This is a companion to a paper by the authors entitled “Gödel’s natural deduction,” which presented and made comments about the natural deduction system in Gödel’s unpublished notes for the elementary logic course he gave at the University of Notre Dame in 1939. In that earlier paper, which was itself a companion to a paper that examined the links between some philosophical views ascribed to Gödel and general proof theory, one can find a brief summary of Gödel’s notes for the (...) Notre Dame course. In order to put the earlier paper in proper perspective, a more complete summary of these interesting notes, with comments concerning them, is given here. (shrink)

This is an examination, a commentary, of links between some philosophical views ascribed to Gödel and general proof theory. In these views deduction is of central concern not only in predicate logic, but in set theory too, understood from an infinitistic ideal perspective. It is inquired whether this centrality of deduction could also be kept in the intensional logic of concepts whose building Gödel seems to have taken as the main task of logic for the future.

This is a companion to a paper by the authors entitled “Gödel on deduction”, which examined the links between some philosophical views ascribed to Gödel and general proof theory. When writing that other paper, the authors were not acquainted with a system of natural deduction that Gödel presented with the help of Gentzen’s sequents, which amounts to Jaśkowski’s natural deduction system of 1934, and which may be found in Gödel’s unpublished notes for the elementary logic course he gave in 1939 (...) at the University of Notre Dame. Here one finds a presentation of this system of Gödel accompanied by a brief reexamination in the light of the notes of some points concerning his interest in sequents made in the preceding paper. This is preceded by a brief summary of Gödel’s Notre Dame course, and is followed by comments concerning Gödel’s natural deduction system. (shrink)

Terms do not always cover the same meaning all the time. While translating into another language we have to take care of possible shifts in meaning in each of both languages. Some examples have been shown here from the new translation of Locke‘s Essay into Czech.

Terms do not always cover the same meaning all the time. While translating into another language we have to take care of possible shifts in meaning in each of both languages. Some examples have been shown here from the new translation of Locke‘s Essay into Czech.

Very often moral disagreements can be resolved by appealing to factual considerations because in these cases the parties to the dispute agree as to which factual considerations are relevant. They agree, that is, with respect to their basic moral standards. Hence, when their disagreement about the non-moral facts is resolved, so is their moral disagreement. But sometimes moral disagreement persists in spite of agreement on factual considerations. When this happens, and when neither party is guilty of illogical thinking, we have (...) a case of moral deadlock. (shrink)

Už dlouho jsme ve filozofii poměrně slušně informováni o tom, co se děje na západ od nás. Tyto informace se však týkají spíše anglofonního světa, už méně německého, který byl po velmi dlouhou dobu naším kulturním partnerem. Popelkou zůstává svět frankofonní – a je to škoda. Mezeru v tomto okruhu se nyní snaží zaplnit Miloš Kratochvíl ze Západočeské univerzity v Plzni svou knihou, jejíž název je uveden v titulu této recenze.

The paper examines the fundamental concepts of the political publicist Miloš Štefanovi?, which in the 1980ies and 1990ies suggested the transformation of Slovak political thinking as well as abandoning the voluntarily adopted passive attitude. Štefanovi? developed a consistent conception of national politics based on self-respon- sible, independent, bottom up political work grounded in patriotic self-criticism. He was also one of the prime movers of the cooperation between nationalities in Hungary as well as a critique of the distorted political culture of (...) the government establishment. (shrink)

This paper deals with Schaffer’s distinction between metaphysical structures, as well as his appeal for revival of neo-Aristotelian approaches that imply ordered structure, based on the criticism of Quine’s method that, in his view, implies flat metaphysical structure. However, although we believe that Schaffer’s distinction between metaphysical structures is an interesting and, basically, acceptable view, we will try to show that Schaffer’s arguments are not convincing enough to persuade us to abandon Quine’s method and adopt the Aristotelian metaphysical model. Moreover, (...) when mistakes that Schaffer makes are corrected and Quine’s method is given due attention, we will see that this can enable us a more tenable interpretation of the concepts that Schaffer speaks of (metaphysical structures), but also – as in his case – to draw certain conclusions that go beyond objectives of classification as such. (shrink)

Miloš Ćipranić Punoletstvo misli: Trivo Inđić.

