bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Reading ‘Jabberwocky’ Rightfully
Authors: Duddy Thomas
Published: November 2019

In his essay "The Politics of Interpretation: Spinoza's Modernist Turn," Berel Lang attributes to Spinoza the view that interpretation presupposes or implies a political framework-in effect, that interpretation is itself a politics. The thrust of Spinoza's argument is against "interpretation from authority," i.e., against the view that the meaning of a text can be determined by an external authority. Understanding cannot be coerced, according to Spinoza. In my paper I attempt to make the relationship between reader and text even more direct and "free" than it is in Spinoza. I argue that any approach (such as Derrida's) which posits an interpretation between reader and text places constraints on the notion of a democracy of free readers. I argue that in a truly literate democracy readers have the right to claim that they have understood or grasped their texts without having any kind of intermediary placed between themselves and their texts, regardless of whether this intermediary takes the form of an external authority (in Spinoza's sense) or an interpretation (in Derrida's sense). In the course of the paper I draw upon Michael Dummett's philosophy of language in order to critique the "humpty-dymptyism" of the interpretationist school. I place myself firmly on the side of Alice in Through the Looking Glass, and spend some time discussing the significance of the difficulties which she experiences with the nonsense poem, "Jabberwocky."
Nihilismo y Encarnación en la Hermeneútica de Gianni Váttimo
Authors: Giardina Mónica N.
Published: November 2019

El presente trabajo expone y problematiza las categorías de la filosofía de la interpretación, que Gianni Váttimo* reconoce como herencia del mensaje cristiano; por entender que el autor esclarece el fenómeno del ‘retorno del cristianismo,’ su sentido y alcance en la filosofía tardo-moderna. Se explicita la relación de continuidad entre la historia de la revelación cristiana y la historia del nihilismo, a partir del análisis especulativo del fenómeno religioso de la encarnación de Jesús. En consonancia con la interpretación del pensiero debole, el resurgimiento de la religión en los albores del tercer milenio, no puede ser comprendido desde un cuerpo doctrinal dogmático. Muy por el contrario, el Dios qu retorna en la época posmetafísica requiere ser pensado desde la categoría de debilitamiento, inscripta en la ontología de corte heideggeriano. La tarea del pensar que propone la hermeneútica desde una instancia ética se define en un doble proceso: a) el alejamiento del pensar violento de la metafísica, correspondiente en el plano religioso con el abandono de concepciones naturalistas, y b) La asunción de la Verwindung bajo la luz y el límite de la caritas. En este contexto, la conjunción nihilismo y encarnación, se transforma en la clave de interpretación del decurso de la filosofía occidental.
Razón y Lenguaje
Authors: Juliá María Lidia
Published: November 2019

La tematización filosófica de la proximidad de razón y lenguaje desde el giro hermenéutico practicado por H-G. Gadamer permite repensar a la razón, núcleo de la filosofía occidental, en su posibilidad misma de universalidad y respeto de la diferencia. Razón y lenguaje están entretejidos en la idea misma de logos. El logos reside en esa disposición de las palabras para la unidad del sentido, y por ello, se ha llamado logos a la frase. Pero la frase, al igual que la palabra, es una fragmentación del lenguaje. En realidad el lenguaje es en la conversación. Cuando realmente hay conversación se llega a la elaboración de algo común y en ello consiste el entendimiento. En la praxis social y en el arte tiene lugar una conversación, un entenderse en algo con otro, una orientación hacia la unidad no supresora de la alteridad, que patentiza una universalidad no totalizadora en la misma filosofía occidental.
Are All Interpretations Possible?
Authors: Kremer Alexander
Published: November 2019

Two fundamental criticisms made by traditional hermeneutics against philosophical hermeneutics are that the latter deny the possibility of objectively true interpretation, as well as assert that all interpretations are possible on the basis that they cannot be measured. In my paper, I argue that the first criticism is well-founded, while the second is not. I contend that interpretations can be decided according to two relational criteria: (i) which interpretation has a more comprehensive horizon; and (ii) which one is derivable from the other.
The Name’s Motives
Authors: Cuartas R. Juan Manuel
Published: November 2019

From the philosophy of language comes a new critical way: seeing global writing as a model of the proper life. The philosopher of language must break the metaphysic of phonocentrism and open up new avenues for reflection on names, contexts, discourses, and signs.
The Publicity of Thought and Language
Authors: Laurier Daniel
Published: November 2019

I try to clarify the ways in which one would seek to hold that language and/or thought are public. For each of these theses, I distinguish four forms in which they can be framed, and two ways of establishing them. The first will try to make the publicity of thought follow from that of language; the second will try to make the publicity of language follow from that of thought. I show that none of these strategies can do without the thesis that language and thought are interdependent, and that even while admitting this thesis, the second strategy presents more difficulties than the first.
Judge Posner’s Challenge to the Philosophy of Law
Authors: Entemann Willard F.
Published: November 2019

