Víctor A. Sánchez Azanza, Raúl López Penadés y Daniel Adrover-Roig Dept. de Pedagogía Aplicada y Psicología de la Educación, Universidad … Read More →.

It is common to hear talk of the aim of belief and to find philosophers appealing to that aim for numerous explanatory purposes. What belief 's aim explains depends, of course, on what that aim is. Many hold that it is somehow related to truth, but there are various ways in which one might specify belief 's aim using the notion of truth. In this article, by considering whether they can account for belief 's standard of correctness and the epistemic (...) norms governing belief, I argue against certain prominent specifications of belief 's aim given in terms of truth, and advance a neglected alternative. (shrink)

The _Physics_ is a foundational work of western philosophy, and the crucial one for understanding Aristotle's views on matter, form, essence, causation, movement, space, and time. This richly annotated, scrupulously accurate, and consistent translation makes it available to a contemporary English reader as no other does—in part because it fits together seamlessly with other closely associated works in the New Hackett Aristotle series, such as the _Metaphysics_, _De Anima_, and forthcoming _De Caelo_ and _On Coming to Be and Passing Away_. (...) Eventually the series will include all of Aristotle's works. Sequentially numbered endnotes provide the information most needed at each juncture, while a detailed Index of Terms indicates places where focused discussion of key notions occurs. An illuminating general Introduction describes the book that lies ahead, explaining what sort of work it is and what sorts of evidence it relies on. (shrink)

A partir del libro Ronald Dworkin. Una biografía intelectual, me interesa defender la hipótesis de que Dworkin es un autor interesante, y en particular un filósofo del derecho que se debe tener en cuenta, no solo por el contenido de sus tesis sino también por su forma de hacer filosofía del derecho. Este trabajo no se enfoca, por tanto, en los contenidos concretos de la propuesta iusfilosófica de Dworkin sino en algunas enseñanzas e invitaciones a la reflexión en relación con (...) el sentido y la capacidad de transformación e incidencia sociales de la filosofía del derecho. La trascendencia del pensamiento de Dworkin radica en que interviene en el corazón del debate planteando problemas conceptuales y justificatorios básicos, y atacando el pensamiento dominante en un determinado momento. (shrink)

Much has been written since the Covid-19 pandemic hit the world. The way in which we refer to this and other diseases has been commented and criticized in the media and in public online forums. Several linguists have referred to the different metaphors with which we refer to the disease appealing to our social responsibility towards the words we use to refer to sensitive subjects and have compiled alternative forms to “the war metaphor”. There is a linguistic, political, and even (...) health concern about the possible consequences of referring to Covid-19 as a war. However, the conceptual metaphor DISEASE IS WAR is ubiquitous, the key is: it is conceptual, it is a metaphor of the mind and not of language. Moreover, its variations and changes are a reflection of human creativity, but there is nothing wrong with the metaphor per se. In any case, it is a means to criticize certain discourses and there, as in everything, the context of the communicative act is ineludible. In this article we will see some examples of how we refer to SARS-CoV-2 in different media and explain the ubiquity of the metaphor. We shall also note that there is nothing wrong with the metaphor itself, which is, in fact, based on a biologically hooked form, present in human cognition, to refer to something that threatens us and that we must avoid or combat. (shrink)

El artículo examina algunos de los límites del derecho antidiscriminatorio en su actual configuración, a partir de las grandes tendencias que le dan soporte desde el punto de vista legislativo y jurisprudencial. El texto plantea una reflexión sobre los principios interpretativos tradicionales y los problemas de incorporación en el juicio de igualdad de estándares de orden explicativo y justificatorio que permitan captar los patrones o estructuras sociales de discriminación e identificar de forma más precisa a los sujetos. A tal efecto (...) propone la ampliación del espectro argumental de la discriminación indirecta y la igualdad material, a través de criterios interpretativos adicionales derivados de categorías como la discriminación estructural y la interseccionalidad de las discriminaciones. (shrink)

En este trabajo se analizan algunas de las tesis que Luigi Ferrajoli desarrolla en su libro La lógica del diritto. Dieci aporie nell’opera di Hans Kelsen. Se discute hasta qué punto las aporías que el autor italiano identifica en el pensamiento de Kelsen pueden ser consideradas auténticas aporías. Al mismo tiempo, se señala que el sentido general de la crítica de Ferrajoli tiene que ver más bien con la comparación de dos modelos de consideración del Derecho, en donde los derechos (...) fundamentales y la labor del juez, entre otras cosas, son entendidos de modo diverso. (shrink)

Entrevista a Christian Felber al hilo de su visita a Benicàssim en agosto de 2013. Charlamos con él sobre algunos aspectos de su teoría del bien común, así como de otros temas de corte ético, político, económico y social.

