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Soviet Marxism is often characterized by the term ontologism. The latter could be defined as a totalizing assertion about material being as inherently dialectical, often coupled with an understanding of thought as mere reflection. This fundamental assertion is said to remain unchallenged among dogmatic party philosophers and critical Marxists alike. Far from an innocent misconception, Soviet ontologism is associated with some of the harshest historical events like the Lysenko affair, where the imposition of the dialectical optic onto the natural sciences resulted in an ideological blockade of research. Various sources of this peculiarity have been identified in Soviet Marxism, from the endorsement of dialectics of nature to the rejection of Cartesian metaphysics. However, a political account of Soviet ontologism is yet to be written. This article will address the question of ontologism as it has been theorized in relation to the philosophy of Evald Ilyenkov. Tracing the history of Russian ontologism from the nineteenth century, we will recover its nationalist dimension. Then, drawing on the philosophical controversies between Lenin and Bogdanov, which in turn will be linked to Ilyenkov's intervention, we will examine the various strands of ontological thinking in Soviet Marxism and identify Ilyenkov's position. Finally, we will ask what insights can the ontological thinking of Soviet Marxism provide in the context of contemporary philosophical turns towards ontology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the intricate relationship between the concepts of "dao" and "One" in Daoist philosophy, emphasizing the significance of the One in various aspects of early Daoism. Topics include the role of the One as the central concept, its ontological, generative, and political implications, and the varying perspectives on whether the One or dao takes precedence in Daoist thought.

Mastering of the "sociology" major by domestic students takes place in accordance with the curricula approved by the management of each university, taking into account the normative documents of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine. Therefore, modern applicants (students) are initially inclined to functionalism and systemic theory in sociology, offering to study the works of the classics of sociology of the end of the 19th century - the beginning of the 20th century. However, the applicants will later learn about theoretical polyparadigmism in modern sociology and the possibility to choose not only classical concepts for the implementation of their scientific developments. This possibility was a consequence of the fact that changes were taking place in the paradigm of system theory. This influenced the evolution of sociological theorizing. Therefore, the above now affects the choice of applicants, post-graduate students and doctoral students of the basic concept for their sociological explorations, in order to avoid accusations of ignorance of modern sociological theory. The situation, as a rule, has two contradictory sides. So, on the one hand, there are classical instructions or settings for scientists to carry out their cognitive procedures (for example, diagnosis, classification, stratification, typology, or systematization in general). On the other hand, alternative post-classical foundations have already been proposed, which are rather only outlined in most textbooks and textbooks on sociology, and therefore deserve in-depth study in order to reveal their diverse potential (heuristic, diagnostic, methodological, etc.). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reviews Sergey Bulgakov’s critical views of the basic concepts of German idealism. The particular nature of the Russian philosopher’s reconstruction is brought to light, and the author shows that its distinguishing feature is the rejection of gnosiological processes as an existential guide in favour of their replacement with an ontological setting. The author emphasizes that although such demands were typical of the era of ideological transition “from Marxism to idealism”, they were, nevertheless, not the only ideological strategy adopted by Russian philosophical movements of that time. Systems of Russian thought — recognizable as constructions of Russian idealists who did not consider it necessary to abandon the classical philosophical tradition in order to renew Christian philosophy — are critical of Bulgakov’s ontologism. Such constructions include, for example, the neo- Kantianism of Fyodor Stepun and the neo-Hegelianism of Ivan Ilyin, both of whom were contemporaries of Bulgakov. At the same time, mystic-rationalist Vladimir Solovyov was himself a philosophical universalist — at home with both “metaphysical ontology” and idealistic speculation. Solovyov might be called the common ground of these two trends, which when taken together can yield some productive polemic. The three-hypostatic character of being, which is Bulgakov’s fundamental theologoumenon in both his “sophiology” and his “philosophy of the name”, is seen in this article as the ontological axiom of Bulgakov’s philosophy during his Crimean period. By providing an original context for the consideration of western European philosophical thought, this “perspective from above” sheds new light on the subject, allowing us to perceive unexpected and productive twists and turns in western European thought. This perspective is of interest not only in Russia, but also in the West. Evidence of this can be found in the fact that eminent French thought historian Pierre Hadot (1922–2010) appeals to Bulgakov’s ideas in his own work. At the same time, this article stresses that in opposition to the imperative Bulgakov himself sets out, such a view cannot be unconditionally affirmed as Christian-dogma or as foundational for determining where, or where not, heresy is present. Both ontologism and antinomianism, which Fr. Sergius affirms, bring with them internal philosophical and theological difficulties. First and foremost, they often quite unexpectedly — even for the philosopher himself — lead into the territory of mythological archaism, distancing Bulgakov’s thought not only from rationalism, but also from Orthodox Christian contemplations which have been tried and tested by Holy Tradition. At the same time, Bulgakov’s systematic structures — put to the task of developing such anti-systematic principles — remain a motivation for and the foundation of much active intellectual work both on the reception of Bulgakov’s thought, and on progress in the development of a particularly Russian Christian form of thought.

