One of the high-points of Italian Renaissance humanism, Machiavelli's The Prince immediately transcended the time and culture from which it had sprung, circulating throughout Europe and paving the road to an astonishing variety of discussions on power and liberty for centuries to come. Indeed, one could hardly think of a literary work whose reception has been more controversial and arguably more crucial to the fashioning of modernity. This volume gathers together the proceedings of a conference held in Oxford, in November (...) 2013, to mark the 500th anniversary of the composition of The Prince. It explores pivotal aspects of the text's complex identity, focusing on three interrelated areas: 1. The Prince's own ways of appropriating ancient and modern traditions of political thought and ethics; 2. the textual history and interpretive details of the work; 3. translations of the treatise into foreign languages (including English and other translations), with their cultural adaptations and reconceptualizations of the original. All chapters offer highly original insights by leading experts on The Prince, shedding light on hitherto neglected topics and locating Machiavelli's masterpiece in an intriguing network of intersecting perspectives. (shrink)

Life history theory aims to explain the relationship between life events, recognizing that the fertility and growth schedules of organisms are dependent on environmental conditions and an organism’s ability to extract resources from its environment. Using models from life history theory, we predict life expectancy to be positively correlated with educational investments and negatively correlated with adolescent reproduction and total fertility rates. Analyses of UN data from 193 countries support these predictions and demonstrate that, although variation is evident across world (...) regions, strong interactions exist among life expectancy, reproductive investments, and educational attainment, and these relationships occur independently of economic pressures and disease burdens. The interactions are strongest, however, in countries with a life expectancy of ≥60 years as these countries tend to have stable economies and a limited HIV/AIDS burden. These findings suggest that policies aimed at influencing education and reproductive decisions should consider environmental characteristics that drive people’s expectations about their longevity. (shrink)

The capacity to attribute beliefs to others in order to understand action is one of the mainstays of human cognition. Yet it is debatable whether children attribute beliefs in the same way to all agents. In this paper, we present the results of a false-belief task concerning humans and God run with a sample of Maya children aged 4–7, and place them in the context of several psychological theories of cognitive development. Children were found to attribute beliefs in different ways (...) to humans and God. The evidence also speaks to the debate concerning the universality and uniformity of the development of folk-psychological reasoning. (shrink)

We provide a translation of Binet and Henri’s pioneering 1894 paper on the influence of suggestibility on memory. Alfred Binet is famous as the author who created the IQ test that bears his name, but he is almost unknown as the psychological investigator who generated numerous original experiments and fascinating results in the study of memory. His experiments published in 1894 manipulated suggestibility in several ways to determine effects on remembering. Three particular modes of suggestion were employed to induce false (...) recognitions: indirect suggestion by a preconceived idea; direct suggestion; and collective suggestion. In the commentary we suggest that Binet and Henri’s paper written over 115 years ago is still highly relevant even today. In particular, Binet’s legacy lives on in modern research on misinformation effects in memory, in studies of conformity, and in experiments on the social contagion of memory. (shrink)

Sound propagation within certain non-relativistic condensed matter models obeys a relativistic wave equation despite such systems admitting entirely non-relativistic descriptions. A natural question that arises upon consideration of this is, “do devices exist that will experience the relativity in these systems?” We describe a thought experiment in which ‘acoustic observers’ possess devices called sound clocks that can be connected to form chains. Careful investigation shows that appropriately constructed chains of stationary and moving sound clocks are perceived by observers on the (...) other chain as undergoing the relativistic phenomena of length contraction and time dilation by the Lorentz factor, \, with \ the speed of sound. Sound clocks within moving chains actually tick less frequently than stationary ones and must be separated by a shorter distance than when stationary to satisfy simultaneity conditions. Stationary sound clocks appear to be length contracted and time dilated to moving observers due to their misunderstanding of their own state of motion with respect to the laboratory. Observers restricted to using sound clocks describe a universe kinematically consistent with the theory of special relativity, despite the preferred frame of their universe in the laboratory. Such devices show promise in further probing analogue relativity models, for example in investigating phenomena that require careful consideration of the proper time elapsed for observers. (shrink)

