenological approach to the self and consciousness can offer a complementing alternative to the contemporary comprehension of the nature of consciousness. Engaged in an open dialogue with neuroscience and cognitive science in his dealings with consciousness, Zahavi holds, nonetheless, that this notion cannot be completely understood without reference to the notion of the self. Thus, this paper will analyse Zahavi’s ideas about the self and consciousness in Subjectivity and Selfhood as to evaluate whether his phenomenological approach is able to overcome the materialist tones of Searle’s philosophy of mind, opening the possibility of a non-reductive comprehension of human beings. (shrink)

Animal welfare involves societal and human values, ethical concerns and moral considerations since it incorporates the belief of what is right or what is wrong in animal treatment and care. This paper aims to ascertain whether the different dimensions of individual attitudes toward animal welfare in food choices may be characterized by general human values, as identified by Schwartz. For this purpose, an EU-wide survey was carried out, covering almost 2500 nationally representative individuals from five European countries. Compared with the (...) previous literature this study shows a twofold novelty: it develops a general framework to link individual enduring beliefs and attitudes toward animal welfare attributes in food choices; the framework is analyzed within a broad-based cross-country study. Our empirical results prove that human values related to self-transcendence are strongly associated to overall animal welfare attitudes and especially to those explicitly related to food choices, while values related to the spheres of self-enhancement and conservatism are significantly associated to less sensitive attitudes to animal welfare. Moreover, our results appear to indicate that a determinant of animal welfarism in food choices is potentially associated to individual concerns regarding food safety issues. (shrink)

A classical objection to pictorial communication is that pictures are intrinsically ambiguous and a picture, per se, can communicate an indeterminate number of different contents. The standard interpretation of this objection is that pictures are subordinate to language and that pictorial communication is parasitic on verbal communication. We argue that in many cases verbal communication presents a similar indeterminacy, which is resolved by resorting to pragmatic mechanisms. In this spirit, we propose a pragmatic approach which explains pictorial communication in terms (...) of implicatures in a wide sense. (shrink)

El presente artículo se centra en el esclarecimiento de las nociones de percepciones inconscientes («petites perceptions»), percepciones y apercepciones en la teoría de la conciencia en Leibniz con el fin de responder dos preguntas: 1) Ad intra, es decir, intra-sustancialmente: ¿Cómo un evento inconsciente se vuelve consciente dentro de una misma sustancia simple?; 2) Ad extra, es decir, inter-sustancialmente: ¿dónde puede decirse que surge la conciencia en la jerarquía de mónadas? Para responder estas preguntas, seguiré la siguiente metodología. En primer (...) lugar, presentaré la teoría de la conciencia en Leibniz enmarcada en su visión metafísica. Presentaré a su vez los pasajes más conflictivos y el problema que surge al momento de definir la conciencia. En segundo lugar, presentaré las interpretaciones más comentadas que existen actualmente acerca de este problema. Me centraré en las posturas de Rocco J. Gennaro, Larry M. Jorgensen, Christian Barth y Alison Simmons. Finalmente, propondré una interpretación propia de la teoría de la conciencia en Leibniz. (shrink)

