Lenin's work "On the Significance of Militant Materialism," written in the spring of 1922, is justly regarded as the philosophical testament of our leader. In it, the tasks of the day were merged with the tasks of the entire epoch on the basis of a profound analysis of reality.

Foreword Philip T. Grier The attempt to retrieve a work of scholarship buried under as much historical debris as was IA Il'in's original two-volume commentary on the philosophy of Hegel presented distinct challenges, as well as possible ...

“If you find it strange that, in setting out these elements, I do not use those qualities called heat, cold, moistness, and dryness, as do the philosophers, I shall say to you that these qualities appear to me to be themselves in need of explanation. Indeed, unless I am mistaken, not only these four qualities, but also all the others (indeed all the forms of inanimate bodies) can be explained without the need of supposing for that purpose any other thing (...) in their matter than the motion, size, shape, and arrangement of its parts.” So does Descartes, in his The World, or Treatise on Light [Le Monde ou Traité de la Lumière], express the uniphenomenal principle of the physical world, which is the basis - or foundation - of his great cosmic synthesis. The uniphenomenal character of Cartesian physics - namely, explaining all phenomena and appearances from a single primordial phenomenon (and substance) - has such a great semantic and intuitive value for the structure of the human mind that Plato, even before Aristotle’s hyle, had come to contemplate his concept of chora, the cosmic and universal matrix at the base of all phenomena, existing before and beyond the coming into existence of the elements and of sensible things. Even the physics of Democritus is uniphenomenal. A perfect example of uniphenomenal physics in our time is the Spacio-fluido-dynamics of the scientist Marco Todeschini (Bergamo, 1899 - 1988) who, with his monumental Teoria delle apparenze [Theory of Appearances] of ’49 tried to clear a path towards the hope of reaching a Cartesian kind of unified cosmic synthesis. (We accept only the fundamental concept of Todeschi’s theory here, that is, the uniphenomenal character of his physics, without occupying ourselves with criteria such as the value or the plausibility of his hypotheses.) This concept of uniphenomenal physics will serve as an ultra-clear instrument to dissipate the epistemological fog of AI (Artificial Intelligence). (shrink)

L’Intelligenza Artificiale Generativa (IAG) pone sfide inedite all’educazione universitaria. Dalla definizione dei contenuti alla valutazione delle prove e alla determinazione delle modalità di esame, questo nuovo e potente strumento inaugura una stagione di cambiamenti su cui è urgente riflettere. La tecnologia contribuisce da sempre a dare forma al lavoro didattico, il quale evolve anche alla luce delle opportunità e dei rischi che essa introduce. Come far sì che l’evoluzione stimolata dall’IAG sia felice, ovvero serva i valori e gli obiettivi della (...) didattica e delle persone che la vivono? Ne ho discusso con alcuni colleghi dell’Unità di Studi META del Politecnico di Milano – docenti impegnati a vario titolo in corsi di carattere filosofico e sociale rivolti a studenti di formazione tecnica. (shrink)

Aux initiatives actuelles pour tenter de faire de la musique avec l’intelligence artificielle, par exemple de Google ou des équipes d’Elon Musk, il manque l’essentiel : l’intention artistique et le feedback émotionnel. Telle est l’analyse de Jean-Claude Heudin, chercheur en intelligence artificielle et sciences de la complexité, mais aussi musicien et compositeur qui travaille sur un projet d’IA pour la musique électronique : Angelia.

L’intelligence artificielle est partout, l’air de rien, pour mieux nous contrôler et nous orienter en douceur. Faut-il se rebeller contre cet état de fait, qui s’impose à nos modes de vie sans la moindre délibération démocratique? Est-il encore possible ou même souhaitable de jeter ces IA invisibles, voire indiscernables, à la poubelle du numérique? Ne faudrait-il pas, avant de clamer l’urgence du « danger » qui vient, oser les connaître? L’enjeu est de construire une culture critique de l’IA, qui associerait (...) artistes, écrivains, chercheurs, ingénieurs, mathématiciens, logiciens, penseurs, philosophes, artisans et bien sûr citoyens dans une même dynamique de réflexion. (shrink)

