Philologus, founded in 1846, is one of the oldest and most respected periodicals in the field of Classics. It publishes articles on Greek and Latin literature, historiography, philosophy, history of religion, linguistics, reception, and the history of scholarship. The journal aims to contribute to our understanding of Greco-Roman culture and its lasting influence on European civilization. The journal Philologus, conceived as a forum for discussion among different methodological approaches to the study of ancient texts and their reception, publishes original scholarly (...) contributions with a strong international focus. Publications languages are: German, English, Italian, French. As of 2014 the publication of supplementary volumes will be resumed. The series Philologus. Supplemente / Philologus. Supplementary Volumes will publish monographs and edited volumes pertaining to all aspects of the study of ancient literature and its reception, with a special focus on topics concerning literary theory, philosophy and the history of scholarship from an interdisciplinary perspective. (shrink)

Late archaic lyric poetry tends to obscure all pathetic and tragic elements of Achilles’ destiny present in the Iliad. The offence against his honour, his grief for Patroclus, his yearning for native Phthia, and a painful awareness of being ὠκύμορος – none of these themes play a role in the passages of Pindar, Bacchylides or Simonides where Achilles is mentioned. Yet each of these three poets operates differently with regard to the epic source, and it is worth investigating how they (...) do so. (shrink)

Certain strands of modern literature and philosophy have laid pronounced emphasis upon the impossibility of sharing the experience of dying: in the face of death, all social bonds dissolve and the human being finds himself in the deepest and most inescapable of solitudes. Greek myth, however, depicts stories in which death is physically shared by two individuals, or magically transferred from one individual to another: such stories provide a fascinating starting point for comparing ancient and modern views on the same (...) problem, or, rather, for exploring ancient perspectives on a modern problem. This article takes as its premise the idea that ‘death’ as an abstract notion is a human construct, and argues that feelings and questions associated with death, such as that of its inexorable power to isolate the dying person psychologically from the rest of mankind, are not intrinsic to the phenomenon, but instead determined by culture. (shrink)

The author sets out to present the Nothing of nihilism as the driving force behind the history of Western thought referred to as “metaphysics”. The starting points for clarifying the thesis are found in two interpretations of nihilism in the more recent scholarly literature: the understanding of nihilism as “differentiation” and as “overcoming”. The understanding of nihilism as overcoming calls for a broader examination of Nietzsche‘s interpretation of nihilism. On the one hand, the author relies on Heidegger‘s understanding of nihilism (...) and metaphysics, according to which nihilism cannot be separated from metaphysics. At the same time, she seeks to re-formulate the question about Nothing: to what extent can Nothing be phenomenologically understood as the destructive process that reflects metaphysics in its continuously changing guises as metaphysics, i.e. as the interpretative structure that continues to emerge throughout history. The Nothing thereby shows itself as a metaphysical “prerequisite” for man‘s creative power and reality as such.Die Absicht der Autorin ist es, das Nichts des Nihilismus als Antrieb der „Metaphysik“ genannten Geschichte des abendländischen Denkens aufzuzeigen. Um diese These zu erläutern, werden zwei Nihilismusdeutungen der neueren Fachliteratur, seine Auffassung als „Differenz“ und als „Überwindung“, zum Ausgangspunkt genommen. Die Auffassung des Nihilismus als Überwindung gibt Anlass zu einer umfassenderen Erläuterung von Nietzsches Nihilismusinterpretation. Sie stützt sich einerseits auf Heideggers Nihilismusund Metaphysikauffassung, wonach der Nihilismus nicht von der Metaphysik abgetrennt werden kann. Andererseits versucht sie die Frage nach dem Nichts neu zu formulieren: Inwiefern kann das Nichts phänomenologisch als derjenige Destruktionsprozess verstanden werden, der die Metaphysik in ihren immer wechselnden Masken als Metaphysik, d. h. als in der Geschichte stets zum Zuge kommende Interpretationsstruktur erweist? Das Nichts zeigt sich dabei als metaphysische „Voraussetzung“ der Schöpferkraft des Menschen und der Wirklichkeit überhaupt.Namjera autorice je pokazati ono ništa nihilizma kao pokretačku silu “metafizikom” nazvane povijesti zapadnjačkog mišljenja. U svrhu razjašnjenja te teze za polazišne točke uzimaju se dva tumačenja nihilizma u novijoj stručnoj literaturi: shvaćanje nihilizma kao “diferencije” i kao “prevladavanja”. Shvaćanje nihilizma kao prevladavanja daje povoda za obuhvatnije razjašnjenje Nietzscheove interpretacije nihilizma. Autorica se oslanja s jedne strane na Heideggerovo shvaćanje nihilizma i metafizike, prema kojemu se nihilizam ne može odijeliti od metafizike. Ujedno pokušava iznova formulirati pitanje o ničemu: u kojoj mjeri se ništa može fenomenološki razumjeti kao onaj destruktivni proces, koji metafiziku u njezinim stalno se izmjenjujućim maskama očituje kao metafiziku, tj. kao interpretativnu strukturu koja stalno izlazi na vidjelo u povijesti. Ništa se pritom pokazuje kao metafizička “pretpostavka” stvaralačke snage čovjeka i stvarnosti uopće. (shrink)

