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Este artículo presenta los resultados obtenidos a través del uso de herramientas informáticas (Provalis Research), también conocidas como CAQDAS (Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software), para el análisis de los escritos de Peirce, las bases estadísticas de una cronología para su último periodo intelectual y la justificación de una posible periodización del Pragmaticismo, además de la descripción de ciertos descubrimientos realizados en nuestro trabajo de archivo sobre los documentos y manuscritos originales de Peirce. Este trabajo es una parte de nuestra investigación en la Universidad de Quebec en Montreal (UQAM) y la Biblioteca Houghton de la Universidad de Harvard.

En primer término, se aborda la relación asimétrica de humanidades y ciencias en las instituciones contemporáneas de conocimiento sugiriendo la inconveniencia de acentuar la diferencia entre unas y otras, en la medida en que ambos órdenes epistémicos están sometidos hoy a los mismos condicionamientos estructurales. El efecto que estos tienen sobre las humanidades es analizado a través de dos aspectos críticos. En segundo término, se discute la significación epistémica de la ocurrencia como principio común de ciencias y humanidades apelando a la obra de Georg Christoph Lichtenberg a manera de caso ejemplar. En esta, experimentalismo y ensayo, singularidades, ficción y variación dan cuenta de un mismo brote epistémico en humanidades (y literatura) y ciencias.

Abstract: Pereira’s “The projective theory of consciousness” is an experimental statement, drawing on many diverse sources, exploring how consciousness might be produced by a projective mechanism that results both in private selves and an experienced world. Unfortunately, pulling together so many unrelated sources and methods means none gets full attention. Furthermore, it seems to me that the uncomfortable breadth of this paper unnecessarily complicates his project; in fact it may hide what it seeks to reveal. If this conglomeration of diverse sources and methods were compared to trees, the reader may feel like the explorer who cannot see the forest for the trees. Then again, it may be the author who is so preoccupied with foreground figures that the everpresent background is ultimately obscured.

In a paper published in 1998, Ricardo Salles argues that the Stoic theory of action cannot account for practical knowledge, i.e., knowledge about what action is appropriate to be carried out in certain circumstances. The aim of this paper is to propose a solution to this problem. For this aim, I argue that the Stoics developed a perceptual theory of moral knowledge. According to this theory, the moral properties instantiated in objects, people, and actions are known through perception. After explaining this theory, I argue that it allows us to show that the Stoics deemed perception as a source of practical knowledge.

This paper provides an account of the evolution of the notion of comparatio in the main dialectical works of Valla, Agricola, and Vives. It highlights the elements of continuity and discontinuity and sheds light on the original contributions of Vives’s treatment. In Valla, Agricola and Vives, the notion of comparatio characterizes: a) the locus of the relation to another in the inventio method; b) the cognitive act through which one can grasp the relationships of similarity and difference between concepts; c) the epistemic method for weighing the degree of plausibility of probable arguments. The paper also shows how Vives enhances the role of comparatio within dialectical art. Firstly, he attributes a pre-eminent position to the locus of the comparatio by virtue of the transversality of its application to all the other loci. Secondly, he identifies the explanation of the key concept of syllogism in the act of compering two sentences with a third. Finally, he finds the essence of the disputatio in the method of comparing equally probable contradictory arguments. This can rightly be considered an innovative element of the Vivesian dialectical treatment with respect to the most advanced European humanist movement of the first decades of the sixteenth century.

This paper analyzes Paul of Venice’s theory of measurement of natural properties and changes. The main sections of the paper correspond to Paul’s analysis of the three types of accidental changes (local motion: section II; augmentation: section III; alteration and qualities: section IV), for which the Augustinian philosopher sought to provide rules of measurement. It appears that Paul achieved an original synthesis borrowing from both Parisian (Albert of Saxony in particular) and Oxfordian sources (especially Richard Swineshead). It is also argued that, on top of this theoretical synthesis, Paul managed to elaborate a quite original theory of intensive properties that marks him out not only from the nominalist framework of his Parisian sources but also from the usual realist treatments of the problem. Finally, it is shown that, to a certain extent, Paul undertook to apply the mathematical and logical tools inherited from the Calculatores tradition to empirical problems of natural philosophy, leading to reevaluate his role in the evolution of scientific thought in early 15th-century Italy (section V).

This paper provides a philosophical analysis and a new edition of an anonymous Epitome (Compendium) of John Dumbleton’s solution to the semantic paradoxes (insolubilia). The first part of this paper briefly presents Dumbleton’s cassationist solution to the semantic paradoxes, which the English philosopher proposes in his Summa Logicae, written in the 1330s–40s. The second part investigates the solution to various types of insolubles proposed by the anonymous author of the Epitome. The third part provides a new critical edition of the Latin text – a first edition was edited by Bottin in 1978 – and an English translation.

This paper argues that the account of friendship (philia) present in Plato's dialogue the Lysis is rife with the disruptive and maddening force of eros. By its end it is no longer clear whether the familiar sorts of personal relationships that we typically count as friendships, and which Aristotle discusses with great sensitivity and appreciation in the Nicomachean Ethics, can be meaningfully sustained. To support this thesis, the paper analyzes each of the seven, relatively self-contained arguments Socrates offers. In addition, it shows how the dramatic context in which these arguments are embedded foreshadows the dialogue's principal objective: to blur the distinction between philia and eros by allowing the latter to infect the former.

