Еротичната валидност на истината като междуиндивиден феномен

Author(s): Nevena Krumova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 6/2015

This text attempts to clarify relations between love and truth, and the nature of that which is true – not in the sense of the truth about Being but as „the concept of truth in the intrasubjectivity of the existences“. The study is oriented to the late texts of Sartre and his attempts to deploy his ideas after Being and Nothingness. The article also draws parallels between objectivated and nonobjectivated fear and non-objectivated Eros searching for the relation between the non-objectivity of Eros and the erotic validity of the truth. The text goes no further than the interpretative level and is not focused on language prior to the object.

Срещи на исляма с модерността

Author(s): Stefan Penov / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 6/2015

Legacy of the Ancients: Plato on the Self

Author(s): Chris Tasie Osegenwune / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2016

Early traits of moral subjectivism can be gleaned from some of Plato’s dialogues with the emphasis on the “self.” The Socratic injunction “man know thyself” provided a stimulus for self-examination and self-awareness, which spring from human subjectivity. The Republic, Plato’s greatest dialogue, a magisterial masterpiece, recognized truth, value, and reality as fluctuating as they relate to the physical world. However, he gave much credence to the forms or ideas as the real reality. Plato recognized the centrality of human subjectivity—the contemplative intellect which grasps the forms—as the basis of truth, value, and intelligibility in the physical world. His accommodation of objectivity and subjectivity is an eloquent testimony to the centrality of duality not only in the everyday reality of humanity, but also in the decision making process in world affairs. For Plato, subjectivity is grounded in “theory of justice,” the recognition that communication, understanding, and cooperation are required for harmony and peaceful coexistence to subsist in the human community. Not adhering to Plato’s theory of justice, which stipulates the need for specialization of functions—i.e., one man, one job—is injustice, and does not encourage peace and stability. This paper recognizes the need to go beyond Plato’s presentation of moral objectivism as an independent realm of reality to moral subjectivity. This is the task of a philosophy that recognizes the importance of the idea of human freedom and the attainment of a stable society.

Process Ontology in an Eastern Perspective, with Special Reference to Zhuangzi

Author(s): Desislava Damyanova / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2016

The transience of being in the Chinese context—and specifically within Daoist texts—has been the subject of scholarly attention both as a philosophical theme and as a social phenomenon. Dao is the mystery that makes nature “the way it is.” It can mean process, pattern, or existence. Eastern thinkers tend to find truth in every perspective, pursuing the middle way, and they stress mutual dependence—Zhuangzi’s “equality of things,” the “axis of Dao,” etc. The Chinese sages tend to harbor an optimistic outlook that, however opposed divergent views may appear, in the end they are bound to harmonize and complement one another. Humans can unite themselves with the way they live. There are three threads at work in Zhuangzi’s thought: (1) The principle of equality: all things are equal or have relative parity. Each has its own merit, even that which seems deformed or useless to humans. (2) The principle of difference: each thing is unique and exists in itself in accordance with the Dao. (3) The principle of transformation. The only constant is that myriad beings are always transforming and becoming.

A lét és a jó egysége Augustinus filozófiájában

Author(s): Amália Soós / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2019

The aim of this paper is to sketch some of the philosophical guidelines of Augustine’s thinking on the problems of good, evil and being. Starting with the early Cassiciacum dialogues, the research continues with the dialog On the Free Will and the anti-Manichaean treatise about the nature of good, focusing mainly on the Neoplatonic influence concerning the idea of unity and on the ways Manichaean doctrines justify the vivacity of Augustine’s philosophical thoughts on good and evil.

The Highlights of Descartes’ Epistemology (An Introduction)

Author(s): Przemysław Gut,Arkadiusz Gut / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

Descartes (and Spinoza) on Intellectual Experience and Skepticism

Author(s): John Carriero / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

Descartes’s epistemology is rooted in his profound interest in and respect for what might be called intellectual experience, especially lucid intellectual experience. (Lucid intellectual experience is my term for what Descartes calls perceiving clearly and distinctly.) This interest, it seems to me, was shared by Descartes’s rationalist successors Spinoza and Leibniz. In the first part of this paper, I locate the phenomenon of lucid intellectual experience, focusing on Descartes and Spinoza. I try to show if we do not give enough attention to the character of such experience, we risk losing touch with a central motivation behind their respective epistemologies. In the second part of the paper, I consider intellectual experience in the context of skeptical doubt, particularly radical doubt. Although Descartes and Spinoza are often taken to be opposed here, I think they share more than is commonly appreciated.