Infallibilism is the view that a belief cannot be at once warranted and false. In this essay we assess three nonpartisan arguments for infallibilism, arguments that do not depend on a prior commitment to some substantive theory of warrant. Three premises, one from each argument, are most significant: if a belief can be at once warranted and false, then the Gettier Problem cannot be solved; if a belief can be at once warranted and false, then its warrant can be transferred (...) to an accidentally true belief; if a belief can be at once warranted and false, then it can be warranted and accidentally true. We argue that each of these is either false or no more plausible than its denial. Along the way, we offer a solution to the Gettier Problem that is compatible with fallibilism. (shrink)

La bifacialidad de la hipóstasis nodal (noûs, psyché) en el régimen de emanación neoplatónico, recabada en clave antropológica, impregna el pensamiento occidental como expresión de la doble faceta de la razón: facies cognoscitiva/ad infra e idealizadora/ad supra. El noúmeno se erige en límite ideal de conocimiento para la progresión de la razón hacia lo incondicionado, con valor, entonces, no cognoscitivo sino regulativo. Sobre esa tesis kantiana versal, la irrealidad de lo cognoscible en su comisión objetiva (la objetualidad de lo sólo (...) óntico transluce su ontologización como irreal - fenomenológico) y la transfenomenalidad del en sí agostado en la apariencia (despliegue del ser en el espectro completo de manifestaciones ante conciencia que detrae la realidad al noúmeno, relegado a mera ficción), el libro ensaya patrones de lectura del hiato objeto - sujeto, procurando cauces a la metafísica e imponiendo barreras indelebles a la ciencia, en un recorrido que arranca en el mythos y en la anáfora filogenética del enigma de Edipo. La topología freudiana del aparato psíquico servirá de base para una división de las edades del espíritu que reelabora la propuesta de Comte, asociando el super - yo a la era teocrática de prominencia de la faz acognitiva (vivencia del noúmeno como realidad metafísica significativa en sí misma, no puro ideal, con la jerarquía y envolturas del mundo medio como consecuencia sociológica y el supra - egocidium místico, implosión del superyo decisiva para el renacer -teorema de Thomas-), el yo a la era crítica (inflación utópico - normativa del noúmeno y restrictiva adhesión epistemológica a lo fenoménico en una época que conserva la ilusión transcendental), ambas, etapas de bipolaridad con quiásmica descompensación facial, y el ello, en fin, al orden positivista unifacial surgente con la revolución industrial y el vitalismo que, en sus directrices primarias, sanciona el estatuto canónico del noúmeno, abonándose al fenómeno y abrazando la inmanencia como única solución de fe. (shrink)

Throughout scattered passages in Quodlibeta Avenionensia and the comments on Liber Sententiarum we can reconstruct the hardly explored core of some metaphysics of the transcendentals in the thought of Durandus of Saint-Pourçain. Bonum: an extrinsic denomination of the entity diverted from the distinctions of negotiantis et ratiocinantis reason, which would redefine evil as disconvenientia, without dismissing its definition as privation of good. The relative being of truth as the relationship of the thing with itself according to its intellective being and (...) its effective real being, or the characterization of the transcendental unum as convenience of the esse individuum to that which exists per illud quod est with explicit veto on the condition of separable accident, outline an original collage, with diverse doctrinal elements, which condemns the dimension of absolute res or the positive formal matrix of the transcendentals. (shrink)

El artículo segmenta un recorrido por la metafísica esencialista y el paradig-ma unívoco del ens que brinda Duns Escoto, auténtica propuesta ontológica del Medievo en detrimento del programa energetista sustentado en la analogia entis. Se hilvanan los momentos estructurales de comunidad esencial o real-metafísica en la entidad, comunidad natural específica, individuación y subsistencia incomunicable, en un régimen bidireccional con quiásmica prerrogativa de comunidad del ens unívoco o de virtualidad del singular. La persona es el evento exuberante en que culmina la (...) actualidad de la naturaleza sustancial individuada de índole espiritual. (shrink)

