Resumen: Derek Parfit en Personas, racionalidad y tiempo sostiene que si bien es posible concebir experiencias sin referir a personas, las experiencias dependen para su existencia de las personas, y a su vez, las experiencias dependerían para su identidad de cierta otra entidad no idéntica con la entidad persona. Tal tesis, que deviene de determinado experimentos mentales de Parfit, específicamente del argumento Mi División y el Argumento del Hospital, se revisará desde ciertas nociones metafísicas de E. J. Lowe, en específico, (...) desde la tesis que supone que dependencia de identidad implica dependencia existencial, de forma que si x depende para su identidad de y, x dependería, de igual forma, para su existencia de y. Tal supuesto permitirá desarrollar ciertas problemáticas para lo que Parfit sostiene en su esquema sobre la dependencia de las experiencias.: Derek Parfit in People, rationality and time argues that although it is possible to conceive experiences without referring to people, experiences depend on people for their existence, and in turn, experiences would depend on certain other entity not identical to the person entity for their identity. This thesis, which comes from certain mental experiments of Parfit, specifically from My Division argument and the Hospital Argument, will be reviewed from certain metaphysical notions of E. J. Lowe, specifically, from the thesis that assumes that identity dependence implies existential dependence, so that if x depends on the identity of y, x would depend, in the same way, on the existence of y. This assumption will bring to developing certain problems concerning what Parfit holds in his scheme on the dependence of experiences. (shrink)

The paper suggests that Bastiat’s theory of interests, harmony, and the State is rooted in a particular conception of Natural Right, in which the Lockeans and thomistic streams of thought meet. But it also suggests that Bastiat’s interpretation of the role that Providence plays in human events is not able to give a sustainable theory of liberal order. The paper also considers the criticisms to Bastiat’s economic and political theory coming from exponents of classical liberalism, from the Austrians, and from (...) Catholic thinkers of that time, such as L. Taparelli d’Azeglio and M. Liberatore.The conclusion is that although the economic theory of Bastiat is by now obsolete from the conceptual point of view, his political theory and his criticism of the state do remain extraordinarily topical.Cet article suggère que les théories des intérêts, de l’harmonie et de l’Etat de Bastiat sont ancrées dans une conception particulière du droit naturel au confluent des pensées lockéenne et thomiste. Cependant, il suggère aussi que l’interprétation que donne Bastiat du rôle de la Providence dans les affaires humaines ne débouche pas sur une théorie recevable de l’ordre libéral. L’article examine aussi les critiques qu’adressent les partisans du libéralisme classique-tels que les économistes autrichiens, les penseurs catholiques de l’époque comme L. Taparelli d’Azeglio et M. Liberatore-à l’égard des théories économiques et politiques de Bastiat. L’article conclut que le caractère obsolète des théories de Bastiat d’un point de vue conceptuel ne remet pas en cause la singulière actualité de sa théorie politique et de sa critique de l’Etat. (shrink)

Escribir sobre ética —y en particular sobre ética médica— en los tiempos que corren comporta un cierto riesgo, no sólo por la posible incompetencia del autor, sino porque éste se encuentra algo desubicado en un entorno de crisis moral propiciada por el cientifismo como nueva religión laica y la voracidad de los mercados. La preocupación de los legos por la creciente dificultad en discernir aquello que es ético o bueno de lo que no lo es constituye en la actualidad un (...) dilema universal, al menos por cuanto respecta a nuestra civilización occidental. Dicha preocupación se encuentra plasmada en decenas de textos dedicados no ya a los aspectos más abstractos o filosóficos de la ética general, sino a las “éticas particulares” aplicables a las profesiones, las empresas o al ámbito político. Así, se habla de una ética periodística, del compliance industrial, de la investigación, de la banca, de las redes de sociales y, por supuesto de la medicina. (shrink)

