Tarski's theory of truth brings out the question of whether he intended his theory to be a correspondence theory of truth and whether, whatever his intentions, his theory is, in fact, a correspondence theory. The aim of this paper is to answer both questions. The answer to the first question depends on Tarski's relevant assertions on semantics and his conception of truth. In order to answer the second question Popper's and Davidson's interpretations of Tarski's truth theory are examined; to this (...) end both Tarski's definition of truth in terms of satisfaction and the T-sentences are taken into account. (shrink)

The Modern concept of truth, which subjects truth to certainty, broke the harmonious relation between reality and truth, that prevailed in Ancient and Medieval Philosophy. Hans-Georg Gadamer thinks that the main task of contemporary Philosophy is to recover the original harmony of being and knowledge. To shed light on the nature of this problem, we expound the metaphysical-theological foundation of truth, which is at the roots of Aristotelian and Thomistic Philosophies. Specifically, we analyze here the relation between being, truth and (...) logos in the Aristotelian treatise Perì Hermeneías, and in its Thomistic commentary. (shrink)

After the collapse of the Hegelian philosophy, many thinkers returned to the main principles of Kantian transcendentalism. In this way, they initiated the neo-kantian movement. Wilhelm Dilthey was among them. Nevertheless, only in spirit can his “Critique of the Historical Reason” be called neo-kantian. In fact, the core of Dilthey’s project, the “Categories of Life”, is a completely new gnoseological proposal, that mediates between transcendental philosophy and empiricism.

To cope with the intersubjective and communicative deficiencies of Heidegger's Analytics of Existence, Hans-Georg Gadamer developed a theory of language whose nature is at one time phenomenological and ontological. Inspired by Plato's dialectics and Aristotle's ethical and rhetorical works, Gadamer sees human linguistic capabilities as the defining trait of all that is human. Language lives in conversation, dialogically structuring all social and cultural relations. Language is the ambit in which human beings and their historical world take place. In Gadamer's thought, (...) logos replaces being as the ontological support. In such a way, Gadamer's hermeneutical philosophy seeks to fill the void opened by the 20th Century deconstruction of Metaphysics. (shrink)

Centrando la mirada en Cristo, las enseñanzas de Benedicto XVI desarrollan la íntima conexión que existe entre las tres virtudes teologales y la Verdad Encarnada, el Hijo de Dios hecho hombre. En efecto, no nos es posible creer en Jesucristo, amarlo y esperar en Él, si no conocemos su verdadero rostro, que se revela al intelecto humano iluminado por la fe. Este hecho pone en evidencia que el hombre necesita su natural capacidad de conocer la verdad para poder descubrir el (...) rostro de Cristo. Si se disocia de la razón, la fe cristiana pierde credibilidad y se convierte en una opción existencial arbitraria, pues resulta imposible argumentar racionalmente sobre ella. Por otra parte, las relaciones sociales y políticas se deshumanizan si se expulsa de la vida pública a las razones de la fe, porque una cultura que cierra sus puertas a Dios deja también afuera al hombre. Podremos alejar estos peligros sólo si la razón y la fe se reencuentran de un modo nuevo. Sin embargo, antes tenemos que recuperar la fe en la razón, es decir, nuestra confianza en su capacidad de conocer la verdad en toda su amplitud. (shrink)

An English translation of the Second Disputation.

The Embodied Mind provides a unique, sophisticated treatment of the spontaneous and reflective dimension of human experience.

Modern society is characterised by rapid technological development that is often socially controversial and plagued by extensive scientific uncertainty concerning its socio-ecological impacts. Within this context, the concept of ‘responsible research and innovation’ is currently rising to prominence in international discourse concerning science and technology governance. As this emerging concept of RRI begins to be enacted through instruments, approaches, and initiatives, it is valuable to explore what it is coming to mean for and in practice. In this paper we draw (...) attention to a realm that is often backgrounded in the current discussions of RRI but which has a highly significant impact on scientific research, innovation and policy—namely, the interstitial space of international standardization. Drawing on the case of nanoscale sciences and technologies to make our argument, we present examples of how international standards are already entangled in the development of RRI and yet, how the process of international standardization itself largely fails to embody the norms proposed as characterizing RRI. We suggest that although current models for RRI provide a promising attempt to make research and innovation more responsive to societal needs, ethical values and environmental challenges, such approaches will need to encompass and address a greater diversity of innovation system agents and spaces if they are to prove successful in their aims. (shrink)

