EMPIRIZMO DOGMŲ KRITIKA: UŽMOJAI IR RIBOS

Author(s): Mindaugas Japertas / Language(s): Lithuanian Issue: 72/2007

The article looks into the recent history of the repudiation of the so-called dogmas of traditional empiricism, starting with “Two Dogmas of Empiricism”, a celebrated paper by Willard V. O. Quine. Quine initiated, but was not to bring to an end, the whole enterprise of debunking and rejecting the untenable dogmas. A few decades later, Donald Davidson found the dualism of the conceptual scheme and empirical content at work in Quine’s own philosophy and labelled it “the third, and perhaps the last,” dogma of empiricism. It was not the last, however. John McDowell, the author of Mind and World, criticized Davidson for succumbing to the dualism of reason and nature, a “dogma” which he claims to be the real source of the familiar dualisms of modern philosophy (surely including the empiricist tradition).

What Was Einstein’s „Biggest Mistake in Life

Author(s): Angel S. Stefanov / Language(s): English,Bulgarian Issue: 4/2016

The aim of this paper is to provide arguments for three claims. The first one refers to Einstein’s philosophical commitment to constructive realism. The second claim concerns the variety of the assessments of his theoretical results and methodology. And the third states that, if Einstein ever made a mistake with respect to his theoretical expectations, it was not his introducing the cosmological constant – which he is said to have confessed as his mistake, but his ontological belief expressed in his famous saying „God does not play dice“.

Ръселовата философска логика: 25 години залози и печалби

Author(s): Denitsa Zhelyazkova,Kristiyan Enchev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2-3/2017

Лингвистичният обрат и раждането на логическия анализ на езика: Готлоб Фреге (1891–1895)

Author(s): Kamen Lozev / Language(s): English,Bulgarian Issue: 6/2018

The paper reveals the changes which took place in Frege’s way of thinking in the years 1891-1895 with regard to some fundamental notions defended in his Begriffsschrift, 1879. The “judgeable content” was rethought in terms of its Sinn (meaning) and Bedeutung (sense or denotation). This change of mind helped Frege explain the epistemological and informative aspects of identity statements and prepared the ground for precise formulation of some of his important conclusions presented in the first volume of his Grundgesetze der Arithmetik, 1893. The paper traces the application of the notions of Sinn and Bedeutung to proper names of objects, concept words and sentences. The author emphasizes Frege’s arguments as to why the Bedeutung of the sentence should be its truth-value.

The Conception of Bernard Bolzano About the Continuum and the Achievements of Contemporary Mathematics

Author(s): Vesselin Petrov / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2004

The present paper is devoted to the contribution of the eminent philosopher and mathematician Bernard Bolzano to the problem of continuum. The paper consists of two parts. In the first part it is compared the conception of Bolzano about the continuum with that of Aristotle. Bolzano’s view includes two essential moments: first, that the continuum is composed of noncontinual elements (points), and second, that two points which are at a certain distance one to other cannot compose a continuum. Aristotle has two definitions about continuity: in the first one he in fact develops the idea of continuity as a physical connectedness, and in the second one he emphasizes the infinite divisibility of the continuum. The second part of the paper gives an evaluation of Bolzano’s contribution to the problem of continuum in comparison with the achievements of the contemporary mathematics on the problem. There is a tendency to consider continuity in two senses: as an infinite divisibility and as a connectedness. The contemporary topology (as a branch of mathematics) develops the concept of continuity in the second sense. Bolzano’s conception bears in some respects the resemblance to the contemporary definitions in topology of the concepts of closeness, neighborhood, isolated point, etc. His definition about the continuum can be considered as a remote precursor of the contemporary topological definition of continuity as connectedness.