Resumen Según el diagnóstico sobre la academia contemporánea del pensador italiano Piero Coda, la teología, disciplina escindida de la filósofa desde la modernidad, se ha reducido a una mera apologética de la fe. En este marco, la Trinidad se vacía de contenido ontológico, dejando de ser principio de interpretación de la realidad. En el presente artículo analizaré las consecuencias antropológicas que posee el hecho de que la creación, específicamente del hombre, sea imago Trinitatis en el pensamiento de Edith Stein. En (...) la primera sección, presentaré brevemente cómo Stein aborda el misterio y las relaciones intra-trinitarias utilizando las imágenes del amor y de la vida. Luego, presentaré brevemente el desarrollo de la noción de persona y como ésta es resignificada a la luz del dogma trinitario para explicar en qué sentido Dios es persona. En la segunda sección, presentaré cómo se da la imagen del Dios Trino en la creación. Este será el primer paso, dado que para Stein el discurso cosmológico es solo la antesala del discurso antropológico. Finalmente, analizaré cómo se da la imagen del Dios trinitario en la persona humana y por ende cómo esta noción es resignificada y enriquecida.According to the diagnosis on the contemporary academy of the Italian thinker Piero Coda, theology, having been cut off from philosophy since modernity, has been reduced to mere apologetics. Within this framework, the doctrine of the Trinity is emptied of any ontological content, ceasing to be a principle of interpretation of reality. In this article I will analyse the anthropological consequences of the fact that creation, specifically of man, is imago Trinitatis in the thought of Edith Stein. In the first section, I will briefly present how Stein approaches mystery and intra-Trinitarian relationships using the images of love and life. Then, I will offer a quick description of the development of the notion of person and how it is re-signified in light of the Trinitarian dogma as to explain in what sense God is a person. In the second section, I will present how the image of the Triune God appears in Creation, a first step in cosmological discourse that will lead, for Stein, to the anthropological discourse. Finally, I will analyse how the image of the Trinitarian God is present to the human person and therefore how this notion is re-signified and enriched. (shrink)

The essay examines Thomas Hill Green’s idealistic reading of Aristotle’s Metaphysics and De anima, starting from his “monopsychist” view of human understanding. His criticism of the Aristotelian notion of substance leads him to a recalibration of hylomorphism and a “noetization” of matter, which could be seen as an averroizing move. Green holds that there is only one “Eternal Consciousness” and that the individual thinking subjects are particular manifestations of it. As for Averroes’ unity of intellect, this idea derives from a (...) “left-wing” account of the potency of thought. But there are several other ontological, ethical, religious, and political consequences in making potency something essentially spiritual. The comparison between the two philosophers could help to throw light on the ‘obscure’ conception of “Eternal Consciousness”. (shrink)

El presente artículo parte de la idea de que para superar la crisis ecológica que estamos viviendo no basta con desarrollar más tecnología y más ciencia, sino que también es necesario repensar y modificar nuestra relación con la naturaleza. Como sostiene la eco-filosofía, es necesario superar una ontología mecanicista centrada en un antropocentrismo fuerte que contrapone dualísticamente al hombre con la naturaleza, viéndola como mera propiedad al servicio del ser humano. Ahora bien, mientras que las eco-filosofías suelen apoyarse en una (...) ontología relacional, la hipótesis que se sostendrá a lo largo de este artículo es que no solo esta ontología puede funcionar de base para repensar y modificar nuestra relación con la naturaleza, sino que también la clásica doctrina metafísica de los grados del ser puede servir como base para un nuevo paradigma ecológico. (shrink)

The article analyses and comments on the collective volume entitled Storia della metafisica, edited by Enrico Berti. The author goes through the various contributions dedicated to a prominent metaphysician or a metaphysic current and lets emerge the different recalibration experienced by the concepts of ‘transcendence’ and ‘transcendental’. Berti’s preliminary choice is indeed to include in a history of metaphysics only those metaphysicians who have considered transcendence particularly relevant in their philosophical enterprises. From this survey, it is possible to assert the (...) good health of metaphysics in the contemporary Italian debate. (shrink)

The article analyses and comments on the collective volume entitled Storia della metafisica, edited by Enrico Berti. The author goes through the various contributions dedicated to a prominent metaphysician or a metaphysic current and lets emerge the different recalibration experienced by the concepts of ‘transcendence’ and ‘transcendental’. Berti’s preliminary choice is indeed to include in a history of metaphysics only those metaphysicians who have considered transcendence particularly relevant in their philosophical enterprises. From this survey, it is possible to assert the (...) good health of metaphysics in the contemporary Italian debate. (shrink)

The attention paid to Italian philosophy in the recent historiographical and theoretical debate is constantly increasing: therefore it becomes necessary understanding first of all if there is such...