Biological ontologies are used to organize, curate, and interpret the vast quantities of data arising from biological experiments. While this works well when using a single ontology, integrating multiple ontologies can be problematic, as they are developed independently, which can lead to incompatibilities. The Open Biological and Biomedical Ontologies Foundry was created to address this by facilitating the development, harmonization, application, and sharing of ontologies, guided by a set of overarching principles. One challenge in reaching these goals was that the (...) OBO principles were not originally encoded in a precise fashion, and interpretation was subjective. Here we show how we have addressed this by formally encoding the OBO principles as operational rules and implementing a suite of automated validation checks and a dashboard for objectively evaluating each ontology’s compliance with each principle. This entailed a substantial effort to curate metadata across all ontologies and to coordinate with individual stakeholders. We have applied these checks across the full OBO suite of ontologies, revealing areas where individual ontologies require changes to conform to our principles. Our work demonstrates how a sizable federated community can be organized and evaluated on objective criteria that help improve overall quality and interoperability, which is vital for the sustenance of the OBO project and towards the overall goals of making data FAIR. Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest. (shrink)

People can intuitively distinguish semantically coherent from incoherent word triads, even without knowing the common denominator. Drawing on cognitive linguistics, the present authors suggest that...

Etablie sur les dernieres editions revues par Malebranche, la presente edition des Conversations chretiennes et des Meditations sur l'humilite et la penitence reunit, selon les intentions de l'auteur, les textes disjoints par les editeurs modernes. Nous tenons compte d'une edition des petites meditations de 1701 jusqu'ici perdue. Par leur date de publication et par les enrichissements qu'ils apportent a la Recherche de la verite ces textes annoncent les Eclaircissements de 1678 et les oeuvres de la maturite. L'orthographe et la ponctuation (...) sont modernisees, et les citations retraduites. (shrink)

Ouvrage majeur de la philosophie de Malebranche, De la recherche de la verite constitue un moment cle dans la reflexion philosophique a l'age classique. Si son inspiration est cartesienne, Malebranche y soutient d'emblee une theorie originale de la connaissance, de la verite et de la causalite: notamment la these de la vision en Dieu des idees et l'analyse des causes de l'erreur. Plus qu'une theorie de la connaissance, c'est donc une theorie complete de l'esprit humain et de ses multiples fonctions (...) que nous livre l'ouvrage. Cette nouvelle edition de la Recherche de la verite donne a lire pour la premiere fois dans un format accessible a tous, un texte majeur de la pensee moderne, heritier de l'age classique et annonciateur des Lumieres: les textes sont etablis a partir des deux dernieres editions de 1700 et 1712 revues par Malebranche lui-meme, et des trois premiers volumes des oeuvres Completes publiees sous la direction d'Andre Robinet; l'orthographe a ete modernisee. La ponctuation a fait l'objet d'une revision systematique; les textes cites en langue etrangere ont ete traduits ou retraduits, et leurs references mises a jour afin de tenir compte des editions les plus recentes. Enfin, le lecteur trouvera, dans ce premier volume, une presentation eclairante de cette oeuvre par Jean-Christophe Bardout, offrant ainsi des grilles de lecture et de comprehension de cet ouvrage majeur du XVIIe siecle, qui n'avait jusqu'alors fait l'objet d'aucune etude specifique. (shrink)

Shortlisted for the 2005 British Academy Book prize, Nicola Lacey's entrancing biography recounts the life of H.L.A. Hart, the pre-eminent legal philosopher of the twentieth century. Following Hart's life from modest origins as the son of Jewish tailor parents in Yorkshire to worldwide fame as the most influential English-speaking legal theorist of the post-War era, the book traces his successive metamorphoses; from Yorkshire schoolboy to Oxford scholar, from government intelligence officer to Professor of Jurisprudence, from awkward batchelor to family (...) figurehead. In the tradition of Ray Monk's biography of Wittgenstein, Nicola Lacey paints an absorbing picture of intellectual and psychological development, of a mind struggling to cope with intellectual self-doubt, uncertain sexuality, a difficult marriage and an anti-semitic society. In depicting the evolution of Hart's life and mind, Lacey provides a vivid recreation of both the intellectual and social climate of Oxford in the post-War era. (shrink)