Парадигмальні аспекти взаємодії психоанализу й арт-терапії: проблема якісної класифікації психотипів (закінчення)

Author(s): Galina Popoyena Poserezhna / Language(s): Ukrainian Issue: 39/2017

Purpose of Article. The article substantiates the psychological type classification based on universal ontological grounds, and demonstrates an ability to scan psychic characteristics of an individual. Thus, the mentioned idea provides an effective interaction of practices based on the psychoanalysis and art therapy. The certain claim opens the space for the actual interaction of psychoanalytic and art-therapy practices. Methodology. The methodology of the study applies methods of classification and typological analysis as well as integral and symbolic-numeric approaches. Their application allows to reveal the disadvantages of the existing quantitative classifications of psychological types and to offer the universal and qualitative ones instead. Scientific Novelty. The scientific novelty of the article is presented through the fundamentally new method of psychological types classification practice. The approach appeals to the conglomeration of objective psychic modes that form a certain psychological type (altogether there are 16 of them, which are systemically represented). In addition, the logical justification for the selection of mental functions, which are taken into account in the proposed qualitative classification, is provided for the first time. As a result, each person appears as a carrier of an exclusively individual set of specific mental qualities, unique as to their "bouquet," which can be "woven" from objective data, rather than reflections of a psychoanalyst. Conclusions. Only by using a qualitative classification of psychological types, psycho- and art therapy-related practices will develop a strong paradigmatic basis, thus, combining their actual ontological aspects in harmonious coherence, and allowing to accelerate the psychodiagnostic process radically. At the same time, from the scientific and theoretical perspective, the developed method will open new channel of the essence of man as a cosmic phenomenon realization.

Новата монография на Веселин Петров върху Уайтхед

Author(s): Serghey Gherdjikov / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2020

Vesselin Petrov's new book on Whitehead is an analysis of “some specific features of his teachings, such as his views concerning rationality, dynamic holism, things and objects, events, anticipation, creativity, nature, organism, and life” (Petrov, 2019: 7). The book is a real achievement for the genre: a monographic thematical study of a comprehensive author's philosophy as “a philosophy of organism”. Alfred Whitehead is a unique, difficult to understand thinker who introduces new concepts and new meanings of traditional and modern concepts. Prof. Vesselin Petrov is an author of a series of works on Whitehead and processual philosophy and editor of collections of articles on processual philosophy and Whitehead. The author is one of the leaders in modern Whiteheadianism. Professor Petrov has been the Executive Director (2015 – 2017) of the International Process Network. Whitehead is a unique thinker who creates a philosophy entirely of a non-classical type. Whitehead's philosophy is postmodern in the meaning introduced twenty years before French postmodernism as a constructive outcome of Modernism. For Whitehead, unique, modernism proves to be anti-rational. His philosophy is different from both the continental and the analytic.

Derrida, Chomsky and Wittgenstein: Grammatologist / Grammarian / Grammatist

Author(s): Prakash Kona / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2011

That there is no fixed point but point(s) of origin is the point of origin of this essay that begins with a play on the word gram. It could be the Derridean gramme or Chomskyean grammar. It could also be “language-game” meant to bring Wittgenstein into the conversation. I used Alfred Hitchcock’s statement on psychoanalysis taken from the 1945 classic “Spellbound” as a point of “origin” for the discussion on grammar. The statement concentrates on the “origins” of the problems of the mind that psychoanalysis hopes to cure. In using Hitchcock, more of artist of language than a language-theorist, I problematize the idea of origin itself; whether it ought to come from a serious-minded philosopher like Freud - the so-called “right” source or a secondary source such as Hitchcock playing with the Freudean idea of psychoanalysis through his narrative. The origin of discussion thus turns out to be a false start. It serves a purpose in showing the apparent nature of the text that psychoanalysis is a construction like any other discourse that dominated Western philosophy from Plato to the present. Yet origin must exist in the literal sense of the term. Freud did off er psychoanalysis as a form of therapy to open the text to meaning - in this case, the text is the human mind itself. In the process, psychoanalysis itself is a multifaceted text that becomes a stage for the entrance of the gram. The idea is to show philosophy as a narrative; the narrative dimension of philosophy and philosophy itself as a form of narration. From a Derridean perspective, the point of origin is a null, which opens the text to diverse readings. It is both the anarchy of the text as well as silence at the heart of language.

