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Abraham Ibn Daud is known as the philosopher who in his Ha-Emunah ha-Ramah (written originally in Arabic c. 1160) transplanted the Aristotelianism of the Muslim falāsifah al-Farabi and Avicenna to Jewish soil. Some 250 years later, Ḥasdai Crescas subjected this system to a severe criticism in his Or Ha-Shem (c. 1410). In his introduction Crescas classifies Ibn Daud as an Aristotelian philosopher but does not refer to him any further. Drawing on previous research by other scholars the paper examines the question to what extent Ibn Daud’s work was relevant for Crescas. Exact literary parallels that point to a unique influence of Ibn Daud on Crescas regarding philosophical doctrines are hard to uncover because Ibn Daud’s philosophical sources are the same as Crescas’s. Moreover, Ibn Daud’s thought displays many similarities to that of Maimonides and also to Gersonides whose views Crescas criticizes. The area of Biblical exegesis yields more results: Crescas can be shown to have drawn on Ibn Daud’s use of certain Biblical verses. Ibn Daud’s interpretation of Psalm 139 in relation to the key problem of God’s knowledge as well as his use of the light metaphor is likely to have inspired Crescas to ponder the question of the relation between philosophy and religion.

This paper shows that in the philosophy of Sánchez Vázquez the basis for creative praxis is not innovation but the activity of practical consciousness, to which that Marxist philosopher describes as dialectical unity of the subjective and the objective. Furthermore, the paper argues that, in the sense of such unity and mutatis mutandi, creation has a place in non-practical human activity.

The paper examines the roles of Crescas and Spinoza in the transition from the medieval to the modern conception of the universe. Crescas is presented as an illustrative example of the tension between Aristotelianism and revealed religion and how the latter brings about the dissolution of the former, thus paving the way for the modern conception of the universe. It is then showed how this modern conception is embodied in Spinoza’s thought, which radicalizes some of its defining traits. This radicalization undermines the traditional conception of the Deus absconditus and leads in Spinoza to the replacement of religion by philosophy as the true divine revelation.

The aim of this paper is to explain the connection between discursive rules and moral norms in the frame of discourse ethics. The paper begins with an analysis of the difference between action and operation and with a reconstruction of the concept of discourse. After that, the difference and the relationship between law and obligation are presented. The conclusion is that the connection between action and possible discourse is implicit in the notion of moral responsibility.

This paper considers and distinguishes two objections which ordinarily are thought to oppose a realistic conception of ethics: G. E. Moore’s naturalistic fallacy and Hume’s law. After having presented both objections, having developed their presuppositions and consequences and having answered each of them, the paper concludes that it is possible to hold today a realistic conception of ethics. It is structured in the style of a disputed question, divided in six articles.

In this paper we critically analyze how the relation of representation between theories and phenomena is characterized in van Fraassen’s Empiricist Structuralism. Our aim is to offer arguments that emphasize the role of the object in building data models. We also propose to show that the methodological option suggested in his recent work is insufficient to recover a plausible link between data models and phenomena.

In this paper we wish to address a problem which has to do with the growing obsolescence of human beings in the context of societies which are at once ultra-technological, hyper-consumerist and based around a market economy. We aim to examine critically and in detail the psychosocial and anthropological conditions of a world where women and men are being overtaken by a sometimes explosive combination of commercial speed and globalised capitalism. Technophilia, the true fetishism of our age, operates at full capacity as one of the legitimising ideological discourses of that historical process by means of which men are dwarfed by their own creation; men overwhelmed by the crushing power of a set of technoscientific developments which - and this is crucial - unfold with relative and worrying autonomy and following dynamics which often do not respond to actual human needs. Technology, which is never politically innocent, acquires uncommon proportions and scope when, in addition, its deployment responds to a cumulative capitalist logic of a boundless nature. It is this issue, therefore, which we aim to elucidate from an anthropological and philosophical point of view.

In the beginning of 1980’s Michel Foucault lectured on «παρρησία» at the Collège de France. Foucault’s lectures have become an important new way to interpret the parrhesía notion, from the political and philosophical point of view. Basically, Foucault distinguishes between a political parrhesía of democratic nature and a philosophical parrhesía whose origin can be traced to Plato. In this paper I focus my analysis on the political parrhesía, and I try to prove that Foucault’s definition of this concept is not in accordance with the Democratic Thinking of Ancient Athens. According to Foucault, parrhesía is a «une parole d’au-dessus», a discourse spoken from above. However, an alternative interpretation of ancient sources can prove that in reality the parrhesía is a discourse spoken from below. Contrary to what Foucault maintains, the works of Euripides, Demosthenes, Isocrates, and other authors contribute toward finding a popular root in the parrhesía, that it should be defined as the dignity of the popular speech.