By and large, contemporary news stories are stories about a particular nation, told to an audience that is seen and addressed in national terms. However, the understanding of the exact ways in which national imagination becomes engrained in the narrative conventions of news reporting is still rather limited, in particular when it comes to audiovisual genres. This article aims to fill a part of this blank by examining the links between national imagination and the narrative conventions of television news. Building (...) on existing debates about different modes of news reporting, the article distinguishes two distinct sets of narrative conventions at work in television news: one typically found in routine reporting, the other characteristic of crisis and celebratory reporting. It is argued that each of these two sets of conventions is tied to a different form of nationalism, and normally arises in a different political climate. Links between national imagination and narrative conventions vary accordingly. To demonstrate this, the article provides a comparative analysis of narrative structures in selected samples of television news bulletins broadcast in the early 1990s in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The concluding section reflects on the external validity of the chosen case study and surveys supportive evidence from four other relevant cases, drawn from the UK and Israel. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 56, Issue 3-4, pp 241 - 271 William of Ockham and John Buridan provide different accounts of the distinction between formal and material consequences. Some consequences – in particular, enthymemes – that Ockham would classify as formal would be classified as material by Buridan. This paper explains this taxonomical discrepancy. It identifies the root of the discrepancy not in a difference between Ockham’s and Buridan’s notions of propositional hylomorphism but rather in Ockham’s endorsement of relational characterizations of (...) consequences. (shrink)

The subject of this paper is Charles Morris’ semiotic theory that has as one of its major projects the unification of all sciences of signs. However, since the above project has proven to be unsuccessful, we will try to examine here the reasons that led to this. Accordingly, we will argue that to transcend the particularities of individual disciplines that he wanted to unify, Morris had to make certain ontological assumptions, instead of theoretical and methodological ones, that they could share. (...) However, because the 'sign' as an ontological category could in our view only be established if we follow the principles of the pragmatic philosophical tradition, we will try to show that the reasons for this failure should be primarily sought in different effects that consistent application of the pragmatic principles has in each of them (primarily in linguistics and the philosophy of language). On the other hand, this should enable us to draw several important conclusions regarding Morris’ project: namely, that his failure does not have to mean giving up semiotics as a potentially key discipline in approaching some fundamental philosophical problems, but also that it would demand return to the original semiotics developed in Peirce’s works. (shrink)

In this paper we will try to show the differences between Quine’s and Gibson’s interpretation of the naturalized epistemology project. Namely, although Gibson points out that the genetic approach advocated by Quine is the best strategy there is to investigate the relations between evidence and theory, and that externalizing of empiricism that it requires is one of Quine’s major philosophical contributions, we argue that the assumptions on which Gibson’s project is based, apart from the fact that they are in conflict (...) with some strongly held intuitions, would have to be essentially different from Quine’s. In other words, contrary to Quine’s position within which we have the possibility of staying on more moderate, and in our opinion, more plausible behavioristic line of approach, we will try to show that one of the consequences of Gibson’s interpretation is that this possibility is ruled out in Gibson’s case. On the other hand, this should enable us to draw some more radical conclusions about the nature of Quine’s epistemological project. (shrink)

Although Williams’ contextual thesis is above all a critique of one way of interpreting contextualism in epistemology, viz., simple conversational contextualisam, I will argue that this thesis has also been a very successful means for the critique of a standpoint on which that interpretation, and the entire traditional epistemology rests - epistemological realism. Accordingly, in spite of certain weaknesses in Williams’ position pointed out by his critiques, in this paper I will try to show that, by interpreting the problem of (...) scepticism as first and foremost a methodological necessity of epistemological realism, Williams succeeds in offering an enlightening diagnosis of the sceptical paradox problem which is at the centre of epistemology traditionally construed. (shrink)

In this paper, we will try to confront Quine’s and Davidson’s holistic position through Davidson’s thesis of the mental as a non-ontological category. In this regard, since Davidson came to this position through the thesis of the mental as a decidedly conceptual category, we will try to show how this approach does not, nevertheless, rule out the possibility of its interpretation in ontological terms. However, in what follows we will draw attention to the fact that the mental can be interpreted (...) so that it proves to be immune to ontologizing in Quine’s sense. This would be the evidence of different ways, which are not necessarily compatible, to argue for Davidson’s central thesis - the thesis about holistic character of the mental - as well as, which is closely related, a certain difference that exists between Davidson’s view of the mental as a conceptual category on the one hand, and a holistic category on the other. (shrink)

DRAGAN BULATOVIĆ, UMETNOST I MUZEALNOST: ISTORIJSKO-UMETNIČKI GOVOR I NJEGOVI MUZEOLOŠKI ISHODI, GALERIJA MATICE SRPSKE, NOVI SAD, 2016.Miloš Ćipranić.