L’intelligence artificielle (IA) est une notion propice aux fantasmes. En pratique, elle désigne notamment une technologie permettant à des machines de réaliser des choses que les humains qualifient d’intelligentes. Le rapport que l’intelligence artificielle entretient avec le droit se situe essentiellement à deux niveaux. D’une part on peut traiter, grâce à l’intelligence artificielle, le droit comme un objet mathématique, ce qui permet de quantifier l’ aléa judiciaire. Dans ce cadre, la machine ne singe pas le raisonnement du juge mais permet (...) de mieux mesurer les issues possibles et leurs probabilités, dans l’espoir de favoriser les solutions amiables. D’autre part, l’intelligence artificielle est un domaine du droit naissant dont les juristes doivent se saisir. Le droit n’est pas démuni face aux multiples enjeux qui existent en ce domaine, qu’il s’agisse de robotique autonome ou de systèmes experts. La responsabilité du fait des choses et la responsabilité du fait des produits défectueux sont les deux voies à explorer principalement. Les juges devront traiter ces sujets nouveaux dans les prochaines années, en comblant certaines lacunes du droit, lequel évoluera à son tour. (shrink)

Mené entre septembre 2019 et janvier 2020 par les designers Jürg Lehni et Douglas Edric Stanley au sein du Master Media Design de la Haute École d’Art & Design de Genève (HEAD – Genève), le workshop « Thinking Machines » prend comme point de départ l’automatisation des métiers de la création et le fantasme de machines « pensantes ». Ce projet examine, avec un brin d’ironie, un avenir où les designers seraient en mesure de cultiver les IA et de s’extraire (...) des fantasmes technologiques. En quoi le design pourrait-il contribuer à une critique de la culture dominante de l’IA? Comment inventer, par les pratiques de design, des alternatives soutenables? (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Shame is Not an Effective Diet PlanJudith BrukThe stigma of being obese is so strong that it is assumed that anyone with the condition is (or should be) deeply ashamed. After all, it’s really easy to lose weight, right? Just cut out dessert and walk around the block three times a week. If you can’t even do that, then you are definitely a moral failure, have succumbed to Gluttony (...) and Sloth, and deserve to be shunned by society.The problem is that shame is not a very effective diet plan; quite the opposite. It’s no surprise that recent research shows that shame leads to depression that leads to isolation, which, in the morbidly obese, leads to a suicide rate twelve times that of healthy–weight people.Unfortunately, it is indeed true that many obese people feel a great deal of shame, even if we occasionally put on a façade of bravado or seeming shamelessness, e.g., the “large and in charge” sitcom staple trope. The bottom line is that our shame about our weight does keep us from engaging with other people, limits our willingness to participate in physical activities, and generally makes us reluctant to simply exist out in public. None of these are behaviors conducive to positive lifestyle changes.For years I engineered my life so I would only go out of my house when absolutely necessary: grocery shopping and the occasional meeting at work were pretty much it (I usually work from home). I went for years without going to a movie, shopping for clothes in a store, eating in a restaurant, gardening, or any of the other activities I once enjoyed. I was ashamed to be seen. And since I had tried and tried and tried and tried to lose weight for three decades and only ended up more overweight as the years went by, I finally, truly gave up. I convinced myself my psychological makeup was so flawed (or was missing whatever ingredient it was that made someone succeed at sustained weight loss) that I just hoped my inevitable heart attack would be instantaneously fatal. This thinking is irrational, or at least unhealthy. (I am an otherwise fairly smart person with an advanced degree and am professionally employed.) Yet, it is basically the path that both societal attitudes and medical treatment lead us down at this point in time.Here are a few examples that illustrate how the path to irrationality evolved for me.About twelve years ago, I decided to see a psychotherapist to get to the bottom of my subconscious psychological issue that was keeping me overweight. This therapist suggested I see a nutritionist who gave me a list of detailed thyroid tests to take to my doctor so she could order the labs and we could get a full profile of how my thyroid was functioning. Upon presenting the list to my doctor’s PA (my doctor was not available that day), she rolled her eyes, gave a very deep sigh and said to me, “Every fat woman wants to believe it’s because of her thyroid and it never, ever is.” I was so embarrassed for having even brought the subject up that in an effort to save face, I reacted to my shame by replying, “Yeah, I just assume my extreme lack of energy and excess weight is simply because I eat too much.” She said, “Right, so let’s not even bother running these tests.” It was at least ten years later that I finally had the thyroid panel run and found out it was very low functioning.After about a year of seeing that shrink, she declared me “cured” and sent me on my way, though I had not lost any weight. It was about this time I first began thinking that throwing in the towel [End Page 91] was a good option. That didn’t mean that I went out and ate pizza and ice cream every day. Not at all. In fact, given the fact that I had been vegetarian and general health–food freak beginning in my mid–twenties, I rarely had anything in the house that contained sugar... (shrink)