Many scholars consider that Socrates in the Lysis holds that friendship and love are egoistic and utility-based. In this paper, I will argue against those readings of Plato’s Lysis. I will analyze how Socrates treats utility and egoism in the many different kinds of friendship he discusses in the dialogue, from parental love, like-to-like, and unlike-to-unlike relationships, to the accounts of friendship rooted in the human relation to the good and the ways in which we can belong with some other human beings. The upshot of my paper is twofold. I endeavor to prove that some of these relationships, as Plato’s Socrates discusses them, are not egoistic and that Plato represents and valorizes a particular type of friendship having to do with philosophy and philosophical way of life, which is for the sake of another.

ABSTRACT We can often find in the literature (both popular and academic) ascriptions of complex collective duties to extensive unstructured collections of individuals. By ‘complex collective duties’, I mean collective duties that, plausibly, require that the individual members of an extensive unstructured collection should enact different contributory act-types to achieve an end jointly - for example, the alleged universal collective duty to end global poverty. In this paper, I argue that these duties are not action-guiding. The reason is that they do not pass what I call the ‘test of action-guidance’. This test assumes the intuitive belief that a moral duty is action-guiding only if it is clear to the duty-bearer the act-type that she should enact after the ascription of the duty. Complex collective duties ascribed to extensive unstructured collections fail to pass this test because, even though each duty-bearer (that is, each member of the collection) receives guidance on the end that they should achieve jointly, it is not clear to these agents the act-type that each of them should put into practice.

ABSTRACT This paper examines the role that the notion of political obligation has in the thought of the Italian philosopher of politics and law Alessandro Passerin d’Entrèves (1902 - 1985), especially in its relationship with the democratic regime and forms of resistance on the part of citizens. By analyzing the author’s main arguments in this regard, it seeks to demonstrate the flexibility of the author’s concept of State, and the importance of philosophy as a point of intersection between morality and law, constituting itself as an instrument of phenomenological approach to the forms of human association.

While refutation is usually related to Plato's early, Socratic, dialogues, this paper is aimed at exploring the link between refutation and dialectic in some of his middle and late dialogues. First, it argues that refutation assumes a constructive role in the Phaedo, where the best logos is the least refutable, and also in the Republic, where the philosopher is invited to fight his way through all elenchoi. Then, it tries to show that the gymnasia of Prm. 130a ff. is aimed at training young Socrates to come to the aid of the theory he embraces preventing it from being refuted. He should travel and explore all the paths, by assuming a hypothesis as well as the opposite one. This methodology paves the way on which Plato advances in the Sophist, where the antinomic structure of the gymnasia gives way to a “constructive” dialectic in which the aporia is solved and a thesis is established by refutation. The last section of this paper is devoted to analysing Sph. 251c-252e, where the positive and constructive function of the elenchus is especially clear. Plato argues for the symploke eidon by exploring all the hypotheses that are open to the search and refuting those that ultimately represent obstacles to his position. The symploke is the truth which remains when all the hypotheses that contradict it have been refuted. The conclusion is that the elenchus does not disappear but is put at the service of the truth, as an essential part of the method for attaining a positive doctrine.

By framing Aristotle’s dialectic in the broader context of scientific inquiry and demonstration, this paper is aimed at showing of what use the “reputable opinions” can be for grasping the principles of sciences, as declared in Topics I.2. It argues that such a use cannot imply ‒ at any stage of inquiry ‒ a replacement of the logic and intrinsic goals of demonstration by those proper to dialectic. However, it also defends a substantive (but still modest) contribution of dialectic ‒ beyond its well-attested methodological role in discarding contradictory opinions and its (possible though not germane to the context of Topics I.2) application to proving the principle of non-contradiction by means of refutation. This contribution consists in providing the preliminary accounts of facts in order to have scientific inquiry started, as required in Posterior Analytics II.8. To better appreciate how the proposed location of dialectic in a pre-demonstrative stage of inquiry is operational, the paper finally examines Physics IV.1-5.

The aim of the present paper is to show the results of one chapter of my Doctorate thesis about Thasian black-figure pottery as archaeologically contextualized documents, being part of the votive objects offered at female sanctuaries, especially the Artemision of Thassos. This paper is centered on Thassos, an island situated in the Northern Aegean, settled by Greeks from Paros. We focus on the Archaic Period, more specifically on the sixth century BC, the peak of local production. Departing from the archaeological contexts through excavation reports, we analyze significant social and religious connections among votive materials associated with the Thasian black-figure pottery. These connections brought us elements that allowed us to interpret the multiculturalism imbricated within the objects, the mimicry and the innovations in the decoration of this black-figure pottery, as well as the particular demand in quantitative terms of a type of vessel called lekane, an object that was loaded with information and religious and apotropaic meaning. In addition, those same elements also showed us traits that reveal votive practices, judging by the way the pottery was exhibited, and its decorative features, which to date are only attested in Thassos. The research revealed intrinsic relationships linked to the diverse facets of Artemis, from a goddess protecting the rites of passage to the protection of women in childbirth, as seen in the black-figure pottery, amulets and other apotropaic objects. Moreover, it demonstrated that the multiple facets of Artemis, as protector of women, act in many spheres, such the civic-religious space in connection with the oíkos and social order, the possibility of a good childbirth and the social position of women in Thassos from the Archaic period.

