In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Guide to Personal Knowledge: The Philosophy of Michael Polanyi: Tacit Knowledge, Emergence and the Fiduciary Program by Dániel Paksi and Mihály HéderAlessio TartaroPAKSI, Dániel and Mihály Héder. Guide to Personal Knowledge: The Philosophy of Michael Polanyi: Tacit Knowledge, Emergence and the Fiduciary Program. Wilmington, Del.: Vernon Press, 2022. xxiii + 209 pp. Cloth, $65.00Famous for the concept of "tacit knowledge," Polanyi is a figure who looms over twentieth-century (...) philosophy without ever establishing himself as one of its major protagonists. Yet, Polanyi tackled central problems in twentieth-century Western philosophy and offered [End Page 358] insightful and original analyses thereof. In Personal Knowledge, Polanyi articulates ideas about metaphysics, mathematics, evolution, philosophy and sociology of science, epistemology, philosophy of language, political theory, theology, and more. The richness of the contents, but also their deep unity, make Polanyi's work a unique piece in the philosophical landscape of his time, full of fruitful insights that are still relevant nowadays.Guide to Personal Knowledge, written by two of the leading experts on Polanyi's philosophy, deserves the merit of providing an accessible introduction to this complex work. The book is divided into thirteen chapters, each corresponding to the respective chapter of Personal Knowledge. In each chapter, Paksi and Héder clearly explain Polanyi's main ideas, presenting them in the same order as they appear in Personal Knowledge. The chapters are introduced by a "Goals of the chapter" section that provides a series of key points, where the authors summarize Polanyi's objectives in the corresponding chapter of Personal Knowledge.The Guide is interspersed with many direct quotations from Personal Knowledge that allow the reader to link the Guide to the original text. The use of figures and tables illuminates even the most complex concepts, such as "tacit integration" and the difference between "random and ordered systems." The Guide is enriched by twenty-five boxes that provide information on ideas, authors, and concepts directly or indirectly referenced by Polanyi in Personal Knowledge. These boxes are a valuable supplement. In some cases, they offer insight into contemporary events, theories, and scholars to which Polanyi alludes but that he does not elaborate on, for example, about the role of the Michelson-Morley experiments in Einstein's development of the theory of relativity. In other cases, boxes develop a comparison between Polanyi's ideas and related philosophical figures, such as Thomas Kuhn and Samuel Alexander. Thanks to the boxes, the reader gains a richer and more complete view of Polanyi's thought.In the preface, Paksi and Héder preliminarily introduce some key concepts for understanding Polanyi's work, including "objectivity," "trust" and "fiduciary program," "tacit knowledge," "intellectual passions," "deceptive substitution," "moral inversion," "operational principles," "logic of achievement," and "emergence." Their analysis always proves faithful to Polanyi's thought, and the authors show how these concepts are interrelated and constitute the pillars of Personal Knowledge's argumentative structure. Other equally crucial concepts in Polanyi's work, for example, "commitment," "indwelling," "tradition," "conviviality," "anthropogenesis," "ultrabiology," are not introduced in the preface, but they are explored in depth in the respective chapters.The thirteen chapters of the book recapitulate in detail the main thematic segments of Personal Knowledge. The critique of objectivism and positivist views of science is explained and analyzed in chapters 1 to 4. This critique is articulated on several levels. Polanyi first criticizes [End Page 359] objectivism because it attempts to remove the personal element from scientific knowledge in order to pursue ever higher degrees of formalism, neutrality, and impersonality. Polanyi asserts, however, that the personal element is irreducible, and then proceeds to demonstrate how it operates: in the evaluation of probability statements (chapter 2), in the appreciation of ordered patterns (chapter 3), and in the practice of skills (chapter 4). The ineliminability of the personal element shows that objectivism is false. Paksi and Héder brilliantly retrace the train of thought that leads Polanyi to this conclusion.The second theme that runs across Personal Knowledge concerns the tacit foundation of human intellectual abilities and, consequently, of science and society. In chapter 6, the authors follow Polanyi's disparate arguments about animal intelligence, human... (shrink)

Starting in 1946, Polanyi begins to criticize a comprehensive system of ideas that he names positivism. His criticism is twofold. On the one hand, it has the narrow aim of pointing out the inconsistencies of a positivist account of science, according to which the essence of scientific objec­tivity lies in establishing rigorous mathematical relations between measured variables employing fixed rules. On the other hand, it examines the broad assumptions underlying this view, namely radical empiricism and skeptical doubt. The present paper (...) analyzes both aspects of this criticism, stressing its crucial role in the development of Polanyi’s philosophy. (shrink)