Resumen Ante el dilema de si la Lógica de Hegel debe entenderse como una ontología o como una continuación del proyecto kantiano de la lógica trascendental, el artículo sostiene que no es propiamente una ontología, ni un análisis de conceptos y categorías subjetivas. Su vocación metafísica se basa en el postulado según el cual la reflexión del pensamiento sobre sí mismo tiene consecuencias para la comprensión del ser de lo que no es pensamiento, de modo que resulta ser un proyecto (...) novedoso de ontología mediada por la autorreflexión del pensar.This text faces the dilemma whether Hegel’s Logic must be understood as ontology or as continuation of the Kantian project of transcendental logics. It upholds the thesis that Hegel’s Logic is not properly an Ontology -a direct and immediate description of object’s immanent way of being- nor an analysis of merely subjective concepts and categories. The metaphysical vocation of Hegel’s Logic draws rather on the claim that thought’s self-reflection has necessarily consequences for the comprehension of the being of all that is not thought. Hence, we are facing a groundbreaking project of an ontology that is mediated by thought’s self-reflection. (shrink)

In this article, I consider Alkis Kontos’ and Allan Bäck’s critiques to Suits that his theory of games and good living lack ontological grounds or rests on the wrong foundations. Taking these criti...

This paper presents a pedagogical framework for teaching cross-cultural clinical ethics. The approach, offered at the intersection of anthropology and bioethics, is innovative in that it takes on the “social sciences versus bioethics” debate that has been ongoing in North America for three decades. The argument is made that this debate is flawed on both sides and, moreover, that the application of cross-cultural thinking to clinical ethics requires using the tools of the social sciences within a principles-based framework for clinical (...) ethics. This paper introduces the curriculum and provides guidelines for how to teach cross-cultural clinical ethics. The learning points that are introduced emphasize culture in its relation to power and underscore the importance of viewing both biomedicine and bioethics as culturally constructed. (shrink)

Fern Logan’s collection of photographic portraits documents the emergence of the African American artist into mainstream American art. The Artist Portrait Series captures sixty significant artists from the late twentieth century.

Measurements are shown to be processes designed to return figures: they are effective. This effectivity allows for a formalization as Turing machines, which can be described employing computation theory. Inspired in the halting problem we draw some limitations for measurement procedures: procedures that verify if a quantity is measured cannot work in every case.

In the present work we propose to analyze the proclean reading on Laws X 896a –Where Plato seems to say that all the acts of the bodies depends on a causality of divine and psychological order– as a response to what Plutarch said in this regard. The cheronean maintains that, according to Plato, evil is caused by an evil soul, which in eternal struggle with the good soul, officiates as a mechanical cause and guiding principle of the cosmos. In our (...) opinion, it is against the foregoing that the proclean effort is focused to point out that evil does not exist in its purity, nor in the superior entities although it is a deviation that is it occurs in individual human souls and operates as a parasitic entity. We aspire to use arguments that show in what sense Proclus defends the One-Good principle, which cannot have opposites, and the existence of evil in the lower entities without denying contingency or blaming the cosmos for evil. (shrink)

First published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

It is necessarily true that water is H2O, but it is a contingent fact that there is any water at all. Water therefore seems ill suited to ground the necessary truth that water is H2O. One view traditionally attributed to Scotus and Henry of Ghent was that while water is contingent, the essence of water is necessary; hence, the essence of water can ground the so-called eternal truth that water is H2O. Francisco Suárez rejects this view on the grounds (...) that it contradicts the Christian doctrine of creation, according to which everything other than God was contingently created in time. Suárez’s own view of the eternal truths has proven elusive to commentators, but I argue that Suárez ultimately endorses a version of the view he rejects: essences ground the eternal truths. But this raises several puzzles: how is Suárez’s view distinct from the views traditionally ascribed to Scotus and Henry? How does Suárez’s view escape the argument from creation, which Suárez raises against his opponents? I argue that Suárez distinguishes between his view and his opponents’ view by saying that essences have “extrinsic being,” whereas his opponents claim that essences have “intrinsic being.” The distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic being has not received much attention, but I argue that it marks an important fault line in scholastic thinking about the ontological status of non-existents. I argue that the notion of extrinsic being can be explicated in terms of ontological pluralism and grounding. The notion of extrinsic being helps differentiate Suárez’s view from his Scotistic and Henrician opponents, and it allows Suárez to respond to the creation argument he raises against his opponents. On my reading, Suárez’s solution to the problem of eternal truths turns out to be both highly original and philosophically satisfying. (shrink)