This paper sets out to analyze Proclus’ exegesis of Socrates’ suggestion in Parmenides 132d1-3 that Forms stand fixed as patterns (παραδείγματα), as it were, in the nature, with the other things being images and likenesses of them. Proclus’ analysis of the notion of being pattern reveals the impact of the Aristotelian conception of the form as paradigm on his views, as we can infer from Alexander of Aphrodisias’ and Simplicius’ explanation of the paradigmatic character of the Aristotelian form. Whereas Aristotle and Alexander of Aphrodisias refute the efficient causality of the Platonic Forms and support that μέθεξις is just a metaphor, Syrianus, Proclus and Asclepius defend the Platonic theory, and specifically Proclus, who brings to the fore the multilateral role of the Forms as patterns with regard to the secondary things of this realm.[1] [1] An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Symposium Platonicum XII: Plato’s Parmenides, organized by the International Plato Society, Paris, 15-19 July 2019.

Assuming that a nihilist reading of Gorgias’ thought is to be ruled out, the issue of ‘not being’ remains one of the thorniest in his philosophy; indeed, it is fair to conclude that Gorgias is deeply concerned with ‘not being’. But what, after all, is Gorgias’ ‘not being’? This paper aims to answer this crucial question, by taking into consideration Gorgias’ main texts (i.e. the Treatise, the Apology of Palamedes and the Encomium of Helen). Each of them provides a serious – although not always explicit – account of ‘not being’. Overall, the aim is to show that Gorgias’ account of ‘not being’ is not concerned with ‘non-existence’ at all. It is deeply concerned, however, with falsehood and language. The paper will, therefore, be structured as follows: in part 1, the Treatise and specifically the the first section of the Particular Proof will be addressed and its ‘linguistic’ conception of ‘not-being’ fully exploited; in part 2, the Apology of Palamedes will be taken into account, in order to enucleate its ‘not-being-as-falsehood’ argument; the results from part 1 and part 2 will allow us, in part 3, to provide an analysis of the Encomium of Helen which points at its underlying conception of ‘not-being’.

In a work entitled On the Generation of Animals, Aristotle remarks that “intellect (nous) alone enters from outside (thurathen)”. Interpretations of this passage as dualistic dominate the history of ideas and allow for a joining together of Platonic and Aristotelian doctrine on the soul. This, however, pulls against the well-known Aristotelian position that soul and body are intertwined and interdependent. The most influential interpretations thereby misrepresent Aristotle’s view on soul and lack any real engagement with his embryology. This paper seeks to extract the account of intellect (nous) in Aristotelian embryology from this interpretative background and place it within the context of his mature biological thought. A clear account of the actual import of this statement in its relevant context is given before explaining how it has been misunderstood by various interpretative traditions. The paper finishes by touching on how early commentary by Christian writers, freed as it was from the imperative to synthesise Greek philosophy, differed from those that came after. While realising that Aristotle’s position would not aid them in their explanations of the soul’s survival after death, their engagement with Aristotle’s science allowed for other aspects of theology concerning the fittingness of soul to body.

In a seminal essay from 1967, historian Lynn White, Jr., argues that the profound cause of today’s environmental crisis is the anthropocentric perspective, embedded in the Christian “roots” of Western tradition, which assigns an intrinsic value to human beings solely. Though White’s thesis relies on a specific tradition – the so-called “dominant anthropocentric reading” of Genesis – the idea that anthropocentrism provides the ideological basis for the exploitation of nature has proven tenacious, and even today is the ground assumption of the historical and philosophical debate on environmental issues. This paper investigates the possible impact on this debate of a different kind of anthropocentrism: Aristotle’s philosophy of biology. The topic is controversial, since it involves opposing traditions of interpretations; for the purpose of the present paper, the dominant anthropocentric reading of Gen. 1.28 will be analyzed, and the relevant passages from Aristotle’s De Partibus Animalium, showing his commitment to a more sophisticated anthropocentric perspective, will be reviewed.

Towards the end of the fourth century CE Nemesius, bishop of Emesa in Syria, composed his treatise On Human Nature (Περὶ φύσεως ἀνθρώπου). The nature of the soul and its relation to the body are central to Nemesius’ treatment. In developing his argument, he draws not only on Christian authors but on a variety of pagan philosophers such as Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics and the great physician-cum-philosopher Galen of Pergamum. This paper examines Nemesius’ references to Aristotle’s biology in particular, focusing on a few passages in the light of Aristotle’s Generation of Animals and History of Animals as well as the doxographic tradition. The themes in question are: the status of the intellect, the scale of nature and the respective roles of the male and female in reproduction. Central questions are: Exactly which impact did Aristotle make on his thinking? Was it mediated or direct? Why does Nemesius cite Aristotle and how? Long used as a source for earlier works now lost, Nemesius’ work may provide intriguing glimpses of the intellectual culture of his time. This paper is designed to contribute to this new approach to his work.

With regards to the excesses of our current pandemic, many early philosophical contributions to an understanding of our situation have focused on an unsolvable dichotomy between continuity and discontinuity with regards to the possible novelty of the Covid-19-pandemic. This paper seeks to take the event-character of this global phenomenon as given, to focus instead on the question of what it means to philosophize it, and in turn, to think through our present. How can we write for or near the present without reducing it to a mere moment, without stifling it in concepts hastily cast upon it? Through a discussion of the symptomatic positions of Deleuze, Foucault, and Derrida on the concept of the event around 1968, this paper argues for a second order ethics of tending to the present as a repeated critical practice that does not renounce being affected by the world it emanates from.