In recent years a growing number of scholars in science studies and related fields are developing new ontologies to displace entrenched dualisms. These efforts often go together with a renewed interest in the roles played by symbolisms and tools in knowledge and being. This article brings Maurice Merleau-Ponty into these conversations, positioning him as a precursor of today’s innovative recastings of technoscience. While Merleau-Ponty is often invoked in relation to his early work on the body and embodiment, this article focuses (...) on his later work, where the investigation of perception is integrated with an ontological exploration. The resulting approach revolves around the highly original idea of the body as a standard of measurement. We further develop this idea by coining the term ‘the measuring body’, which to a greater extent than did Merleau-Ponty accentuates the relative autonomy of symbolisms and tools and their capacity to decentre the perceiving body. (shrink)

The liberal and democratic political order is underpinned by universal principles of justice. However, the universality of these principles is now being questioned and undermined by challenges from postmodernism, communitarianism, multiculturalism and other forms of anti-foundationalism. These challenges highlight the sheer diversity of cultures and values, treating liberal values and democratic political culture as one idea of social organization amongst many. While social and political orders are capable of almost endless variation, it may be that not every diverse order is (...) legitimate and we can justifiably regard some forms of social organization as beyond the pale and a 'thin' form of universalism has been developed to support this contention. The core idea behind 'thin universalism' is that it is possible to rehabilitate the universalist aspirations of normative theory while acknowledging the force of many antifoundationalist and multiculturalist criticisms of universalism. This book brings together prominent international political theorists to explain and discuss this contested concept and explore how we can stand up for and act upon principles in a world characterized by cultural difference, moral skepticism, and political division. The authors present a variety of perspectives: some chapters are sympathetic to the idea of a thin universalist account of justification, some are reluctant advocates and others are skeptical about its success or even desirability. Opening out core debates in contemporary normative theory, this volume will be of great interest to researchers and scholars working in the fields of contemporary political theory, political philosophy and IR theory. (shrink)

Two versions of Peri tou mē ontos ptmo by Gorgias, related by an Anonymous Author MXG and by Sextus Empiricus SE, have been alternatively accredited by scholars according to their disposition to seek a doctrine or a rhetorical- communicational dimension respectively with the first tendency prevailing. Comparing the ptmo to the rest of Gorgiasʼ works, we verify and clearly demonstrate how SE manages to convey a precise modus argumentandi. In effect, SE shows Gorgias’ demonstrative reasoning as employing: 1 the (...) application of demonstrandum and quod erat demonstrandum typical of Gorgiasʼ speeches, reinforced by a substantial and abundant use of verbs of explanation and demonstration, especially in comparison to the rest of the same Against the Logicians’ section. Otherwise, MXG reduces this lexicon to the more generic phēmi; 2 the continuous employment of the reductio ad absurdum, like in all of Gorgias’ works; 3 a very refined formulation of the principle of non-contradiction §67, similar to the one seen in Pal. 25. In addition, MXG is accurate in the discussion of some arguments as in the third kephalaion, however, presents as an overcorrected interpreter, more interested in questioning Gorgias than reporting his original text, also directly referring to Zeno, Melissus, and Leucippus. The context of the ptmo in SE’s work the structure presented leads us to believe that SE had the text or at least an accurate summary of the ptmo different from MXG. The aims of this paper are: 1 to demonstrate that SE shows well the Gorgianic demonstrative reasoning and, for this specific reason, he is reliable and valuable resource for us; 2 to hypothesise that SE’s version is based on and independent as yet unknown source. (shrink)

The two extant versions of Gorgias’ Peri tou mē ontos have been preserved by an anonymous author and by Sextus Empiricus. Both versions have been differently interpreted by scholars who examine either the doctrine or the rhetorical-communicational dimen­sion. When comparing the PTMO with the rest of Gorgias’ works, the present paper aims to demonstrate that S.E. offers a more precise account of Gorgias’ modus argumentandi. Thus, S.E. shows the following, typical features of Gorgias’ demonstra­tive reasoning: 1) application of demonstrandum (...) and quod erat demon­strandum, 2) continuous employment of reductio ad absurdum and 3) a refined formulation of the principle of non-contradiction. The MXG, on the other hand, is accurate in the discussion of particular arguments, but presents an interpreter who is more interested in questioning Gorgias rather than doing justice to his thought. Hence, this article concludes that it was S.E., who had the text or at least a relatively accurate summa­ry of the PTMO. (shrink)