This paper presents a conceptual analysis of Richard Posner's empirical theory of judicial behavior. His theory opposes the conventional view which holds that judges are insulated from external pressures so their judicial decisions will be based upon a disinterested understanding of the law. Since economics holds that all people — including judges — attempt to maximize their utilities, Posner thinks that the conventional view is an embarrassment which presumes judges are not rational. His theory holds that the judicial insulation has actually left judges maximizing their utilities by trading judicial utility against leisure utility. Posner's theory presents a challenge to the hope for a disinterested judiciary. It threatens as well to eliminate the philosophy of law by reducing it to what he calls antecedent conditions.
How Ontology Saved Free Speech in Cyberspace
Authors: Van Camp Julie
Published: November 2019

Reno v. ACLU, the 1997 landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court providing sweeping protection to speech on the Internet, is usually discussed in terms of familiar First Amendment issues. Little noticed in the decision is the significance of the ontological assumptions of the justices in their first visit to cyberspace. I analyze the apparent awareness of the Supreme Court of ontological issues and problems with their approaches. I also argue that their current ontological assumptions have left open the door to future suppression of free speech as the technology progresses. Ontology is significant because zoning in the physical world has long been recognized as a way to segregate "adult" entertainment from minors. So far, at least, the justices seem to agree that such zoning is not possible in cyberspace, and therefore that adult zones for certain forms of expression are not possible. But this conclusion is far from settled. The degree of free speech on the Internet in the future will depend on whether or not our ontological understanding of cyberspace supports such zoning or renders it incoherent or impossible.
A Philosophical Perspective on the Regulation of Business
Authors: Wendling Barbara
Published: November 2019

The paper compares the Anglo-American and continental legal systems in parallel with a comparison of the philosophical foundations for each. The defining philosophical distinction between the two legal traditions (viz., the Anglo-American system is predicated on idealism and the continental system on materialism) is shown to influence the way in which criminal justice is handled by the two systems as applied to citizens, and how this influence is carried across to the regulation of business as applied to corporations. The idealistic (possibly theological) worldview inherent in the Anglo-American legal system explains its moral presumptions regarding human freedom, dignity, and responsibility, while the materialist worldview inherent in the continental legal systems explains its amoral assumptions about human motivations and behavior. I suggest that while the Anglo-American legal system may be justified in its moral philosophical presumptions as applied to citizens, the continental legal system, with its amoral assumptions, more accurately reflects corporations than citizens. Understanding how the philosophy behind the two legal systems influences the application of law in modern society can lead to improvements in public policy.
Reviving Psychophysical Supervenience
Authors: Campbel Neil
Published: November 2019

Many philosophers has lost their enthusiasm for the concept of supervenience in the philosophy of mind. This is largely due to the fact that, as Jaegwon Kim has shown, familiar versions of supervenience describe relations of mere property covariation without capturing the idea of dependence. Since the dependence of the mental on the physical is a necessary requirement for even the weakest version of physicalism, it would seem that existing forms of supervenience cannot achieve that for which they were designed. My aim is to revive the concept of supervenience. I argue that if we construe supervenience along Davidsonian lines — as a relation connecting predicates rather than properties — then it avoids the shortcomings of the more familiar varieties.
Animal Belief
Authors: Fellows Roger
Published: November 2019

If Mary believes a bone is on the lawn, then she literally believes that, though her belief may be mistaken. But, if her pet Fido rushes up to what is in fact a bit of bone-shaped plastic, then Fido does not believe that there is a bone on the lawn. However, the best explanation for Fido’s behavior may be that he initially believed there was a bone on the lawn. Unless we are methodological or analytical behaviorists, the claim that we can best explain the behavior of dumb animals by treating them as if they literally held beliefs (and desires) subject to various rationality constraints is hardly surprising. I argue that this instrumentalism does not support the realist view that dumb animals are literally to be credited with beliefs. In particular, I focus on Davidson’s argument that a creature can have beliefs only if it can be the interpreter of the speech of another. Davidson’s argument, which has not won wide acceptance, is the most subtle examination to date of the relation between belief and language. I examine the premises of his argument, indicate two major criticisms, and attempt to defend his conclusion that dumb animals lack beliefs by adducing supporting arguments.
Restoring Mind-Brain Supervenience: A Proposal
Authors: Lantin Robert G.
Published: November 2019

In this paper I examine the claim that mental causation — at least for cases involving the production of purposive behavior — is possible only if ‘mind/brain supervenience’ obtains, and suggest that in spite of all the bad press it has received in recent years, mind/brain supervenience is still the best way for a physicalist to solve the ‘exclusion problem’ that plagues many accounts of mental causation. In section 3, I introduce a form of mind/brain supervenience that depends crucially on the idea that some brain state-types---namely, those involved in the production of purposive behavior---are nonlocally sensitive, where by ‘nonlocal sensitivity’ I mean cases where relevant causal histories and environmental circumstances effect a difference in some of an organism’s brain state-types intrinsic, causal properties. I will argue that such a mode of sensitivity of brain state-types offers the best way out of the exclusion problem for anyone convinced that mental state-types should be relationally individuated.
Identity Conditions for Indicator State Types within Dretske’s Theory of Psychological Content Naturalization
Authors: Litch Mary
Published: November 2019