This paper uncovers and explores the consequences of the restricted libidinal economy at the roots of Adam Smith’s image of thought. Focusing on Smith’s « History of Astronomy », the paper argues that the space in which the smithian system operates is grounded on Newton’s celestial mechanics. It shows how this epistemological framework strongly impacted Smith’s economic, libidinal, semiotic and cognitive views. More precisely, it underlines how this framework is unable to cope with unexpected events such as psychic and economic crisis, that are figured by comets, meteorites – and more broadly, any kind of not identified cosmological objects – in Smith’s text. Second, the paper sets up a dialogue between Smith’s image of thought, Kant’s first Critique and Freud’s meta-psychical apparatus, underlying some affinities between the three projects. Finally, the paper presents F. W. J. Schelling’s post-Kantian, general and meteoric cosmology as a relevant alternative to reconfigure the current globalized and yet restricted image of thought we inherited from classical liberalism and rationalism.

This paper investigates the influence of the mathematical problematic on the political function of Gilles Deleuze’s work (including his work with Guattari). Most prominent is an investigation into the Deleuzian problematic—signified by Deleuze as the (non)being or? being of being—which is traced through the work of French mathematics by way of Georges Bouligand, Salomon Maïmon and Albert Lautman. This mode of mathematical formalization is explored in relation to Kantian axiomatization (in terms of both extensive magnitudes and intensive magnitudes/distances, as well as the relationship between problems and ideas). This paper explores the way that Deleuze uses Lautman’s discussion of the mathematical real to bring mathematical concepts into other discourses (such as politics). The paper concludes by enacting this move, exploring the way that the concept of the problematic is used within the political register by putting it into conversation with the aleatory.

Two recent tendencies in digital-cultural theory have attempted to critique a representational view of computation through an attention to the language that itemizes computational processes. This paper argues that that each of the thinkers aligned with these two broad camps tend to reduce this language to one of two kinds of structure. The first approach sees the structures of computation and digitality as chiefly social; the second sees these structures as an extension of mathematical and philosophical logic. This paper proposes that the task of thinking outside this schema necessitates a methodological approach to computational elaborations of language not in terms of a logic of structure but a logic of sense. Through the work of Gilles Deleuze—by way of linguist Louis Hjelmslev—I introduce a notion of sense suitable for the analysis of the logico-mathematical statements that comprise digitality. I then read two examples from machine learning and computational linguistics research that provide occasion to consider aspects of digitality traditionally elided by the dominant usages of computers in the natural and social sciences. Finally, I conclude with some proposals regarding how we might conceive of the ontogeny of a digital object from this perspective.

The concept of the assemblage is one with great interest for music studies. While a number of authors have previously considered the Deleuze-Guattarian assemblage in relation to a variety of musical repertoires and genres, this paper will focuses instead on a more fundamental theoretical question. Considering a musical or a mixed media work as a Deleuze-Guattarian assemblage entails recognising that its ‘interest’ or ‘success’ is in some way the product of its consistency in the sense that it constitutes a successful, viable, meeting place of elements from these milieu, of these heterogeneous forces. We might then ask – what exactly do we mean when we speak of the consistency of a musical or mixed media assemblage? Acknowledging that most of the work that has been done in this area has relied principally on the joint theorisations of Deleuze and Guattari, this paper for the most part traces the concept of consistency as it is formulated in multiple places in Guattari’s writings. This is undertaken in the conviction that Guattari’s various theorisations offer us interesting and productive ways of thinking the consistency of musical compositions and events. The paper concludes with some general remarks on the fluid nature of consistency in musical composition from the turn to atonality to the contemporary situation.

This paper explores the question of the relationship between art, rhythm, and life through a mobilisation of Giorgio Agamben’s discussion, first, of Nietzsche and the active nihilist’s relationship to art, and second, on his diagnosis of rhythm as pertaining to the “original structure” of the work of art in The Man Without Content. Agamben’s notion of the “rhythmic” and “poietic” encounter is one which situates the experience of rhythm as the experience of the originary dimension of temporality and of the human’s relationship to the world. Turning to Nietzsche, this paper seeks to complicate Agamben’s picture by discussing Nietzsche’s under-discussed explorations of rhythm and its connection to art (focusing primarily on his early works). Three distinct rhythms will be identified: Apollonian, Dionysian, and the tragic or joyful rhythms of the Apollo-Dionysus relation (discussed through Nietzsche’s reading of Heraclitus and of Deleuze’s reading of Nietzsche’s Heraclitus). Reading Agamben through Nietzsche, it will be discussed how Agamben’s notion of rhythm (1) blends Apollonian and Dionysian elements; (2) does not through this blending however offer a tragic or joyful notion of rhythm, which, for Nietzsche, follows from their double affirmative rhythmisation. Instead of a rhythmic-poietic encounter opening an originary and authentic experience of temporality and dwelling, Nietzsche offers an account of tragic and joyful rhythms which continually create new worlds.