Dès le moment de la Réforme, l'Église protestante s'est constituée en une communauté plurielle, marquée par des sensibilités diverses. Cette diversité paraît justifier le constat de tendances plus libérales marquant une confiance plus optimiste dans les capacités d'action des hommes, tandis que des tendances plus doctrinales soulignent plus volontiers le poids du mal. Après le rappel des caractéristiques et développements d'une tradition libérale moderne au XIX° siècle, avec l'évocation de la figure d'Harnack, l'auteur soulève la question des rapports de cette (...) tradition avec le mouvement oecuménique, rapports marqués par les événements liés aux deux Guerres mondiales, ce qui lui fait évoquer en terminant la figure de Karl Barth.From the moment of the Reformation the Protestant Church constituted itself into a plural community, marked by diverse sensibilities. This diversity appears to justify the appearance of more liberal tendencies, which indicate a more optimistic confi­dence in the capacities of men's actions, while the more doctrinal tendencies readily underline the weight of evil. After recalling the characteristics and developments of the modern liberal tradition in the 19th century, evoking the personage of Harnack, the author raises the question of the relationships of this tradition with the ecumenical movement. These relationships were effected by the events related to the two World Wars, which leads the author to refer, at the end, to Karl Barth. (shrink)

Anosognosia for hemiplegia is a lack of awareness about paralysis following stroke. Recent explanations use a ‘forward model’ of movement to suggest that AHP patients fail to register discrepancies between internally- and externally-generated sensory information. We predicted that this failure would impair the ability to recall from memory whether information is internally- or externally-generated . Two experiments examined this prediction. Experiment 1 demonstrated that AHP patients exhibit a reality monitoring deficit for non-motor information , whilst hemiplegic controls without anosognosia perform (...) like age-matched healthy volunteers . Experiment 2 explored if this deficit occurs when AHP patients discriminate performed, imagined, or observed movement. Results showed impaired reality monitoring for movements in AHP and nonAHP patients relative to HVs. Findings suggest that reality monitoring processes not directly related to movement, together with a failure to reality monitor movements, contribute to the pathogenesis of AHP. (shrink)

" Si rien ne change avant un demi-siècle, écrivait Flaubert, l'Europe languira dans de grandes ténèbres ". un semblable pressentiment en persuadait Baudelaire : " Le monde va finir ". Comme si le sentiment de quelque décadence était aussi constant qu'inévitable, Péguy le notait encore : " Tout ce que nous avons défendu recule de jour en jour devant une barbarie, devant une inculture croissante, devant l'envahissement de la corruption politique et sociale. " hier encore, à l'occasion d'un tout banal (...) changement de calendrier, historiens, sociologues, politologues, futurologues ne furent-ils pas sollicités de scruter dans ce qu'ils connaissent du passé ce qu'ils pourraient y voir du futur? Or d'où vient que nous nous interrogions avec autant de perplexité sur l'humanité à venir, su ce n'est que nous doutions de nous y reconnaître? D'où vient ce sentiment d'un hiatus entre ce qui nous précédait et ce qui déjà nous suit? Cet essai s'interroge sur la crise de la conscience contemporaine. Est-elle aussi illusoire que toujours, ou mieux fondée que jamais? Dans un univers de toutes parts médiatisé par les sciences, administré, programmé, planifié et rationalisé par les techniques, la répudiation de la raison, la destitution de la vérité, la frénésie de l'immédiation ne dessinent-elles pas une nouvelle figure de l'homme? Livré à toutes les médiations et n'aspirant qu'à l'immédiat, ne suivant aucune règle mais conditionné par toutes, calculant toutes choses et s'abandonnant aux plus incontrôlées, ; n'en est-il pas disloqué? (shrink)

Ce volume collectif montre que l'herméneutique fictionnalisée permet de réfléchir sur les procédures de l'interprétation, de penser les limites de la fiction et de prendre en charge des discours que les disciplines savantes ne sont pas toujours en situation de produire.