O presente artigo examina como a obra historiográfica _Revoluções Cisplatinas_, de 1915, do político, diplomata e historiador Alfredo Augusto Varella, representa tanto disputa política como uma forma de escrita da história sobre a Farroupilha. A partir da hipótese de que na Primeira República, no Rio Grande do Sul, houve uma hegemonia social e política do PRR quer se investigar como a obra de Varella articulou-se com o seu contexto. Portanto, o objetivo é analisar como foi construída a narrativa sobre a (...) Farroupilha no contexto de disputas em torno do borgismo. Para atingir tal objetivo, usa-se o conceito de operação historiográfica de Michel de Certeau, isto é, como a partir de uma análise do lugar social, da prática científica e da escrita do texto pode-se perceber as transformações na escrita da história sobre a Farroupilha. Por fim, percebe-se que a obra analisada foi um objeto tanto de luta política como de virada interpretativa na escrita da Farroupilha. (shrink)

In our paper we aim to meditate on the concept of depth (profondeur) in the works of M. Merleau-Ponty, as it is a key notion to understand the French philosopher’s concept of space. Furthermore we will try to show that space plays a fundamental role in the development of Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy, allowing us to understand important features both of his phenomenological readings and ontological project.

As we turn to the lived experience of memory, we are confronted with an eerie and enigmatic possibility: the possibility to remember what we ourselves never lived. How to explain phenomenologically this enigmatic but fundamental level of spatialized memory? I would like to come back to these issues in order to face yet another fundamental question: Does a phenomenology of spatialized memory require any onto-phenomenological concretizations?

Esse artigo parte da arte, da ficção científica e da literatura fantástica para propor uma outra cosmopolítica, divergente daquela que sustentaria, simultaneamente, realismo literário e etnocentrismo ocidental.

We propose a nonmonotonic Description Logic of typicality able to account for the phenomenon of the combination of prototypical concepts. The proposed logic relies on the logic of typicality ALC + TR, whose semantics is based on the notion of rational closure, as well as on the distributed semantics of probabilistic Description Logics, and is equipped with a cognitive heuristic used by humans for concept composition. We first extend the logic of typicality ALC + TR by typicality inclusions of the (...) form p :: T(C) v D, whose intuitive meaning is that “we believe with degree p about the fact that typical Cs are Ds”. As in the distributed semantics, we define different scenarios containing only some typicality inclusions, each one having a suitable probability. We then exploit such scenarios in order to ascribe typical properties to a concept C obtained as the combination of two prototypical concepts. We also show that reasoning in the proposed Description Logic is EXPTIME-complete as for the underlying standard Description Logic ALC. (shrink)

It is in Sein und Zeit that Heidegger decrees the end of the Geisteswissenschaften and their tradition, when, as he is commenting on the Briefwechsel [exchange of letters] between Dilthey and Yorck von Wartenburg, he pays homage to the latter for “his full understanding of the fundamental character of history as virtuality [...] [which he] owes to his knowledge of the character of being of human Dasein itself.” Consequently, Heidegger continues, “the interest of understanding historicality” is confronted with the task (...) of an elaboration of the “generic difference between the ontic and the historical.” But he must part ways with Yorck when the latter, after having clearly established that difference, moves from virtuality to mysticism. If, on the other hand, once separated from the ontic, “the question of historicality shows itself to be an ontological question which inquires into the constitution of being of historical being”, it is once again towards Dilthey that one must turn, in spite of his confused vitalism. Heidegger effects two operations at once. On the one hand, he expels the Geisteswissenschaften from the position they occupied at the heart of metaphysics, as the inheritors of the Enlightenment and the outcome of Hegelianism. On the other hand, he brings to fulfillment the critical labor which had precisely shown its value in Dilthey’s historicism —acritical labor which develops the search for the meaning of historicity and allows one to move from the theory of objectivity to that of expression, from the acknowledgment of historiography in the context of the critique of cognition to its definition at the heart of the transcendental schematism. Historicity is then posited as an ontological dimension and leaves only its ontic residue for historiography. (shrink)