Food security is becoming an increasingly relevant topic in the Global North, especially in urban areas. Because such areas do not always have good access to nutritionally adequate food, the question of how to supply them is an urgent priority in order to maintain a healthy population. Urban and peri-urban agriculture, as sources of local fresh food, could play an important role. Whereas some scholars do not differentiate between peri-urban and urban agriculture, seeing them as a single entity, (...) our hypothesis is that they are distinct, and that this has important consequences for food security and other issues. This has knock-on effects for food system planning and has not yet been appropriately analysed. The objectives of this study are to provide a systematic understanding of urban and peri-urban agriculture in the Global North, showing their similarities and differences, and to analyse their impact on urban food security. To this end, an extensive literature review was conducted, resulting in the identification and comparison of their spatial, ecological and socio-economic characteristics. The findings are discussed in terms of their impact on food security in relation to the four levels of the food system: food production, processing, distribution and consumption. The results show that urban and peri-urban agriculture in the Global North indeed differ in most of their characteristics and consequently also in their ability to meet the food needs of urban inhabitants. While urban agriculture still meets food needs mainly at the household level, peri-urban agriculture can provide larger quantities and has broader distribution pathways, giving it a separate status in terms of food security. Nevertheless, both possess (unused) potential, making them valuable for urban food planning, and both face similar threats regarding urbanisation pressures, necessitating adequate planning measures. (shrink)

Boethius, the Roman philosopher, was executed for treason and pilloried by modern scholars for misinterpreting Aristotle to the West. This book examines his semantics and logic, attempting to clear his name and lend him new credence.

Celebrated as the equal to the great philosophers of old, namely Plato and Aristotle, whom – as Cassiodorus put it – he taught to speak Latin better than they spoke Greek, Boethius aspired to fully emancipate Roman culture from its Greek models through translations and exegesis so faithful they would leave nothing more to be desired from the original. The essay focuses on Boethius philhellenism, without complexes insofar as it had little to do either with the mixed feelings of his (...) Roman predecessors or with the plundering agenda of his Christian contemporaries. Special attention is paid to the close relationship Boethius established between word for word translations and multi-layered commentaries which he thought of and – albeit partially – carried out as part of the same scholarly endeavour. Devoid of literary pretentions as well as free from aspirations to autonomy, Boethius literal rendering and scrupulous interpretation were meant to be completely self-sufficient. Together they stand out as both the most innovative and the most conservative features of his ambitious cultural project. -/- Célébré comme l’égal des grands philosophes du passé, auxquels il aurait appris à parler Latin mieux qu’ils ne parlaient Grec, Boèce a caressé le rêve d’une émancipation radicale de la culture romaine vis-à-vis des modèles grecs qu’il se proposait de traduire et interpréter assez fidèlement pour que la comparaison avec les sources ne soit plus nécessaire. De son effort de livrer un Aristote et un Platon latins à la hauteur des originaux grecs, nous étudions l’étroite solidarité qui relie la traduction mot-à-mot des textes grecs et la restitution scrupuleuse de leur sens. Cette double tâche, que Boèce a conçue et menée d’un seul tenant, nous est dès lors apparue comme le reflet d’un philhellénisme sans complexes, tout aussi éloigné des sentiments ambivalents que nourrissaient vis-à-vis des hellènes ses devanciers romains que des efforts visant à domestiquer l’héritage classique auxquels se livraient certains de ses contemporains de même confession que lui. Affranchis de tout rêve d’autonomie, les traductions et les commentaires de Boèce se conçoivent comme parfaitement autosuffisants. Ensemble ils constituent ce qu’il y a à la fois de franchement novateur et de profondément conservateur dans son projet de faire parler Latin les sources grecques. (shrink)