Within the context of Dretske’s theory of psychological content naturalization, as laid out in Explaining Behavior, the concept of an indicator state type plays a pivotal role. Providing a general (and non-circular) description of the identity conditions for being a token of an indicator state type is a prerequisite for the ultimate success of Dretske’s theory. However, Dretske fails to address this topic. Thus, his theory is incomplete. Several different approaches for specifying these identity conditions are possible; however, each is inadequate.
Ontomorph: Mind Meets The World
Authors: Potr Matja
Published: November 2019

Chunking of the world as done by the mind depends on how the world is. The world is one object, but not a simple one. Morphological content is just right to allow organisms which move in the world to perform the appropriate dynamical chunking, which from the perspective of the higher cognition may appear to consist of several separate objects. Embracing nonreductionism is desirable because organisms are part of the world. At bottom, there is nothing else other than physical stuff. But it is possible, and indeed it is true, that the physical stuff is very richly structured. One kind of physical stuff are things such as minds. The intricate structure of minds, particularly the complicated topography of their multidimensional space is ultimately responsible for qualitative experiences and consequently for the hard problems of consciousness. As the space of morphological content is itself a part of the physical world, it can begin to throw light on this problem and primarily at the qualitative states — as products of encounter of one form of physical stuff, organisms, with the rest of the physical stuff around them. Some surfaces of the world are moulded and shaped in their encounter other surfaces in the world. But the world has many dimensions; some surfaces are richer than others. The purpose of the shaping is the tacit expectation of further encounters with surfaces in the world.
David Hume’s Treatment of Mind
Authors: Preston Aaron
Published: November 2019

This paper critically examines Hume’s argument against the knowledge/existence of substantival mind. This denial is rooted in his epistemology which includes a theory of how complex ideas which lack corresponding impressions are manufactured by the imagination, in conjunction with the memory, on the basis of three relations among impressions: resemblance, continuity and constant conjunction. The crux of my critique consists in pointing out that these relations are such that only an enduring, unified agent could interact with them in the way Hume describes. I note that Hume attempts to provide such an agent by invoking the activities of imagination and memory, but that it is unclear where these belong in his system. After discussing the relevant possibilities, I conclude that there is no category within the limits of his system that can accommodate the faculties and allow them to do the work Hume assigned to them. I then note that Hume’s rejection of substantival mind rests upon the assumption that something like substantival mind exists; for the action of the latter is required for the proper functioning of the process of fabrication which creates the fictitious notion of substantival mind. My concluding argument is that if the existence of substantival mind is implicit in Hume’s argument against substantival mind, then his argument resembles an indirect proof, and ought to be considered as evidence for, rather than against, the existence of substantival mind.
Principles for Cognizing the Sacred
Authors: Arinin Evgeniy
Published: November 2019

Today we need a scientific analysis of basic world views which expresses genuine understanding of the sacred. Such world views hold the main principles for cognizing reality. A ‘substratum’ understanding of the Sacred is characteristic of mythology and magic, wherein all spiritual phenomena are closely connected with a material or corporeal bearer. Functional understanding of the Sacred is developed by the earliest civilizations in which the spiritual is separated from the material. For example, Plato, Aristotle, and Neoplatonism created European functional theology. Substantial understanding of the Sacred appears in Christianity. Here we find the synthesis of substratum and functional peculiarities which are looked upon as "creaturous," revealed by God to man and integrated in their fundamental unity as the basis for variety. It is only unity which avoids the mixing of the three images of an object-substratum, function, and substance-that allows us to cognize a true object. In reproducing the Sacred as such, we can show the Sacred as the unity of the mysterious and the obvious, the static and the dynamic, and the passive and the active.
European Philosophy and Religion in Millenniums lasting Dispute
Authors: Cooper Brigitte Dehmelt
Published: November 2019

The disputes between philosophy and religion can be avoided and solved not by the contemporary separation of their conclusions but because Socrates-Plato taught us how valid judgments are established. Plato is the founder of "scientific logic", because he discerned the instantaneous relations of similar, different, equal through the intelligibility between ultimate distinctions. This relation, not very accurately called "like" by Socrates, holds too for the intelligence in its relation to the intelligibility of the distinctions of "can" and "must", of which every person is "implicitely" aware, and both "can" and "must" are known as "real possibilites". Final, ultimate distinctions are perceived since they are "evident per-se ". They cannot be doubted by the person which is conscious of itself. These immediate relations are distinguished from relations in which one term is "in the likeness of" the other, which expresses a judgment due to an active comparison, established by man through thinking and through physical actions, placing those relations into the region of time and space. They are the relations of kinship that are in the "likeness of"- (syggenes called in Greek). It will be shown why Aristotles criticism of Plato's use of the word "partaking" has fanned the dispute among the students of Plato, who consider the timeless, eternal reality of distinctions - called ideas by Plato- of highest, ultimate importance. It justifies the validiy of human insights and judgments. This is also not correctly understood by the Christian theologians, who hide behind supernatural revelations and dogmas. Plato did not jutify his metaphysical insights with "transcendental moonshine" as the follower of Aristotle accuse him.
Kuona, An African Perspective on Religions
Authors: Mwase Isaac M.T.
Published: November 2019