Revitalizacija antičke i srednjovjekovne filozofije u mišljenju Josefa Piepera

Author(s): Franjo Mijatović / Language(s): Croatian Issue: 4/2019

In the article, we will try to present the fundamental meaning and significance of philosophizing, more precisely the philosophical act, of the Christian thinker Josef Pieper. He sees the reason for the revitalization of antique and medieval philosophy in the possibility of a far-wider understanding of the entirety of the world which concerns the entirety of being in all its (non)occurrence. While contemporary philosophy held debates on the truth between hermeneutic and analytical philosophy, Pieper remains loyal to his antique and medieval teachers, especially Plato and Aquinas. Although Pieper’s thought is deeply imbued with thoughts of the said two, it is in no way, which is the aim this article, limited to the mere repetition or compilation of what was said long ago. In this regard, Pieper argues that a tradition, such as the Platonic and the Thomist, can be an example to all other traditions, and serve as the real model of human rational philosophical research, and philosophizing as a possibility of divine-human event in search of the truth.

Математические аспекты архитектурной логики формообразования римского Пантеона

Author(s): Andrey Radzyukevich,Gennadi Grigorenko / Language(s): Russian Issue: 1/2020

The paper tests the methodology of architectural and ethnographic research of the object of material culture-a masterpiece of world architecture of the Roman Pantheon. The method involves performing the proportional-metrological analysis of the forms using the results of three-dimensional laser scanning. The sequence of actions allowing receiving extremely reliable dimensional drawings of necessary elements of an architectural monument is presented. The analysis suggests that the design metrological module of the Pantheon was a Roman foot of 0.445 m. A detailed analysis of the size of the rotunda plan made it possible to confirm the hypothesis that the design was based on the use of an integer analogue of the number "PI" - fraction 22/7. In addition, an integer right triangle 5: 12: 13 could be used to construct the right angle and to determine the basic proportions of the elements of the facade of the portico. Apparently, in the process of designing the forms of the Pantheon, the method of harmonizing elements on the basis of the similarity method with a change in their scale was used

Truth and freedom as the axiological foundations of practicing science at the Lvov-Warsaw School

Author(s): Joanna Zegzuła-Nowak / Language(s): English Issue: 28/2019

The contribution is discussed of the Lvov-Warsaw School (LWS) in determining the axiological dimension of science. By promoting philosophical culture and solid axiological foundations, the School members aspired to imbue the spirit of patriotism and a sense of national community in society. They believed that if science is to serve humanity, it should not develop in an infinite and recalcitrant way. Apart from defining substantive and methodological directives, the LWS scholars regarded it important to draw up axiological frameworks of scientific studies to define their proper tasks and protect them against depreciating factors. Science, in their view, should promote and develop values. As they saw it, science based on clearly defined axiological foundations should not only seek to improve man’s living, but also develop his inner life. Hence, the scholar’s mission should adhere to set values, in particular truth and freedom, imbuing scientific work with the status of crucial and at the same time autonomous field of human activity.

Znaczenie językowe normy prawnej w poznańsko-szczecińskiej szkole teorii prawa w świetle pragmatyzmu analitycznego

Author(s): Wojciech Rzepiński / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2019

The author first reconstructs standpoints adopted by the scholars from the Poznan-Szczecin school of legal theory regarding the linguistic meaning of a legal norm. This reconstruction allows certain dilemmas related to the adoption of analytic philosophy in the theory of law to be visualized. In the next section of the article, attention is paid to the influence of Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz’s philosophy on the understanding of linguistic meaning within the School. The problem of linguistic meaning may be explained by the definition of equivalence, the core of which is a set of directives of a specific language. Finally, the author comments on the theses of Robert B. Brandom’s analytic pragmatism and the application of the latter to legal theory of Maciej Dybowski. Analytic pragmatism extends semantic research through an attempt to understand practice-related conditions.

Schmerzlokalisation und Körperraum

Author(s): Mihai Ometiță / Language(s): German Issue: 1/2020

The paper brings a challenge to Cartesian dualism, while introducing some under-explored manuscript remarks from Wittgenstein’s middle period, which are methodologically and thematically akin to some passages from Merleau-Ponty’s early period. Cartesian dualism relegates pain to mental awareness and location to bodily extension, thus rendering common localizations of pain throughout the body as unintelligible ascriptions. Wittgenstein’s and Merleau-Ponty’s attempts at doing justice to common localizations of pain are mutually illuminating. In their light, Cartesian dualism turns out to involve an objectification and a deappropriation of one’s body. Moreover, Wittgenstein’s unveiling a heterogeneous multiplicity of corporeal spaces (e.g. visual-space, tactile-space, feeling-space) rehabilitates the view, reinforced by Merleau-Ponty, that corporeal pain is intimately related to corporeal localization, while corporeal space is not part of the physical space of things.

