Science is the most powerful tool of the twentieth century, but is its influence properly harnessed? This book examines the often-difficult relationship between scientists and those who govern them. A distinguished group of specialists looks at the history of this relationship, where it stands today, and what needs to be done to ensure that science is used in the future for the greatest good of the greatest number.

This paper explores the relationships between American phenomenology of music and conventional studies of musical analysis. The temporality of experience is a central topic in the phenomenology of music: recent research in USA has focused on musical time-consciousness (Schutz and Smith) or on analytical applications (Clifton, Lochhead, Ferrara). Many methods of musical analysis, like phenomenological methods, are concerned to study subjective temporal structures: Schenkerian and post-Schenkerian scholars (Salzer, Meyer, Narmour, Lewin) have elaborated specific systems for the explanation of musical form (...) on a experiential basis. Apart from any comparison with the different approaches, phenomenological analysis appears to be fundamental for the analytical interpretation of music. (shrink)

Seekers know that they will search all their lives not only for what they have lost, but above all for what they do not yet know and that they are not even sure exists. Augusto Cavadi, to whom this book is dedicated on his 70th birthday, is an indomitable seeker. For this reason a group of friends and colleagues wrote these collected testimonies, reflections, ideas and suggestions inspired by his writings and his life as an anti-academic philosopher without a (...) tie--Translated from back cover. (shrink)

Este artículo trata sobre la postura práctica de Aquino ante dos grandes dificultades filosóficas actuales que se encuentran en la base del debate ético contemporáneo. Como son la Is-ought thesis de Hume y la síntesis radical de Moore, la Open question. La posible solución tomista se puede encontrar en la triple función del intelecto humano, teórico y práctico a la vez: a) Aprehender las nociones ontológicas e intelectas ens, verum y bonum; b) Formular los primeros principios teóricos y prácticos; c) (...) E imperar que se haga el bien ontológico e intelecto y se evite lo contrario. (shrink)

This article concerns Aquinas’s practical doctrine on two philosophical difficulties underlying much contemporary ethical debate. One is Hume’s Is-ought thesis and the other is its radical consequence, Moore’s Open-question argument. These ethical paradoxes appear to have their roots in epistemological scepticism and in a deficient anthropology. Possible response to them can be found in that Aquinas’s human intellect (essentially theoretical and practical at the same time) naturally performs three main operations: 1º) To apprehend the intellecta and universal notions ens, verum (...) and bonum. 2º) To formulate the first theoretical and practical principles. 3º) To order that the intellectum and universal good be done and the opposite avoided. Thomistic philosophical response to both predicaments will not be exclusively ethical, but will harmonically embrace ontology, anthropology and epistemology. (shrink)

In 1964, Augusto Del Noce assembled in a book some of his best works on Marxism, atheism, and the history of modern philosophy. The result was Il problema dell’ateismo, which he always regarded as foundational to his way of thinking. The book remains his best-known work and is still in print in Italy almost sixty years later. The Problem of Atheism offers the first English translation of this landmark book, one of the earliest works to recognize the new secularizing (...) trends in Western culture following World War II. Del Noce situates atheism historically, reconstructing its philosophical trajectory through European modernity. Documenting the author’s entire intellectual experience, these essays explore the birth of modern philosophy, reckon with the great European crisis of 1917 to 1945 and the Cold War that followed, and mine the opposition between Marxism and the rise of the affluent society. The result is rich with premonitions of the cultural landscape that would take shape throughout the 1960s and the decades that followed. Proving its English translation to be long overdue, The Problem of Atheism remains relevant to contemporary debates about secularization, political theology, and modernity. (shrink)

Das angebliche Bilderverbot, das im Zweiten Gebot des Dekalogs enthalten sein soll, ist eigentlich ein Idolatrieverbot. Das heißt, dass das jüdische Gesetz nicht Bilder an sich, sondern Idole verbietet. Gewiss: Manche Bilder werden als Idole verehrt. Es gibt aber auch Bilder, die keine idolatrische Bedeutung haben, und umgekehrt Idole, die keinen bildlichen Charakter aufweisen. Die Untersuchung dieser komplexen Zusammenhänge ist das Hauptziel des vorliegenden Sammelbandes. Von unterschiedlichen theoretischen Standpunkten ausgehend, eröffnen die hier versammelten Aufsätze neue Perspektiven auf das Verhältnis zwischen (...) Bild und Idol. Mit Beiträgen von Beniamino Fortis, Asher D. Biemann, Ellen Rinner, Mario C. Schmidt, Lars Tittmar, Johannes Bennke und Agata Bielik-Robson. (shrink)