El Espíritu es enteramente individual y activo, no una abstracción de la naturaleza humana, y absolutamente vivo, una conciencia cuya existencia consiste en tenerse a sí misma por objeto -pontifica Hegel-, que se hace una determinada representación esencial de sí, en gemación como alma, latente inmaterialidad de la materia, vida psíquica difusiva en progreso desde el estado de conciencia oscura que transluce la sensación al imperio unilateral de exacerbados sentimientos de sí, estigmas de desorden en el despliegue del Espíritu, inadaptado (...) a un mundo sistemáticamente organizado y capaz de desprenderse de todo contenido finito. La profética visión del arte como modalidad sensible de expresión de lo no-espiritual al ser asumido imaginariamente por el Espíritu absoluto subyace en el Epipsychidion de Shelley. (shrink)

En Ciencia de la lógica, Hegel finaliza la lógica objetiva con un largo estudio de las categorías modales (realidad, necesidad y posibilidad). Nuestra propuesta es que tal estudio hay que entenderlo en confrontación directa con la situación dejada por Kant en los principios del entendimiento puro de KrV. Para defender tal tesis expondremos, en primer lugar, la exposición kantiana del problema; en segundo lugar, el desarrollo de la lógica de la esencia dentro de la obra; y, por último, la nueva (...) interpretación que propone Hegel de las categorías modales. (shrink)

A Platonist philosopher and priest of Apollo at Delphi, Plutarch (ca. 45-120 CE) covers in his vast oeuvre of miscellaneous writings and biographies of great men virtually every aspect of ancient religion, Greek, Roman, Jewish, Egyptian, Persian. This collection of essays takes the reader on a hike through Plutarch's Religious Landscapes offering as a compass the philosopher's considerations on issues of philosophical theology, cult, ethics, politics, natural sciences, hermeneutics, atheism, and life after death. Plutarch provides a unique vantage point to (...) reconstruct and understand many of the interesting developments that were taking in the philosophical and religious world of the first centuries CE. (shrink)

The social sciences playa variety of multifaceted roles in the policymaking process. So varied are these roles, indeed, that it is futile to talk in the singular about the use of social science in policymaking, as if there were one constant relationship between two fixed and stable entities. Instead, to address this issue sensibly one must talk in the plural about uses of dif ferent modes of social scientific inquiry for different kinds of policies under various circumstances. In some cases, (...) the influence of social scientific research is direct and tangible, and the connection between the find ings and the policy is easy to see. In other cases, perhaps most, its influence is indirect-one small piece in a larger mosaic of politics, bargaining, and compromise. Occasionally the findings of social scientific studies are explicitly drawn upon by policymakers in the formation, implementation, or evaluation of particular policies. More often, the categories and theoretical models of social science provide a general background orientation within which policymakers concep tualize problems and frame policy options. At times, the in fluence of social scientific work is cognitive and informational in nature; in other instances, policymakers use social science primarily for symbolic and political purposes in order to le gitimate preestablished goals and strategies. Nonetheless, amid this diversity and variety, troubling general questions persistently arise. (shrink)

1. Happiness, then and now -- Happiness, eudaimonia, and practical reasoning -- Happiness as eudaimonia -- Happiness and virtuous activity -- New directions from old debates -- 2. Happiness then: the sufficiency debate -- Aristotle's case against the sufficiency thesis -- 3. Happiness now: rethinking the self -- Socrates' case for the sufficiency thesis -- Epictetus and the stoic self -- The Stoics' case for the sufficiency thesis -- The embodied conception of the self -- The embodied conception and psychological (...) well-being -- The Stoics' case against the embodied conception. (shrink)

El presente artículo indaga en la posición a la que queda relegada la poesía trágica y cómica en la ciudad ideada por Platón. En primer lugar, destaca la crítica de Platón a las consecuencias morales que se siguen de una conciencia exclusivamente estética. En segundo lugar, estudia cómo la poesía estará presente en los himnos a los dioses y en las alabanzas a los hombres buenos que tienen lugar en los juegos y sacrificios que imitan las batallas de guerra.