The paradox marking Spinoza’s reappearance in modernity is well known. If Mendelssohn wished to “give him new credence by bringing him closer to the philosophical orthodoxy of Leibniz and Wolff,” and Jacobi, “by presenting him as a heterodox figure in the literal sense of the term, wanted to do away with him definitively for modern Christianity”—well, “both failed in their goal, and it was the heterodox Spinoza who was rehabilitated.” The Mendelssohn-Jacobi debate can be grafted onto the crisis of a (...) specific philosophical model. It generates a figure of Spinoza capable of assuaging the exacerbated spiritual tension of that epoch, and of constituting the systematic preamble of the relation between power and substance—between subject and nature. Spinoza, the damned Spinoza, had a resurgence in modernity as a Romantic philosopher. Lessing won out by recognizing in Spinoza an idea of nature which was capable of balancing the relation between feeling and intellect, freedom and necessity, and history and reason. Herder and Goethe, against the subjective and revolutionary impatience of the Sturm und Drang, based themselves on this powerful image of synthesis and recomposed objectivity: Spinoza is not only the figure of Romanticism; he constitutes its grounding and its fulfillment. The omnipotence of nature was no longer to break off into the tragedy of feeling, but it was to triumph over it, by opposing it to a kingdom of completed forms. Spinoza’s first reception within Romanticism was thus an aesthetic reception, a perception of motion and perfection, of dynamism and forms. And it remained such, even when the general frame and the particular components of Romanticism were subjected to the labor of philosophical critique. Fichte, the real philosophical hero of Romanticism, considered both Spinoza’s and Kant’s systems to be “perfectly coherent,” in the incessant ontological movement of the I. For the Schelling of the 1790s, the assertion of a radical opposition between 1 critical philosophy and dogmatic philosophy—that is, between a philosophy of the absolute I founding itself on the critical philosophy and a dogmatic philosophy of the absolute object and Spinozism—was quickly resolved into an analysis of action which dialectically took on the weight of the objective. Far from becoming antinomial, the absolute position of the I composes itself into a necessary process which, above tragedy, exalts the “spiritual automatism” of the relation between subject and substance. The aesthetic dimension of this synthesis consists in ceaselessly and tirelessly bringing back power and substance, the productive element and the form of production, to perfection. Romanticism, according to Hegel, is characterized by a capacity to overcome the pure objectivity of the ideal and the natural as a true idea of beauty and truth, initially to destroy the union of the idea and its reality, and to locate the latter in the difference, so as then to bring to manifestation the inner world of absolute subjectivity and reconstruct its objectivity where the overcoming of sensibility is appeased in the absolute character of the result. The filiation of this process is still Lessingian, but the new dialectic expresses and articulates its motivations, while insisting on the propaedeutic of the beautiful along the path leading to the absolute. Spinoza, a certain Spinoza, becomes the central figure in this process. (shrink)

We must undoubtedly take advantage of the benefits brought by new technologies, and we must apply them to the human being to the extent that a prolonged and serene reflection tells us that this application brings improvements in a full sense. But that does not mean that we should accept the ideological discourse of transhumanism. This discourse owes much of its power of conviction to certain philosophical assumptions that have not been sufficiently clarified and discussed. This article aims to highlight (...) some of them. (shrink)

"One of the most significant figures of current political thought."--New Statesman.

Il materialismo storico e la filosofia di Benedetto Croce.

The essay investigates the relationship between humanity and catastrophe in Davi Kopenawa’s shamanic cosmology, which is compared by approximation to Lucretius’ venusian cosmology and by contrast to Kant’s moral eschatology. It considers the thesis of the structural and dynamic instability of the sky and the problem of the cosmic void. So it seeks to develop the question about the origin and the end of humanity through the catastrophe, both in its ancestral, extra-human dimension, and in its connection with the current (...) socio-environmental destruction, of anthropic origin. In conclusion, it speculates about the role played by the critical thinking in the catastrophe’s eruption. (shrink)

