This paper analyzes the impact that Lamarckian evolutionary theory had in the scientific community during the period between the advent of Zoological Philosophy and the publication Origin of Species. During these 50 years Lamarck’s model was a well known theory and it was discussed by the scientific community as a hypothesis to explain the changing nature of the fossil record throughout the history of Earth. Lamarck’s transmutation theory established the foundation of an evolutionary model introducing a new way to research (...) in nature. Darwin’s selectionist theory was proposed in 1859 to explain the origin of species within this epistemological process. In this context, Charles Lyell’s Principles of Geology and Auguste Comte’s Cours de Philosophie Positive appear as two major works for the dissemination of Lamarck’s evolutionary ideology after the death of the French naturalist in 1829. (shrink)

This paper presents key elements of Paolo Prodi´s historiagraphic theory that allow us to include him in the contemporary debate on the rol of religion and morality within democratic societies. The text is developed in three moments. First, we will briefly describe the aforementioned debate. Second, we will present the theorical elements found in Prodi’s works which are more relevant for the topic discussed. Finally, we will offer some critical comments in order to present what, for us, is still an (...) open discussion. (shrink)

Since it implies a reduction in the quality and the quantity of the natural resources, environmental degradation is a present day problem that requires immediate solutions. This situation is driving firms to undertake an environmental transformation process with the purpose of reducing the negative externalities that come from their economic activities. Within this context, environmental marketing is an emerging business philosophy by which organizations can address sustainability issues. Moreover, environmental marketing and orientation are seen as valuable strategies to improve a (...) firm's competitiveness. However, the literature that has analyzed the link between environmental strategies and firms' results has been inconclusive and contradictory. In this study, we propose and test a model that analyses how the implementation of ecological issues within a firm's marketing strategy and orientation influences organizational results. Data were obtained through a survey sent to Spanish manufacturing firms. The results show that environmental marketing positively affects firms' operational and commercial performance and this improvement will influence their economic results. Moreover, environmental marketing is revealed as an excellent strategy to obtain competitive advantages in costs and in product differentiation. Thus, this study agrees with the researchers who affirm that environmental strategies positively affect firm's competitiveness while reducing environmental impact. (shrink)

Final value accrues to objects that are good for their own sakes, while instrumental value accrues to objects that are good for the sake of their effects. The following paper aims to show that this distinction cuts across some surprising areas of the evaluative domain. This means that there may be some unexpected types of value that can come in a final or instrumental form. The argument proceeds by looking at two prominent types of value, namely kind-value and personal value. (...) The former accrues to objects that are good as the kinds of things that they are, while the latter accrues to objects that are good for someone. Substantive examples are offered in support of the idea that these types of value can come in final or instrumental form. The substantive examples are then given additional support by considering the structure and behavior of fitting attitudes. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the search for explainable models and interpretable decisions in AI must be reformulated in terms of the broader project of offering a pragmatic and naturalistic account of understanding in AI. Intuitively, the purpose of providing an explanation of a model or a decision is to make it understandable to its stakeholders. But without a previous grasp of what it means to say that an agent understands a model or a decision, the explanatory strategies will (...) lack a well-defined goal. Aside from providing a clearer objective for XAI, focusing on understanding also allows us to relax the factivity condition on explanation, which is impossible to fulfill in many machine learning models, and to focus instead on the pragmatic conditions that determine the best fit between a model and the methods and devices deployed to understand it. After an examination of the different types of understanding discussed in the philosophical and psychological literature, I conclude that interpretative or approximation models not only provide the best way to achieve the objectual understanding of a machine learning model, but are also a necessary condition to achieve post hoc interpretability. This conclusion is partly based on the shortcomings of the purely functionalist approach to post hoc interpretability that seems to be predominant in most recent literature. (shrink)

Value is an inescapable part of the human experience and what life must be like for a conscious and feeling person. Philosophical questions about value are therefore naturally invited: What sort of thing would value be if it were part of the furniture of the world? How should we understand the relations that value is thought to stand in to other things? In a broad sense, these are formal questions calling for philosophical studies into the understanding of value notions. The (...) following work represents one such study. Its main concern lies specifically with the notion of final value, the idea that things can be good or bad for their own sakes. (shrink)