Epistemic Functions of Intuition in Descartes

Author(s): Monika Walczak / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

The topic of the paper is the notion of intuition in Descartes’ philosophy and its epistemic functions. Descartes introduces his notion of intuition in the context of a description of his method and process of knowing and doing science. Intuition is a significant component of this process. I intend to show that the main epistemic functions of intuition in Descartes’ philosophy are differentiated. Intuition is essential not only in the context of justification (the Cartesian synthetic method of proof) but also and especially in the context of discovery (the Cartesian analytic method of discovery). It plays not only a role in the foundation of the cogito but also on different stages of constructing the system of knowledge. Intuition has important functions in grasping simple natures, forming primary concepts, comprehending complex natures, forming primary propositions (including primary principles), and capturing relationships between them and building deductive reasoning (the role of intuition in deduction). Hence, intuition is the foundation for all primary stages of producing knowledge. It is active and important element of pure thinking (a priori) in human knowledge, and science. It fulfils these functions due to its specific epistemic properties. I also argue that intuition is not an autonomous and complete type of knowledge. Nor is it an intuitive thesis, but rather the basis of a justification for theses (including the cogito).

The Epistemic Significance of Current Clear and Distinct Perceptions in Descartes’ Epistemology

Author(s): Przemysław Gut / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

In this article, I discuss the epistemic role that Descartes believed was played in knowledge construction by current clear and distinct perceptions (the ideas or propositions which appear most evident to us when we are attending to them). In recent literature, we can find two interpretations about the epistemic status and function of current clear and distinct perceptions in Descartes’ epistemology. The first may be called the psychological, the second normative. The latter states that current clear and distinct perceptions are utterly immune to all doubt, even before God’s existence is proven and the general rule of truth is established. Thus, their certainty is for Descartes not merely psychological, but normative. I endorse the normative interpretation for a number of what I believe to be cogent reasons. However, there are also some difficulties with it. Therefore, after presenting positive arguments for the interpretation (sections I–IV) I discuss the difficulties of textual and substantive nature that the normative interpretation needs to address if it is to be upheld (sections V–VI).

The Curious Sensations of Pain, Hunger and Thirst. Reliabilism in the Second Part of Descartes’ Sixth Meditation

Author(s): Stefaan E. Cuypers / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

This paper discusses the epistemic status of bodily sensations—especially the sensations of pain, hunger and thirst—in the second part of Descartes’ Sixth Meditation. It is argued that this part is an integral component of Descartes overall purely epistemological project in the Meditations. Surprisingly perhaps, in contrast with his standardly taken infallible, internalist and foundationalist position, Descartes adopts a fallibilist, externalist and reliabilist position as regards the knowledge and beliefs based on bodily sensations. The argument for this conclusion is justified by an analysis of both the criterion of nature’s teachings and the concept of true errors of nature in terms of Wilfrid Sellars’ distinction between the logical space of reasons and the empirical space of causes.

Cartesian Social Epistemology? Contemporary Social Epistemology and Early Modern Philosophy

Author(s): Amy M. Schmitter / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

Many contemporary social epistemologists take themselves to be combatting an individualist approach to knowledge typified by Descartes. Although I agree that Descartes presents an individualist picture of scientific knowledge, he does allow some practical roles for reliance on the testimony and beliefs of others. More importantly, however, his reasons for committing to individualism raise important issues for social epistemology, particularly about how reliance on mere testimony can propagate prejudices and inhibit genuine understanding. The implications of his views are worked out more fully by some of his immediate successors; I examine how François Poulain de la Barre, and (briefly) Mary Astell analyze the social conditions for epistemic agency in a Cartesian vein.

Thomas Hobbes’s Elements of Law and His Third Objections to Descartes’s Meditations

Author(s): Krzysztof Wawrzonkowski / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

In this article I endeavour to present the axis of the dispute between Hobbes and Descartes on the ground of Meditation, and its most important moments. I focus primarily on the analysis of the most important accusations made by Hobbes and the reconstruction of some of his views, which at the time could only be found in The Elements of Law, Nature, and Politics. This work was the first major and coherent attempt to speak out on cognitive-theory and social issues; I strive to defend the thesis that understanding the content of Objections requires knowledge of this work. The mature form of the work shows that the Englishman already had his views well thought-out and could feel quite confident in formulating from their perspective critical remarks on Descartes’s philosophy, to which, it seems, he may have owed quite a lot.

