This paper presents a reflection on subjectivity in the context of consumer society, discussing two alternative approaches: on the one hand, the iden- tification between subject and commodity, traceable, among others, to Bauman, and, on the other hand, Žižek’s interpretation of subjectivity as an emerging surplus of the conflict within the symbolic order. The result- ing exchange between these alternatives shows the constitutive relations of the subject of consumption in the dimension of desire, in the margin of freedom, and in (...) the role of reflexivity. Finally, the understanding of the relationship between the subject and the material world is proposed as a constructive performativity of subjectivity. (shrink)

Este artículo presenta una reflexión sobre el lugar y la pertinencia de la filosofía del arte en un mundo del arte en el cual cualquier cosa puede ser una obra de arte, a partir de la propuesta teórica de Arthur Danto. Si la filosofía aún tiene algo que decir sobre el arte, sería desde una posición que reconozca la centralidad de la práctica artística sin delimitarla. La apertura en el arte no puede ser un motivo de negación o juicio, sino (...) un incentivo al pensamiento. Sin embargo, según Danto, ello exige aceptar puntos de partida y consecuencias que modifican la relación entre arte y filosofía. (shrink)

Este artículo corto reflexiona sobre la interesante relación que Michel Foucault plantea entre las formaciones de saber y las prácticas o dispositivos de poder, a través del caso particular de la clínica y la práctica médica. En efecto, este caso aporta elementos de relación en el propósito de hacer del hombre tanto un objeto de estudio como una variable para controlar. Es particular que el caso de la medicina aporte un concepto central para dilucidar la relación entre saber y poder, (...) a saber, el concepto de mirada, si bien ha de reconocerse la transformación del mismo conforme al modo de aplicación. (shrink)

This paper presents the results of a grounded analysis of an object organization case. The importance of clarifying the dynamics of the relationships of meaning contained in the modes of appropriation of the objects within the space of the living room is highlighted, since, as the analysis shows, a particular arrangement of objects cannot be isolated from the processes of identification of the individuals and from the construction and communication of a way of being or lifestyle. For this purpose, the (...) case study of object organization is presented in relation to contemporary culture theorists that have highlighted the importance of aesthetics in the production and reproduction of cultural practices and representations. The aim is to propose an alternative framework that enriches the analysis of the aesthetics of the object world in contemporary culture. (shrink)

El texto plantea una lectura de la obra de Michel Foucault según la cual en la época clásica –siglos XVII y XVIII– se construye una concepción del espacio que es correlativa a las prácticas discursivas que caracterizan la “episteme de la representación”. Esta concepción vincula los campos estético, social y epistémico a través de la idea del espacio como un ‘campo de visibilidad’ cuyas reglas de constitución comunican un tipo de representación pictórica, un modelo de distribución de las poblaciones y (...) una forma de discurso sobre la enfermedad. Dado que esas reglas, a su vez, se realizan a través de dispositivos concretos de producción de saber y de relaciones de poder, en su descripción espero dar cuenta de los límites históricos y epistémicos de la época clásica. (shrink)

This study examines how evidence is used differently in argumentative discourse compared to individual arguments. Applying a 1×2 crossover study design, 37 secondary school students were asked either to discuss a social issue with their partner before individually writing an essay outlining their opinion or, vice versa, first to discuss and then to write. As background information, they were provided with pieces of evidence with different levels of quality. Dialogs and essays were analyzed regarding (a) the type of evidence and (...) (b) the way evidence was used. Results showed that in their essays students referred more often to the pieces of evidence provided to them (shared evidence). In contrast, they used evidence more often to address the opposing viewpoint in dialogs by incorporating it in a more elaborated (clearer) line of reasoning. Findings suggest that dialogues are a more effective tool than individual writing production, and the study provides first hints regarding how to design curricula that will encourage students to use evidence in a more sophisticated way in their argumentation. (shrink)

Sydney Shoemaker has been arguing for more than a decade for an account of the mind–body problem in which the notion of realization takes centre stage. His aim is to provide a notion of realization that is consistent with the multiple realizability of mental properties or events, and which explains: how the physical grounds the mental; and why the causal work of mental events is not screened off by that of physical events. Shoemaker's proposal consists of individuating properties in terms (...) of causal powers, and defining realization as a relation of inclusion between sets of causal powers. Thus, as the causal powers that define a mental property are a subset of the causal powers that characterize a physical property, it can be said that physical properties realize mental properties. In this paper we examine the physicalist credentials of Shoemaker's mind–body theory in relation to three important issues: the direction of the relation of dependence that the theory is committed to; the possibility of mental properties existing without being anchored by physical properties; and the compatibility of the theory with the causal closure of the physical world. We argue that Shoemaker's theory is problematic in all three respects. After that we consider whether the theory should count as a mind–body theory at all, given that it seems to be committed to a distorted view of mental properties. (shrink)

“Acme” è arrivata al suo settantacinquesimo anno.