The Peripatetic treatise Peri pneumatos has recently received a great deal of scholarly attention. Some authors, predominantly A. Bos and R. Ferwerda, try to prove that the treatise is a genuine work of Aristotle and all the theories advanced in the text can be ultimately explained by references to this or that Aristotelian doctrine. Quite on the contrary, P. Gregoric, O. Lewis and M. Kuhar are firmly convinced that the treatise contains some physiological ideas introduced after Aristotle and are (...) inclined to support the traditional dating of the treatise to the time after Praxagoras of Cos. Largely in agreement with the latter proposition, in the present study I tentatively place this earliest and unique witness of the discussions on the source of growth and nourishment of the so-called connate pneuma in the context of the Peripatetic tradition of the Early Hellenistic period. The treatise is translated into the Russian for the first time. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Reading Aristotle with Thomas Aquinas: His Commentaries on Aristotle’s Major Works by Leo J. EldersEfrem Jindráček O.P.Reading Aristotle with Thomas Aquinas: His Commentaries on Aristotle’s Major Works. By Leo J. Elders. Edited by JÖrgen Vijgen. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2023. Pp. xi + 560. $75.00 (hardcover). ISBN: 978-0-8132-3579-0.The prolific Thomistic scholar Jörgen Vijgen has edited a new book by the well-known and recently (...) deceased Thomistic Dutch philosopher, university [End Page 718] professor, and religious priest Leo J. Elders, S.V.D. (1926–2019). According to the bookplate, the book is based on the French original Aristote et Thomas d’Aquin (Paris, 2018), but according to the editor’s preface it is the original English version: “while originally written in English, a French translation appeared already in 2018” (vii). In any case, this is a very precise and interesting panoramic presentation of all twelve of Thomas’s commentaries on Aristotle’s books. The presentations are arranged not according to the chronological sequence of Thomas’s writing, but rather according to the order in which we usually arrange the treatises of Aristotle (i.e., from On Interpretation to Politics). The text is based on Elders’s lecturing activities in Houston in the 1980s, which he himself revised and added to towards the end of his life. It is also obviously a thematic follow-up to several of his articles continuously published on the subject (“Saint Thomas d’Aquin et Aristote,” Revue Thomiste 88 [1988]: 357–76; “St. Thomas Aquinas’s Commentary of Aristoteles’s Physics,” Doctor Angelicus 7 [2007]: 17–51; “The Aristotelian Commentaries of St. Thomas Aquinas,” The Review of Metaphysics 63 [2009]: 29–53).The author has, of course, chosen the best existing Latin editions of Thomas’s texts (Leonine and Marietti), but for the sake of easier editing and citation he has kept the numbering of the paragraphs according to the Marietti edition. Each chapter devoted to one of Thomas’s commentaries has almost the same structure (the presentation of Aristotelian text, Thomas’s intention and commentary according to uniform books, concluding remarks). The book concludes with an extremely comprehensive bibliography (511–25), index of names (527–31) and a subject index (533–36).Elders articulates the basic philosophical question that drives this work in the preface: “if they [Thomas’s commentaries] contained Thomas’s own philosophy and if they were a reliable presentation of Aristotle’s thought, or, on the contrary, if they deformed it in some place by introducing some of Thomas’s Christian faith and theology” (ix). After the analysis of Thomas’s twelve commentaries, Elders arrived at the conclusion that “the commentaries are a masterful and faithful presentation of Aristotle’s thought and of that of Thomas himself. Thomas’s Christian faith does not falsify or alternate the text, but give occasionally an outlook at what lies behind philosophical thought” (ibid.).In the Introduction (1–13), Elders discusses the objections of other contemporary scholars (É. Gilson, J. Owens, M. D. Jordan, H. V. Jaffa) who have reached different positions, even with the help of texts that are, on the contrary, close to the author’s view (D.-M. Chenu, C. Kaczor, F. del Punta). And not only that: “In order to trace the relatively few texts where Thomas disagrees with certain doctrine of Aristotle or completes certain statements, my method is to go through each chapter of the different commentaries and to note where Thomas makes observations and advances a different explanation. In order to do so, it seemed best to present a summary of the contents of the different chapters of each treatise, noting those places where Thomas makes [End Page 719] corrections and additions, or brings in sentences expressing truths of the Christian faith” (13).In order to examine Elders’s analytical reading of Thomas’s commentaries, we will consider three representative chapters: namely, his treatment of Thomas’s commentaries on Peri hermeneias (14–58), Meteorologica (205–32), and Metaphysics (311–400). These three commentaries are unequal in several respects: not all were completed by Thomas himself, and not all... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A New Fragment of Sophocles and its Schedographic ContextJohn J. KeaneyThe General ContextA popular medium of elementary Byzantine education in grammar and orthography was the genre known as.1 The genre is represented by a (larger or smaller) collection of (brief passages of prose [most frequently] or verse). The individual words of the text are accompanied by a fourfold analysis: (1) interlinear glosses;2 (2 and 3) grammatical and etymological/derivational analysis (...) of individual words; (4) a list of words beginning with the same two or three letters as the word analyzed-each word may or may not be glossed. While these lists quote some well-known texts, the grammatical analyses preserve only two quotations of classical authors; both, by some chance, are of Sophocles.3Our earliest, and necessarily very incomplete, knowledge of the genre comes in references and allusions thereto, like those of Anna Comnena (Alexiad 15.7) or Eustathius (e.g., Comm. in Hom. Il. 1.367.4; [End Page 173] 2.585.16 van der Valk). Between that period and the appearance of the first texts, there arose a traditional core of (hereafter skhedē).4 The earliest representatives of this core were written in the south of Italy at the end of the thirteenth century. These, with the folia containing our text, are B (Barberinianus Graecus 102:1290/1 [subscription]: fol. 60 v); P (Parisinus Graecus 25745: fol. 61 r) written by Nicolaus Hagiopetrite\s in Galatina; N (Par. Gr. 2572:1295/6 [subscription]: fol. 51 v) by one Georgius, son of the protopapas Leo, of Ardeo; and M (Monacensis Graecus 272: fol. 42 v). These represent