Емоционално-наративното съществуване

Author(s): Chavdar Dimitrov / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 5/2020

The article is about a dimension, referable by the concepts of ‘affectivity’, ‘emotionality’ and ‘sensitivity’. The issue addresses both the “disorder of habitual complicity with the world” and the fact that “our acting, talking, feeling and thinking begins as a response to ‘something’ indeterminable that comes from elsewhere”, i.e. to the narrative life experience in which there is enduring/undergoing or “being overwhelmed“ (Sabeva 2016: 241, 244). The subject-matter sets the task of explaining a common field. At its basis, sensitivity is the initial appearance of behaviors and things, because moods (Stimmungen) “throw” us or co-constitute us in the world; emotions are part of our worldly comportment where potential narrativity is equally important. Social attitude, which has its origin in existential “disposedness” (Heidegger 2005: §§ 29–31), sharеs some extraordinaries and gaps. In this process a limit of the self is reached, when one accepts the inevitability of what is being experienced, and self-understanding becomes alienated from one’s own position. The claim of the research is to add a point to the understanding of social integration in interdisciplinary studies.

The Basics of Neo-Realist Cosmology: Bertrand Russell against Alfred North Whitehead

Author(s): Andrii Synytsia / Language(s): English Issue: 25/2020

The article presents a comparative analysis of neo-realist views of Russell and Whitehead on cosmology in the first decades of the 20th century. It is noted that despite the similarity of the basic theoretical and methodological principles of their philosophizing, these thinkers formulated philosophical-cosmological conceptions that differed significantly from each other. The reason for this was that Russell, at the epistemological level, used the theory of degrees of certainty, and on the logical one he developed the theory of descriptions, but Whitehead, in contrast, was a supporter of the theory of critical realism in epistemology and the method of extensive abstraction in logic. All this influenced the former to pay more attention to the questions of analysis and, accordingly, to use the basic concepts of facts, logical atoms, and propositions, and the latter to focus on the question of synthesis and to consider the structure of being through the prism of concepts of actual entities, eternal objects and prehension. Hence the world for Russell is a static formation (set of events), and we only need to define its laws, and for the Whitehead world is a dynamic formation (set of processes), the laws of which still need to be understood. It is emphasized that as a result, Russell’s cosmology rejected the previous metaphysics, but Whitehead’s cosmology aimed at finding the origins of modern cosmology in the writings of early thinkers. Nevertheless, it is argued that the cosmological teachings of both had a significant influence on the development of analytic philosophy.

Conjoining and the Weak/Strong Quantifier Distinction

Author(s): John Collins / Language(s): English Issue: 60/2020

Pietroski’s model of semantic composition is introduced and compared to the standard type hierarchy. Particular focus is then given to Pietroski’s account of quantification. The question is raised of how the model might account for the weak/strong distinction in natural language quantification. A number of options are addressed and one proposal is tentatively recommended.

Generative Linguistics Meets Normative Inferentialism: Part 1

Author(s): David Pereplyotchik / Language(s): English Issue: 60/2020

This is the first installment of a two-part essay. Limitations of space prevented the publication of the full essay in present issue of the Journal. The second installment will appear in the next issue, 2021 (1). My overall goal is to outline a strategy for integrating generative linguistics with a broadly pragmatist approach to meaning and communication. Two immensely useful guides in this venture are Robert Brandom and Paul Pietroski. Squarely in the Chomskyan tradition, Pietroski’s recent book, Conjoining Meanings, offers an approach to natural-language semantics that rejects foundational assumptions widely held amongst philosophers and linguists. In particular, he argues against extensionalism— the view that meanings are (or determine) truth and satisfaction conditions. Having arrived at the same conclusion by way of Brandom’s deflationist account of truth and reference, I’ll argue that both theorists have important contributions to make to a broader anti-extensionalist approach to language. What appears here as Part 1 of the essay is largely exegetical, laying out what I see as the core aspects of Brandom’s normative inferentialism (§1) and Pietroski’s naturalistic semantics (§2). In Part 2 (next issue), I argue that there are many convergences between these two theoretical frameworks and, contrary to first appearances, very few points of substantive disagreement between them. If the integration strategy that I propose is correct, then what appear to be sharply contrasting commitments are better seen as interrelated verbal differences that come down to different—but complementary—explanatory goals. The residual disputes are, however, stubborn. I end by discussing how to square Pietroski’s commitment to predicativism with Brandom’s argument that a predicativist language is in principle incapable of expressing ordinary conditionals.