Considered one of the leading proponents of natural theology in the 20th century, E. L. Mascall (1905–1993) taught philosophy and theology at King’s College London for most of his career. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he insisted that classical theism, embodied in the writings of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, could be successfully revived for a modern audience. Known for his vigorous defense of neo-Thomism, Mascall offered an unusual interpretation of The Five Ways. While modern scholastics typically read the proofs as syllogistic exercises, Mascall maintained that God’s existence could not be deduced from premises, but must be grasped by means of a unique type of “metaphysical intuition” which he called “contuition.” In my paper, I will re-examine his position, explore his reasons for adopting it, and finally raise several questions concerning its significance for the history of neo-Thomism.

This paper discusses Hilan Bensusan's new book, Indexicalism: Realism and the Metaphysics of Paradox, from two different yet interrelated angles. On the one hand, it examines its problematic admixture of subtractive and chiastic logics for approaching the Otherwise, and questions its unresolvedness thereof. On the other hand, it analyses its anti-ontologism and criticises its subsequent mistrust of the conceptual beyond the perceptual. An in-depth reconsideration of philosophy's original distinctiveness and a polyvalent conversation with extramodern ontologies guide the discussion, through which we nonetheless stress the relevance of Bensusan's proposal in a philosophical arena dominated by the power negative and agree with him on the importance, if not on the absoluteness, of indexicality for the renewal of contemporary thought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Russian philosophy underwent many phases: Westernism, Slavophilism, nihilism, pre-revolutionary religious philosophy, and dialectical materialism or Soviet philosophy. At first sight, each one of these phases seems antithetical to the preceding one. Yet, they all appear to have in common a certain negative attitude towards the subjectivism of Kantianism and German Idealism. In contrast to the latter, Russian philosophy typically displays a tendency towards ontologism, which is generally defined as the view that there is such a thing as being in itself, i.e., being independent of cognition, and that this being is to some extent knowable. We discern, in these otherwise diametrically opposed movements, an underlying ontologism that constitutes a common thread running in a straight line through the history of Russian philosophy. In this article, I provide an overview of Russian ontologism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Shpet's interpretation of Husserl's phenomenology has caused puzzlement because of the lack of clarity with which he treats the transcendental turn in Appearance and Sense (1914). I suggest that we find a more comprehensive discussion on the topic in Shpet's 1917 article, "Wisdom or Reason?" There, Shpet reacts to Husserl's treatment of a cluster of problems related to the latter's transition to transcendental idealism. I read "Wisdom or Reason?" not only in relation to Husserl's Logos article of 1911, but also to his 1907 lecture series "The Idea of Phenomenology." My analysis of Shpet's phenomenology reveals that he followed through with the transcendental turn, although his philosophy developed in a direction different from Husserl's transcendental idealism. Shpet postulates a collective consciousness, in which meaning-constitution takes place, and discovers the "word" as the foundation for any cognition. Shpet's phenomenology remains ontological, as he considers language or culture as the "form of being" in which human beings live. In "Wisdom or Reason?," Shpet argues that we can have direct knowledge of this meaningful reality: being is not "represented" but "presented" in a word. A certain compatibility thus exists between Shpet's phenomenology of cultural reality and Husserl's search for the absolute validity of knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Semyon Frank (1877–1950) opposed the Neo-Kantian School and admitted the real existence of the objects of cognition. He treated ontologism as essential to the entire movement of Russian religious philosophy. For Frank, one can only know about something thanks to the absolute, which exists prior to the knowing subject. Ontologism, affirming the priority of being over cognition, has a great significance not only for metaphysics and epistemology, but also for the philosophy of religion. In particular, Frank taught that the most privileged mode of cognition of God is intuition, an immediate experience of God or faith (the so-called living knowledge). Intuition is at the heart of the ontological proof, which can be found in St. Anselm, Descartes, and Frank himself. Frank dedicated a number of articles to this topic: "K istorii ontologicheskogo dokazatel'stva" ("On the History of the Ontological Proof," 1915), "Ontologicheskoe dokazatel'stvo bytiya Boga" ("Ontological Proof of the Existence of God," 1930), as well as texts recently discovered at the Bakhmeteff Archive, including "Dokazatel'stvo bytiya Boga" ("Proof of the Existence of God"). In this way, Russian ontologism leads to a new interpretation of the traditional ontological proof, one which acknowledges the existence of God, not on the basis of arguments resting on His definition, but on the basis of the intuitive recognition of His being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The article focuses on the term womanly nihilism and radical feminism. Topics discussed include pursuit of a radical feminism that rejects ontologies of ownership and the class politics that sustains them; the benchmark of success and the slogan for neoliberal feminism; and iteration of a formula that has come to galvanize mainstream attitudes toward feminism.

