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Fundamental sciences study the basic laws of nature, and they, first of all, include physics and other related sciences. The status of these sciences determines the plausibility of our knowledge and presupposes the directions and prognoses of further development. The analysis of the present condition of fundamental sciences, or of their condition in the last decades, shows that there are some indications of crisis. The symptoms of crisis have different roots, we mention only some of them: methodological, epistemological, ontological and pragmatic. We are first of all interested in the state of crisis caused by the impossibility of forming one single fundamental science, realized through single fundamental physics. Early in the last century there occurred a paradigmatic change of fundamental science patterned in Einstein’s Special and General Theory of Relativity as well as in Bohr’s and Heisneberg’s quantum mechanics. These two concepts in many parts are not compatible and further development of science aimed at reconciling these two worldviews, and at giving one single theory. But this did not prove feasible till the present day and the cause lies in a deep ontological difference, that is, in different conceptions of physical reality. In this short paper one will try and give indications of these differences which can induce us to the conclusion that we are dealing with a deep crisis; and if these diagnoses are correct, a simple question poses itself: is an end of the fundamental science showing through, and at the same time the end of science in general or whether we have a new beginning?
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The text has two parts: historical and a systematical. In the first one, main theses on subjectivity are briefly traced throughout the entire history of Western philosophy (from Plato to Heidegger), which is generally determined as ‘self-empowering of subjectivity’. Greater attention is given to early German philosophical Romanticism. In the second part, the structure of subjectivity is sketched. Subjectivity is acomplex notion, the descriptive determinations of which are personhood, individuality and privacy. What makes these to be the instances of subjectivity – is the self-consciousness. In general the text deals with the main question: What is subjectivity, and what is its relationship with self-consciousness and self-knowledge?
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It belongs to the peculiarity of reason, that its principle eludes our thinking in which reason manifests itself. The problematic accessibility of what should be most evident for our thinking leads to a phenomenology of concealment. But how then can thinking begin, how can its foundations be laid? This motif marks the beginning of philosophy: e.g. in Plato’s Republic and in Aristotle’s Metaphysics. The essay traces the intellectual work on this motif of concealment of what is best known per se and the associated problem of the foundation of thinking following the discourse in Latin philosophy in the 13th–15th century. Taking the example of Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure, Meister Eckhart and Nicholas of Cusa we can perceive very different answers to this question. Cusanus calls the attempt to capture what eludes our thinking the hunt for wisdom, which originates from the natural desire of human reason.
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The current paper examines the phenomena of contingency and necessity with respect to causality presented by Thomas Aquinas mainly in Summa Theologica. According to Aquinas, the first cause (God) is active in the natural actions of things through the secondary causes of nature. Nature is considered as a certain kind of art (the divine art), impressed upon things, by which these things are moved to a determinate end. Creatures can participate not only in determinate natural processes, but also in contingent ones. Aquinas affirms that some things happen as of necessity and others of contingency, for it is according to the condition of the proximate cause that the effect has contingency or necessity. Contingency is considered to be identical with the potentiality to be or not to be. Aquinas maintains that potentiality belongs to matter, whereas necessity results from form, because whatever is consequent on form is of necessity in the subject. Thus contingency is due to the material mode of being. An essential part of this article is dedicated to exemplifying the coexistence of God’s providence and the contingent events.
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The concept of rectitudo in the philosophy of Anselm of Canterbury is one of the important terms when we consider his view of the being. Rectitudo is the inner norm for each existing thing and as such it guarantees the being of the things. Due to rectitude all of the existing entities are keeping their state of being exactly as they were created and therefore they are both right and just – they perfectly fit with their own nature, i.e. with God’s will. Examining some chapters of Anselm’s dialogue “De veritate” we can state that there are some uncertainties considering the view that all existing things are right and just entities. Seemingly not all of the created things inevitably follow their own rectitudo and therefore some of them could cease to follow God’s will and with this to leave their state of being.Continuing this thought we find that the problem with falling away from the rightness, constituting the very being of things, could be traced in the rational willing creatures only. However, this falling away is different form men’s freedom and free choice. In the beginning of De libertate arbitrii Anselm states explicitly, that the ability to err has nothing to do with freedom nor yet with the free choice. By analogy with truth, freedom is defined in an independent from the sin manner.Tracing the main similarities starting with the truth (represented by rectitudo) and the specific definition of freedom, the text aims to show that their concurrence plays a crucial role in understanding Anselm’s anthropological thought.
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The paper examines the Estimaverunt Indi, one of the medieval most relevant geomantic treatises which is currently edited in the framework of the project «Foreseeing Events and Dominating Nature: Models of Operative Rationality and the Circulation of Knowledge in the Arab, Hebrew and Latin Middle Ages». Before dealing with the treatise, however, some general issues regarding geomancy are discussed. In chapter 1, in particular, the geomantic technique is described very concisely. Chapter 2 and 3 give a few historical indications concerning its scientific status, at same time stressing its differences from astrology. Chapter 4 raises the crucial issue of the relationship of the Estimaverunt Indi with the famous Étienne Tempier’s condemnation in 1277 and proposes a solution to this question. The final chapter suggests a few working hypotheses for future research on geomancy.