I motivate and characterize an intensional semantics for ‘ought’ on which it does not behave as a universal quantifier over possibilities. My motivational argument centers on taking at face value some standard challenges to the quantificational semantics, especially to the idea that ‘ought’-sentences satisfy the principle of Inheritance. I argue that standard pragmatic approaches to these puzzles are either not sufficiently detailed or unconvincing.

This book analyzes the uses of emotive language and redefinitions from pragmatic, dialectical, epistemic and rhetorical perspectives, investigating the relationship between emotions, persuasion and meaning, and focusing on the implicit dimension of the use of a word and its dialectical effects. It offers a method for evaluating the persuasive and manipulative uses of emotive language in ordinary and political discourse. Through the analysis of political speeches and legal arguments, the book offers a systematic study of emotive language in argumentation, rhetoric, (...) communication, political science and public speaking. (shrink)

Statements about the future are central in everyday conversation and reasoning. How should we understand their meaning? The received view among philosophers treats will as a tense: in ‘Cynthia will pass her exam’, will shifts the reference time forward. Linguists, however, have produced substantial evidence for the view that will is a modal, on a par with must and would. The different accounts are designed to satisfy different theoretical constraints, apparently pulling in opposite directions. We show that these constraints are (...) jointly satisfied by a novel modal account of will. On this account, will is a modal but doesn't work as a quantifier over worlds. Rather, the meaning of will involves a selection function similar to the one used by Stalnaker in his semantics for conditionals. The resulting theory yields a plausible semantics and logic for will and vindicates our intuitive views about the attitudes that rational agents should have towards future-directed contents. (shrink)

Raccolta di saggi sulla storia della filosofia rinascimentale e moderna.

Conditional perfection is the phenomenon in which conditionals are strengthened to biconditionals. In some contexts, “If A, B” is understood as if it meant “A if and only if B.” We present and discuss a series of experiments designed to test one of the most promising pragmatic accounts of conditional perfection. This is the idea that conditional perfection is a form of exhaustification—that is a strengthening to an exhaustive reading, triggered by a question that the conditional answers. If a speaker (...) is asked how B comes about, then the answer “If A, B” is interpreted exhaustively to meaning that A is the only way to bring about B. Hence, “A if and only if B.” We uncover evidence that conditional perfection is a form of exhaustification, but not that it is triggered by a relationship to a salient question. (shrink)

The principle of autonomy, through various court rulings, gradually became part of medical practice and tradition in the second half of the 1800s, notably when the emergence of surgical anaesthesia began to raise serious questions regarding informed consent. In fact, surgical anaesthesia was initially used not only to avoid pain but also to combat patients’ resistance to operations.

Argument from analogy is a common and formidable form of reasoning in law and in everyday conversation. Although there is substantial literature on the subject, according to a recent survey ( Juthe 2005) there is little fundamental agreement on what form the argument should take, or on how it should be evaluated. Th e lack of conformity, no doubt, stems from the complexity and multiplicity of forms taken by arguments that fall under the umbrella of analogical reasoning in argumentation, dialectical (...) studies, and law. Modeling arguments with argumentation schemes has proven useful in attempts to refine the analyst’s understanding of not only the logical structures that shape the backbone of the argument itself, but also the logical underpinning of strategies for evaluating it, strategies based on the semantic categories of genus and relevance. By clarifying the distinction between argument from example and argument from analogy, it is possible to advance a useful proposal for the treatment of argument from analogy in law. (shrink)

This paper shows how reasoning from best explanation combines with linguistic and factual presumptions during the process of retrieving a speaker’s intention. It is shown how differences between presumptions need to be used to pick the best explanation of a pragmatic manifestation of a dialogical intention. It is shown why we cannot simply jump to an interpretative conclusion based on what we presume to be the most common purpose of a speech act, and why, in cases of indirect speech acts, (...) we need to depend on an abductive process of interpretation. (shrink)

RESUMEN El artículo ingresa en la ontología del acontecer y recorre cuatro momentos. En primer lugar, distingue la visión del mundo en general, propia de la llamada “metafísica” de la visión del ser como acontecer, y busca un diálogo entre la perspectiva del ser en la metafísica y ontología de Hans-Georg Gadamer. En segundo lugar, analiza la estructura del acontecer o el modo como se despliega el movimiento del sentido, para determinar la lógica de la pregunta como estructura del acontecer. (...) En tercer lugar, entabla un diálogo entre la idea de acontecer y la categoría de finitud, para evidenciar que, cuando se piensa en una ontología del acontecer, esta remite a la determinación de la finitud. Y, finalmente, plantea algunas líneas de desarrollo para profundizar en esta investigación. ABSTRACT The articles discusses the ontology of the event and covers four moments. First, it identifies the general worldview typical of the “metaphysics” of being as event, and seeks to establish a dialogue between the perspective of being in Hans-Georg Gadamer’s metaphysics and his ontology. Secondly, it analyzes the structure of the event or the way in which the movement of meaning unfolds, in order to determine the logic of the question as structure of the event. Third, through a dialogue between the idea of event and the category of finitude, the article shows that thinking the ontology of the event leads to the determination of finitude. Finally, the article suggests a few lines of inquiry for further in-depth research of this topic. (shrink)