Variations in life history define key comparative and evolutionary biological questions, important for understanding the mechanisms of mammalian evolutionary divergence, developmental adaptability and plasticity. In this regard, the differences among predominantly altricial and precocial species represent a particularly significant, if still poorly understood and contested case. Here, it will be shown how the classical analysis of such ontogenetic variations, going back to the semantic biology of A. Portmann, can be expanded and synthesized with comparative physiological approaches, based on the negentropic (...) theory of ontogeny by I. A. Arshavsky and his school. In this little received but pioneering tradition, extensive comparative and experimental investigations were carried out on the role of musculoskeletal systems and stressors in driving life history variations, particularly in the altricial-precocial spectrum. As shown by Arshavsky and co-workers, by focusing on general allometric regularities, the approximations based on the classical energy rules of surface and mass offer valuable benchmarks, but also predictions that are frequently violated by the variability of physiological and metabolic scaling relationships among altricials and precocials, and thus, a complex and historical approach is needed to describe their local physiological mechanisms and systemic regularities. This paper shows how Arshavsky’s findings and framework can play an integrative role in this context, potentially helping to bridge the mainly descriptive approach of semantic morphology, as developed by Portmann’s school, with the more functional explanations predominating current ecology and life history theory. These problems can be important for biosemiotics by highlighting the contingent, activity-dependent, and surplus anabolic stress mechanisms underlying diversification in eutherian developmental systems and possibly, the epigenetic evolution of pace-of-life syndromes. (shrink)

This paper offers some insights and clarifications of the paramount role that Mexico has had in the forging of first-order cybernetics. Our account starts with Arturo Rosenblueth as a key intellectual figure in the foundation and formation of the field. After revisiting a historical context of people and places, we proceed to a cultural and media archeological investigation that helps us obtain new insights into the ongoing effort to intertwine the complex intellectual networks across different countries in Latin America, North (...) America, and Europe. We then present cases and first-hand interviews to discuss the legacy of cybernetics in Mexico around institutions where Rosenblueth was affiliated, mainly the Institute of Cardiology and, later on, the CINVESTAV at the Instituto Politécnico Nacional. We claim that subjective affinities are as important as common scientific goals to establish and keep connections alive, necessary to the development of a research field. As the active compound in spicy peppers, capsaicin represents a local component to the definition of cybernetics. Ultimately, the paper aims to contribute to the research on the importance of cybernetics in Latin America. (shrink)

¿Cuál es la relación entre Derecho y confianza? ¿y cómo puede el Derecho favorecer la confianza social “adecuada”? El libro de Tommaso Greco sobre La legge della fiducia ofrece una respuesta a tales cuestiones y propone una revisión del “maquiavelismo jurídico”, entendido como el paradigma jurídico clásico. En este trabajo, a partir de la lectura de dicha obra, se plantean algunas reflexiones sobre dicha relación y se hace una crítica del planteamiento “principialista” del autor.

Research on the use of smartphone apps with the aim of developing self-regulated learning and increasing academic performance of university students in virtual mode, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, is recent and scarce. The present article shows the results of a study that analyzed the effect of using the 4Planning app with an intra-curricular approach on SRL and on the academic performance of 119 1st-year psychology students in virtual mode, at a Chilean university. The research was conducted with (...) quantitative methodology and a quasi-experimental design, with pre- and posttest measurements of an experimental group and comparisons with three control groups. The results show that students who used the app during 10 weeks of the first academic semester 2021: increased SRL self-report, increased academic self-efficacy, and obtained higher academic performance, compared to those who did not use it. The above occurs because the 4Planning app activates functions of the self-regulatory system of goal-directed behavior, which allows exercising the capacity of self-direction and self-influence on this type of behavior in the particular context of academic performance, which produces SRL. It is concluded that the 4Planning app is effective in developing self-regulation and improving the academic performance of 1st-year university students, in virtual learning mode. (shrink)