one6 branch of the oldest class of manuscripts (class Ia). The four manuscripts are related, as shown by the fact that they preserve the same order of skhedē throughout. N and M are closely related for they add a final skhedos not found in B and P. A second branch (Ib) is represented by Pal (Palatinus Graecus 927: fol. 26 v), R (Reginenses, PP Pii II 15: fol. 206 v8), and C (Conventi Soppressi 29: fol. 40 v).The Specific ContextThe ninth of the traditional skhedē is[End Page 174]The word analyzed is. The text:A.A.B.C.D. om. PalRAlthough the text is badly transmitted,10 it is all but certain that it goes back, ultimately, to Herodian.11 The closest parallel passage12 is from the Peri dikhronōn (2.15.11-27 Lehrs):[End Page 175] (δ 511).A. B. (F36 Kassel-Austin).Some Sophoclean Usage(1) is found once (Ph. 945). (2) With compare Ai. 543: and Ant. 548: (3) For the polarity of "mind" and, see OT 524-24: F 929.1-2 Radt:. For as a feature of the Sophoclean hero, see Knox 1964, 21.John J. KeaneyPrinceton University e-mail: [email protected], J., and J. Irigoin, eds. 1977. La Paléographie grecque et byzantine. Paris: Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique. Google ScholarCanart, P. 1977. "Un Style d'écriture livresque dans les manuscrits chypriotes du XIVe siècle: La Chypriote 'bouclée.'" In Bompaire and Irigoin, 303-21.Constantinides, C. N., and R. Browning. 1993. Dated Greek Manuscripts from Cyprus to the Year 1570. Nicosia: Cyprus Research Center. Google ScholarDyck, A. 1993. "Aelius Herodian: Recent Studies and Prospects for Future Research." ANRW 2.34.1:772-94. Berlin: de Gruyter. Google Scholar---, ed. 1995. Epimerismi Homerici. 2d part. Sammlung griechischer und lateinischer Grammatiker 5/2. Berlin: de Gruyter. Google ScholarGallavotti, C. 1983. "Nota sulla schedographia di Moscopulo e suoi precedenti fino a Teodoro Prodromo." BPEC, 3d ser., 4:1-35. Google ScholarGamillscheg, E. 1950. "Zur handschriften Überlieferung byzantinischen Schulbücher." JÖB 43:211-30. Google ScholarHunger, H. 1978. Die hochsprachliche Literatur der Byzantiner. Vol. 2. Munich: C. H. Beck. [End Page 176]Google ScholarKassel, R., and C. Austin. 1991. Poetae Comici Graeci. Vol. 2. Berlin: de Gruyter. Google ScholarKeaney, J. J. 1971. "Moschopulea." BZ 63:303-21. Google ScholarKnox, B. M. W. 1964. The Heroic Temper. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Google ScholarLehrs, K... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Cross and Creation: A Theological Introduction to Origen of Alexandria by Mark E. TherrienJean-Paul JugeCross and Creation: A Theological Introduction to Origen of Alexandria by Mark E. Therrien (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2022), xxii + 303 pp.Although Origen of Alexandria has been misrepresented and maligned since his own lifetime, allies have always arisen to defend him in his stead. Especially after the French Catholic reappraisal (...) of Origen's theology in the twentieth century, the once-dominant interpretation of Origen as a Platonist dressed in Christian garb no longer holds sway among most scholars. As Mark Therrien notes, however, traces of a "metaphysical reductionist" interpretation of Origen, propounded most notably by Adolf [End Page 295] von Harnack, still influences Origenian scholarship (89). Therrien's book vigorously opposes this line of interpretation and provides a rereading of crucial passages in Origen's On First Principles (Peri archōn) and his Commentary on John. In addition to presenting a fresh interpretation of these texts, Therrien also offers an introduction for those who are encountering Origen's theology for the first time. Rather than prefacing with biographical remarks, this book dives straight into Origen's major theological texts, allowing the reader, as Henri de Lubac put it, "to see Origen at work."Therrien operates under the principle that Origen is above all a biblical theologian whose speculation is driven primarily by his commitment to exegesis rather than Platonic presuppositions. Thus, his reading of various controversial excerpts of Origen, particularly from the Peri archōn, pays close attention to the biblical verses that Origen cites, which operate not as mere ornamentation but as the indispensable mechanics of his theology.This book is divided into eight chapters, each of which presents a "fundamental pillar" of Origen's thought: God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, eschatology the soul, the world, the Cross, and deification. Drawing attention to the first two cycles that comprise Origen's Peri archōn, Therrien treats the first cycle as authoritative to Origen's system, since it is here that Origen presents the Church's teaching in a more dogmatic form prior to the zetetic approach of the second cycle. Chapter 1 highlights the anti-Valentinian polemic that contextualizes Origen's account of divine incorporeality and the possibility of genuine knowledge of God. Following the insights of Cyril O'Regan, Therrien notes that an extreme apophaticism led the Valentinian Gnostics to "assimilat[e] God to creaturely categories," as seen in their account of various deities emanating from God as if by a material transfer of substance (36). For Origen, only the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are absolutely incorporeal, and it is their absolute incorporeality that separates the Trinity from all creatures. Despite this fundamental distinction between the Trinity and creation, Origen affirms that a limited knowledge of God is possible for rational creatures with the caveat that, whenever God is likened analogically to a created reality, the dissimilarity is always greater (38). Therrien contends that, unlike the Gnostics, Origen envisions the material world as the positive and even necessary means for creatures to derive knowledge of God.Chapter 2 focuses on Origen's Christology, especially the primacy of Christ's title "Wisdom," which the author accounts for by explaining the logic behind Origen's exegesis of John's Prologue and Prov 8:22. Long before the Arian controversy of the fourth century, Origen insisted that God is eternally Father and thus generates the Son from all eternity. Origen has often been characterized, however, as arguing that God's eternal status as Creator [End Page 296] necessarily entails the existence of creation ab aeterno. Therrien points out that such a reading conflates Origen's two distinct notions of creation: the foreknown existence of creatures as "sketched and prefigured" in Wisdom from all eternity and the concrete, substantial existence of creatures that begins in time (60). The investigation of Origen's pneumatology in chapter 3 shows how Ps 103 (in the Septuagint) informs Origen's notion of the Holy Spirit as Creator. For Origen, creation is not simply a past event, but is instead a dynamic process: "Created beings must, so to... (shrink)