What is the hallmark of success in human–agent interaction? In animation and robotics, many have concentrated on the looks of the agent — whether the appearance is realistic or lifelike. We present an alternative benchmark that lies in the dyad and not the agent alone: Does the agent’s behavior evoke intersubjectivity from the user? That is, in both conscious and unconscious communication, do users react to behaviorally realistic agents in the same way they react to other humans? Do users appear (...) to attribute similar thoughts and actions? We discuss why we distinguish between appearance and behavior, why we use the benchmark of intersubjectivity, our methodology for applying this benchmark to embodied conversational agents, and why we believe this benchmark should be applied to human–robot interaction. (shrink)

Digital Earth applications provide a common ground for visualizing, simulating, and modeling real-world situations. The potential of Digital Earth applications has increased significantly with the evolution of artificial intelligence systems and the capacity to collect and process complex amounts of geospatial data. Yet, the widespread techno-optimism at the root of Digital Earth must now confront concerns over high-risk artificial intelligence systems and power asymmetries of a datafied society. In this commentary, we claim that not only can current debates about data (...) governance and ethical artificial intelligence inform development in the field of Digital Earth, but that the specificities of geospatial data, together with the expectations surrounding Digital Earth applications, offer a fruitful lens through which to examine current debates on data governance and artificial intelligence ethics. In particular, we argue that for the implementation of ethical artificial intelligence and inclusive approaches to data governance, Digital Earth initiatives need to involve stakeholders and communities at the local level and be sensitive to social, legal, cultural, and institutional contexts, including conflicts that might arise within those contexts. (shrink)

A close reading of Theogony 116-133, showing the logic of opposites and of whole/part relations that governs Hesiod's account of cosmogenesis, refuting the traditional interpretation of the birth of Chaos as the split between heaven and earth, and providing evidence that Hesiod considered and decided against making Tartaros the parent of the cosmos.

The essay considers synthetically the passages of Hesiod’s Theogony concerning Khaos, Gaia, Uranòs, and Tàrtaros as describing the cosmic structure at its very beginning and at its present state. The final result of the cosmogenetic process consists of three solid parallel disks of equal size separated from one another by the space of Khaos/Aèr. The whole structure is conceived of as an ideal cylinder, whose superior base is Uranòs, the inferior one is Tàrtaros and the median section is Gaia, dividing (...) the whole cylinder into two high semicylinders full of Khaos/Aèr. From this Khaos/Aèr, the primal Four Elements derive, as plants do from their roots, from which all other substances of the universe originate in turn. Thus, Khaos is arkhè not only in the chronological-historical sense, but also in the sense of an eternal generative substance of all things. We may conclude that the Hesiodic word khaos is a lexical ancestor of the later physical and philosophical term hyle because it conveys the primeval notion of ‘matter’. (shrink)

A close study of Hesiod's understanding of the birth of Chaos as the beginning of the cosmos, in which I (1) show why this beginning is better interpreted as the differentiation of earth from Tartaros than as the splitting of earth from sky, (2) explicate the differentiation on three levels that structures the cosmos, and (3) reflect on the semantic and ethical implications that may have led Hesiod to this vision of the cosmos.

A close study of Hesiod's understanding of the birth of Chaos as the beginning of the cosmos, in which I (1) show why this beginning is better interpreted as the differentiation of earth from Tartaros than as the splitting of earth from sky, (2) explicate the differentiation on three levels that structures the cosmos, and (3) reflect on the semantic and ethical implications that may have led Hesiod to this vision of the cosmos.

The supraconfessional spirit, very characteristic of the Ottoman world, which tended to regroup many different elements, and was based on the universal conviction, according to which all religions are valued and competed for the same purposes, still resonates in the Balkans. A significant example, that in this article is analyzed from the perspective of the phenomenon of shared holiness and as a mirror of diverse influences, is an icon of Bulgaria, the unusual Islamic-Christian representation of the Virgin and Child, which (...) was recently located in a village where, apart from the «Turks» and Bulgarians, there are still living descendants of the Don Cossacks, who are ethnically Russian. (shrink)

A close examination of the implicit logic that guides Hesiod's account of the genesis of the cosmos in the Theogony 116-133, with special attention to his choice of Chaos as the first born and to the logical relations between opposites and between whole and parts as these emerge within, as the structuring principles of, Hesiod's ordering of the births of cosmic elements.