The Cartesianism and Anti-Cartesianism of Locke’s Concept of Personal Identity

Author(s): Adam Grzeliński / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

This article focuses on the relationship between the conceptions of personal identity presented by Descartes and by Locke. Contrary to common readings, I claim that the difference between them cannot be reduced to a simple contrast between rational substantialism and genetic empiricism. Locke does not resign from the substantialist position but delimits the two spheres: natural cognition with its foundation in experience and philosophical speculations, in which he tries to present a rational interpretation of religious dogmas which is consistent with his epistemological programme. Locke’s criticism is directed against the Cartesian notion of a thinking thing as a substance independent of the body and his description of the differentiation of experience and his depiction of human subjectivity is expanded in relation to Cartesian philosophy: personal identity gains explication at four complementary levels: psychological, biological, socio-legal, and religious.

„Süße des Lebens“, „Schmecken des Schönen“ und höchstes Gelingen. Hêdonê und Eudaimonia bei Aristoteles

Author(s): Ralf Elm / Language(s): German Issue: 1/2020

The topic of the phenomena joy, lust or pleasure (hêdonê) is repeatedly astonishing and at the same time a quite ambivalent field for Aristotle. His numerous statements about the hedônê made throughout the work, his basic definitions and systematic analyzes, in particular the two so-called pleasure treatises in the 7th and 10th book of Nicomachean Ethics and their consideration in the examination of emotions in the second book of Rhetoric are very stimulating. In my lecture, I would first like to (I) visualize some of the phenomenal diversity that Aristotle had in mind. In a second step (II) I will briefly introduce Aristotle’s engagement with anti-hedonism in his first treatise (EN VII 12-15) and introduce his understanding of pleasure as “unhindered activity”. This is then deepened in the third section (III) with Aristotle’s second treatise on pleasure (in EN X 1-5) and his second suggestion of pleasure as a “perfection that comes to perfection”. That self-referential relationships always play a role in lust and displeasure, for which the elementary corporeality is just as important as the intersubjectivity of friendships (for example, in the context of Aristotle’s political philosophy) is addressed in the final section (IV).

What is a World? Deception, Possibility, and the Uses of Fiction from Cervantes to Descartes

Author(s): Justin E. H. Smith / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2016

In this short essay I will aim to show that literary fiction is consistently at the vanguard of the exploration of philosophical problems relating to the concept of world, while what we think of as philosophy, in the narrower sense, typically arrives late on the scene, picking up themes that have already been explored in literary texts that are explicitly intended as exercises of the imagination. I will pursue this argument with a sustained investigation of the shared aims and methods of Miguel de Cervantes and René Descartes.

Leibniz and Calvino, Possible Worlds and Possible Cities, Philosophy and Fiction

Author(s): Ohad Nachtomy / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2016

Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities presents a wide array of possible cities—cities whose composition turns on a productive ambiguity of their being described or invented by Marco Polo in his conversations with Kublai Khan. Implicit in this book is also a theory about how all possible cities are composed. The method turns on decompos¬ing a city down to its basic elements and recomposing it in different ways through the imagination. I argue that there is a close affinity between Calvino’s theory of fictional cities and Leibniz’s theory of possible worlds. The main similarity is that both theories are combinatorial—they suppose that possibilities are produced by combination and variation of basic elements. The paper presents Leibniz’s theory of possibility in its metaphysical context and explores the similarity (as well as some differences) with Calvino’s cities in their literary context. I suggest that there is a rather strong relation between the theory of literary fiction implicit in Invisible Cities and Leibniz’s theory of possibility, in that both define the possible in terms of the conceivable. Indeed, Leibniz often refers to literary examples to substantiate his position, and I argue that this reveals an essential feature of his theory.

Renaissance Averroism and Its Aftermath: Arabic Philosophy in Early Modern Europe, ed. by Anna Akasoy and Guido Giglioni, Dordrecht: Springer, 2013, 405 pp.