La tesi che si intende discutere è che il progetto sia l’intima essenza dell’uomo. I primi argomenti a suo favore non vanno tuttavia ricercati nella riflessione antropologica, in quanto il “discorso dell’uomo sull’uomo” presume il suo stesso oggetto di ricerca, rischiando di “avvitarsi” in un circolo vizioso senza uscita. Non è casuale che, in tal senso, le intuizioni più illuminanti siano state espresse attraverso il linguaggio mito-poietico. Già nel Protagora Platone, con le figure di Prometeo e di Epimeteo, mette in (...) scena il dramma di una condizione umana che si presenta quale strutturale privazione di qualità specifiche, che la sola “capacità anticipante” del Titano può risarcire, facendosi portatrice della tecnica come istanza di sopravvivenza in ambiente ostile. Da questo momento in avanti, l’avventura del progetto diventa metonimica protensione verso le cose a venire (ad-ventura); condizione necessaria, ancorché non sufficiente, per orientarsi in un mondo inteso come stato di indeterminazione dal quale emanciparsi. Tali premesse paiono oggi indicare una possibile via di uscita alla crisi di valori generata dal capitalismo finanziariario, che ci costringe a vivere in un rinnovato stato di incertezza, all’interno di un desolante paesaggio di rovine. La rigenerazione della città, in tale scenario, costituisce pertanto la ripresa di un cammino, destinato a incontrare difficoltà e resistenze, anche politiche. Un viatico necessario alla riproposizione tentativa di futuri possibili: nella consapevolezza che essi si fondino sulla capacità di formulare ipotesi sul passato – divenuto “criticamente” il nuovo ambiente in cui operare – sempre sospesi tra il “non più” del mondo alle nostre spalle e il “non ancora” di quello che auspichiamo a venire. A partire dalla fondamentale distinzione tra Umwelt e Welt, introdotta dall’etologo Jakob von Uexküll, i percorsi della filosofia fenomenologico-esistenziale si intrecciano con quelli dell’Antropologia filosofica, confermando il senso dell’avventura del progetto e il suo problematico intrecciarsi con i destini dell’uomo. Max Scheler, Helmuth Plessner, Arnold Gehlen, Martin Heidegger, Gunter Anders, e Hannah Arendt, nutrono la consapevolezza che il carattere aporeticamente sfuggente dell’essenza umana derivi dalla costante riformulazione del rapporto “uomo”/“mondo”, di cui il progetto risulta il paradossale fondamento “effimero”. Ciò impone che la cultura del progetto sia la prima a doversi mettere in gioco, ponendosi come continua interrogazione sui propri principi, metodi, regole ed esiti, da sottoporre a un incessante processo di verifica e confutazione. L’avventura del progetto diventa pertanto espressione architettonica dell’esistenza – intesa come fuoriuscita dal ciclico riproporsi di uno stato di incertezza – che nel suo divenire costruisce la realtà sociale quale unico mondo abitabile dall’uomo, sempre uguale per quanto mai identico. (shrink)

The deformation: Bataille and the irrepresentable The present article is focused on the interactions of matter and form in the writings of Georges Bataille. Starting with the notion of "formless" that he outlined in the journal Documents and through Georges Didi-Huberman's text on the "formless resemblance", we will try to show how, in Bataille's work, high and low respond to each other and intertwine to generate a "spastic" device of deformation that allows the desire to reshape the writing and the (...) images that surround it. For this purpose, we will apply Gilles Deleuze's approach to the painting of Francis Bacon, which is fundamentally opposed to "representation" in order to achieve what Deleuze calls the "pure figurative". The approach will help us to understand how Bataille's works respond to the same demand for "material deformation" and "formal materialization", which manifests itself by accident and is addressed less to the understanding than to sensibility. (shrink)