This article provides a four-fold typology of comparative sports policy studies: Type 1, Seeking Similarities, is a nomothetic approach seeking law-like gener­alization; Type 2 is Describing Difference, an ideographic approach seeking to capture the specificity of policy systems; Type 3, Theorizing the Transnational, goes beyond the nation-state as the unit of analysis to fuse global and local levels of explanation; and Type 4, Defining Discourse, seeks to analyze ways in which policy discourse defines the reality of the policy problems it seeks to address. The authors underline the ontological and epistemological assumptions of such approaches that are often only implicit, and they employ selected examples to illustrate the contribution to knowledge of the different approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Stylos is the property of Pontificia Universidad Catolica Argentina and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Theories that posit metaphysical structure are able to do much work in philosophy. Some, however, find the notion of 'metaphysical structure' unintelligible. In this paper, I argue that their charge of unintelligibility fails. There is nothing distinctively problematic about the notion. At best, their charge of unintelligibility is a mere reiteration of previous complaints made toward similar notions. In developing their charge, I clarify several important concepts, including primitiveness, intelligibility, and the Armstrong-inspired "ontologism" view of the world. I argue that, ultimately, their charge is best understood as an objection whose central premise is that the notion of 'structure' runs contrary to an important presupposition of contemporary metaphysics. But that central premise is, on closer inspection, implausible. I respond to the objection by identifying three popular metaphysical theories that violate the alleged presupposition but are still generally regarded as intelligible. The objection thus fails to show that a theory that posits metaphysical structure is unintelligible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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This essay asserts that the intellectual and moral attitude that legitimates, justifies and ennobles violence derives from the fact that the evolution of modern philosophical history has been dominated by the ‘rationalist’ paradigm (versus the ‘ontological’ one). This process is clarified by reference to four European scholars, whose analysis is different but in many respects analogue: Huizinga, Del Noce, Eisenstadt, and Spaemann. The triumph of violence and injustice (in the form of coercion as a-normativity) in late modern societies demonstrates the failure of this paradigm; and its failure perhaps provides an opportunity for the realist/ontological paradigm to strengthen its position. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay asserts that the intellectual and moral attitude that legitimates, justifies and ennobles violence derives from the fact that the evolution of modern philosophical history has been dominated by the ‘rationalist’ paradigm (versus the ‘ontological’ one). This process is clarified by reference to four European scholars, whose analysis is different but in many respects analogue: Huizinga, Del Noce, Eisenstadt, and Spaemann. The triumph of violence and injustice (in the form of coercion as a-normativity) in late modern societies demonstrates the failure of this paradigm; and its failure perhaps provides an opportunity for the realist/ontological paradigm to strengthen its position. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista de Filosofía (0034-8244) is the property of Universidad Complutense de Madrid and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article presents the author's views on the ontological turn in Mesoamericanist ethnology. Topics discussed include relation between ethnography and ontology, social conditions in emerging countries, national problems faced by ethnologists, poststructuralism, criticism on ontologism and multinaturalism.