From my ongoing "Metalogical Plato" project. The aim of the diagram is to make reasonably intuitive how the Socratic elenchos (the logic of refutation applied to candidate formulations of virtues or ruling knowledges) looks and works as a whole structure. This is my starting point in the project, in part because of its great familiarity and arguable claim to being the inauguration of western philosophy; getting this point less wrong would have broad and deep consequences, including for philosophy’s self-understanding. -/- (...) (i.) is the first pass at elenchos in which the Socratic interlocutor does not reflect on knowledge being the crux of the problem. (ii.) is the second, rarer, reflective pass in which they are, making the investigation explicitly about knowledge. Its centrality in the Charmides makes that neglected dialogue of superlative importance. This structure is also the gateway through which the discussion/dialectic crosses into the Agathology (discussion of the form of the good) at Republic 505. -/- The problem of elenchos, then, grasped as a whole structure, is that it seems that knowledge can neither satisfactorily be included in nor excluded from its own scope. The development of the ti esti (“what is ---?”) question leads to the introduction of knowledge into its own scope (i. implicitly, as goodness contrasted with blind rule-following ii. explicitly qua knowledge) while the development of the dual peri tinos (“----about what?) question leads to K’s elimination from its own scope. The introductions are motivated to avoid contradiction, but produce regress; the eliminations are motivated to avoid regress, but produce contradiction. In scholarship, and in the history of philosophy, the ti esti question is universally recognized, to the point of being identified with philosophy’s origin and essence; the peri tinos question is neglected textually and never recognized as the equal dual to the ti esti. This, I claim, has blocked the development of a nontrivial logical appreciation of what Plato's Socrates is up to. (One rather disastrous effect of this neglect is taking Aristotle as the beginning of the development of logic, rather than, correctly, for the beginning of logic’s fatal separation from mathematics and dialectic.) -/- Further, because of this monopticism of the ti esti, the function of consistency in the elenchos has not been understood, even with respect to the ti esti. The ti esti is actually in search of completeness, given a norm of consistency; the peri tinos is in search of consistency, given a norm of completeness. Only appreciating the two questions as dual allows space in the structure to clarify these different orientations relative to consistency. (And, dually, to completeness, whose function in the elenchos is generally entirely missed by scholars and relegated to discussions of eros; it's not out of place there, of course, but its significance is secured here.) Recognizing the duality of the ti esti and peri tinos questions is thus the royal road, in the Socratic-Platonic context, to catching sight of what we post-Cantorians can recognize as the metalogical duality of consistency and completeness. (The salutary disruptive effects of this Plato-Cantor proximity have, of course, been traced in complementary ways by Badiou.) -/- Note that the diagram is supposed to provide a relatively accessible orientation, not to stand on its own, and certainly not to be the last word on any subject. An important qualification (telegraphed in the previous paragraph) is that what elenchos shows is not finally circular or paradoxical, though the problem first presents as such (stubbornly, obdurately, as "difficult" Plato's Socrates always says with characteristic understatement). What is depicted here is meant, at a first pass, to be the shape of that first presentation, the form of the problem of elenchos, rather than of its solution. It's not an accident that this problem strongly resembles "Russell's paradox" (not Russell's not a paradox.) Problem is to solution as RP is to the diagonal theorems. (shrink)