¿Cómo se ha constituido el sujeto científico? ¿De qué manera se ha levantado el edificio de la razón? Este libro es una aportación a una línea de estudios rigurosa. La filosofía de la ciencia ha tenido en los últimos decenios un empuje académico notable y, a la reciente bibliografía con que cuenta esta renovada disciplina, deberá añadirse este brillante y hondo ensayo, abordado "desde el movimiento de las ideas mismas". Este nuevo desarrollo exigía una capacidad de abstracción considerable: desde Heráclito (...) hasta Heisenberg, Popper, Lakatos, para despejar la "figura ficticia" del sujeto de la ciencia. Jaime Labastida ha ordenado en varias líneas paralelas ese proceso de constitución del sujeto científico moderno: la línea de la filosofía, la línea de la física, la de las ciencias naturales, la de la economía política. La conclusión subraya con gran solidez cómo se edifica la razón, condición necesaria para hacer ciencia rigurosa. (shrink)

The desire to guide research and innovation in more ‘responsible’ directions is increasingly emphasised in national and international policies, the funding of inter- and trans-disciplinary collaborations and academic scholarship on science policy and technology governance. Much of this growth has occurred simultaneously with the development of nanoscale sciences and technologies, where emphasis on the need for responsible research and innovation has been particularly widespread. This paper describes an empirical study exploring the potential for RRI within nanosafety research in Norway and (...) Denmark. It identifies three different ways nanosafety scientists relate to core RRI criteria, demonstrating areas of both convergence and divergence between their views and those of academics and policymakers currently defining and working to promote RRI. The paper identifies a range of practical barriers and cultural differences that are creating such divergences and inhibiting the enactment of RRI within the particular site of research laboratories. It concludes that the identified differences and challenges demand critical reflection on both the appropriateness and applicability of RRI characteristics for enactment at the level of individual research scientists. Significant changes are therefore advocated as required if RRI, as currently imagined and promoted, is to become an integral mode of scientific culture. (shrink)

Should the philosophy of biology deal with organismic, or with molecular aspects , or with both ? We are, of course, not the first to appreciate the ...

Nature, God and Humanity clarifies the task of forming an ethics of nature, thereby empowering readers to develop their own critical, faith-based ethics. Calling on original, thought-provoking analyses and arguments, Richard L. Fern frames a philosophical ethics of nature, assesses it scientifically, finds support for it in traditional biblical theism, and situates it culturally. Though defending the moral value of beliefs affirming the radical Otherness of God and human uniqueness, this book aims not to compel the adoption of any particular (...) ethic but rather illumine the contribution diverse forms of inquiry make to an ethics of nature. How does philosophy clarify moral conviction? What does science tell us about nature? Why does religious faith matter? Rejecting the illusion of a single, rationally-compelling ethics, Fern answers these questions in a way that fosters both agreement and disagreement, allowing those holding conflicting ethics of nature to work together for the common good. (shrink)

We explore the distinctive characteristics of Mexico's society, politics and history that impacted the establishment of genetics in Mexico, as a new disciplinary field that began in the early 20th century and was consolidated and institutionalized in the second half. We identify about three stages in the institutionalization of genetics in Mexico. The first stage can be characterized by Edmundo Taboada, who was the leader of a research program initiated during the Cárdenas government (1934-1940), which was primarily directed towards improving (...) the condition of small Mexican farmers. Taboada is the first Mexican post-graduate investigator in phytotechnology and phytopathology, trained at Cornell University and the University of Minnesota, in 1932 and 1933, respectively. He was the first investigator to teach plant genetics at the National School of Agriculture and wrote the first textbook of general genetics, Genetics Notes, in 1938. Taboada's most important single genetics contribution was the production of "stabilized" corn varieties. The extensive exile of Spanish intellectuals to Mexico, after the end of Spain's Civil War (1936-1939), had a major influence in Mexican science and characterizes the second stage. The three main personalities contributing to Mexican genetics are Federico Bonet de Marco and Bibiano Fernández Osorio Tafall, at the National School of Biological Sciences, and José Luis de la Loma y Oteyza, at the Chapingo Agriculture School. The main contribution of the Spanish exiles to the introduction of genetics in Mexico concerned teaching. They introduced in several universities genetics as a distinctive discipline within the biology curriculum and wrote genetics text books and manuals. The third stage is identified with Alfonso León de Garay, who founded the Genetics and Radiobiology Program in 1960 within the National Commission of Nuclear Energy, which had been founded in 1956. The Genetics and Radiobiology Program rapidly became a disciplinary program, for it embraced research, teaching, and training of academics and technicians. The Mexican Genetics Society, created by de Garay in 1966, and the development of strains and cultures for genetics research were important activities. One of de Garay's key requirements was the compulsory training of the Program's scientists for at least one or two years in the best universities of the United States and Europe. De Garay's role in the development of Mexican genetics was fundamental. His broad vision encompassed the practice of genetics in all its manifestations. (shrink)