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In this text I present the philosophical profile of Stanislaw Judycki. Referring to the conception of philosophy outlined in Prof. Judycki’s text entitled “Why is philosophy difficult?” I try to show how the author of this conception remained faithful to it in his original philosophical work. Thus, I try to bring out and discuss the most important features of Stanislaw Judycki's way of doing philosophy as well as the characteristic features of the philosophy that resulted from it. I also discuss in summary form some of the most important themes and problems taken up by Stanislaw Judycki and the characteristic features of his philosophical writing.
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The Noble Savage is an idealized concept of the uncivilized man, who symbolizes theinnate goodness of one not exposed to the corrupting influences of civilization. It is aromantic conception of a man enjoying a natural and noble existence untilcivilization makes him a slave and corrupts him. John the Savage is the son born ofparents from the Brave New World, but raised in the Savage Reservation, Johnrepresents a challenge to the dystopia. He is the character closest to being the heroof the novel. John is labelled a savage in Brave New World because he rejects society’svalues and prefers to live as people did in older times. Even though he rejects thesociety tells him is civilized John is closest in mindset and experience to what weconsider civilized today. John is the only character in the novel burn naturally of amother, as opposed being born in a laboratory from a test-tube procedure. Johnmaintains a familial relationship with his mother, while the other characters neverknow their parents. John reads Shakespeare as a hobby, while the other charactersuse drugs and sex as their only sources of recreation. And finally, once in London,John abhors society and claims that freedom and individuality should never besacrificed for the sake of stability.
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In this text, the author attempts to interpret Boleslaw Prus’ novel Emancipantes, referring to the story of the main character, Madzia Brzeska, and Professor Debicki’s metaphysical lecture. She believes that there is a connection between the metaphysical theses and the ethics of the novel’s heroine. According to her, Prus tries to present a unique philosophy of life in the novel, which is based on the achievements of the natural sciences of the time, but also on the inclusion of a religious component. The most important thing in the novel, however, is to give man a place in this philosophy of life and to assign him a moral task. First, she briefly (I) presents the historical context of the creation of Prus’ novel, then (II) moves on to the existential plot, i.e. Madzia’s adventures, and then (III) she concentrates on to Dębicki-Prus’ confession de foi, in which he acknowledges the existence of an immortal soul and eternal life. Finally, (IV) she reflects on the permanence of the metaphysics contained in Debicki’s lecture.
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This article contributes to the currently lively debate over the existence of practical wisdom. From the beginning of ethics, phrónêsis has been understood as one of the most important virtues. In contemporary ethics, due to situationists’ critique (ethicists strongly inspired by the findings in the field of social psychology), the existence of virtues, including phrónêsis, has been questioned. One of the strategies to overcome the situationist criticism is to perceive virtues as practical skills at an expert level (such as virtuosic skills in playing a musical instrument), the existence of which no one questions.The autor demonstrates similarities and differences between practical skills and virtues. She refers to the conception of phrónêsis as a specific virtue that serves many different functions. She wonders whether the strategy of defending traditionally understood virtue as a practical skill at an expert level is sufficiently justified and whether it is not a kind of hard to accept reductionism.
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The author argues that the existence of subjectivity requires an addition to the traditional attributes of God, which she calls the attribute omnisubjectivity. It is the property of consciously grasping with perfect accuracy and completeness every conscious state of every conscious creature from that creature’s first- person perspective — the perspective of I. The author uses the analogy of empathy to defend the possibility of omnisubjectivity. She argues that given the existence of conscious beings in the universe, omnisubjectivity is entailed by such traditional attributes as omniscience and omnipresence, and it is implied by traditional practices of prayer. The author concludes by using the idea of one person’s grasp of another person’s subjectivity to give a possible explanation of the differences in the consciousness of the Persons of the Trinity.
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In the wake of the 20th century French School of imagination studies, my paper wants to highlight the significant differences between two visions about humanity: a traditional transcendentalist vision of immortality, created by a long historical and cultural process of self-poiesis, and an immanentist scientific ideological vision, represented by the humanism of the modern era. In postmodern times, this positivist view prolongs itself in the “transhumanist revolution”, a by-product of the ideological myth of progress.
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Golden Door (Nuovomondo), a 2006 film by Emanuele Crialese, tells the story of Europeans immigrating to America at the turn of the twentieth century. Representing various characters travelling there driven by diverse motivations, the film showcases different versions of a utopian imaginary vision of America. The article analyses the various ways in which the American ‘promised land’ isc onceptualized in the film and how all of them are contrasted with and checked by the realities of the voyage and the Ellis Island reception centre. Referring to the concept of the imaginary, the analysis discusses mechanisms and functions of their production and their subsequent verification and contrast with the rather dystopian realities of the host country.