El presente artículo examina las diferentes teorías del contenido mental de Dretske y su relación con sus consideraciones epistemológicas para concluir que el hecho de conceptualizar o albergar un determinado contenido es ya un tipo de conocimiento, a saber, conocimiento animal. A continuación el autor discute dicho enfoque sosteniendo, a diferencia de Dretske, que mantener la dicotomía entre conocimiento animal y conocimiento reflexivo resulta virtuosa pues mantiene tanto aquello que puede ser naturalizado apelando a la Historia natural como da razón (...) de las practicas justificatorias que intervienen en el denominado conocimiento reflexivo y que a su juicio es irrenunciable e irreductible. (shrink)

In this essay, I deal with the problem of the attribution of psychological predicates to non-human animals. The first section illustrates three research topics where it has become scientifically legitimate to explain the conduct of non-human animals by means of the attribution of psychological predicates. The second section discusses several philosophical objections to the legitimacy of such attributions provided by central thinkers from the last decades. I try to show that these objections —which are related among other questions to the (...) holism of the mental, the indeterminacy of the attributions, and the strangeness of animal concepts— can be alleviated. In the third section, I propose to adopt a literalist view of the attributions in the sense articulated by Figdor. At the same time, I argue that one must draw limits to the conceptual change forwarded by her literalist view, taking into account holistic considerations and the fact that the psychological concepts must retain their core notes. (shrink)

Morally progressive social changes seem to have taken place with the onset of democratic governance, the abolition of slavery, the rise of gender equality, and other developments. This essay attempts to demonstrate that natural and objective moral facts are a plausible cause of some morally progressive social changes. Since this hypothesis is a version of naturalistic moral realism, I call it the Naturalist-Realist Hypothesis. To support the NRH, I argue that objective moral facts are natural facts pertaining to the impartial (...) promotion of well-being within a population of agents facing a social dilemma. I then describe a mechanism to explain how natural and objective moral facts so construed may cause some morally progressive social changes. I suggest that the NRH is a credible hypothesis because it is compatible with empirical findings from research on the evolution of moral cognition and on the sociology of mass political movements. (shrink)

Education is a fundamental pillar in human development, and its evolution throughout history has been influenced by a variety of factors, including imaginative culture and human nature. In this study, we explore how educational methods have evolved in response to the interaction between these two aspects. We look at how human creativity, imagination, and adaptation have influenced the way we teach and learn, from early forms of knowledge transmission to more contemporary approaches focused on active student engagement and the development (...) of practical skills. Our research is based on a comprehensive review of the academic literature in the fields of education, evolutionary psychology, cultural anthropology, and imagination studies. We explore how societies have used imagination as a tool to transmit knowledge and values, as well as to foster creativity and individual expression. We also examine how adaptive aspects of human nature, such as the ability to learn collaboratively and adapt to changing environments, have influenced the way educational methods are designed. Our results show a clear evolution in educational methods over time, from approaches focused on the one-way transmission of knowledge to more interactive and participatory models that encourage exploration and discovery. We identify common patterns in the way societies have used imagination and adaptation to promote learning and socialization and discuss the implications of these findings for contemporary education. In conclusion, this study highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between imaginative culture, human nature, and education. It provides a solid foundation for the design of educational methods that harness the innate creativity and adaptability of human beings and offers guidance for educators and policymakers on how to promote meaningful and lasting learning in today's world. (shrink)

Many word forms in natural language are polysemous, but only some of them allow for co-predication, that is, they allow for simultaneous predications selecting for two different meanings or senses of a nominal in a sentence. In this paper, we try to explain (i) why some groups of senses allow co-predication and others do not, and (ii) how we interpret co-predicative sentences. The paper focuses on those groups of senses that allow co-predication in an especially robust and stable way. We (...) argue, using these cases, but focusing particularly on the multiply polysemous word ‘school’, that the senses involved in co-predication form especially robust activation packages, which allow hearers and readers to access all the different senses in interpretation. (shrink)

El artículo presenta la crítica de Amartya Sen al modelo antropológico que subyace a la concepción de la economía neoclásica (sobre todo en sus versiones utilitarista y de la elección racional), para exponer luego la concepción de sujeto que ofrece el enfoque de las capacidades y la noción del desarrollo como libertad.