Cicero was not only a great Roman politician, lawyer and orator: he also dealt extensively with philosophy, which he believed constituted the surest foundation for his commitment to civic affairs. Not limiting himself to the translation of previous philosophical thought, he critically addressed central theoretical questions, and thereby made a lasting impact on Roman intellectual life. This book offers a modern guide to interpretations of Cicero's philosophical studies, one that ranges across his numerous philosophical works. Addressed to students and scholars (...) of ancient philosophy, and to interested readers in the humanities more generally, the volume aims to break down the boundaries between the philosophical, literary and linguistic dimensions of Cicero's highly influential oeuvre. Stefano Maso is a full professor in Ancient Philosophy at the University of Ca' Foscari - Venice. Among his books are: Grasp and Dissent: Cicero and Epicurean Philosophy (Brepols 2015); Epicurus on Eidola: Peri Phuseos Book II. Update, Proposals, and Discussions (ed. with F. Masi, Hakkert 2015). He is co-editor of "Lexis. Poetica, retorica e comunicazione nella tradizione classica". (shrink)

Can we make sense of the dogma of Parmenides' poem, that only being is? The prospect that Parmenides presents a perplexity, rather than a solution, forms the central hypothesis of this dissertation. Plato's Socrates seems to have understood this, and we, too, may fear our failure to fathom Parmenides' words and understand his meaning. Every attempt to penetrate Parmenides' thinking becomes unwittingly entangled in an impossible dilemma of trying to account for itself within the austere singularity of being, in seeming (...) defiance of the goddess' injunction against saying or thinking what is not. Thinking requires non-being to individuate or recognize itself, but even the minimal duality needed to acknowledge oneself is most emphatically denied. Parmenides' dogma, however, no less than his reasoning, has proven always attractive, despite its clear implication that everything we do is illusion. The goddess' distinction between Aletheia and Doxa, and her arguments, exacerbate this problem, although these two parts are commonly seen as the kernel of Parmenides' thought. Parmenides' proem grounds this fundamental split in a third and allows us to glimpse the poem's more aporetic structure. Parmenides' thinking is first approached through what his poem says and implies about itself. Its impossibility in light of its own argument points toward self-awareness and a discovery of the ineradicable duality of thinking. A second approach begins with the poem's ancient title, Peri Phuseos, and examines several pre-Parmenidean uses of the word phusis that show enigmatic implications from its first appearance. Scholars suggesting a prototypical concept of nature in early uses of phusis seem to gild the lily. Plato appears as a third locus for inquiry about Parmenides' thinking, and the intersection of Socrates and Parmenides is traced across the dialogues. The structure of Parmenides' poem appears knowingly imitated by Plato frequently, which bears significantly on his representations of Socrates' life and philosophic education. Socrates' caution about whether he understood Parmenides parallels a caution expressed as his "second sailing." Socrates' turn to speeches shows his concern with discovering intention, which perhaps animates his fear of awesome Parmenides but also suggests him to be Socrates' inchoate precursor concerning soul. (shrink)

The image of a copy of Praxiteles’ Aphrodite—nude but demurely shielding her pubic region—which adorns the dust cover of Pearson’s superb monograph, Aristotle on Desire</i>), suggests to the casual book buyer that the volume encased therein will explain Aristotle’s thoughts about sexual desire—perhaps as a central part or the paradigm case of his general theory of desire. But the goddess likes being tricky: Aristotle has very little to say about sexual desire (at best it is a subcategory of <i>epithumia</i>, set (...) alongside the desires for eating and drinking and reduced to tactile stimulation), and it is not immediately apparent that he possesses a general theory or account of desire. No doubt, Aristotle discusses many aspects of <i>orexis</i> (Aristotle’s general term for desire) in relationship to human action, in his consideration of the rhetorical manipulation of the emotions, and in his examination of animate motion. But as Pearson notes, neither in Aristotle’s catalog of writings nor in his surviving works is there an Aristotelian <i>peri orexeôs</i>. Pearson’s monograph, which is the “distant descendant” of a Ph.D. completed at Cambridge in 2004, thus is an exercise in detective work which combs through Aristotle’s discussions of desire throughout the corpus (albeit with focus on the ethical treatises, the <i>Rhetoric</i>, and <i>De Anima</i>) in order to reconstruct what a general theory of desire would look like for Aristotle. Pearson does a masterful job at drawing together into a coherent whole many of Aristotle’s scattered remarks about the different aspects of desire and provides a model for textual analysis of philosophically abstruse passages. Along the way, he overturns a number of scholarly orthodoxies (for instance, that Aristotle’s account of <i>thumos</i> retains elements of Platonic <i>thumos</i> or “spiritedness” or that <i>thumos</i> has a unique relationship to the <i>kalon</i> or what is fine) and situates Aristotle’s theory amidst contemporary philosophers of desire such as Thomas Nagle, Thomas Scanlon, and G.F. Schuler. The result is a landmark work of scholarship that scholars working on Aristotle’s moral psychology will need to engage and argue with. Whether the work warrants the adornment of Aphrodite is a question to which I will return in my conclusion. (shrink)

How is time framed in corporate social responsibility (CSR) talk? The literature mostly fails to analyze how multiple CSR activities are framed from a temporal perspective. Moreover, those researchers who undertake temporal framing tend to overlook the role of home-country cultural characteristics. Using a mixed-method analysis of 2,720 CSR reports from developing country companies, we show that CSR talk is mostly framed in the future tense when firms communicate complex human rights issues such as slavery or child labor, while the (...) past and present tenses are more frequent when they report on philanthropy and other cause-related activities. We find that these effects are stronger when firms are from countries characterized by greater uncertainty avoidance. We contribute to the CSR communication literature by showing that temporal references in CSR talk tend to differ, depending on the company-level control of CSR activities, and by highlighting uncertainty avoidance’s role as a boundary condition for aspirational talk’s performativity. (shrink)

In the scenario of growing polarization of promises and dangers that surround artificial intelligence (AI), how to introduce responsible AI and robotics in healthcare? In this paper, we develop an ethical–political approach to introduce democratic mechanisms to technological development, what we call “Caring in the In-Between”. Focusing on the multiple possibilities for action that emerge in the realm of uncertainty, we propose an ethical and responsible framework focused on care actions in between fears and hopes. Using the theoretical perspective of (...) Science and Technology Studies and empirical research, “Caring in the In-Between” is based on three movements: the first is a change of focus from the world of promises and dangers to the world of uncertainties; the second is a conceptual shift from assuming a relationship with robotics based on a Human–Robot Interaction to another focused on the network in which the robot is embedded (the “Robot Embedded in a Network”); and the last is an ethical shift from a general normative framework to a discussion on the context of use. Based on these suggestions, “Caring in the In-Between” implies institutional challenges, as well as new practices in healthcare systems. It is articulated around three simultaneous processes, each of them related to practical actions in the “in-between” dimensions considered: monitoring relations and caring processes, through public engagement and institutional changes; including concerns and priorities of stakeholders, with the organization of participatory processes and alternative forms of representation; and making fears and hopes commensurable, through the choice of progressive and reversible actions. (shrink)