Author(s): Lucian Petrescu / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2016

-

THE ENLIGHTENMENT EPISTEMOLOGY AND ITS WARNING AGAINST THE INSTRUMENTALISATION OF SCIENCE

Author(s): Ana Bazac / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

The paper is written in order to demonstrate the lack of soundness of the present counter-Enlightenment attacks against reason and science. The characterisation of Enlightenment cannot only refer to the logical consequences of the universally manifested reason –(the wishful thoughts about) the humans‘ education and educability and thus the changing the world for the better –without substantiating them. Kant has substantiated the Enlightenment epistemology that supports even today the human endeavour to live in a better world. As the purpose of the analysis is the epistemological way of comprehension –i.e. the rational all the way, coherent to the end, thus the scientific questioning of the premises of every theory –the paper thus features only a selection from among the coryphaei of the Enlightenment movement. It starts from Kant‘s ―Copernican revolution‖ –a metaphor used by him that may rightfully be employed in order to evaluate his philosophy –which, in the view expressed here, consists in the interdependence of the constructivist epistemology and the categorical imperative ethics. Actually, and this is the thesis promoted here, this epistemology and this ethics constitute a continuous and unique structure and just this unitary epistemological-ethical structure, called here even the Enlightenment epistemology, is the basis of the Enlightenment perspective and theory of comprehension. But this perspective and comprehension form a methodological pattern for the approach of the world and for the reason to be of the human knowledge. Thus, the paper is not a simple reminder of an old page of the history of philosophy. And neither should the history of philosophy be thought of as an evolution of ideas, where there would exist just a simple transmission and taking over of the relay from one paramount theory to another and where at one time or another the respective preponderant theory would exist alone. The Enlightenment pattern was not the only one when it appeared, and so much less today. The epistemological analysis of some contemporary facts emphasizes the contradictory views expressed within the Enlightenment and counter-Enlightenment manners. There are presented Enlightenment type arguments and anti-Enlightenment arguments, put face to face. Thus, the paper shows that the Enlightenment perspective and understanding defeat the counter-Enlightenment attacks and they outline a methodological framework for the current interpretation of science and technology.

Schellingovo samorazumijevanje u povijesti filozofije

Author(s): Kristijan Gradečak / Language(s): Croatian Issue: 01/157/2020

Schelling begreift seine eigene Stellung in der Philosophiegeschichte auf zweifache Weise: mit seinem Frühwerk hat er zu der Entwicklung der negativen Philosophie oder der Philosophie der absoluten Identität beigetragen, so dass sie vollends ihre Verwandlung in die positive Philosophie vollziehen könnte. Parallel dazu hat er an der Begründung und Entwicklung der geschichtlichen bzw. Philosophie der Offenbarung gearbeitet. Letztere ist auch wirklicher Inhalt der positiven Philosophie. Diese Auffassung über die Begrenztheit der rationalen Philosophie kann man im gesammten Schellingschen Werk bestätigen, unabhänging von der Entstehungszeit einzelner Schriften. Deshalb ist man durchaus berechtigt auch in dem früheren Werk zumindest die methodische Vorbereitung zur positiven Philosophie zu betrachten. Demzufolge sieht Schelling seine eigene Rolle in der Philosophiegeschiche als eine vermittelnde und endlich den Parallelismus zwischen der unüberwältigten negativen und unrealisierten positiven Philosophie auflösende.

Revisiting Ingarden’s Theoretical Biological Account of the Literary Work of Art: is the Computer Game an "Organism"?

Author(s): Matthew E. Gladden / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

From his earliest published writings to his last, Roman Ingarden displayed an interest in theoretical biology and its efforts to clarify what distinguishes living organisms from other types of entities. However,many of his explorations of such issues are easily overlooked, because they don’t appear in works that are primarily ontological, metaphysical, or anthropological in nature but are “hidden” within his works on literary aesthetics, where Ingarden sought to define the nature of living organisms in order tocompare literary works to such entities. This article undertakes a historical textual analysis that traces the evolution of Ingarden’s thought regarding the nature of the literary work of art as an organism-like entity and uncovers its links with the simultaneous development of his systems theory and its central concept of the “relatively isolated system”: for Ingarden, a literary work and an organism are each a systematically transforming, “living,” functional-structural whole that comprises a system of hierarchically arranged and partially isolated (yet interdependent) elements whose harmonious interaction allows the literary work or organism to fulfill its chief function. Having completed that historical analysis, we test Ingarden’s assessment of works of art as organism-like entities in a novel context by investigating the organism-like qualities of the contemporary computer game; insofar as their AI-driven behavior displays a form of agency, such games might appear to be even more “alive” than traditional works of art. We show that Ingarden’s conceptual framework provides a useful tool for understanding the“organicity” of such games as works of art, despite the fact that they differ qualitatively from those art forms with which Ingarden was directly familiar.