Explanation has played myriad roles in truthmaker theory. The notion of explanation is sometimes thought to give content to the very idea of truthmaking, and is sometimes used as a weapon to undermine the entire point of truthmaker theory. I argue that the notion of explanation is dialectically useless in truthmaker theory: while it’s true that truthmaking offers a form of explanation, this claim is theoretically unilluminating, and leaves truthmaker theorists vulnerable to various kinds of attack. I advocate an alternative approach to truthmaker theory that downplays the role of explanation, and show how it releases the enterprise from a variety of problematic commitments that have troubled truthmaker theorists. The “ontology-first” approach to truthmaking that I advocate not only restores the initial impulse behind truthmaking, but also has a number of theoretical advantages. Most prominently, it dodges the infamous problem of negative existentials, and lessens truthmaker theory’s dependence on contentious intuitive judgments about both explanation and truthmaking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This text has as the objective of formulating an epistemological critique of political science, questioning the ontology underlying its conceptual framework. These conceptual settings bear some epistemological obstacles that are mostly evident in political regimes' typologies. With the aim to formulate a correction, I resort to the theory of power evolution based on Niklas Luhmann's political sociology. In the epistemological and historical analysis of political science I employ a methodology of the Foucaultian archeology of knowledge and the Cambridge School of intellectual history, as well as some elements of formal logics underlying systems theory; while in its purposive part the article bears upon a socio-systemic vision of socio-cultural evolution. It is concluded that this ontological burden can be left behind by shifting to a complexity paradigm which develops a new and non-ontological language. This could be achieved by reframing crucial problems, with relation to power as a means to communicate and the functional differentiation of a political system. A salient contribution of the text is the category of cyclical configurations of power, which intends to describe with higher fidelity the set of problems that has been usually object of political regimes theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper offers five desiderata on a realist normative theory of politics: that it should avoid moralism, deontologism, transcendentalism, utopianism, and vanguardism. These desiderata argue for a theory that begins from values rooted in a people’s experience; that avoids prescribing a collective deontological constraint; that makes the comparison of imperfect regimes possible; that takes feasibility and sustainability into account; and that makes room for the claims of democracy. The paper argues, in the course of exploring the desiderata, that a neo-republican philosophy of government does pretty well in satisfying them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The twentieth century Russian philosopher Nikolai Lossky was one of the earliest and most important proponents-but also critics-of Bergson's philosophy in Russia at a time when many Russian philosophers were preoccupied with the same complex of philosophical questions and answers that Bergson was addressing. Thus, if only from the standpoint of intellectual history, Lossky is central to the study of the reception of Bergson in Russia. In this article, I present the principal historical links, points of agreement between Bergson and Lossky, such as their respective anti-Kantianism, intuitivism, ontological realism, vitalism, organicism, Neo-Platonism, as well as their points of disagreement, including some of Lossky's key criticisms of Bergson, with special emphasis on the issues of intuition, ideal being, substance and change, time, and sensible qualities. This paper is meant as an introduction to the translations of Lossky's 'Heдocтaтки гнoceoлoгiи Бepгcoнa и влiянie иxъ нa eгo мeтaфизикy' (The Defects of Bergson's Epistemology and Their Consequences on His Metaphysics) (1913) and his review of Bergson's, Les deux sources de la morale et de la religion (1932), which are published in the present issue of Studies in East European Thought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What if—in light of the escalating pace of academic production—scholars adopted a Slow Ontology? Because this question moves beyond slowing the pace or volume of productivity to address underlying issues of ontology, it asks not how we can find a slower way of doing scholarship, but how we can find a slower way of scholarly being. A philosophy of Slowness has sparked movements around the globe regarding Slow Food and Slow Cities; these and similar movements disrupt daily practices that prioritize speed, efficiency, and output at the expense of quality. In response, a Slow Ontology approaches writing as a site of creative intervention. This article offers methodological possibilities for writing a Slow Ontology in qualitative inquiry: each attends to how we might write the materiality of our local environments. In writing a Slow Ontology, researchers might create writing that is not unproductive, but is differently productive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scientific explanations must bear the proper relationship to the world: they must depict what, out in the world, is responsible for the explanandum. But explanations must also bear the proper relationship to their audience: they must be able to create human understanding. With few exceptions, philosophical accounts of explanation either ignore entirely the relationship between explanations and their audience or else demote this consideration to an ancillary role. In contrast, I argue that considering an explanation’s communicative role is crucial to any satisfactory account of explanation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through utilizing correlative ontology, which is derived from ancient Chinese philosophy, this article offers a redefinition of the individual (subject), which subsequently helps to problematize the ‘particular versus universal’ distinction. It is then shown how correlative ontology might be useful for criticizing and stimulating the English School of International Relations and its two main views (i.e. solidarism and pluralism) on humanitarian intervention. The significance is that correlative ontology helps to challenge ‘solidarism qua universalism’ and ‘pluralism qua particularism’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article critically reviews the extant literature on social group representation and clarifies the advantages of intersectionality theory for studying political representation. It argues that the merit of intersectionality theory can be found in its ontology of power. Intersectionality theory is founded on a relational conception of political power that locates the constitution of power relations within social interactions, such as political representation. As such, intersectionality theory pushes scholarship beyond studying representation inequalities – that are linked to presumably stable societal positions – to also consider the ways in which political representation (re)creates positions of privilege and disadvantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zha Changping takes inspiration from Western art theories and applies them to a contemporary Chinese context. The article has an ontological perspective, discussing how the concept of “relational aesthetics” manifests in Chinese contemporary art. It also discusses its relation to the history of ideas. The focus is on art, but the ontological perspectives on creation and humanity are universal. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