Kuona is a Shona (one of Zimbabwe’s major languages) verb meaning "to see." In poetic constructions, it is often used as an ocular metaphor meaning insight or understanding. This ocular metaphor can be used to describe Mugambi’s assessment of the exclusivistic claims one often encounters in the Abrahamic religions. Such claims often arise from a strongly held belief that the adherent is one of God’s chosen. Mugambi has emerged as one of the most articulate philosophical theologians in the African continent. His reflections, ubiquitous in classrooms on the continent, deserve a much broader audience. My paper seeks to introduce Mugambi’s perspective on religion. Part of Mugambi’s project has been to make an assessment of this notion of chosenness in the Abrahamic religions. He does so particularly with reference to the relationship between Christianity and the African religious heritage.
Inclusive Infinity and Radical Particularity
Authors: Simoni-Wastila Henry
Published: November 2019

God, or in Nishida’s case Buddha-nature, is frequently conceptualized as relating to the world by including it within the Infinite. Particular elements within the world are not seen as existing in absolute differentiation or total negation from Spirit, God, or Absolute Non-Being. The Many are not excluded but are, on the contrary, included within the One. The logic by which the One includes the Many is a logic of manifold unity, or, as Hegel quite confidently puts it, true infinity as opposed to spurious infinity. I will argue that such a logic of inclusive infinity is operative in Hartshorne, Hegel and Nishida. Each uses different terminology and writes with different systemic emphases, but as applied to God or the Ultimate, the function and consequences of the logic of inclusivity are strikingly similar for all three philosophers. Although infinite inclusivity provides a way of unifying the chaotic diversity of existence into a rational totality, there are central questions that have remained unanswered in the three metaphysicians. Primary among them is the question that sums up within itself many of the others: the problem of radical particularity. The particular elements of the world which are claimed to be included within the parameters of the Ultimate are just that: particular fragments of reality. I argue that their particular nature makes it impossible for the Infinite to incorporate them within its purview without raising serious difficulties.
The Role of Tacit Knowledge in Religion
Authors: Van Herck Walter
Published: November 2019

Clarity concerning what kind of knowledge a religious person possesses is of the utmost importance. For one thing, J. Whittaker remarks that believers must have some knowledge that enables them to make the distinction between literal and non-literal descriptions of God. (1) In the believer's perception 'God is a rock', but not really a rock. God however really is love. Whittaker suggests that making this distinction requires knowledge that cannot be metaphysical or experiential, but a more basic form which he terms 'practical' knowledge. Without going into his discussion of the metaphysical and experiential view, I would like to elaborate on this notion of knowledge in three steps. Firstly, I want to consider a short passage in Kant's Critique of Pure Reason (A 132-3 / B 171-2) on judgment. This passage points out that we necessarily know more than we can say or state. Secondly, Michael Polanyi's account of tacit knowledge will be introduced to see what 'religious tacit knowledge' could mean to be. Thirdly, analysis of a text from Meister Eckhart's Reden der Unterweisung will aim to show the relevance of this notion of practical (or tacit) knowledge in religious contexts.
The Role of Love in the Thought of Kant and Kierkegaard
Authors: Wennemann Daryl J.
Published: November 2019

Following Ronald Green's suggestion concerning Kierkegaard's dependence upon Kant, I show how Kierkegaard drew upon Kant's The Metaphysics of Morals in order to develop his own doctrine of divine love. Where Kant saw only a peripheral role for love in the moral life, we will see how Kierkegaard places love at the center of human life in Works of Love. The leap of faith requires that every aspect of life be informed by love in response to God's love for us.
The Elimination of Natural Theology
Authors: White David E.
Published: November 2019

The dispute between fideists and rationalists seems intractable since those who argue for faith alone claim that they are offended by the use of reason in religion. The advocates of reason claim that they are equally offended by the appeal to faith. This dispute may be resolved by showing that those who rely on faith may be seen as engaging in an experiment of living, so they can become part of a rational experiment without having to alter their practice; in contrast, those who use reason to justify religion can be seen as addressing a spiritual need. From an evangelical point of view, it would be wrong to disparage the mathematician’s use of the mathematical proof of God’s existence (such as Gödel’s). Wittgensteinian objections to natural theology can be met by showing that the use of reason in religion is distinct from the general kind of philosophical speculation to which Wittgenstein rightly objected. Those who claim that one must already have faith in order to seek understanding successfully can be answered by showing that their claim can be tested empirically only when there is a robust practice of natural theology among those who do and do not have a prior faith. There is reason for thinking religion should be subjected to a more rigorous scrutiny than used in secular matters.
Bootstrapping and the Problem of Testing Quantitative Theoretical Hypotheses
Authors: Gruenberg David
Published: November 2019