Zygmunt Bauman, professor of Sociology at the University of Leeds and, since 1990, emeritus professor, has developed key concepts for the understanding of fundamental issues of today’s world, such as liquid modernity, time, space and disorder, individualism versus community, globalization and consumer’s culture, love and identity, etc. His analyses of the links between modernity, Holocaust, democracy and social politics were the principal subject of the following interview, which was conducted by Vicente Ordóñez and Vicent Sanz on the occasion of Zygmunt (...) Bauman’s recent visit to Spain. (shrink)

Los ensayos aquí reunidos son una muestra de la fascinación que Ferlosio ejerce entre quienes se dedican a la filosofía extramuros. Porque, ciertamente, las distintas contribuciones que articulan este monográfico están escritas por gentes alejadas de los círculos académicos al uso: profesores de instituto, de remotas universidades iberoamericanas, exiliados, etc. El elenco de contribuciones, ciertamente atípico, responde a la perfección a las exigencias que introduce el pensamiento de Ferlosio: un pensamiento que ayuda a vivir pensando y calibrando la vida en (...) toda su amplitud, sin añagazas, sin teodiceas ni revelaciones. (shrink)

Sometimes it takes years of debate for philosophers to discover what it is they really disagree about. Sometimes they talk past each other in long series of books and articles, never guessing at the root disagreement that divides them. But occasionally a day comes when something happens to coax the cat out of the bag. "Aha!" one philosopher exclaims to another, "so that's why you've been disagreeing with me, misunderstanding me, resisting my conclusions, puzzling me all these years!".

Realists about possible worlds typically identify possible worlds with abstract objects, such as propositions or properties. However, they face a significant objection due to Lewis (1986), to the effect that there is no way to explain how possible worlds-as-abstract objects represent possibilities. In this paper, I describe a response to this objection on behalf of realists. The response is to identify possible worlds with propositions, but to deny that propositions are abstract objects, or indeed objects at all. Instead, I argue (...) that realists should follow Prior (1971) and others in treating higher-order quantification (e.g. quantification into predicate or sentence position) as a genuine form of quantification in its own right, and so in particular, not to be analysed in terms of first-order quantification over abstract objects. I argue that from this ‘higher-orderist’ perspective, there is a relatively straightforward answer to the question of how possible worlds-as-propositions succeed in representing possibilities. (shrink)

Western philosophers have made significant contributions to the establishment of government around the world. Philosophers like Plato, Locke, Hobbes, and Machiavelli dramatically influenced the government system not just in foreign countries but also in the Philippines. Hence, this seminar paper explored the political notions of four Western philosophers and positioned them in Duterte’s six years of presidency. In pursuit of this study, the researcher employed a systematic literature review. A systematic review process is used to collect articles, and then a (...) qualitative approach is used to assess them. The researcher came up with four major themes in this study particularly (1) Duterte is a Dictator, not a Philosopher-King, (2) Violators of natural rights, (3) the Sea-monster of Davao, and lastly (4) Love, fear, cruelty, and Duterte. Thus, the researcher concurred that all of the philosophical ideas of the four Western philosophers did not fit or even violated during Duterte’s six years of presidency in the Philippines. (shrink)

Realists about possible worlds typically identify possible worlds with abstract objects, such as propositions or properties. However, they face a significant objection due to Lewis (1986), to the effect that there is no way to explain how possible worlds-as-abstract objects represent possibilities. In this paper, I describe a response to this objection on behalf of realists. The response is to identify possible worlds with propositions, but to deny that propositions are abstract objects, or indeed objects at all. Instead, I argue (...) that realists should follow Prior (1971) and others in treating higher-order quantification (e.g. quantification into predicate or sentence position) as a genuine form of quantification in its own right, and so in particular, not to be analysed in terms of first-order quantification over abstract objects. I argue that from this ‘higher-orderist’ perspective, there is a relatively straightforward answer to the question of how possible worlds-as-propositions succeed in representing possibilities. (shrink)

Behavioral interventions have shown promising neuroprotective effects, but the cascade of molecular, brain and behavioral changes involved in these benefits remains poorly understood. Projecte Moviment is a 12-week multi-domain, single-blind, proof-of-concept randomized controlled trial examining the cognitive effect and underlying mechanisms of an aerobic exercise, computerized cognitive training and a combined groups compared to a waitlist control group. Adherence was > 80% for 82/109 participants recruited. In this study we report intervention-related changes in plasma biomarkers and structural-MRI and how they (...) related to changes in physical activity and individual variables and their potential role as mediators in the cognitive changes. Our results show that although there were no significant changes in molecular biomarker concentrations in any intervention group, changes in ICAM-1 and SDF1-α were negatively associated with changes in physical activity outcomes in AE and COMB groups. Brain volume changes were found in the CCT showing a significant increase in precuneus volume. Sex moderated the brain volume change in the AE and COMB groups, suggesting that men may benefit more than women. Changes in molecular biomarkers and brain volumes did not significantly mediate the cognitive-related benefits found previously for any group. This study shows crucial initial molecular and brain volume changes related to lifestyle interventions at early stages and highlights the value of examining activity parameters, individual difference characteristics and using a multi-level analysis approach to address these questions. (shrink)