This paper draws on artistic explorations of territorial and spatial forces through analysis of projects set in the natural landscape, in a specific indoor site or at the threshold between the two. Specific attention is given to the artistic processes at play in the transformation of materials created/collected in the natural environment when shaped for presentation in an indoor location. What is the relation between being and becoming in this liminal space? According to Erwin Straus, the impetus to this process is the pathic moment of sensation, a moment which evolves in two dimensions: as an unfolding of the world and of the self (Straus 1965). Louis Schreel argues that in Deleuze and Guattari, artistic practice activates a process in which «the work ‘captures’ forces at work in the world and renders these sensible. Its effects are above all real and not merely imaginary: the image is not a mental given but a concrete, existing reality» (Schreel 2014: 100). Here, Deleuze distinguishes between the percept – landscape in the absence of man – and affect, the non-human becomings contained in the artwork. This paper wishes to unpack these processes through a study of two concrete instances of artistic practice, aiming to create immediate interaction between musician and environment, in which either of the two authors took part.

This paper analyses the argumentative strategy of the ninth chapter of the treatise De Interpretatione in the light of Aristotle's Rhetoric. The subject of the ‘future events’ developed in chapter IX brings up themes that are proper not only to philosophical thought, but also to political practice, forensic rhetoric, deliberative rhetoric and even tragic poetry. In this paper, it is argued that Aristotle uses the dialectical method and certain rhetorical techniques to touch the various discussions related to the subject addressed. He erects a hypothetical adversary and a thesis to refute, condensing some positions that were probably scattered in the most diverse textual and oratory sources of his time. Moreover, he builds the thesis of his hypothetical opponent from premises established in previous chapters of his own treatise. With this, he can simulate the defense of his opponent's thesis before demolishing it. Thus, according to the hypothesis defended here, the philosopher does not in fact commit himself to the arguments presented between 18a35 and 18b25, but only simulates the defense of the reasoning which he will soon refute. In addition, it is also concluded that chapter IX is part of the argumentative chain of the treatise, having as a peculiar characteristic, not the theme or nature of the arguments exposed, but the rhetorical method it employs.

ABSTRACT This paper aims to map the different theoretical options related to the Precautionary Principle (PP). Great part of the literature on it can be systematized by answering to three different questions: is there a basic structure in the PP? If so, in which interpretation of the PP does this structure express itself? Finally, are its damage or knowledge conditions fixed or adjustable? The first question separates realist from non-realist approaches. The second question allows us to discriminate monist, dualist, or pluralist positions in relation to the three interpretations of the PP: decision rule, procedural requirement, or epistemic rule. Finally, the third question distinguishes rigid from non-rigid formulations of the principle. Based on this mapping, one can not only navigate through the different formulations of the PP present both in official documents and in specialized literature, but also deflect some of its common objections, and understand Hans Jonas’ eventual connection with PP. Notwithstanding, this mapping does not capture other important themes attached to PP, which motivates a final distinction between narrow and broader forms of PP.

Critical and pancritical rationalism were mainly debated in the second half of the XXth century, however a new important paper on pancritical rationalism has been published recently, and hence a critical commentary of this recent publication is required, one is offered here.

ABSTRACT According to one influential argument against the existence of a priori knowledge, there is no a priori knowledge because (i) no belief is immune to revision, and (ii) if there were a priori knowledge, at least some beliefs would be unrevisable. A version of this argument was famously advocated by W. V. Quine, and is still popular among many naturalist philosophers. The aim of this paper is to examine and reject this argument against the a priori. The paper starts by discussing the thesis (i) and its role in Quine’s Web of Belief model. It is suggested that this thesis faces some important challenges that might jeopardize its use in the above argument against the a priori. Premise (ii) of the argument is then discussed. Philip Kitcher has famously defended a version of premise (ii). His arguments are assessed and rejected. The conclusion is that we have no good reason to accept (ii), and, with it, this argument against the a priori. The paper ends by proposing an account of the a priori that is perfectly compatible with (i).

ABSTRACT The aim of this paper is to show that "traditional" and "resolute" interpretations have not freed the "Tractatus" from the apparent paradoxical self-defeat. I argue that these readings only give it new clothing. Hacker's "traditional" reading ends up ascribing a metaphysical conspiracy to the "Tractatus", which is incompatible with the aims of the book. The "resolute" reading of Diamond and Conant ascribes an authorial conspiracy to Wittgenstein, which contradicts his views on authorship and method. Grounded in the difficulties found in both sides of the current debate, I conclude this paper by proposing several requirements that the correct interpretation of the "Tractatus" should fulfill.

The aim of this paper is to study a set of three issues related to the understanding of partial justice and partial injustice as character dispositions, namely the distinctive circumstance of action, the emotion involved therein and the pleasure or pain following it. Those points are treated in a relatively obscure way by Aristotle, especially in comparison with their treatment in the expositions of other character virtues in the Nicomachean Ethics. Building on the expression ‘capacity towards the other’ (δύναμις ἐν τῷ πρὸς ἕτερον), the paper highlights the interpersonal nature of the circumstances of just and unjust actions, and points how such nature is directly related to notions such as ‘profit’ (κέρδος) or ‘getting more’(πλεονεκτεῖν) as well as to the unusual conception of excess, defect and intermediacy in Nicomachean Ethics Book V. The interpersonal nature of just and unjust actions works also as the starting-point for the interpretation both of the pleasure briefly mentioned in 1130b4 as characterizing the greedy person and of the emotion involved in acting justly or greedy, which is mentioned in an extremely elliptical way in 1130b1-2: the paper argues, on the one hand, that the pleasure felt in acting justly or unjustly concerns not only the goods that are the object of just or unjust interactions, but also the way such interactions affect the people involved; on the other hand, it argues that the emotion actuated in just or unjust interactions relates to the agent’s concern or lack of concern with the good of those people.