In this article I argue that anti-perfectionist liberals can accept nudging in certain areas: in particular, they can accept nudges aimed at helping people to discharge their nonenforceable duties, and to secure personal autonomy. I claim that nudging is not disrespectful since it does not involve a comparative negative judgment on people’s ability to pursue their plans, and that the judgments that motivate nudging are compatible with treating citizens as free and equal. I also claim that despite being sometimes manipulative, (...) nudging is easy to resist and so it can be employed to pursue legitimate goals. (shrink)

This paper seeks to destabilize the silent privilege given to the secured juridical-political position of the citizen as the stable site of enunciation of the problem/solution framework under which the stranger (foreigner, immigrant, refugee) is theoretically located. By means of textual, intertextual, and extratextual readings of Antigone, the paper argues that it is politically and literarily possible to (re)invent her for strangers in the twenty-first century, that is, for those symbolically produced as not-legally locatable and who resignify their ambivalent ontological (...) status between life and death as an alternative sociopolitical location of speech and action in equality with “others.”. (shrink)

The origin of Paraconsistent Logic is closely related with the argument that from the assertion of two mutually contradictory statements any other statement can be deduced, which can be referred to as ex contradict!one sequitur quodlibet (ECSQ). Despite its medieval origin, only in the 1930s did it become the main reason for the unfeasibility of having contradictions in a deductive system. The purpose of this paper is to study what happened before: from Principia Mathematica to that time, when it became (...) well established. The main historical claims that I am going to advance are the following: the first explicit use of ECSQ as the main argument for supporting the necessity of excluding any contradiction from deductive systems is to be found in the first edition (1928) of the book Grundzüge der theoretischen Logik by Hilbert and Ackermann. At the end, I will suggest that the aim of the 20th century usage of ECSQ was to change from the centuries long philosophical discussion about contradictions to a more "technical" one. But with Paraconsistent Logic viewed as a technical solution to this restriction, the philosophical problem revives, but now with an improved understanding of it at one's disposal. (shrink)

En este artículo se defiende la necesidad de que el actor de la ciencia, el científico, disponga de suficiente formación filosófica como para analizar críticamente el alcance de su propia actividad especializada, análisis que debiera empezar por entender qué es eso a lo que llamamos ciencia. Se ejemplifica la necesidad de tal formación recurriendo a la biología sintética. Se muestran los peligros que se corren de la derivación hacia campos no científicos si el científico está imbuido de una ciencia fáustica (...) orientada a la obtención del producto –el ente biológico sintético– disminuyendo veladamente el interés por estudiar el mismo desde la óptica de la ciencia prometeica, aquella que se aproxima progresivamente a la comprensión de los entes vivos. (shrink)

La convocatoria del XVIII Congreso Internacional de Filosofía Latinoamericana se equivocó al afirmar que los estudios sociales latinoamericanos sobre ciencia y tecnología no habían establecido una relación explícita con la filosofía. Como contraejemplo, este artículo analiza un curso de extensión fuertemente influenciado por los dos campos. Este estudio buscó identificar cómo el caso problematiza la educación en ciencia y tecnología en Latinoamérica y para esto se orientó por preguntas clave de la filosofía latinoamericana. Los resultados superan una discusión apenas didáctica (...) para cuestionar si dicha educación debe/puede crear condiciones para que diferentes actores/actrices estudien su relación con el conocimiento, la tecnología y la propia educación, asumiendo su lugar histórico en la transformación de estas instituciones y de las desigualdades que reproducen. (shrink)

A standard approach to neutral value suggests that it can be understood in comparative terms by reference to value relations. I develop some objections to the standard approach based on assumptions about value facts being closely connected to fittingness facts. I then suggest that these objections give us reasons to amend the standard approach with a noncomparative understanding. The claim is that if an item has neutral value, then it is a fitting target of indifference, where this is understood not (...) as an absence of attitudes but a discrete type of reaction or evaluation. By leaning on some general insights from philosophical psychology about the evaluative role of indifference, I then attempt to give some hints as to how we might understand its nature. (shrink)