This paper focuses on the role affectivity plays in the so-called young Martin Heidegger’s hermeneutical transformation of phenomenology. After establishing in the introduction the close connection existing between affectivity and facticity, I take the notion of movedness (Bewegtheit) of factical life as my main guiding thread. Firstly, I explain the peculiar meaning this notion has in young Heidegger’s philosophy. Secondly, I analyze the double “basic movedness” (Grundbewegtheit) of love and hate as being the intentional matrix of curare (Bekümmerung) according to the Heideggerian interpretation of Augustine’s Confessions during the summer semester lecture course in 1921. Thirdly, I consider the double movedness of pathos and Befindlichkeit as laid out in the summer semester lecture course in 1924, called Basic Concepts of Aristotelian Philosophy. And, finally, I elucidate the “Logic of the Heart” behind the hermeneutics of facticity as jointly articulating both the New Testament tradition of affectus (Augustine) and the Greek tradition of pathos (Aristotle).

This paper aims to tackle Arendt’s thinking in connection with our current knowledge on the history of Greece, in order to examine the philosopher’s interpretation of the Greek world – a special emphasis will be placed on the concepts of action, nomos and freedom, as well as on the importance of the agora’s political space. Furthermore, I intend to put into question those readings that attribute a kind of naïve hellenophilia to Arendt, also pointing out the limitations that she herself observed within the political approach of the polis. I argue that Arendt does not find, in Ancient Greece, any of the resorts that can counterbalance action and which she considers necessary in order for it to avoid falling into hybris, such as: forgiving, promise and authority. Finally, I claim that the Roman concept of lex, due to its relational dimension, is closer to her account of politics than the Greek concept of nomos.

This paper studies the role of literature and rethorics as a tool of philosophical practice within the classical tradition of «spiritual exercises». The aim of this study is to propose new ways of thinking the relations among philosophy and literature as formative or psicagogic disciplines, as well as for stand up for the role of philosophy and literature in our society.

This paper attempts to go more deeper into some ways to identify persons whose claims on justice are legitimate, trying to go beyond the traditional principles of territoriality and citizenship, which are considered inadequate for the current globalized world. Here we analyze the ideas offered from a theoretical perspective which seeks to relate the concepts of justice and democracy, extending the reflexive dynamics of politics beyond its traditional frontiers to the constitution of the demos itself.

The scholastic scientific diagram of the 13th century has a main component: the translations of Aristotle treatises. In this way Boethius’ works are highly significant both for his translations of Greek terms and for fixing a precise lexicology that allows us to interpret it. These records were enriched with meaningful translations and comments that began to spread in the 12th century and the following ones of the 13th century. However, Thomas Aquinas’ scientific view shows this tradition and enhances a certain understanding of the Aristotelian texts. On this basis the following paper analyzes the notion of ‘dignitates’ on the thomistic opera omnia, because this is one of the terms which sets up the scientific scheme of Aristotelian root, with the objective to show its place, its meaning and its scope in the order of sciences.

In this paper, we investigate the proper way in which the philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty has used the phenomenological method. Understanding the being, for him, is not achieving an absolute truth reserved to an intellectual elite. Understanding the world is, on the contrary, going down, being quiet, catching up with the being and, to a certain extent, seeing things from its perspective. Taking the path of knowledge is thus downing and watching existence from its many facets without avoiding the work of the intelligence. For this reason we will go through those main aspects that distinguish the phenomenology of the first Merleau-Ponty from the phenomenon to the history passing by the existence and the other.

Thomas Kuhn’s relativistic position is usually expounded in terms of its subjectivist and irrationalist consequences and, accordingly, as a contribution to anti-scientificism. This paper explains his pluralism in semantics and ontology and shows in it a kind of relativism from which those consequences do not follow. It is also argued that, despite that, this version does not converge to empiricism or scientific realism.

The paper discusses Fichte’s reception of the kantian essay Was heißt: Sich im Denken zu orientiren? that Fichte employs in different phases of his thought in highlighting the specific nature of his Wissenschaftslehre respect to Kant’s critical philosophy and to identify the misunderstandings that led to psychological (Fries) and realistic (Bardili) misrepresentation of criticism. The article discusses the definition of objectivity of representations that can be formed from the transcendental point of view, that Fichte elaborates in the Wissenschaftslehre nova methodo; the possibility to derive a real object from the logic, which Fichte reflected in the Transzendentale Logik II (§ 3) and the different constitution of the object that can be configured within the transcendental context, that Fichte describes in the Einleitungsvorlesungen in die Wissenschaftlehre 1813 (§ 4).