WE WILL FIGURE IT OUT. KNOW-HOW, HYBRID WAYS, AND COMMUNICATIVE (INTER)ACTIONS

Author(s): Ion Copoeru,Adrian Luduşan / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2020

The goal of this paper is primarily to pinpoint some substantial analytical and conceptual difficulties with the account of knowledge how proposed by (Stanley & Williamson, Knowing How, 2001) [henceforth S&W] and (Stanley, Knowing (How), 2011), (Stanley, Know How, 2011) based on (Groenendijk & Stokhof, 1984) [henceforth G&S] semantic analysis of embedded questions. In light of such difficulties, (1) we propose supplementing their account with an integrated approach of knowledge how, and suggest adding a mereological layer to the semantic framework of embedded questions (2) we argue that the characteristics of what we call ‘hybrid ways’ and ‘hybrid knowledge’ strongly indicate reopening the issue of the proper account of questions towards the complementary relevant account of interrogation in communicative interactions, and the role of the context (in)forming knowledge-how. As a methodological principle, we remain neutral on the intellectualist vs anti-intellectualist debate. We also remain silent on the nature and explanation of the modes of presentations or ways of thinking that should be developed in order to adequately account for hybrid ways and hybrid knowledge.

On the impossibility of phenomenological langugage in the context of Wittgensteins manuscripts from 1929-1933

Author(s): Georgy Chernavin / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2021

The article treats Ludwig Wittgenstein’s manuscripts and typescripts where he formulates the problemof impossibility of “phenomenological language” defined by him as the “description of immediate sensual perception without any hypothetical supplementation.” One may find this phase of his philosophy(1929–1933) a bit paradoxical because the philosopher claims this phase, from the very beginning,to have been overcome; we deal here with philosophical self-criticism. The Lewis Carroll’s paradox isconsidered in terms of analogy to this criticized project of “phenomenological language”—the paradoxof a ridiculously exact map which coincides with the mapped area. We open up new possibilities forcomparison between the Wittgensteinian project of the “primal language” and Husserlian, Heideggerian and Finkian projects of “phenomenological language.”

Wittgenstein and the Pseudo-Problem of Evil

Author(s): Zoheir Bagheri Noaparast / Language(s): English Issue: 55/2021

Theists believe that our world was created by an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent God. If God with such traits creates a world, we would expect that the world to have certain features. Such features should be compatible with God’s traits. We do not expect a God who is omnipotent and omniscient to create a poorly-designed world. If we believe that our world is created by God with the aforementioned traits and yet our world is poorly designed, we would either abandon our belief that our world was created by God or we would preserve our belief. If we wish to preserve our belief we would either revise the traits we attribute to him, or we would find a way to justify the co-existence of God with such traits as the creator and a poorly-designed world. In the history of philosophy one feature of our world has been subject to a great many debates, namely ‘evil’. By evil we have all the pain and sufferings that sentient beings go through. God is said to be omnibenevolent, as a result he would not want us to go through pain and suffering. He is also omniscient and omnipotent and therefore he has the knowledge and power to do so. Yet we are facing pain and suffering in this world. For the theists reconciling the existing evil in this world with God is a great challenge and atheists try to argue from evil and prove the non-existence of God. The debate between theists and atheists surrounding the problem of evil presupposes a certain conception of God. The presupposition is that God is a person who possesses a mind, will power and has a moral character. For Wittgenstein attributing personhood to God is a confusion. As a result, for Wittgenstein there can be no ‘problem of evil’ and the debates between the theists and atheists is not engaging with a real problem but a pseudo-problem. The problem of evil does not need a solution and smart arguments and counter-arguments, rather it needs therapy.