In his famous 1982 paper, Allen Newell [22, 23] introduced the notion of knowledge level to indicate a level of analysis, and prediction, of the rational behavior of a cognitive arti cial agent. This analysis concerns the investigation about the availability of the agent knowledge, in order to pursue its own goals, and is based on the so-called Rationality Principle (an assumption according to which "an agent will use the knowledge it has of its environment to achieve its goals" [22, (...) p. 17]. By using the Newell's own words: "To treat a system at the knowledge level is to treat it as having some knowledge, some goals, and believing it will do whatever is within its power to attain its goals, in so far as its knowledge indicates" [22, p. 13]. In the last decades, the importance of the knowledge level has been historically and system- atically downsized by the research area in cognitive architectures (CAs), whose interests have been mainly focused on the analysis and the development of mechanisms and the processes governing human and (arti cial) cognition. The knowledge level in CAs, however, represents a crucial level of analysis for the development of such arti cial general systems and therefore deserves greater research attention [17]. In the following, we will discuss areas of broad agree- ment and outline the main problematic aspects that should be faced within a Common Model of Cognition [12]. Such aspects, departing from an analysis at the knowledge level, also clearly impact both lower (e.g. representational) and higher (e.g. social) levels. (shrink)

Inventing novel knowledge to solve problems is a crucial, creative, mechanism employed by humans, to extend their range of action. In this paper, we present TCL (typicality-based compositional logic): a probabilistic, non monotonic extension of standard Description Logics of typicality, and will show how this framework is able to endow artificial systems of a human-like, commonsense based, concept composition procedure that allows its employment in a number of applications (ranging from computational creativity to goal-based reasoning to recommender systems and affective (...) computing). -/- The framework relies on 3 main ingredients: a non monotonic extension of standard Description Logics (allowing to reason on exceptions to inheritance in standard knowledge bases) a probabilistic extension coming from the field of logic programming (the DISPONTE semantics) a cognitive heuristics known ad HEAD-Modifier determining preference rules for the inheritance mechanisms of the novel concepts to be generated via commonsense rules. -/- We report the obtained results and the lessons learned of this research path in the context of model-based AI applications. -/- . (shrink)

Antonio Gramsci (1891--1937) was one of the most original political thinkers in Western Marxism and an exceptional intellectual. Arrested and imprisoned by the Italian Fascist regime in 1926, Gramsci died before fully regaining his freedom, yet he wrote extensive letters while incarcerated, rich with insight into the physical and psychological tortures of prison. In meticulous detail, Gramsci records how political prisoners, himself included, contend with the fear of illness and death and the rules and regulations that threaten to efface (...) their individuality. Forming an incomparable link between Gramsci's intellectual passion and his emotional vulnerability, _Letters from Prison_ shows a man reconstructing his life while being separated from it, struggling to recapture the primary relationships that once defined his identity. Frank Rosengarten divides more than four hundred Gramsci letters into two companion volumes, complete with a chronology of the thinker's crucial life experiences, biographical notes on his correspondents, and a bibliography of works cited in his letters. (shrink)

Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikām é uma das obras mais importantes do místico e pensador andaluz Muḥyi al-dīn Ibn 'Arabī (1165-1240). Esse texto, um dos melhores exemplos do pensamento medieval, é um autêntico repositório simbólico do conhecimento da tradição abraâmica. Ao mesmo tempo, o mestre murciano atribui essa obra a uma experiência visionária na forma de conhecimento descendente do qual ele se sentia um mero transcritor. Este trabalho se propõe a analisar simbolicamente os desafios de um livro visionário e, por outro lado, os (...) recursos que ele utiliza: os profetas como arquétipos para justificar a antropologia transcendental do ser humano perfeito (insān al-kāmil) e a metodologia da "cadeia ligada" para legitimar um conhecimento além da razão. (shrink)