I propose in this paper a reflection, a self-analysis, about my extensive teaching experience, not from a formal point of view of the specificity of the program and the subjects of my courses, but about the singularity of the teaching activities. The commitment with the students, with the topic taught and with the Institution in which I have the honor to work, constitute the fundamental motive that leads and conducts my profession as teacher. My explanation displays ten items (1.The lesson as creation. 2. Space, time, and subject. 3. There is always time. About the difficulty to adjust contents to 52 hours. 4. The worst lesson is the one not given. 5. The teacher’s virtues. 6.To spare the rod is to spoil the child. The child’s rod. 7. Extension and intensity of the contents in the academic year. 8. The reward of the well-done work. 9. Our dignity lies in the fulfillment of the agreements. 10 Tutorial, exams and evaluation). Each of them presents a speculation about one of the ideal elements of the good teacher all of us aim to be. For that reason this essay is not a positivist description of the teaching reality, but it expects to reconstruct the critical demarcation between the ideality which all of us try to achieve and the empirical reality that constantly pull us in the opposite direction. The coercion without coercions of the exemplariness pushes us to maintain alive the faith in the appropriation of the nature and soul of the ideal teacher

Sainsbury 2005 and 2009 offers a theory of empty names that purports to account for the content and truth-value of all utterances involving them. The goal is to do this while offering a homogenous semantic treatment: both empty and nonempty names make the same kind of contribution to truth-values. The account is based on a new theory of reference that purports to be an alternative among nondescriptivist accounts. According to the new theory, there is reference even without referents. In this paper I argue that the theory does not offer a homogeneous semantics for names and that, thus, it fails to offer a more satisfactory alternative to the theories already available. I conclude by briefly describing a way in which a theory could in fact offer such homogeneous semantics for names via a cognitive theory of empty names.

This paper focuses on the problematic relationship between method and object in Walter Benjamin’s research. In order to do this, first we will try to clarify the dialectical structure of the notion of “critique”, which plays a key role in his method of historical knowledge. Benjamin’s peculiar appropriation of Goethean “dialectics” will allow us then to show the structural affinity that exists between the medium of representation and the historical object represented, paying special attention to the particular case of the object called “Baroque”.

En este trabajo se discute la interpretación de Isaiah Berlin de la filosofía política fichteana en términos de un organicismo. Esta interpretación muestra que las libertades individuales juegan un rol fundamental en la educación de los ciudadanos futuros en tanto que ésta es una tarea realizada por los padres y no por el Estado. Sin embargo, Fichte no defiende una idea de la libertad individual como no-interferencia, aun cuando las similitudes entre su teoría y la de Humboldt sugieran lo contrario. Del mismo modo, Fichte no defendió tampoco la idea de la libertad como no-dominación, como revela la comparación con la teoría de Philip Pettit. Por el contrario, Fichte sostuvo que la educación de los futuros ciudadanos tiene sentido únicamente cuando las libertades individuales son consideradas como inextricablemente unidas con la propiedad. This paper discusses Isaiah Berlin’s interpretation of Fichtean political philosophy in terms of organicism. It shows that individual liberties play a fundamental role in the education of future citizens as a task performed by parents, not the state. However, Fichte did not defend an idea of individual liberty or non-interference, even if similarities between his theory and Humboldt’s suggest the contrary. At the same time, Fichte also did not espouse the idea of freedom as non-domination, as a comparison with Philip Pettit’s theory reveals. By contrast, Fichte posited that the education of future citizens makes sense only if individual liberties are considered inextricably linked to property.

In order to examine whether the usual identification of neoliberal ideas with an ideological discourse is valid, this paper starts off with an analysis of what Marx terms commodity fetishism in Capital, based on which a certain sense of the concept of ideology may be inferred which would result in its being both true and false. In order to determine whether this definition of ideology may be applied to neoliberal theory, we look at its fundamental features and how they continue with or break away from economic liberalism as studied in Michel Foucault’s Birth of biopolitics. Attention is later moved to the characteristics detected by David Harvey in the socalled flexible accumulation as the latest stage of capitalism which coincides with the political implementation of neoliberal doctrine. At the end of the road travelled, it is hypothesised that this theory would be a form of ideology containing a dimension of both truth and falsehood, in line with Marx’s thought.