I consider two alternative solutions to the problem of computing the values of theoretical quantities, and, thus, of testing theoretical hypotheses, viz., Sneed's structuralist eliminationism and Glymour's bootstrapping. The former attempts to solve the problem by eliminating theoretical quantities by means of the so-called Ramsey-Sneed sentence that represents the global empirical claim of the given theory. The latter proposes to solve the problem by deducing the values of the theoretical quantities from, among others, the very hypothesis to be tested. I argue that in those cases where the theoretical quantities are not strongly Ramsey-eliminable-which seems to be the case for most of the actual physical theories-eliminationism does not succeed in computing the values of theoretical quantities and is compelled to use bootstrapping in this task. On the other hand, we see that a general notion of bootstrapping-which, though implicitly, is present as a subreasoning in structuralism-provides a formally correct procedure for computing theoretical quantities, and thus contributes to the solution to the problem of testing theoretical hypotheses involving these quantities.
Naturalized Philosophy of Science and Economic Method
Authors: Luetge Christoph
Published: November 2019

This paper draws a connection between recent developments in naturalized philosophy of science and in economics. Social epistemology is one part of the naturalistic enterprise that has become especially important. Some approaches in this field use methods borrowed from economics, a fact that has often been overlooked. But there are also genuinely economic approaches to the problems of science and knowledge. Some of these approaches can be seen as contributions to an "economic epistemology." While these contributions are certainly fruitful, they have also raised criticism from economists. I overview of these points of criticism and outline possibilities to deal with these problems. In particular, the Buchanan research program offers some help.
Cosmic Teleology and the Crisis of the Sciences
Authors: Mansueto Anthony
Published: November 2019

This paper analyzes recent work from within the physical sciences which argue for the emergence of a new paradigm capable of unifying the sciences and demonstrating the ultimate meaningfulness of the universe. I argue that while there is powerful evidence for cosmic teleology, the works in question do not represent a new paradigm and neither unify science nor adequately accommodate the evidence in question, but rather attempt to "put new wine in old skins." As Aristotle demonstrated, only teleological argumentation offers a complete scientific explanation, and authentic teleology is effectively ruled out by the hegemonic scientific paradigm which gives first place to mathematical formalism-something which makes possible rigorous description but not authentic explanation. This does not mean returning to Aristotelian science, but rather exploring the "road not taken" when Aristotelian science entered a crisis at the end of the medieval period: generalizing the concept of teleology so that it can accommodate both the physical (especially astronomical) evidence which created problems for Aristotelian science long before Galileo and Kepler, and account teleologically for such phenomena as chaos and disintegration. The work of scientists like Gal-Or, Bohm, and Prigogine provides important resources for moving in this direction, but a more explicit option for teleology is necessary if the evidence is to be accommodated and the internal contradictions of the existing paradigm to be resolved.
L’erreur: pédagogue de l’humanité
Authors: Nzinzi Pierre
Published: November 2019

De Parménide, distinguant ontologiquement le chemin de la vérití de celui de la fausseté, à Descartes, garantissant l'infaillibilité de la raison par la méthode, en passant par Spinoza, insistant sur l'infaillibilité de l'esprit qui se porte sur l'idée vraie ou adéquate, la tradition épistémique a toujours marginalisé l'erreur, qu'elle situait alors aux antipodes de la vérité. Or, la tradition doxologique ou conjecturale dont relève l'eépistémologie historique en particulier va la réévaluer, dans le sillage de Kant, critique du paternalisme despotique, mais dont l'atavisme dogmatique affecte encore son projet critique, qui croit que son compterendu des conditions de possibilité de la science ne saurait être crédible s'il n'en constate pas, en même temps, la "clôture" ou l'achèvement. On verra ainsi opérer le gester réévaluatif, dès son inscription inaugurale kantienne, à l'intérior d'une anthropologie négative, qui fait néanmoins de l'erreur le pédagogue d'une humanité incapable d'effectuer toujours des essais parfaits our réussis, mais sachant au moins apprendre de ses erreurs. L'erreur devient alors la clé de toute forme d'ouverture.
Werner Heisenberg
Authors: Spielberg Ana Elisa
Published: November 2019