The Stoic Epictetus famously criticizes his students for studying Stoicism as ‘mere theory’ and encouraged them to add training to their educational program. This is made all the more interesting by the fact that Epictetus, as a Stoic, was committed to notion that wisdom is sufficient to be virtuous, so theory should be all that’s required to achieve virtue. How are we then to make sense of Epictetus criticism of an overreliance on theory, and his insistence on adding training? This paper argues that this tension can be resolved through an appeal to the metaphor of ‘digesting theory’. Epictetus discusses the digestion of theory in three parts of his existent work. While the use of digestion as a metaphor for moral progress in Epictetus has been noted, an explanation as to exactly what this process consists of has yet to be provided. This paper attempts to provide such an account. I argue that digestion consists of assimilating what we have learnt conceptually, at the level of general principles, into specific beliefs concerning existent objects. I argue further that this process of digestion can only be achieved through what Epictetus calls training (askesis).

Este artigo discute a relação entre ética e estética na filosofia de Jean-François Lyotard. Influenciado por Wittgenstein, Lyotard argumenta que a cultura contemporânea é caracterizada por vários jogos de linguagem localmente legitimados, o que impossibilitaria o uso de uma linguagem universal e unificadora. De acordo com Lyotard, metanarrativas tais como a autonomia do sujeito oprimiriam a diversidade. Por causa disso, as metanarrativas deveriam ser substituídas pelos vários jogos. Assim, o artigo também pretende mostrar que essa caracterização de pós-modernidade abrange uma posição ética cética e relativista que torna impraticável uma análise crítica da cultura. Uma das consequências disso é a associação entre a filosofia pós-moderna e a defesa das sociedades capitalistas. [This paper discusses the relation between ethics and aesthetics in the philosophy of Jean-François Lyotard. Influenced by Wittgenstein, Lyotard argues that contemporary culture is characterized by several locally legitimated language games, which would precludes the use of a universal and unifying language. According to Lyotard, metanarratives such as the autonomous subject could oppress diversity. Because of this, the metanarratives should be replaced by several games. The paper also intends to show that this characterization of postmodernity embraces a skeptical and relativist ethic conception that makes impractical a critical analysis of culture. One consequence of this is the link between postmodern philosophy and defense of capitalist societies.]

This paper discusses Rudolf Carnap’s 1929 conferences at the Bauhaus school of art, design and architecture in the context of Otto Neurath’s utopianism. The conferences enable us to understand Carnap’s proposals of logical construction as part of some modernist cultural movements of Central Europe in early 20th Century. Utopias play a significant role in Neurath’s Philosophy of Social Science, as they can be compared to models of social technology. Carnap’s conferences aim at showing that the Bauhaus shared a world-conception with the Vienna Circle, group of which Carnap and Neurath were members. This paper argues that this common world-conception can be understood as a utopia, as a proposal of intervention in society, and that Carnap’s conferences were an invitation to join such utopia. This paper not only performs an exercise of historical reconstruction of Philosophy of Science, but it also shows reflexions on some problems of Social Science and technology. [Neste artigo se discutem as conferências de Rudolf Carnap, em 1929, na Bauhaus, escola de arte, design e arquitetura, no contexto do utopianismo de Otto Neurath. As conferências nos permitem compreender as propostas de Carnap relativas à construção lógica como parte de alguns movimentos culturais modernistas na Europa Central do início do século XX. Utopias desempenham um papel significativo na filosofia das ciências sociais de Neurath, sendo comparáveis a modelos de tecnologia social. As conferências de Carnap objetivam mostrar que a Bauhaus e o Círculo de Viena, grupo de que Carnap e Neurath eram membros, compartilhavam uma concepção de mundo. Argumenta-se neste artigo que essa compartilhada concepção de mundo pode ser entendida como uma utopia, como uma proposta de intervenção na sociedade, e que as conferências de Carnap foram um convite para integração a essa utopia. O artigo não realiza apenas um exercício de reconstrução histórica da filosofia da ciência, mas também apresenta reflexões acerca de alguns problemas de ciências e tecnologias sociais.]

In this paper, I reconstruct and analyze the Academic skeptics’ responses to the apraxia objection. This objection claims that the scepticism is a doctrine impossible to be put into practice because its theses lead to apraxia, that is, a state of lack or impossibility of action. The responses to the objection are divided into two kinds. The first one proves that assent is not a necessary condition to perform actions, so the skeptical advice to globally and wholly suspend assent does not lead to apraxia. The second one proves that it is possible to deliberate and rationally lead our actions without apprehensive impressions, so the skeptical thesis that apprehensive impressions do not exist does not lead to apraxia either. After some general considerations, in the first section of this paper I discuss Arcesilaus’ responses and in the second section Carneades’ responses.

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.