"The thought of Immanuel Kant has had incalculable - and, many would say, negative - impact on the modern estimation of religion, religious belief, and religious knowledge. Yet, Davidovich argues in the strikingly original interpretation, the chief lines and import of Kant's work on religion have been crippingly misunderstood." "Davidovich radically refigures Kant scholarship by focusing decisively on his Third Critique, long thought his weakest, where she finds Kant confronting the results of his strong distinction between theoretical and practical reason. (...) There he attempts a comprehensive theory of reflective judgment, in which contemplative thought of a moral designer of the universe is a principle that overcomes the bifurcation of scientific (rational) and moral (practical) activities." "Moreover, this specifically religious consciousness, which harmonizes the lawfulness of nature with the purposiveness of freedom, is further developed, Davidovich maintains, by Rudolf Otto's and Paul Tillich's influential theories of religion. Today it can safeguard the status of religion and a normative science of religion." "Davidovich's work is an outstanding contribution, breaking new ground in both Kantian scholarship and the theory of religion."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved. (shrink)

Du film Her de Spike Jonze à 2001 L’Odyssée de l’espace de Stanley Kubrick, et des androïdes de Philip K. Dick à l’utopie intergalactique de la Culture de l’écrivain Iain M. Banks, il est impossible de comprendre aujourd’hui l’intelligence artificielle sans s’intéresser à ses puissants imaginaires. Ceux-ci, nourrissant bien des fantasmes de la Silicon Valley, sont essentiels à décrypter pour ne pas les subir, voire pour se les approprier et mieux les détourner, en faire des antidotes contre les multinationales du (...) numérique, puis cultiver grâce à eux nos propres machines rebelles de quelque futur. (shrink)

A assim chamada “Doação de Constantino”, pela qual o papa ter-se-ia tornado senhor temporal, foi julgada, geralmente, de forma negativa pelos pensadores do século XIV (como João Quidort e Ockham), ou como uma ação de duplo efeito (Dante). Marsílio de Pádua a encara sob outro aspecto: a doação mostra que o imperador era superior ao papa e aos demais hierarcas da Igreja. Daí ele deduz que, dentro da sociedade, também da sociedade cristã, o imperador é a autoridade coativa suprema, da (...) qual promana o poder coativo eventualmente exercido pelo papa e os bispos. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Doação de Constantino. Poder coativo. Imperador. Papa. ABSTRACT The so called “Constantine Donation”, by which the pope would have become the temporal Lord, was usually regarded negatively by XIV century thinkers (such as John Quidort and William of Ockham), or as a double effect action (Dante). Marsilius of Padua faces such problem in a different approach: the donation shows that the emperor was superior to the pope and to the others in Church hierarchy. Hence he deduces that inside society, also Christian society, the emperor is the supreme coactive authority, from whom all coactive power eventually enforced by the pope and the bishops arise. KEY WORDS – Constantine donation. Coactive power. Emperor. Pope. (shrink)

A assim chamada “Doação de Constantino”, pela qual o papa ter-se-ia tornado senhor temporal, foi julgada, geralmente, de forma negativa pelos pensadores do século XIV, ou como uma ação de duplo efeito. Marsílio de Pádua a encara sob outro aspecto: a doação mostra que o imperador era superior ao papa e aos demais hierarcas da Igreja. Daí ele deduz que, dentro da sociedade, também da sociedade cristã, o imperador é a autoridade coativa suprema, da qual promana o poder coativo eventualmente (...) exercido pelo papa e os bispos. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Doação de Constantino. Poder coativo. Imperador. Papa. ABSTRACT The so called “Constantine Donation”, by which the pope would have become the temporal Lord, was usually regarded negatively by XIV century thinkers, or as a double effect action. Marsilius of Padua faces such problem in a different approach: the donation shows that the emperor was superior to the pope and to the others in Church hierarchy. Hence he deduces that inside society, also Christian society, the emperor is the supreme coactive authority, from whom all coactive power eventually enforced by the pope and the bishops arise. KEY WORDS – Constantine donation. Coactive power. Emperor. Pope. (shrink)

Questo contributo si propone di fornire uno spunto di riflessione, e una breve panoramica storica, sul ruolo che le scienze cognitive hanno giocato, e possono ancora giocare, nello sviluppo dei sistemi intelligenti di nuova generazione. Illustra, inoltre, le attività recenti che l’AISC (Associazione Italiana di Scienze Cognitive, di cui gli autori sono attualmente Vice-Presidente e Presidente) sta portando avanti per lo sviluppo di linee di ricerca nell’ambito dei sistemi artificiali di inspirazione cognitiva.

