This article examines a complex passage of Aristotle's Physics in which a Pythagorean doctrine is explained by means of a mathematical example involving gnomons. The traditional interpretation of this passage (proposed by Milhaud and Burnet) has recently been challenged by Ugaglia and Acerbi, who have proposed a new one. The aim of this article is to analyse difficulties in their account and to advance a new interpretation. All attempts at interpreting the passage so far have assumed that ‘gnomons’ should indicate (...) ‘odd numbers’. In this article it is argued that the usage of ‘gnomon’ related to polygonal numbers, which is normally considered late, could be backdated to at least the fifth/fourth centuries b.c.; in particular, it explains the link between the philosophical explanandum and the mathematical explanans in Aristotle's passage. (shrink)

Since the publication of David Lewis’ Counterfactuals, the standard line on subjunctive conditionals with impossible antecedents (or counterpossibles) has been that they are vacuously true. That is, a conditional of the form ‘If p were the case, q would be the case’ is trivially true whenever the antecedent, p, is impossible. The primary justification is that Lewis’ semantics best approximates the English subjunctive conditional, and that a vacuous treatment of counterpossibles is a consequence of that very elegant theory. Another justification (...) derives from the classical lore than if an impossibility were true, then anything goes. In this paper we defend non-vacuism, the view that counterpossibles are sometimes non-vacuously true and sometimes non-vacuously false. We do so while retaining a Lewisian semantics, which is to say, the approach we favor does not require us to abandon classical logic or a similarity semantics. It does however require us to countenance impossible worlds. An impossible worlds treatment of counterpossibles is suggested (but not defended) by Lewis (Counterfactuals. Blackwell, Oxford, 1973), and developed by Nolan (Notre Dame J Formal Logic 38:325–527, 1997), Kment (Mind 115:261–310, 2006a: Philos Perspect 20:237–302, 2006b), and Vander Laan (In: Jackson F, Priest G (eds) Lewisian themes. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2004). We follow this tradition, and develop an account of comparative similarity for impossible worlds. (shrink)

Custom is a complex phenomenon, and one that is hardly given a satisfying account, especially if it is assumed, as many legal positivists do, that law is only produced through acts of will. After examining five main reasons for the complexity of custom, I will consider Uberto Scarpelli’s thesis that customary law can be given an account within legal positivism through a reinterpretation of norm-generating facts as the manifestations of a will. But what kind of will is implied here, and (...) how can the underlying norm be inferred? I will first briefly examine Gaetano Carcaterra’s analysis of abduction as a method to infer norms from behaviors, and then distinguish six different forms of will possibly implied in a behavior which is relevant for the formation of a customary norm. I will finally focus on norm-oriented, or nomotropic will, and especially on nomotrophic will, that is, the will –implied and expressed in the reaction to the violation of a norm– that the infringed norm be valid. (shrink)

Qu’est-ce qu’une norme? Y a-t-il des relations logiques entre les normes? Sur quoi repose la validité d’un système normatif? Qu’est-ce que la validité déontique? Les verbes performatifs peuvent-ils agir sur le monde? Quelles sont les différentes façons d’agir en fonction d’une règle? Que sont les règles constitutives? Et qu’est-ce que la vérité? Ce sont là quelques-unes des questions que posent les essais d’Amedeo Giovanni Conte rassemblés dans cette anthologie. Ces essais offrent quelques-unes des contributions les plus originales et les plus (...) significatives de la philosophie du langage normatif. Amedeo Giovanni Conte (Pavie, 1934-Cava Manara, 2019), professeur émérite de l’Université de Pavie, membre de l’Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, fut l’un des philosophes les plus originaux du droit italien. Parmi ses œuvres : Saggio sulla completezza degli ordinamenti giuridici (1962), les trois volumes de Filosofia del linguaggio normativo (1989-2001), Filosofia dell’ordinamento normativo (1997), Sociologia filosofica del diritto (2011) et Adelaster : Il nome del vero (2016). (shrink)

Voces técnicas mínimas que forman el lenguaje filosófico, extraídas de los libros de Filosofía de Bachillerato, Ética y textos de COU.

This is a critical discusssion of Professor da Costa's Essay on the foundations of logic which brings up issues of philosophy of logic, set theory, the foundations of mathematics, and paraconsistency.

A Fuzzy-Set Theoretical Framework -resting on a paraconsistent infinite-valued logic- is sketched, wherein a thorough ontological-reduction program can be carried out. The framework includes formulae of the form “x comprises z in the time-interval e”. Reducing aggregates to sets thus handled is shown to escape usual objections. Likewise, systems generally can be regarded as aggregates, hence as (fuzzy) sets -the purported nonextensionality of systems objection being disposed of owing to our system’s recognizing infinitely many membership degrees. So do bodies, too, (...) which enables us to find a solutionto Unger’s sorites concerning ordinary material bodies. (shrink)

In his 1686 essay GI Leibniz undertook to reduce sentences to noun-phrases, truth to being. Such a reduction arose from his equating proof with conceptual analysis. Within limits Leibniz’s logical calculus provides a reasonable way of surmounting the dichotomy, thus allowing a reduction of hypothetical to categorical statements. However it yields the disastrous result that, whenever A is possible and so is B, there can be an entity being both A and B. Yet, Leibniz was in the GI the forerunner (...) of 20th century combinatory logic, which (successfully!) practices - sometimes for reasons not entirely unlike Leibniz’s own grounds - reductions of the same kinds he tried to carry out. (shrink)

¿Están comprendidos los extranjeros en el ámbito de aplicación de los derechos y deberes fundamentales estipulados por las constituciones modernas? Lamentablemente, no. Ha habido, a lo largo de la historia, progresos y retrocesos en la conciencia jurídica de los derechos migratorios. Hoy tienden a establecerse cláusulas de libre circulación en los espacios de integración económica, al paso que, de manera general , viene prohibida la inmigración del sur al norte. Esa orientación actual es injusta. Ni se atiene a un principio (...) de justicia natural ni respeta la tradición jurídica . Es dudoso que tengan los estados derecho a prohibir la inmigración foránea. Menos aún es admisible que se considere un delito el auxilio a la inmigración no autorizada. Frente a los criterios hoy imperantes, este artículo formula la propuesta de reconocer el derecho universal humano de migración por todo el Planeta. (shrink)