In this paper I discuss one of the most significant strategies in Spinoza’s theoretical approach against those that entrave its understanding in a very powerful way. As well as Descartes, Spinoza uses the inmediate or unreflexive experience for developing his conception of free will or the distinction between body and soul, but he does so in order to prove that the experience is useful to demonstrate some purely anti-Cartesian thesis that express the core principles of Spinozism.

In this paper are discussed the contributions of the contemporary sociological theory to the philosophical and scientical question of Ontology, for this purpose are compared the ontological assumptions elaborated for the General Social Systems Theory by Niklas Luhmann, Communicative Action Theory by Jürgen Habermas and Actor-Network Theory by Bruno Latour.

In this paper, I will show that strict versions of Luck Egalitarianism and Democratic Egalitarianism are implausible since both claim that the object of egalitarian justice should single out one and only one value. On the contrary, weak versions are acceptable since they allow a plural composition of the egalitarian justice object.This plural understanding of the object of egalitarian justice demands the justification of normative priorities since each conception would justify conflictive demands. In this article I will make three arguments to justify the normative priority of Democratic Egalitarianism over Luck Egalitarianism: a purely instrumentalone, another concerning expressive meaning of public policies and one last argument will show why we need a division of egalitarian moral work.

The aim of this paper is to examine how the Greek motto γνῶθι σεαυτόν plays a central role in Plato’s philosophy in order to show how ethics and knowledge go hand in hand in his model of παιδεία. The question of self-knowledge is a practical and theoretical task in life which is developed implicitly in his dialogues, it is for this reason that i examine some passages of the Charmides, Alcibiades I, Phaedo and Republic in order to show how Plato discovers the human interiority (Phaedo) and how self-knowledge is refined and articulated with the tripartition of the soul in the Republic.

The term “double bind” was first used by anthropologist Gregory Bateson. René Girard takes this contribution from the School of Palo Alto to formulate his theory of “mimetic desire”. This paper presents the transformation of this notion in contemporary anthropology.

It is usually assumed that Heraclitus is, exclusively, the philosopher of flux, diversity and opposition while Parmenides puts the case for unity and changelessness. However, there is a significant common understanding of things (though in differing contexts), not simply an accidental similarity of understanding. Both philosophers, critically, distinguish two realms: on the one hand, there is the one, common realm, identical for all, which is grasped by the ‘logos that is common’(Heraclitus) or the steady nous (Parmenides) that follows a right method in order to interpret the real. On the other hand, the realm of multiplicity seen and heard by the senses, when interpreted by ‘barbarian souls’, is not understood in its common unity. Analogously, when grasped by the wandering weak nous it does not comprehend the real’s basic unity. In this paper I attempt to defend the thesis that both thinkers claim that the common logos (to put it in Heraclitean terms) or the steady intellect (to say it with Parmenides) grasp and affirm the unity of the real.

Contrary to the view maintained by many philosophers that science employs the deductive testing of hypotheses, observational natural sciences such as paleoanthropology and the earth sciences apply a scientific methodology consisting in the proposal of hypotheses which are best fitted to the available empirical data, i.e. which best explain the data. Observational natural sciences are predominantly empirical. They are grounded in observation, and they do not implement any Popperian deductive testing of hypotheses. Theoretical natural sciences such as mathematical physics also apply inference to the best explanation for the introduction of significant concepts and hypotheses. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate that in contemporary science, the use of abductive reasoning continues to be as effective as ever.

In this paper we defend the thesis that the notion of life, in Foucault’s work, is not only the historical correlate of power and knowledge practices. Foucault argues a Vitalist ontological position, however intermittent and not at all explicit. The source of this philosophical choice in Foucault is not Nietzsche or Deleuze, but it coincides in many respects with the non-essentialist Vitalism of Georges Canguilhem. First, we compare Canguilhem and Foucault’s relation to the Kantian tradition, in its critical and transcendental aspects. Secondly, we confront the notion of life on the philosophical proposals of Canguilhem and Foucault. Finally we analyze the canguilhemian origin of the normalization foucauldian concept. This affiliation also regards the concept of biopolitics, referred to a power that acts on life, imitating its operation. This rooting of the thought of Foucault in the Vitalism of his master resolves two internal tensions in the path of the first: the justification of movements of revolt and self-formative character of subjectivity.

In this paper I analyze Malcolm Budd’s “aesthetic” approach to nature that claims that the right way to appreciate nature is “as being nature” and not as being art. I study his dependence on Kant’s free beauty and I try to show that free beauty is a theoretical device derived from the unavoidable dependent beauty. Besides, following Joseph Margolis’ philosophy, I intend to show that “nature as nature” is also a cultural artifact.