This paper will attempt to assess the primary differences between what I take to be the two primary philosophical "traditions" in contemporary French philosophy, using Derrida (transcendence) and Deleuze (immanence) as exemplary representatives. The body of the paper will examine the use of these terms in three different areas of philosophy on which Derrida and Deleuze have both written: subjectivity, ontology, and epistemology. (1) In the field of subjectivity, the notion of the subject has been critiqued in two manners, either (...) by appealing either to the transcendence of the other (Levinas, Derrida) or to the immanent jlux of experience itself, in relation to which the Ego itself is trancendent (Deleuze, Foucault, Sartre, James). (2) In the field of ontology, a purely "immanent" ontology would be an ontology in which there is neither a "beyond" or an "otherwise" Being, nor "interruptions" in Being, both of which would require an appeal to a formal element of transcendence (Deleuze). Such a "transcendent" and aporetic structure, which can never appear or be present as such within Being, is what lies at the basis of the project of deconstruction, with its attendant aporias (Derrida). (3) This distinction, finally, finds parallels in Kant's epistemology, for whom the possible experience is conditioned by purely immanent criteria (Deleuze), whereas what goes beyond the limits of possible experience is transcendent (Derrida). Drawing on these three thread of analysis, the paper concludes with an assessment of what is at stake in the ethical differences between the two traditions. The question of "transcendence" is "What mast I do?", which is the question of morality (a duty or obligation that is beyond being, an "ought" beyond the "is"). The question of "immanence" is "What can I do?" (my power or capacity as an existing individual within being). For Levinas and Derrida, ethics precedes ontology because it is derived from an element of transcendence (the Other); for Deleuze, ethics is ontology because it is derived from the immanent relation of beings to Being at the level of their existence (Spinoza). (shrink)

In this groundbreaking book, Daniel D. Novotny explores one of the most controversial topics of Suarez's philosophy: "beings of reason." Beings of reason are impossible intentional objects, such as blindness and square-circle.

The problem known as Buridan’s Ass says that a hungry donkey equipoised between two identical bales of hay will starve to death. Indecision kills the ass. Some philosophers worry about human analogs. Computer scientists since the 1960s have known about the computer versions of such cases. From what Leslie Lamport calls ‘Buridan’s Principle’—a discrete decision based on a continuous range of input-values cannot be made in a bounded time—it follows that the possibilities for human analogs of Buridan’s Ass are far (...) more wide-ranging and securely provable than has been acknowledged in philosophy. We are never necessarily decisive. This is mathematically provable. I explore four consequences: first, increased interest of the literature’s solutions to Buridan’s Ass; second, a new asymmetry between responsibility for omissions and responsibility for actions; third, clarification of the standard account of akrasia; and, fourth, clarification of the role of credences in normative decision-theory. (shrink)

The Jewish Philosophy Reader is the first comprehensive anthology of classic writings on Jewish philosophy from the Bible to postmodernism. The Reader is clearly divided into four separate parts: Foundations and First Principles, Medieval and Renaissance Jewish Philosophy, Modern Jewish Thought, and Contemporary Jewish Philosophy. Each part is clearly introduced by the editors. The readings featured are representative writings of each era listed above and are from the following major thinkers: Abrabanel, Baeck, Bergman, Borowitz, Buber, Cohen, Crescas, Fackenheim, Geiger, Gersonides, (...) Goodman, Graetz, Halevi, Hartman, Heschel, Hess, Hirsch, Ibn Ezra, Ibn Gabirol, Ibn Paquda, Kellner, Kook, Krochmal, Leibowitz, Levinas, Maimonides, Maybaum, Mendelssohn, Novak, Philo, Plaskow, Rosenzweig, Saadia, Scholem, Seeskin, Soloveitchik, Spinoza, Strauss, Wolf, Zunz. (shrink)