Recent neuro-psychoanalytic literature has emphasized the view that our subjective identity rests on ancient subcortical neuro-psychic processes expressing unthinking forms of experience, which are “affectively intense without being known” (Solms and Panksepp, 2012). Devoid of internal representations, the emotional states of our “core-Self” (Panksepp, 1998b) are entirely “projected” towards the external world and tend to be discharged through instinctual action-patterns. However, due to the close connections between the subcortical and the cortical midline brain, the emotional drives may also find a (...) way to be reflected within an intrinsic self-referential processing, evident when the organism is not actively engaged with the external world. Thanks to such endogenous functioning, the core-Self emotional dispositions are not overtly executed, but they are organized within coherent dynamic mental structures, called “feeling-toned complexes” by C.G. Jung and “unconscious phantasies” by Melanie Klein. The intrinsic self-referential dynamism of the ‘brainmind’ originated from REM sleep arousal and then evolved in the resting-state activity of a complex of cortico-limbic midline brain structures (CMS), also called Default Mode Network (DMN). From our neuro-ethological perspective, it is sustained by an “introverted” SEEKING activity leading to the subjective exploration of internally constructed virtual scenarios. This “mind wandering” function, implicated in dreaming, fantasy processing, remembering and thinking, is the essence of the imaginative function and constitutes the first form of reflection, where intentions and drives gain a primordial form of conscious (but not self-conscious) representation. During postnatal development, this original (“archetypal”) imaginative function is slowly attuned in a relational “transitional” space and may be expressed first in non-verbal and eventually in abstract-verbal social communicative patterns. Our view has noticeable implications for psychotherapy. Instead of trying to directly modify interpersonal, extrinsic relationships (a top-down approach), dysfunctional emotional-relational patterns may be modified by a process in which the patient is helped to let-go of the perceived feeling-objects in favor of an immersion, via the actual feeling, from the superficial level of perception towards a void feeling-state, empty of images. Only starting from this “anoetic” feeling-state, the deep imaginal creative and re-structuring self-referential activity may be reactivated by a process of spontaneous imagination. (shrink)

En los últimos años han adquirido especial relevancia dentro de la filosofía jurídica las teorías cosmopolitas. El cosmopolitismo supone una propuesta de gran potencial para insuflar nuevas fuerzas al ideal liberal democrático, debilitado ante los desafíos que presenta la globalización. Aunque los enfoques cosmopolitas actuales son valiosos, requieren complementarse con un análisis de las dinámicas de poder y control existentes en la sociedad tecnológica actual. La vía que se propone para ello es considerar las contribuciones recientes de Byung-Chul Han en (...) torno al concepto de psicopolítica. Han explica cómo la lógica del capitalismo neoliberal tardío logra mediante la tecnología someter al individuo a una nueva forma de control, cuestionando el carácter emancipatorio del proceso de globalización y señalando un aspecto pendiente de estudio en los debates acerca del valor actual del ideal cosmopolita. A partir de las teorías de Han es posible formular propuestas para fortalecer el cosmopolitismo. (shrink)

Este trabajo es una lectura estética-semiótica de la ṣalāt islámica. A menudo considerada como oración por influencia de la colonialización intelectual, diversos trabajos actuales han puesto en duda esta definición. Este trabajo pretende mostrar esta práctica desde una perspectiva estética, etnoescenológica y semiótica con el fin de resaltar otros elementos antropológicos de la performance como las transferencias energéticas, la vinculación con la naturaleza o el uso profundo de los sentidos.

In this article, I argue that the artificial components of hybrid bionic systems do not play a direct explanatory role, i.e., in simulative terms, in the overall context of the systems in which they are embedded in. More precisely, I claim that the internal procedures determining the output of such artificial devices, replacing biological tissues and connected to other biological tissues, cannot be used to directly explain the corresponding mechanisms of the biological component(s) they substitute (and therefore cannot be used (...) to explain the local mechanisms determining an overall biological or cognitive function replicated by such bionic models). I ground this analysis on the use of the Minimal Cognitive Grid (MCG), a novel framework proposed in Lieto (Cognitive design for artificial minds, 2021) to rank the epistemological and explanatory status of biologically and cognitively inspired artificial systems. Despite the lack of such a direct mechanistic explanation from the artificial component, however, I also argue that the hybrid bionic systems can have an indirect explanatory role similar to the one played by some AI systems built by using an overall structural design approach (but including the partial adoption of functional components). In particular, the artificial replacement of part(s) of a biological system can provide i) a local functional account of that part(s) in the context of the overall functioning of the hybrid biological–artificial system and ii) global insights about the structural mechanisms of the biological elements connected to such artificial devices. (shrink)