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In the technique of Fritz Schütze’s autobiographical interview, it is assumed that the informant faithfully recalls his experiences and tells about them as s/he experienced them. The analysis of the content and formal features of the utterance makes it possible to distinguish process structures later in the story, including the trajectory of suffering. The presented article aims to philosophically consider the ethical consequences of studying people experiencing epistemic injustice using the autobiographical narrative interview technique. Recognizing that individuals and groups subjected to treatment bearing its hallmarks do not have the appropriate means to express their experiences, and their perspective is not understood and considered in society, the author guesses that this impacts the process of reconstructing experiences during interviews. In other words, this article aims to reflect on the importance of the impact of epistemic injustice on the data obtained in interviews and to try to identify ways to minimize its impact on the research process and the conclusions formulated within it.
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This paper explores the interaction between faith and culture, highlighting the influence of Christianity on cultural evolution. It approaches the concept of cult in religion, illustrating how it evolves from an internal, personal form to an external, communal expression, being an essential element of religion and expressing the intimate relationship between the believer and God. Further on, the relationship between Christ and culture is explored, from the perspective of the Old Testament, of ancient Greek culture and of modern European culture, emphasizing the way in which Christ influenced and transfigured culture, promoting Christian values and the universality of His message. The role of culture in the expression and practice of faith is highlighted, as well as the importance of understanding and respecting cultural diversity in a Christian context. The conclusions emphasize the need for harmonization between national and universal values, through the prism of the Christian faith, in order to promote an open and inclusive culture, which values communion and dialogue between different cultural traditions.
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We consider this approach a necessary initiative in the current global context of moral decline and decay. The call to the “kingdom of man” is a bitter race hosted by the demon of speed for the satisfaction of this “adulterous generation”. The endpoint is normed identically; only the paths leading to it differ. Secularization, globalization, socialism, communism, capitalism, all subcultural trends, and all social orders devoid of God do nothing but increase the number of lashes on the back of the Savior. Whenever we deviate from our missionary purpose, we must return to the core of the Church and undergo a spiritual reset. In this context, missionary effort must be concentric, focusing first on fertile ground. From here, everything must be exponentially multiplied, following a tactical strategy. The mission of the Church is Trinitarian because it is carried out in the name of the Holy Trinity, as God's plan for the attainment of salvation and perfection, sacramentally incorporated into the ecclesial body of Christ. The mission of the Church is realized as the preservation, confession, and proclamation of the same apostolic faith and as the effort of the faithful and the hierarchy to maintain and strengthen their communion with Christ and with each other, as well as the duty of local Churches to remain in unity with the Universal Church
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The following text, based on previous research, continues the intention to build a conceptual frame for the understanding of the scientific experiment as a relation between two types of categoriality (we used the term „categoriality” as: „complete list of general notions describing a domain of scientific or philosophical investigation”).
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The project of veristic social epistemology is based on the evaluation of social practices directed at acquiring knowledge and avoiding error. This research aims to analyse the social and technological dimensions of information processes. A number of practices in the network environment have a significant impact on the cognitive processes of individuals. They give rise to the acquisition of both true and false beliefs, ranging from reliable information practices to unreliable disinformation practices. The prevalence of phenomena such as echo chambers, fake news, clickbait or deepfakes indicates that the condition of the contemporary infosphere is under serious threat. Disinformation processes, reinforced by technological progress, prompt reflection on the reliability of social practices. In addition to the strictly veristic consequences, the importance of the phenomenon of epistemic injustice should also be pointed out.
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The article examines the theoretical, conceptual and methodological relations between scientific rationality, epistemological concepts and types of epistemology. Several relevant philosophical aspects of classifying epistemology into classical, non-classical and postnon-classical types are analysed. It was highlighted that at the current juncture, there are conceptual approaches to the elements above of scientific knowledge acquisition, justification, rationality, knowledge application, and the criteria for its authenticity. In this context, philosophers argue for developing new epistemological frameworks to facilitate an adequate philosophical comprehension of contemporary scientific knowledge. A variety of ideas have been proposed. In addition, there is a need to clarify terminology. Furthermore, philosophers are engaged in a debate regarding the most appropriate terminology to describe modern epistemology. One such debate concerns the merits of designating modern epistemology as "postnon-classical" or "post-neoclassical" about science. The article demonstrates that in addition to these, the norms, rules, boundaries of scientific understanding, the strategy and methodology of scientific activity, the rationality of scientific knowledge, its justification, the criteria of scientific truth and their search logic have been renewed. Researchers have finally designated this innovation as a post-non-classical (or postneoclassical) type of scientific understanding. The article analysed whether modern epistemology is correctly described as "post-non-classical" or "post-neoclassical" from a philosophical perspective. The methodological principles of systematicity, non-linearity, intersubjectivity and synergetic formation were selected for the interdisciplinary approach. System analysis and dynamic integration are employed as methodologies. The scientific novelty is that the modern epistemological situation can be described as either "post-non-classical" or "post-neoclassical," which is related to how scientific understanding has evolved historically. In this context, the distinction between the terms is not a matter of differing interpretations of the underlying processes. This represents a distinct articulation of analogous concepts.
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