A critical social theory for what and whom? This question is the key for this paper in order to problematize relationships and the dependence relating sociological theory, political praxis and strong institutionalism. The paper’s central argument is that the Western sociological tradition in the 20th century assumed a systemic understanding of society as epistemological-political basis of its constitution, legitimation and political influence, which led to strong institutionalism, that is, the correlation and self-justification between social sciences and political institutions, so that scientifical-political institutions become overlapped in relation to political praxis of social movements, as neutral and impartial regarding class struggle, depoliticizing social systems’ constitution, legitimation and evolution. The paper’s second central argument is that a critical social theory for the constitution and crisis of contemporary Western modernization must abandon the defense of and connection with strong institutionalism, supporting social movements in their epistemological-political criticism to social systems’ technicization and autonomization. [uma teoria social crítica para quê/para quem? Esta questão é a chave-de-leitura que o artigo usa com o objetivo de problematizar as relações e a dependência entre teoria sociológica, práxis política e institucionalismo forte. O argumento central do artigo consiste em que a tradição sociológica ocidental no século XX assumiu uma compreensão sistêmica de sociedade enquanto base epistemológico-política para sua constituição, legitimação e influência política, o que levou ao institucionalismo forte, isto é, à correlação e à autojustificação entre ciências sociais e instituições políticas, de modo que instituições científico-políticas tornam-se sobrepostas à práxis política dos movimentos sociais, bem como neutras e imparciais em relação às lutas de classe, despolitizando a constituição, a legitimação e a evolução dos sistemas sociais. Assim, o segundo argumento central do artigo consiste em que uma teoria social crítica para o estudo da constituição e da crise da modernização ocidental contemporânea deve abandonar sua defesa e sua conexão com o institucionalismo forte, auxiliando movimentos sociais em sua crítica epistemológico-política à tecnicização e à autonomização dos sistemas sociais]

In this paper, I put under scrutiny the arguments put forward by Aristotle in Nicomachean Ethics (NE) VI.9. The paper has two main parts. In the first, I examine the NE VI.9’s first part where Aristotle develops the concept of good deliberation, offering its definition in 1142b27-28. In the second, I examine the connection between good deliberation and phronesis, and, then, discuss the vexata quæstio about if the lines 1142b31-33 might be read as introducing the claim that phronesis provides moral ends. [Neste artigo, analiso pormenorizadamente os argumentos apresentados por Aristóteles em Ética a Nicômaco (EN) VI.9. O artigo é dividido em duas partes principais. Na primeira, abordo a primeira parte de EN VI.9 onde Aristóteles desenvolve a noção de boa deliberação, culminando com a apresentação da sua definição em 1142b27-28. Na segunda, abordo a conexão entre boa deliberação e phronesis e discuto a vexata quaestio de se as linhas 1142b31-33 podem ser lidas como introduzindo a tese de que a phronesis fornece os fins morais]

The paper engages with the Casuistic questions posed in the book on the Perfect Duties to Oneself, in the Metaphysical Principles of the Doctrine of Virtue of the Metaphysic of Morals. It investigates whether it is possible to identify Kant’s literal answers to the casuistic questions that Kant himself poses, concluding that it is not. Therefore, Kantian answers rather than Kant’s answers are discussed. The paper’s outcome supports a rigorist interpretation of Kant’s ethics.

The Protagoras is the touchstone of Socrates’ moral intellectualist stance. The position in a nutshell stipulates that the proper reevaluation of a desire is enough to neutralize it.[1] The implication of this position is that akrasia or weakness of will is not the result of desire (or fear for that matter) overpowering reason but is due to ignorance. Socrates’ eliminativist position on weakness of will, however, flies in the face of the common-sense experience regarding akratic action and thus Aristotle was at pains to render Socrates’ account of moral incontinence intelligible. The key improvement Aristotle makes to Socrates’s model is to underscore that the conditioning of the akratic’s body plays a critical role in determining the power of one’s appetites and, accordingly, the capacity of one to resist the temptations these appetites present for rational evaluation. As Aristotle puts it, “For the incontinent man is like the people who get drunk quickly and on little wine, i.e., on less than most people.” (1151a 3-4). Aristotle presents what I shall call a somatic paradigm (i.e. the drunkard analogy) in order to tackle the problem of akrasia and it is this somatic solution that marks a significant improvement over Socrates’s intellectualist or informational model or so the tradition tells us. In this paper, I wish to push back on the above Aristotelian explanation. I argue that when one fully examines Socrates’ account of weakness of will that Aristotle’s solution is less effective than is traditionally thought. In fact, Socrates can bring Aristotle’s model into his own; just as Aristotle absorbs what is right about Socrates’s model, namely, that akratic action utilizes reason but to a limited degree, Socrates in Meno (77C-78A) develops his own somatic model of weakness of will that connects to the intellectualist paradigm of the Protagoras. To achieve this rapprochement between the two models, I zero in on the description provided by Socrates of those individuals who desire bad things knowing they are bad as “ill-starred” or “bad spirited” (κακοδαίμων ). The “bad-spirited” is the coward and, in contrast to Aristotle’s drunkard, becomes fearful quickly from little danger. This additional somatic component, when connected to Socrates’s position on akrasia in Protagoras adds a new twist to Socrates’s model in the following way: while no one wishes to be ill-starred such that more harm than good will befall one, one may become so as a result of the bad choices one knowingly makes. [1] “After him came Socrates, who spoke better and further about this subject, but even he was not successful. For he used to make the virtues into sciences, and this is impossible. For the sciences all involve reason, and reason is to be found in the intellectual part of the soul. So that all the virtues, according to him arise in the rational part of the soul. The result is that in making the virtues into sciences he is doing away with the nonrational part of the soul and is thereby doing away with passion and character…” (Aristotle, Magna Moralia 1.1. 1182 a15-26)

ABSTRACT This paper presents a solid normative approach in military ethics, which justifies the rule of law in a constitutional regime capable of fixing the proper role of the Armed Forces in Brazil. Deploying this ethical framework, it analyzes the relevant literature, especially authors who defend civilian supremacy for the good functioning of a democratic society. Afterwards, some models of civil-military relations are introduced to establish the parameters and indicators of proper democratic consolidation. These parameters are applied to recent events, revealing that Brazil is regressing in its civilian control over the military. Finally, some practical proposals for reversing this tendency are put forward in pursuit of a fully democratic regime in Brazil.