La incidencia de la educación humanista, en su vertiente filosófica, sobre algunos de los físicos que formaron parte de la creción de la teoría de los quanta-reconocida unánimemente como la más fértil de la historia de la física-es un dato innegable. En este trabajo no pretendemos argumentar a favor o en contra de las dos posturas en pugna, que se observan desde los inicios de esta teoría, sino denunciar algunos de los malentendidos que prácticamente han sepultado el pensamiento de uno de los integrantes más conspicuos de la denominada 'Escuela de Copenhague' y que es Werner Heisenberg. La razón para semejante trvestismo conceptual, bien pudo haberse debido según nuestro criterio, a que su perspectiva filosófica no se habría prestado a ser aprehendida por los Denksysteme que subyacen a las corrientes epistemológicas tradicionales. Esta es la razón por la cual nos ceñiremos estrictamente a sus escritos, subrayando sus reflexiones sobre el pragmatismo y el positivismo y que, paradójicamente, han servido para tildarlo de tal. Sin intención de hacer gala de un inocuo ejercicio de erudición solamente pretendemos mostrar la convicción más profunda de nuestro autor, a saber, que la ciencia nace en diálogo, en la frontera con la filosofía, sin la cual la primera no sería posible.
Sport, Education, and the Meaning of Victory
Authors: Reid Heather L.
Published: November 2019

Sport was included in ancient educational systems because it was thought to promote aretê or human excellence which could be applied to almost any endeavor in life. The goal of most modern scholastic athletic programs might be better summed up in a word: winning. Is this a sign that we have lost touch with the age-old rationale for including sport in education? I argue that it need not be by showing that we value winning precisely for the virtues associated with it. I then take Plato's traditional parts of aretê: piety, sophrosunê, courage and justice and show how they are manifest in modern athletic ideals of self-knowledge, discipline, courage and justice. To the extent that scholastic athletic programs develop these virtues, I conclude, their pursuit of winning is not at odds with the institutional mission of educating students. If an athletic program's pursuit of victory allows such character-building to fall by the wayside, however, it deserves no place in our high schools, colleges or universities.
John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Sport
Authors: Schwartz David T.
Published: November 2019

While his own preference may have been for an engaging book over an exciting ballgame, John Stuart Mill’s distinction in Utilitarianism between higher and lower pleasures offers a useful framework for thinking about contemporary sport. This first became apparent while teaching Utilitarianism to undergraduates, whose interest is often piqued by using Mill’s distinction to rank popular sports such as baseball, football and basketball. This paper explores more seriously the relevance of Mill’s distinction for thinking about sport, focusing specifically on his claims about intellectual complexity and aesthetic value. It finds that while the distinction of higher and lower pleasures does support a hierarchy among sports, it remains problematic to assert that any sport could in fact constitute a genuine higher pleasure.
The Enlightenment and the Electric Battery
Authors: Pancaldi Giuliano
Published: November 2019

This paper is a discussion of the role played by the ideals of the Enlightenment in the invention and assessment of artifacts like the electric battery. The first electric battery was built in 1799 by Alessandro Volta, who was both a natural philosopher and an artisan-like inventor of intriguing machines. I will show that the story of Volta and the battery contains three plots, each characterized by its own pace and logic. One is the story of natural philosophy, a second is the story of artifacts like the battery, and the third is the story of the loose, long-term values used to assess achievement and reward within and outside expert communities. An analysis of the three plots reveals that late eighteenth-century natural philosophers, despite their frequent celebration of 'useful knowledge,' were not fully prepared to accept the philosophical dignity of artifacts stemming from laboratory practice. Their hesitation was the consequence of a hierarchy of ranks and ascribed competence that was well established within the expert community. In order to make artifacts stemming from laboratory practice fully acceptable within the domain of natural philosophy, some important changes had yet to occur. Still, the case overwhelmingly shows that artifacts rightly belong to the long and varied list of items that make up the legacy of the Enlightenment.
The Win of the Sign Over the Signed
Authors: Wurzer Jörg
Published: November 2019

Virtual reality is more than only high tech. We encounter this phenomenon in everyday media worlds and economy. The sign dominates the signed. Philosophy can describe this phenomenon by means of a different ontological analysis following Poppers theory of the three worlds and can prepare new ontological categories for knowledge of acting.
Democracia y Valores Sociales
Authors: Arribas Sonia
Published: November 2019

La teoría democrática de Michael Walzer ocupa un lugar ambiguo en las corrientes actuales de filosofía política. Walzer ha sido precipitadamente clasificado dentro del grupo de los "comunitaristas" en virtud de su empleo abundante del lenguaje integracionista de los "significados compartidos." Asimismo, su énfais en la participación política de los ciudadanos le ha proporcionado la etiqueta de "republicano." En cambio, para otros-los más marxistas-Walzer sigue siendo demasidado "liberal." Este trabajo deja a un lado esos calificativos y pretende acercarse a su teoría para sacar a la luz los aspectos que puedan proporcionar un buen material para el análisis de las sociedades contemporáneas. Para ello, he tomado como guía la distinción que hace Walzer en Thick and Thin entre minimalismo y maximalismo moral, aunque la he aplicado con un significado algo distinto. En el presente trabajo se plantean tanto cuestiones filosóficas acerca de su metodología, cuanto dimensiones estructurales de cómo articular empíricamente la teoría. También se explorarán las relaciones entre la interpretación y la reconstrucción de normas de justicia, con el propósito, no ya de ofrecer soluciones a los citados problemas, sino de clarificar los puntos de convergencia de uno y otro método filosófico para vislumbrar las posibilidades de su combinación.
What is Virtue Epistemology?
Authors: Battal Heather
Published: November 2019