In this paper I critically examine the notion of explanation used in Artificial Intelligence in general, and in the theory of belief revision in particular. I focus on two of the best known accounts in the literature: Pagnucco’s abductive expansion functions and Gärdenfors’ counterfactual analysis. I argue that both accounts are at odds with the way in which this notion has historically been understood in philosophy. They are also at odds with the explanatory strategies used in actual scientific practice. At (...) the end of the paper I outline the desiderata for an epistemologically motivated, scientifically informed belief revision model for explanation. (shrink)

El presente artículo tiene por fin ofrecer una reconstrucción sistemático-doxográfica de los fenómenos de la demora y de la tardanza en el pensamiento de Martin Heidegger entre 1919 y 1930. En la primera sección de este escrito rastrearemos las ambigüedades que penetran en la nominalización y formalización de la demora, para inmediatamente tematizar la estructura disruptiva de cuatro modos de la demora entendida a título constituyente dentro de la obra temprana de Heidegger. Lo que nos interesará es dar cuenta del (...) modo en que la demora porta un potencial desocultante que asegura fenomenológicamente la evidenciación de la dimensión constituyente. En la segunda sección del ensayo, bajaremos a las transformaciones inmanentes de la filosofía de Heidegger para dar cuenta de dos posibilidades de la auto-comprensión de la filosofía a partir de la demora y de la tardanza, precisamente desde dos modos de relación con la dimensión constituyente del aparecer. Por una parte, un modo marcado por la tardanza crepuscular, y por otra parte, un modo ejecutivo basado en la demora auroral. (shrink)

The origin of Paraconsistent Logic is closely related with the argument that from the assertion of two mutually contradictory statements any other statement can be deduced, which can be referred to as ex contradict!one sequitur quodlibet (ECSQ). Despite its medieval origin, only in the 1930s did it become the main reason for the unfeasibility of having contradictions in a deductive system. The purpose of this paper is to study what happened before: from Principia Mathematica to that time, when it became (...) well established. The main historical claims that I am going to advance are the following: the first explicit use of ECSQ as the main argument for supporting the necessity of excluding any contradiction from deductive systems is to be found in the first edition (1928) of the book Grundzüge der theoretischen Logik by Hilbert and Ackermann. At the end, I will suggest that the aim of the 20th century usage of ECSQ was to change from the centuries long philosophical discussion about contradictions to a more "technical" one. But with Paraconsistent Logic viewed as a technical solution to this restriction, the philosophical problem revives, but now with an improved understanding of it at one's disposal. (shrink)

El siguiente texto aborda la poesía de Carlos Fajardo Fajardo, cuya obra sólida, rigurosa y de estupenda factura, lo sitúa entre uno de los poetas más representativos de la actual poesía colombiana. El texto muestra las constantes poéticas de Fajardo, sus propuestas estéticas e influencias, rastreando la sugerente lucidez y la exquisita sensibilidad que habitan en sus poemas.

There is a growing awareness that there are many subtle forms of exclusion and partiality that affect the correct workings of a judicial system. The concept of epistemic injustice, introduced by the philosopher Miranda Fricker, is a useful conceptual tool to understand forms of judicial partiality that often go undetected. In this paper, we present Fricker’s original theory and some of the applications of the concept of epistemic injustice in legal processes. In particular, we want to show that the seed (...) planted by Fricker has flourished into a rich field of study in which the concept is used to analyze many different phenomena in law, not always following the original characterization provided by her. This has led to a distinction between what we will call the narrow version of the concept, which is closer to Fricker’s original account, and the wider version of epistemic injustice, which is a more controversial notion because it is always on the verge of morphing into other well-known concepts like sexism, racial discrimination, oppression, silencing, and gaslighting. We will show that the value of the narrow version is mostly theoretical, and that in order to use the concept of epistemic injustice one must adopt a more liberal understanding of it. (shrink)