Dans le plan de la première partie de la Somme Théologique de Thomas d’Aquin, les questions 12 et 13, dédiées aux noms divins, occupent une place privilégiée et confèrent une perspective inédite au discours théologique grâce à leur double fonction. D’une part, leur fonction est normale dans l’ordre du discours : après avoir établi les principaux attributs de Dieu, dont on a justement affirmé dans la 2e question qu’il est, les deux questions fixent les limites dans lesquelles il peut être (...) connu. D’autre part, les deux questions jouent le rôle de clivage dans l’ordre du discours qui établit comment est Dieu. Ainsi les deux interrogations fondent la connaissance de l’intellect humain par rapport à l’objet véritablement transcendant à toute expérience et questionnent, par conséquent, les conditions de possibilité de la connaissance intellectuelle générique de Dieu sur l’objet. Ce dernier aspect se réfléchit y compris chez les tenants de cette connaissance de telle façon que la légitimation des noms divins ait le rôle d’une légitimation de la théologie comme science, dont l’existence était annoncée et débattue au début de la Somme. (shrink)

Dans le plan de la première partie de la Somme Théologique de Thomas d’Aquin, les questions 12 et 13, dédiées aux noms divins, occupent une place privilégiée et confèrent une perspective inédite au discours théologique grâce à leur double fonction. D’une part, leur fonction est normale dans l’ordre du discours : après avoir établi les principaux attributs de Dieu, dont on a justement affirmé dans la 2e question qu’il est, les deux questions fixent les limites dans lesquelles il peut être (...) connu. D’autre part, les deux questions jouent le rôle de clivage dans l’ordre du discours qui établit comment est Dieu. Ainsi les deux interrogations fondent la connaissance de l’intellect humain par rapport à l’objet véritablement transcendant à toute expérience et questionnent, par conséquent, les conditions de possibilité de la connaissance intellectuelle générique de Dieu sur l’objet. Ce dernier aspect se réfléchit y compris chez les tenants de cette connaissance de telle façon que la légitimation des noms divins ait le rôle d’une légitimation de la théologie comme science, dont l’existence était annoncée et débattue au début de la Somme. (shrink)

This study aimed to examine how anxiety related to different styles of coping during the COVID-19 pandemic and how these relationships were moderated by the cultural orientations of individualism/collectivism and a person’s sense of meaning in life. A sample of 849 participants from Georgia completed an online survey during the final stage of lockdown. To measure the main variables, we used the State Anxiety Inventory, the Horizontal and Vertical Individualism and Collectivism Scale, the Meaning of Life Questionnaire, the COVID-19 Worry (...) Scale, and the Ways of Coping Scale tailored to COVID-19 pandemic. The latter measured rational coping via the subscales of information accessing/processing and action-planning coping, and affective coping – via the subscales of passive-submissive and avoidant coping. Results suggested that anxiety positively predicted both affective coping styles and negatively predicted the action-planning coping style, while COVID-19 worry predicted all coping styles; presence of meaning in life positively predicted both rational coping styles and negatively predicted the avoidant coping style, while search for meaning positively predicted all coping styles; individualism negatively predicted the passive-submissive style and positively predicted the action-planning style, whereas collectivism predicted all coping styles; furthermore, individualism and collectivism moderated the link between anxiety and the passive-submissive coping style, presence of meaning in life moderated the link between anxiety and avoidant coping style, while search for meaning in life moderated the link between anxiety and the action-planning coping style. Overall, the findings enrich the cultural transactional theory of stress and coping, and generate insights for the culture-sensitive approach to the meaning in life. The results were conceptualized vis-a-vis Georgia’s intermediate position between clear-cut individualism and clear-cut collectivism. (shrink)

A presente reflexão pretende partir da afirmação da “morte de Deus”, que constitui em Nietzsche uma das suas concepções fundamentais e, poder-se-ia dizer, também, a chave de leitura do seu filosofar. Deste ponto de partida, o estudo procura extrair e identificar, sem para tal ser exaustivo, as emergências antropológicas e éticas do pensar nietzschiano. Palavras-chave: Übermensch. Dever ser. Vontade de potência. Riqueza antropológica. Ética.

Cosmology is currently a broad and rapidly developing field of knowledge.

The Twenty-fifth Congress of the CPSU on the basis of Marxist-Leninist theory, analyzing the experience and results of previous work and defining the tasks of the next period of struggle for the building of communism, stressed that "the problem of ideological struggle increasingly comes to the fore, and the truth about socialism is the most powerful tool in this struggle.".