This paper functions as a brief introduction to virtue epistemology, a topic that has enjoyed a recent gain in popularity among analytic philosophers. Here I maintain that the defining feature of virtue epistemology is its focus on the intellectual virtues and vices rather than the evaluation of belief. What constitutes such a focus? And, what are the intellectual virtues? In the first section, I enumerate five different ways in which virtue epistemologists might focus on the virtues. In the second, I discuss four topics pertaining to the nature of the intellectual virtues themselves: (1) are the virtues natural or acquired?; (2) are they skills?; (3) are they instrumentally, constitutively, or intrinsically valuable?; and (4) what relation do they bear to truth? Throughout the paper, I identify which virtue epistemologists are partial to which views, and in this manner, catalog much of the recent debate. In conclusion, I suggest some topics for future study.
The Evidence of Waves of Creation
Authors: Kraenzel Frederick
Published: November 2019

Values provide evidence of spirit in human life. Spirit is a creative mental force for realizing values, a force which shows signs of a superindividual growth and decline, a life of its own. This paper documents the historic rise and decline of several waves of human creativity. I also consider possible factors that would account for the rise and fall: the presence of new material, social encouragement and/or patronage, temperamental egotism on the part of creators, the attraction of pioneering talent, or a collective or superindividual spirit.
Preference-utilitarianism and Past Preferences
Authors: Rønnow-Rasmussen Toni
Published: November 2019

A well-known problem for preference-utilitarianism is to what extent it should exclude from consideration certain preferences. In this paper I focus on past preferences. I outline three general and some particular positions that a preference-utilitarian reasonably would want to take with regard to past preferences and why I think that endorsing each of these positions create new problems for the preference-utilitarian. At the end I sketch on a possible solution to the axiological problems here presented. However, although the pluralistic approach that I outline shares with preference-utilitarianism the idea that what is valuable is the satisfaction of preferences, it is not a viable option for a utilitarian. My conclusion is therefore that preference-utilitarianism faces a serious axilogical problem.
Legitimidad democrática: ¿consenso o votación?
Authors: Britos Patricia
Published: November 2019

El propósito der este trabajo es abordar en tema bastante polémico, el de llegar a la resolución de cuestiones políticas con el mayor grado de legitimidad. La teoría de la democracia tiene dos vertientes marcadamente diferentes: la del discurso argumentativo y la de la teoría de la elección social. La primera estudia la forma de resolver los conflictos a través de la deliberación, del discurso argumentativo que apunta al consenso.Y la segunda es la que se ocupa de las formas en que la agregación de preferencias individuales lleva a un resultado social; ésta es la teoría de la elección social, una rama de la elección racional, dedicada especialmente a la teoría de la votación.Estas dos tendencias aparecen separadas la una de la otra, una concentrada en el consenso ideal y la otra, en los resultados electorales. No parece quedar claro por qué para los consensualistas no hay más que modelos ideales que no contribuyen a la resolución de los problemas políticos inmediatos. En el caso de los teóricos de la elección social, parece que aportan más al estudio de la teoría de la democracia porque no desconocen el hecho de que la filosofía política debe ayudar a la resolución de los problemas de la sociedad.
The Moral Aspect of Political Protest under the Totalitarian System
Authors: Buksinski Tadeusz
Published: November 2019

The paper concerns the principles presupposed in political protest against the totalitarian regime. In contrast to the utilitarian view of participating in political protest (K.D.Opp, M. Taylor) the author tries to suggest the moral model of political protest. According to this model, the main reason and motif for challenging the regime is the transgression of the limits of concession, which jeopardizes the spiritual identity and essential qualities of the individuals and all groups (i.e., Church, family, nation). The participants of the protest do not calculate in terms of egoistic or private interests and utilities but in terms of moral values. They consider what action is morally "good" and "bad" or morally "better" or "worse" in this situation, disregarding their personal profits and happiness. The overthrow of the communist system is an incalculating and contingent result of combating the extreme manifestations and worst excesses of the system.
Tolerance, Liberalism, and Community
Authors: Henley Kenneth
Published: November 2019

The liberal principle of tolerance limits the use of coercion by a commitment to the broadest possible toleration of rival religious and moral conceptions of the worthy way of life. While accepting the communitarian insight that moral thought is necessarily rooted in a social self with conceptions of the good, I argue that this does not undermine liberal tolerance. There is no thickly detailed way of life so embedded in our self-conceptions that liberal neutrality is blocked at the level of reflection. This holds true for us in virtue of the socially acquired reflective self found in the pluralist modern world. I reject Michael J. Sandel’s argument that to resolve issues of privacy rights we must reach a shared view of the moral worth of, for instance, homosexual conduct. The view of community most consistent with our situation is a simple causal conception: we are all members of the same community to the extent that we inhabit the same world of causes, physical and social. Any attempt to call us to some thicker, stronger conception of community fails to speak to us in our modernity.
Austin’s Ditch
Authors: Hersh James
Published: November 2019