Dans cet essai d'epistemologie philosophique, Nicolas Grimaldi a voulu proposer une lecture originale de la philosophie de Descartes dont il s'attache avant tout a reconstituer la genese. Cette methode, propre a manifester la continuite d'une pensee, a neanmoins conduit l'auteur a en decouvrir les points de rupture: la pensee de Descartes serait constituee selon trois ordres successifs, correspondant a des experiences differentes. L'ordre de la verite marque tout d'abord un pur rapport a l'esprit, trouvant son modele dans les mathematiques; mais (...) Descartes, bientot lasse des mathematiques qui n'ont pas de contenu exterieur a elles-memes, choisit de s'orienter vers l'ordre de l'utilite, qui vise a nous rendre maitres et possesseurs de la nature. Cette technologie du reel soumet cependant nos demarches a la vraisemblance, et non plus a la verite, et une telle scission engage Descartes a decouvrir alors un troisieme ordre, celui de la beatitude: en decouvrant en nous la ressemblance et la marque de Dieu, nous faisons l'experience de l'infini. Cette tripartition a permis de reamenager l'oeuvre sous trois rubriques: methode, sciences et morale, et de restaurer a la philosophie de Descartes son unite speculative. (shrink)

L’interprétation, parce qu’elle ressemble à des croyances, a été écartée de la science moderne, au profit de la déduction et la généralisation. Or, dans toute science, il y a des préoccupations, des inquiétudes et donc des interprétations. Selon Nicolas Bouleau, il faut davantage d'écoute interprétative du contexte dans lequel nous vivons. En prolongeant la vision de Hans Jonas et les thèses de Lacan sur le savoir, cet essai remet l'environnement au cœur de la démarche scientifique.

Le célèbre ouvrage de Gilbert Durand, Les Structures anthropologiques de l’Imaginaire, propose une élucidation des fondements de l’imaginaire, c’est-à-dire de l’essence à partir de laquelle se dresse l’arborescence de la fantastique. Nous pensons que ces fondements — espace a priori et euphémisme — loin d’émerger d’une phénoménologie rigoureuse, au contraire découlent de présupposés psychanalytiques parasitant le projet initial. Le présent article n’a d’autre but que d’ouvrir la réflexion sur les fondements de l’imaginaire à la phénoménologie henryenne : l’affectivité comme identique (...) à l’être même, semble toute désignée pour compléter la fantastique transcendantale durandienne et ainsi offrir un renouveau aux structures de l’imaginaire. (shrink)

Nicolas Weill propose une lecture stimulante de ces textes qui constituent une des découvertes philosophiques les plus importantes de ces dernières années. La publication des "Cahiers" redonne une actualité brûlante à la question qui divise épigones et détracteurs du penseur allemand : comment continuer à philosopher avec Heidegger sans tenir compte d'une éventuelle contamination de cette philosophie par l'idéologie nazie? Par une analyse sans concession des "Cahiers", en se concentrant sur les Réflexions (tenues par Heidegger de 1931 à 1941) mais (...) tout en cherchant à en dégager les éléments proprement philosophiques, cet ouvrage invite à une approche équilibrée, quitte à "penser avec Heidegger, contre Heidegger", comme le suggérait Jürgen Habermas dès le début des années 1950. Il montre notamment comment l'auteur d'Etre et temps, en inventant une nouvelle forme de philosopher, a poursuivi et prolongé dans ces carnets la critique de la modernité telle qu'elle a été formulée par la "révolution conservatrice" allemande et par Oswald Spengler, le théoricien du déclin de l'Occident. (shrink)

La tolérance, telle que l'entend l'édit de Nantes, est un pis-aller. Les partis catholiques et réformés s'accordent sur l'idée que la tolérance est provisoire, car la restauration de l'unité religieuse doit demeurer la visée. Mais les réformés, minoritaires, sont en position défensive. Beaucoup parmi eux pensent que la tolérance ne tiendra que s'ils continuent de se faire craindre des catholiques. D'où la promotion, par Agrippa d'Aubigné, de l'esprit de résistance. Mais les forces armées protestantes sont réduites en 1629. En fonction (...) de ce nouveau contexte, Moyse Amyraut, tout en professant un parfait loyalisme à l'égard du monarque catholique, sera amené à formuler les linéaments d'une nouvelle théorie de la tolérance, selon laquelle la tolérance n'est plus une grâce temporaire, mais un droit. (shrink)