This paper examines how Descartes’ philosophy was presented and discussed in articles and reviews published in Mind from 1900 to 1947, a period in which this most prestigious British philosophical journal was edited by George F. Stout (until 1920) and then by George E. Moore (from 1921 to 1947). The survey deals with various aspects of the reception of Cartesian philosophy in the journal: articles devoted to several topics of Cartesian thought, critical notices and reviews of the secondary literature, discussions of twentieth-century English translations of Cartesian works. In line with the theoretical character of Mind, most of the interpreters discussed Cartesian philosophy with the aim either of checking its internal consistency or of proving how the Cartesian system might be rendered consistent with its own premises. In this respect, all the themes revolving around the problem of the Cartesian circle attracted the attention of commentators, and the intuitionist foundation of Cartesian theory was analyzed. Descartes’ metaphysics and natural philosophy were often evaluated from the perspective of contemporary philosophical debates, while their original historical context was neglected. Of particular relevance were issues like the mind-body problem, discussed at the beginning of the century in relation to developments in psychology, and the question of the existence of the external world, which was examined from various standpoints, metaphysically, epistemologically and from the point of view of linguistic analysis. Interest in Descartes was shown by many authors from major philosophers (such as Ward, Schiller, Taylor, Broad, Ryle) to lesser known scholars whose profiles and contributions are outlined. Through the angle of the Cartesian presence a sketch emerges of the rich and variegated philosophical scene of British culture in the first half of the twentieth century.

In the 20th century, Leibniz studies flourished in Italy, as attested by the large number of scholarly articles and translations of his main works. Articles on Leibniz’s philosophy were published in the Archivio di Filosofia, which has long been the journal of the Italian Philosophical Society. This paper examines articles on Leibniz published in Italy, and notably in the Archivio di Filosofia. It is divided into three parts. The first one examines Italian research on Leibniz from 1900 to 1930. The second one takes into account articles on Leibniz published in Archivio di Filosofia from 1930 to 1945. The last part is dedicated to Leibnizian studies published in the same journal after 1945.

In this paper I focus on the historiographical fate of Francisco Suárez (1548–1617) and Pedro da Fonseca (1528–1599) in two Iberian journals ran by Jesuits and founded in 1945: the Spanish Pensamiento, and the Portuguese Revista portuguesa de filosofia. I endeavor to show that the discussions of Suárez’s and Fonseca’s ideas on these journal is a two-sided case of constructing the legacies of major figures in late scholasticism, and I emphasize how the demand to identify cultural national heroes intertwines with theoretical and ideological elements, especially the peculiar history of the Iberian Peninsula, and to the historical relationships between Spain and Portugal. With regard to Suárez, the Pensamiento group strives to carve out a specific place for Neo-Suarezianism within Neo-Thomism, also via a substantive reassessment of Suárez’s importance in the history of scholasticism and of philosophy in general. Hence, Suárez’s thought undergoes triumphant reevaluation, which even aims at ousting Aquinas as the ultimate reference of scholasticism, to make Suárez’s Thomism the principal authority of contemporary schools. By contrast, Fonseca remains a rather obscure and neglected figure, dug up by his fellow compatriots on the Revista portuguesa de filosofia, also against this attempt at establishing a Suarezian, Spanish hegemony.

The paper shortly summarizes the research on the philosophy of Kant in the Institute of Philosophy at the Nicolaus Copernicus University (Toruń, Poland). About 30 years ago professor Mirosław Żelazny with a group of collaborators started their research which focuses on three main topics: the reconstruction of Kant’s philosophical system against the background of eighteenth-century German philosophy, historical investigation into its reception in Poland, and the translation of Kant’s works. One of the greatest achievements are the source investigations and the discovery of some unknown manuscripts, the first Polish edition of the “Collected Works of Immanuel Kant” and several monographies on various aspects of Kant’s thought. The paper also stresses the importance of international collaboration with eminent Kant scholars from Germany and Eastern Europe for the projects carried out in Toruń.

The paper focuses on the state of the research on Kant’s philosophy in Slovakia, particularly at the University of Prešov. In the first part the authors describe the situation of Kantian research between the 1850s and 1963 as a period during which there was almost no interest in Kant and his philosophy in the region. The main part of the paper deals with the revival of Kantian philosophy, presented by a group of scholars approximately twenty years ago, that gave rise to a series of successful research projects on Kant supported by the Slovak Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport. The paper outlines the series of five successive research projects that have been realized since 2004 focusing mainly on Kant’s practical philosophy and its relevance for contemporary society. It summarizes the achievements based on the international cooperation in the research and describes the main events and publications realized so far.

The paper deals with Stephan Tichy, the very first Slovak scholar who dealt with Kant’s philosophy in his work Philosophische Bemerkungen über das Studienwesen in Ungarn, anonymously published in 1792. In this work Tichy openly advocates incorporating Kant’s philosophy into university education, with an emphasis on the significance of Kant’s philosophy to the educational system and the total independence of philosophy as such. The paper also compares Kant’s method of teaching philosophy introduced in the Announcement of the Programme of Lectures for the Winter Semester 1765—1766 with Tichy’s ideas on how to teach philosophy at universities.