This paper deals with Peirce’s understanding of perceptual judgment, relating it to the conditions for the use of language defined by Michael Dummett. Namely, drawing on Dummett’s requirement for harmony between descriptive and evaluative aspects of our linguistic practice, we will try to give an interpretation of Peirce’s view of perception that implies rejecting the idea that the formation of a perceptual judgment has an inferential structure. On the other hand, since it is, in Peirce’s opinion, the structure of abductive (...) inference, this approach should enable us to draw some conclusions related to abduction in general. (shrink)

Here I reply to a recent exchange between Edgar Danielyan and Brian Garrett regarding Alvin Plantinga’s assessment of Gaunilo’s ‘ideal island’ objection to Anselm’s ontological argument. I argue that an ideal island is conceivable if it’s defined as any island exhibiting an ideal ratio of great-making island properties.

What are the truth conditions of want ascriptions? According to an influential approach, they are intimately connected to the agent’s beliefs: ⌜S wants p⌝ is true iff, within S’s belief set, S prefers the p worlds to the not-p worlds. This approach faces a well-known problem, however: it makes the wrong predictions for what we call (counter)factual want ascriptions, wherein the agent either believes p or believes not-p—for example, ‘I want it to rain tomorrow and that is exactly what is (...) going to happen’ or ‘I want this weekend to last forever, but of course it will end in a few hours’. We solve this problem. The truth conditions for want ascriptions are, we propose, connected to the agent’s conditional beliefs. We substantiate this connection by pursuing a striking parallel between (counter)factual and non-(counter)factual want ascriptions on the one hand and counterfactual and indicative conditionals on the other. (shrink)

The subject of this paper is the debate between externalism and internalism about mental content presented by Tim Crane in Chapter 4 of his book Elements of Mind. Crane’s sympathies in this debate are with internalism. The paper attempts to show that Crane’s argumentation is not refuting the Twin Earth argument and externalism, and that in its basis it does not differ much from externalism itself Crane’s version of the argument for externalism features two key premises: (1) The content of (...) a thought determines what the thought is about/what it refers to (the Content Determines Reference Principle); and (2) Twins are referring to different things when they use the word “water”. From these, in a few simple steps, Crane’s externalist infers: Therefore, their thoughts are not “in their heads”. Crane suggests denying the Content Determines Reference Principle in the light of indexical thoughts. In the first stage, Crane reduces “content” to “some aspect of content”, although he needs all aspects of content to secure identity of thoughts. However, his view then comes close to something acceptable to externalists. In the second stage, Crane makes content relative to context, but then reference still determines content. (shrink)

This book explores a much-neglected area of moral philosophy--the typology of immorality. Ronald D. Milo questions the adequacy of Aristotle's suggestion that there are two basic types of immorality--wickedness and moral weakness--and argues that we must distinguish between at least six different types of immoral behavior. Originally published in 1984. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of (...) these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

Planar cell polarity, the polarization of cells within the plane of the epithelium, orthogonal to the apical‐basal axis, is essential for a growing list of developmental events, and – over the last 15 years – has evolved from a little‐studied curiosity in Drosophila to the subject of a substantial research enterprise. In that time, it has been recognized that two molecular systems are responsible for polarization of most tissues: Both the “core” Frizzled system and the “global” Fat/Dachsous/Four‐jointed system produce molecular (...) asymmetry within cells, and contribute to morphological polarization. In this review, we discuss recent findings on the molecular mechanism that links “global” directional signals with local coordinated polarity. (shrink)

Nick Bostrom’s “simulation argument” purports to show that if it is possible to create and run a vast number of computer simulations indistinguishable from the reality we are living in, then it is highly probable that we are already living in a computer simulation. However, the simulation argument requires a modification to escape the undermining implications of the scepticism it implies, as argued by Birch. The present paper shows that, even if the modified simulation argument is valid, still it is (...) unsound since it relies on the indistinguishability assumption that even in principle cannot be tested. To account for the unsoundness of the simulation argument, the present paper draws on John Woods' theory of fiction, to expose structural similarities between general fiction and the simulation argument. Though the simulation argument is unsound, it seems persuasive, because the argument immerses the reader in a fictive world with the help of tacit assumptions, leveraging just enough common sense to remain compelling while covering over an untestable premise. Simultaneously with the critique of Bostrom’s argument, Chalmers' argument for the matrix hypothesis is assessed on similar criteria. In either case, both arguments rely on an accumulation of assumptions, both implicit and explicit, hiding the premises that are untestable in principle. (shrink)