How can a metaphysics of abstract entities be built upon a metaphysics of time? In this paper, I address the question of how to accommodate abstract entities in a presentist world. I consider both the traditional metaontological approach of unrestricted fundamental quantification and then ontological pluralism. I argue that under the former we need to impose two constraints in the characterization of presentism in order to avoid undesired commitments to abstract entities: we have to characterize presentism as a thesis only about the concrete, and we also need to avoid the widely held distinction between tensed and tenseless senses of existence. Under ontological pluralism, instead, I argue that we can naturally accommodate any view of abstract objects in a presentist world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to present speculative presuppositions of Italian critical ontology, a philosophical movement started by the work of Pantaleo Carabellese in the fi rst half of the 20th century, which is still active primarily at the Italian University in Perugia. Carabellese´s life itself was a proof that authentic philosophical refl ection leads to the affi rmative position on God as the fundamental condition and the basis of human existence that, as such, represents, in his words, »the only true object of philosophical refl ection«. In the fi rst thirty years of the author´s work, starting with the defence of his diploma thesis on Rosmini at the University of Naples in 1907 until the publication of The Theological Problem as Philosophy in 1931, theoretical relevancy of the concept of being as the unique basis of consciousness has been affi rmed. At the same time it has become obvious that a refl ection that, on the basis of its own presuppositions, does not necessarily aims for theological outcomes of its own speculation, cannot not refl ect on God, if it approaches the argument of contemplative nature in an authentic way. The true »object« of philosophical refl ection is, therefore, the theological argument, while philosophy is a true journey towards the metaphysical awareness of God. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses characteristics of prospective definitions in philosophy. It states pertinence of views of philosopher Pascal on living prospectively, and mentions that difficulty with qualification of the prospective definitions of future real objects can be removed by considering the case as a null. It mentions ontological concerns over the definitions.

The article discusses duality in the aspect of being and cognition and on the tendency to overcome this duality as the basis for philosophical trends and standpoints. It states the need of distinguishing ontic duality from Gnostic duality, and mentions that ontic and epistemological dualities do not exhaust the topic in its entirety. It notes questions on multiplicity of existing ontological or Gnostic dualities.

This paper offers an analysis of two characters, Joe Christmas and Joanna Burden, in William Faulkner’s Light in August . The characters are analyzed through R.D. Laing’s concept of ontological insecurity. In the search for the roots of ontological insecurity, special attention is given to the childhood years of these characters, and to the race-related trauma originating in that period. The aim is to show that both these characters exhibit schizoid personality traits as a consequence of that trauma, and also as a result of the society they live in. Namely, Joe and Joanna never work through their initial trauma because it is actually reinforced by their society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Comprendre: Revista Catalana de Filosofía is the property of Herder Editorial S.L. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Proponents of ground, which is used to indicate relations of ontological fundamentality, insist that ground is a unified phenomenon, but this thesis has recently been criticized. I will first review the proponents' claims for ground's unicity, as well as the criticisms that ground is too heterogeneous to do the philosophical work it is supposed to do. By drawing on Aristotle's notion of homonymy, I explore whether ground's metaphysical heterogeneity can be theoretically accommodated while at the same time preserving its proponents' desideratum that it be a unified phenomenon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some properties are connected in a perspicuous and unproblematic way. For instance, the possession of shape clearly entails the possession of size (and vice versa). In other cases the connection is not so perspicuous. For instance, assuming that the precise rest mass and negative charge of an electron are both among its fundamental intrinsic properties, what links them, given that those properties are inherently separable? (Their separability is apparent from the fact that other kinds of particle have the same mass as an electron but a different charge, or the same charge but a different mass.) Given the inherent separability of those properties, what explains their conjunction in this case? Oderberg (2007,2011) calls this the "unity problem", and attempts to solve it have issued from assorted schools of thought within both substance ontology and the metaphysics of natural kinds. One of the more signifi- cant of these solutions is proffered by E.J. Lowe as part of his four-category ontology. Here I explicate his solution, raise a possible objection, and suggest a reply. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the challenges of conceptualizing Black existence within the realm of what has been defined as civil society. Rather than entering the Afro-pessimism versus Afro-optimism debate, its aim is to provide ethnographic material to further an understanding of the (im)possibilities for redressing Black injury from racialized categories such as law, justice, and humanity. How might we understand mourning and grieving when the racial alterity of the Black subject positions "it" outside the domains of citizenship and humanity? This double negation—neither human nor citizen—is the basis from which the article provides a critique of the racial terror perpetrated by police-linked death squads in São Paulo, Brazil. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]