The following paper focuses on the theory of imitation developed by Walter Benjamin in the famous work of art essay. The essay is approached as a new sample of the “research on the origin” already used in his previous works, which will allow us to highlight the key role assigned to “mimesis” as the “origin” which discloses the unitary law of the whole age. The essay, therefore, overcomes the limited scope of aesthetics in which traditionally has been framed and aims to a wider reflection on the inner contradictions of modernity, regarding which mimesis indicates both the problem and a possible way out.

The main goal of this paper is to argue that Anglo-American philosophy and Continental philosophy should work together within the arena of the philosophy of sport. To do so, the concept “communicative community”, which is found in Habermas’ and Apel’s discursive ethics, will be analyzed and applied to sports. As several authors, such as Raúl Sebastian Solanes, Robert L. Simon and William J. Morgan, have done this task before, I will critically analyze their proposals. In so doing, I will show that in order to make sense of contemporary sports we need a more integrative communicative sporting community than the ones proposed so far in the literature.

the aim of this paper is to prove that secession is inherently undemocratic. We will review the secessionist arguments: the one that starts from a wrong idea of selfgovernment and the one that starts from liberalism. then, we will oppose objections to both: defending the value of equality; rejecting internal homogeneity claims; picking up Buchanan’s classic objections; and finally, reformulating, with Habermas and Pogge, a concept of self-government in order to deduce that it is not legitimate to draw more boundaries because an ideal democracy would require to eliminate the current borders.

Within the strong branch of artificial intelligence (aI), which is aimed at creating thinking machines with intellectual powers like those of man, the most explored research program is symbolic aI, defined as the attempt to use electronic computers to replicate the human mind, either assuming a structural and functional similarity between them, or trying to replicate the behavior produced by the human mind through computational processes that also have an intentional structure but are only instrumentally equivalent. In this paper we show that strong symbolic aI, in either of its two variants, is impossible, since formal systems, that is what all computer programs ultimately are, are not sufficient to replicate in an intentional way four intellectual faculties of man that are essential to intelligent behavior: sense of the situation, common sense, procedural skills and theory abduction.

in this paper i assess Pierre Duhem’s criticism of crucial experiments, and argue that we have reasons to vindicate their existence. i then analize the experiments carried out by Fizeau and Foucault in 1850, and criticize Duhem’s interpretation of their results. i contend that the results of crucial experiences can be described in terms that are neutral with respect to the competing theories. For that reason an experimental result is relatively stable and open to different interpretations in the light of new theories. i conclude by distinguishing successful crucial experiments from decisive experiments. The former are meant to provide evidence that confirms one theory and disconfirms its rivals, but not necessarily to provide sufficient reasons for accepting or rejecting one of those theories.

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate, contrary to what experts generally consider, that the criticism that Diderot has directed at Rousseau in the Essai sur les règnes de Claude et de Néron goes beyond the biographical level, and it is deeply rooted in central structures of Diderot’s philosophy. This, on the other hand, sheds light on the place Seneca occupies in the book and on the criticism that Diderot had made to the Roman philosopher in 1745.

according to Plotinus, it is possible for the soul of the philosopher to follow a way of ascension towards the superior realities. This way is composed of two parts. The first one goes from the sensible world to the Intellect and the second, from the Intellect to the one. In this paper, I investigate the trópos and mēkhanaí, as Plotinus writes in I, 6, necessary to this journey.

In this paper we analyze the problem of how our perceptual experiences give epistemic support to our beliefs. We begin with some considerations formulated by Fodor, but revise them in some respects. We consider, in particular, his recent proposal for the existence of non-conceptual representations in perceptual information processing. Our aim is to vindicate, against the arguments raised by some representatives of so-called ‘perceptual conceptualism’, a normative role for perceptual experiences insofar as they are conceived as representations with non-conceptual content.

The paper presents and analyzes a set of unpublished notes for lecture courses on geometry, which David Hilbert gave between 1891 and 1905. it will be argued that in these lecture courses the author elaborates the conception of geometry which underlies his axiomatic investigations in Foundations of Geometry (1899). on the one hand, it is claimed that this conception of geometry can be characterized by: i) an abstract or formal axiomatic view; ii) an empiricist stance regarding the origins of geometry and its place among the different mathematical theories. on the other hand, it is asserted that the role that Hilbert assigns to geometrical intuition in the process of the (formal) axiomatization of this theory, can be used to perceive his clear opposition with regard to (radical) formalist views which he is often identified with.