Frente a la imagen de un Vico ajeno a las exigencias del rigor metódico, este trabajo se propone plantear: a) Que la preocupación por el problema del método es una constante en el pesamiento de Vico. b) Que su aportación debe considerarse especialmente relevante en lo que atañe a los actuales empeños rehabilitadores de la racionalidad práctica y, en particular, para las más recientes teorias de la argumentación jurídica. c) Que, no obstante lo anterior, la actitud metódico jurídica de Vico (...) no puede ser calificada de meramente "retórica", más bien, entraña un intento de proyectar principios de justificación racional a los tópicos argumentativos del Derecho; o a propiciar un esfuerzo integrador de los topoi retóricos de las controversias jurídicas con las exigencias justificatorias de la razón práctica. Para explicitar este enfoque se procederá a abordar, por aproximación sucesiva, tres cuestiones: 1ª) Los aspectos básicos del actual debate sobre la racionalidad juridica y la teoría de la argumentación en el Derecho. 2ª) La apelación a Vico como punto de partida del nuevo interés por la revalorización de la tópica jurídica. 3ª) El significado de la argumentación en el "interior" de la reflexión metódica viquiana y en sus proyecciones "externas" al presente. (shrink)

It is common to assume of an “objectivist” stage of Zubiri, prior to his meeting with Heidegger in Freiburg. However, if we analyze Zubiri’s philosophy before his stay in Freiburg, we already find a “metaphysical” orientation, and not merely an objectivist one. This orientation is intrinsically related to the early appearance of the notion of “reality” in his courses. The appearance of his concept of reality is at least partially motivated by Zubiri’s early reading of Heidegger’s habilitation thesis on Duns (...) Scotus. Zubiri discovered in Heidegger the possibility of trying to carry out a phenomenological characterization of reality, which took him beyond the conception, basically idealistic, of being as a “position” or as a “belief.” With Heidegger, Zubiri was able to sustain that reality is not something extra animam. However, Zubiri could not follow Heidegger in his conceptualization of reality based on human existence, and with this he began his own path in philosophy. A path that, in a certain sense, breaks with all phenomenology, because reality is located at a moment prior to the meaning of things for a subject or for a human existent. And yet, a path that continues the phenomenological claim of a descriptive fidelity to the things themselves. (shrink)

This chapter discusses the question of whether we will ever have an Artificial General Superintelligence (AGSI) and how it will affect our species if it does so. First, it explores various proposed definitions of AGSI and the potential implications of its emergence, including the possibility of collaboration or conflict with humans, its impact on our daily lives, and its potential for increased creativity and wisdom. The concept of the Singularity, which refers to the hypothetical future emergence of superintelligent machines that (...) will take control of the world, is also introduced and discussed, along with criticisms of this concept. Second, it is considered the possibility of mind uploading (MU) and whether such MU would be a suitable means to achieve (true) immortality in this world—the ultimate goal of the proponents of this approach. It is argued that the technological possibility of achieving something like this is very remote, and that, even if it were ever achieved, serious problems would remain, such as the preservation of personal identity. Third, the chapter concludes arguing that the future we create will depend largely on how well we manage the development of AI. It is essential to develop governance of AI to ensure that critical decisions are not left in the hands of automated decision systems or those who create them. The importance of such governance lies not only in avoiding the dystopian scenarios of a future AGSI but also in ensuring that AI is developed in a way that benefits humanity. (shrink)

El autor presenta una reflexión en torno al concepto de technê según la tradición filosófica antigua hasta el periodo contemporáneo. Su propósito es exponer una nueva visión de la técnica, entendida como un surgir dirigido que nos permite considerar su vinculo con la naturaleza creativa del hombre y la ciencia.