Dual-Process Theories (D-PTs) claim there are two qualitatively different types of processes in the human brain-mind. Despite forming the basis for several areas of cognitive science, they are still shrouded in ambiguity: critics erroneously attack D-PTs as a whole (e.g., Evans and Stanovich Perspectives on Psychological Science, 8(3), 2013), the qualitative/quantitative distinction is not clear enough (De Neys Perspectives on Psychological Science 16 (6): 1412–1427, 2021; Dewey 2022) and, given this criterion, deciding between qualitative or quantitative differences may even be (...) scientifically irrelevant (De Neys 2021). As a way of disambiguating the discussion and clarifying what exactly means to claim the existence of a second type of process, I define two possible categories of D-PT: The substantial and the instrumental. In the substantial case, Type 2 processes are subpersonal level ones. In the instrumental case, Type 2 processing is a personal level phenomenon that does not necessarily imply subpersonal level Type 2 processes. Discussing the different implications of each of the categories, I use as a main example to illustrate the ambiguity – and the exercise of disambiguation – the model proposed by Evans and Stanovich (2013), making clear its substantial character, and contrast it with Frankish’ (2009) – a clear case of instrumental D-PT. Finally, I discuss the contributions this distinction can make. By making the discussion clearer, it can provide a relatively unanimous framework for dual- and single-process theorists (the instrumental version) and clearer desiderata for those wishing to defend the substantive one. (shrink)

1. La Grecia prima di Socrate.--2. Socrate e Platone.--3. Dopo Platone.--4. Primo millennio.--5. Dopo il Mille.--6. Rinascimento.--7. Seicento.--8. Settecento.--9. Kant.

In the last decade, we have witnessed the return of one of the most controversial terms in the political lexicon: totalitarianism. What are we talking about when we define a totalitarian political and social situation? When did we start using the word as both adjective and noun? And, what totalitarian ghosts haunt the present? Philosopher Simona Forti seeks to answer these questions by reconstructing not only the genealogy of the concept, but also by clarifying its motives, misunderstandings, and the (...) controversies that have animated its current resurgence. Taking into account political theories and historical discussions, Totalitarianism especially focuses on philosophical reflections, from the question of totalitarian biopolitics to the alleged totalitarian drifts of neoliberalism. The work invites the relentless formulation of a radical question about democratic age: the possibilities it has opened up, the voids it leaves behind, the mechanisms it activates, and the "voluntary servitude" it produces. Forti argues that totalitarianism cannot be considered an external threat to democracy, but rather, one of the possible answers to those questions posed by modernity which democracies have not been able to solve. Her investigation of the uses and abuses of totalitarianism as one of the fundamental categories of 20th and 21st centuries promises to provoke much-needed discussion and debate among those in philosophy, politics, ethics, and beyond. (shrink)

RESUMO A partir do exame da tradição heraclitiana e platônica sobre a transitoriedade e a imortalidade - conceitos compreendidos como universais - este artigo defende a seguinte antinomia como tese: para haver temporalidade é preciso haver eternidade. Essa tese é demonstrada por meio do estudo e atualização das noções de alma, espírito, ideia e memória, as quais estão conectadas invariavelmente ao tempo passado como princípio ontológico do fenômeno histórico. Para além do ponto de vista filosófico, portanto, da perspectiva específica do (...) conhecimento histórico, este estudo expõe algumas implicações teóricas acerca das condições de possibilidade da história, que são discutidas, finalmente, em diálogo com Friedrich Nietzsche e Jacob Burckhardt. ABSTRACT From the analysis of the Heraclitian and Platonic tradition on transience and immortality - understood as universal concepts - this essay defends the following antinomy as its thesis: if there is temporality there must be eternity. This thesis is demonstrated through the study and updating of the notions of soul, spirit, idea and memory, which are invariably connected to the past as the ontological principle of the historical phenomenon. Beyond the philosophical point of view, therefore, from the specific perspective of historical knowledge, this study exposes some theoretical implications about the conditions of possibility of history, which are finally discussed in dialogue with Friedrich Nietzsche and Jacob Burckhardt. (shrink)

According to the mythical-religious literature time is determined by the eternal nature of divinity or origin of all things. From this adagio, theological literature is provoked and studies on the eternal nature of divinity suggest that if the universe was created the image of its creator the first must also be eternal. Therefore the question arises: how to shape that which by nature is formless, infinite, namely eternity? To answer this question the following paper develops a brief history about the (...) Judeo-Christian tradition on the problem of time and its relationship with eternity and also tries to prepare at the end one logical answer to the question about the form of eternity. (shrink)