The concept of corporate social responsibility has been the subject of several academic contributions, but in the health sector the development of an interest in this subject is very recent. Although many practices in healthcare are already socially responsible, progressing from a series of socially responsible behaviours to a socially responsible organization entails a more consolidated awareness of the health sector’s mission and the needs of its participants. In this paper, we will review the different studies published that address the (...) relationship between the healthcare sector’s corporate responsibility and society, with the aims of individuating the prevailing foci that are emerging and categorizing the proposed contributions according to these foci: social responsibility and organization; social responsibility and social impact; social responsibility and competitiveness. Finally, the paper finishes with a personal definition of CSR and its correlated ethical roots. (shrink)

In contemporary discussions of abortion, both sides argue well-worn positions, particularly concerning the question, When does human life begin? Though often invoked by the Catholic Church for support, Thomas Aquinas in fact held that human life begins after conception, not at the moment of union. But his overall thinking on questions of how humans come into being, and cease to be, is more subtle than either side in this polarized debate imagines. Fabrizio Amerini--an internationally renowned scholar of medieval philosophy--does (...) justice to Aquinas's views on these controversial issues. Some pro-life proponents hold that Aquinas's position is simply due to faulty biological knowledge, and if he knew what we know today about embryology, he would agree that human life begins at conception. Others argue that nothing Aquinas could learn from modern biology would have changed his mind. Amerini follows the twists and turns of Aquinas's thinking to reach a nuanced and detailed solution in the final chapters that will unsettle familiar assumptions and arguments. Systematically examining all the pertinent texts and placing each in historical context, Amerini provides an accurate reconstruction of Aquinas's account of the beginning and end of human life and assesses its bioethical implications for today. This major contribution is available to an English-speaking audience through translation by Mark Henninger, himself a noted scholar of medieval philosophy. (shrink)

Provisional draft, pre-production copy of my book “The Modal Future” (forthcoming with Cambridge University Press).

Judgment aggregation problems are language dependent in that they may be framed in different yet equivalent ways. We formalize this dependence via the notion of translation invariance, adopted from the philosophy of science, and we argue for the normative desirability of translation invariance. We characterize the class of translation invariant aggregation functions in the canonical judgment aggregation model, which requires collective judgments to be complete. Since there are reasonable translation invariant aggregation functions, our result can be viewed as a possibility (...) theorem. At the same time, we show that translation invariance does have certain normatively undesirable consequences (e.g. failure of anonymity). We present a way of circumventing them by moving to a more general model of judgment aggregation, one that allows for incomplete collective judgments. (shrink)

Raccolta di saggi dedicati al Prof. Franco De Capitani.

Raccolta di saggi dedicati al Prof. Franco De Capitani.

Raccolta di saggi sulla storia della filosofia rinascimentale e moderna.

This volume provides a more exhaustive interpretation of Rene Descartes' medical views and its reception in the seventeenth century. Filling the gap in the recent scholarship, the contributions in the volume follow four axes: exegetical, textual, philosophical, and contextual. Authors in this book deal with Descartes' physiology, anatomy, and therapy by reconstructing Cartesian texts, detailing possible medical and philosophical sources, discussing medical collaborations and oppositions, and exploring obscurities and failures in Descartes' medicine. In laying bare the more promising issues of (...) Cartesian programme and discussing the reception and opposition in the seventeenth century, the volume also uncovers the limitations within his interpretation, ultimately revealing a more nuanced application of his methodology to a field of natural philosophy. While medical studies play a not secondary role in Descartes' entire work, the volume aims to discuss in detail the importance of medicine as a suitable field to understand Cartesian philosophy from a significant perspective in seventeenth-century Europe. (shrink)

El cordobés Damián de Castro, gran exponente de la platería rococó española en la centuria dieciochesca, realizó junto a otros artífices diferentes piezas para el cardenal Delgado y Venegas, arzobispo hispalense entre 1776 y 1781. Hoy muchas de estas piezas las podemos contemplar en las vitrinas de nuestro museo catedralicio, sin embargo la existencia en su tiempo de diferentes piezas similares produjo cierta confusión en su posterior identificación. En este nuevo trabajo intentaremos desentrañar las dudas sobre dos de las más (...) vistosas piezas del tesoro de nuestro templo mayor: las dos bandejas de plata sobredorada que, ejecutadas en un exuberante y depurado rococó, deslumbran al visitante con sus fúlgidos destellos y atrevido diseño. (shrink)

Comunicación sobre la reciente edición / Communication about this recent edition: Giambattista Vico, PRINCIPJ D'UNA SCIENZA NUOVA D'INTORNO ALLA COMUNE NATURA DELLE NAZIONI , a cura di Fabrizio Lomonaco e Fulvio Tessitore con una Nota di Manuela Sanna, Liguori Editore, Napoli, 2002, pp. 528.