This essay seeks to show that there are political implications in Jacques Derrida’s critique of J.L. Austin’s notion of performative speech. If, as Derrida claims and Austin denies, performative utterances are necessarily "contaminated" by that which Austin refuses to consider (the speech of the poet and the actor in which literal force is never intended), then what are the implications for the speech acts of the state? Austin considers the speech acts of the poet and the actor to be "parasites" or "ordinary language," "nonserious," and would relegate such speech to a region beyond his consideration, to a "ditch" outside the border of meaning for the performative. Derrida argues that the "contamination" Austin fears for language is necessary for its very performativity. If Derrida is correct, then the performative utterances of the state (e.g. the decree of the judge, "I sentence you...") from the biases of racial or sexual identity is also based upon an impossible desire, a desire that goes against the manner in which language functions. I argue that this desire for a just state cannot be satisfied unless racial and sexual identity is viewed not as "parasitic" and "poetic," but as necessary to the performativity of the state’s liberal power.
The Concept of ‘Metaphysical Liberalism’
Authors: Imamoto Shuji
Published: November 2019

There have been many discussions about ‘Liberalism’ in modern political philosophy. In this paper, I want to discuss the liberal principles of political philosophy on the metaphysical level. This includes the liberal mind, the liberal consciousness, and the liberal ethos, all of which are presupposed in our liberal behaviors, and in turn serve as fundamental principles in any multicultural society. I want to emphasize the liberal tendencies of self-criticism and of the critical way of thinking in European traditional metaphysics, such as Plato’s dialectics or Kant’s philosophy of criticism. The latter is also the logic of dialogue which produces an endless questioning of possible universal truths. I group these characteristics under the label ‘Metaphysical Liberalism’ and assess them from three standpoints: (1) critical agnosticism; (2) methodological falsificationism; and (3) pluralistic universalism. These three points enable us to remain self-conscious of the limitation of any kind of special theory or thought in order to prevent the emergence of any dogmatic belief-system. Such liberal attitudes that allow the realization of individual ideas and thoughts without any political coercion in turn sustain a democratic federalism that creates space for the expression of public opinion even while protecting such space. Such a situation, however, is possible only by educating ourselves in this metaphysical method.
Liberalism, Civic Reformism and Democracy
Authors: Rosales José María
Published: November 2019

This paper argues that liberalism provides democracy with the experience of civic reformism. Without it, democracy loses any tie-argumentative or practical-to a coherent design of public policy endeavoring to provide the resources for the realization of democratic citizenship. The case for liberalism rests on an argumentative reconstruction of the function it performs before the rise of a world economic order and, more specifically, in the creation of the welfare state after the Second World War. Accordingly, liberalism defines a reformist political program: it is an emancipatory political project by virtue of its struggle for an egalitarian and universalist extension of citizenship rights. This is but a formulation of the modern idea of citizenship, conceived of as a universalizable contract of rights. At the same time, liberalism embraces a socioeconomic emancipatory project that endeavors to provide the conditions, within the institutional framework of modern societies, for the accomplishment of citizenship rights.
Short Circuits and Market Failure
Authors: Zuidervaart Lambert
Published: November 2019

This paper reviews three social scientific accounts of the civic sector's role in society: the government failure, contract failure, and voluntary failure theories. All three explain the role of nonprofit organizations as compensating for the market's failure to provide certain collective goods. This approach involves a radical misinterpretation of the underlying principles of civic sector organizations. An account is needed that explains their economy in terms of their normative concerns, rather than explaining normative concerns in terms of their economy. I lay a foundation for such an account by examining (1) the self-understanding among civic sector organizations that they should be "mission-driven," and (2) the implications of this self-understanding for the sector as a "social economy." Whereas "mission-drivenness" calls attention to service-provision, resource-sharing, and open communication as the normative core of civic sector organizations, the notion of a "social economy" suggests a recirculation of money into channels where standard economic logic no longer holds. The key to the civic sector's role lies not in responses to market failure, but in the short-circuiting of a money-driven capitalist economy.
Evolutionary Ethics
Authors: Mizzoni John
Published: November 2019

Michael Ruse has argued that evolutionary ethics discredits the objectivity and foundations of ethics. Ruse must employ dubitable assumptions, however, to reach his conclusion. We can trace these assumptions to G. E. Moore. Also, part of Ruse’s case against the foundations of ethics can support the objectivity and foundations of ethics. Cooperative activity geared toward human flourishing helps point the way to a naturalistic moral realism and not exclusively to ethical skepticism as Ruse supposes.