In recent years, the contribution of various disciplines and professionals (i.e. from marketing, computer science, psychology and pedagogy) to museum management has encouraged the development of a new conception of museology. Specifically, psychology has affected the overall conception of museum and the visitors towards a more holistic vision of the museum experience as a complexity of memory, personal drives, group identity, meaning-making process, as well as leisure preferences. In this regard, psychological research contributes to advance the scientific knowledge about psychological (...) and social phenomena related to the visitor experience, as well as to design innovative technologies and future tourism services. The present contribution discusses the Socio-Cultural Activity Theory as a theoretical framework to conceptualize the museum visit as an activity mediated by the technology, and to better identify the factors shaping the interaction between the visitors and the technologies. To do so, a case study is presented: a qualitative research performed at the Ara Pacis Museum in Rome (Italy) to analyze the visitor experience of a tour that integrates augmented and virtual reality. Information derived from applying Activity Theory on visitors’ experience highlight the value of technology as mediating tool between the museum mission and the visitor experience, considering the interaction between visitors’ characteristics, museum environmental dimensions and technology’s features. (shrink)

Political Constructivism is concerned with the justification of principles of political justice in the face of pluralism. Contemporary accounts of multiculturalism, pluralism and diversity have challenged the capacity of political theory to impartially justify principles of justice beyond the boundaries of particular communities. In this original account, Peri Roberts argues that political constructivism defends a conception of objective and universal principles that set normative limits to justifiable political practice. _Political Constructivism_ explores this understanding in two ways. Firstly, by engaging (...) with constructivist thinkers such as John Rawls and Onora O’Neill in order to lay out a basic understanding of what constructivism is. Secondly, the author goes on to defend a particular account of political constructivism that justifies a universal primary constructivism alongside the many secondary constructions in which we live our everyday lives. In doing so he outlines an understanding of principled pluralism which accepts diversity whilst at the same time recognising its limits. This volume will be of particular interest to students and researchers of political theory and political philosophy. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie Jahrgang: 99 Heft: 2 Seiten: 129-155.

The borders between the physical and the virtual are ever-more porous in the daily lives of those of us who live in Internet enabled societies. An increasing number of our daily interactions and transactions take place on the Internet. Social, economic, educational, medical, scientific and other activities are all permeated by the digital in one or other kind of virtual environment. Hand in hand with the ever-increasing reach of the Internet, the digital and the virtual, go concerns about trust. In (...) the increasing numbers of cross-disciplinary attempts to understand the way that the Internet is changing our societies, ‘trust’ is a truly cross-boundary word, used just as frequently by computer scientists as it is by economists, sociologists and philosophers. Concerns in the name of trust are articulated about the objects and artefacts found, accessed or bought on the Internet, about the people with whom we interact on the interact, and about the technological systems and infrastructures that enable us to carry out activities of different types. -/- This paper reflects on the implications for trust of the way we shape our technologies and they in turn shape us, for example, in the way we trust and the extent to which we can trust ourselves as trusters. The account I am working towards is an ecological and co-evolutionary view of trust and technologies, which attempts to hold in view the complex inter-relationships between the agents and other entities within and across environments. First, I consider the ways in which problems of justifying trust are analogous to problems of justifying knowledge, and claim that trust, like knowledge, cannot be justified from an external position. Second, I outline an account of internal relations drawn from phenomenology. This is followed by a discussion of three aspects of trust which are internally related to it: value, reason and morality. (shrink)

Pila (2009) has criticised the recommendations made by requirements engineers involved in the design of a grid technology for the support of distributed readings of mammograms made by Jirotka et al. (2005). The disagreement between them turns on the notion of “biographical familiarity” and whether it can be a sound basis for trust for the performances of professionals such as radiologists. In the first two sections, this paper gives an interpretation of the position of each side in this disagreement and (...) their recommendation for the design of technology for distributed reading, and in the third the underlying reasons for this is agreement are discussed. It is argued that Pila, in attempting to make room for mistrust as well as trust, brings to the fore the question of having and reflecting upon reasons for trust or mistrust. Pila holds that biographical familiarity is not a sound reason for trust/mistrust, as it seems to obliterate the possibility of mistrust. In response to her proposal, an analysis is proposed of the forms of trust involved in biographical familiarity. In particular, implicit trust is focused upon — as a form of trust in advance of reasons, and as a form of trust contained (in the logical sense) within other reasons. It is proposed that implicit trust has an important role in establishing an intersubjectively shared world in which what counts as a reason for the acceptability of performances such as readings of X-rays is established. Implicit trust, therefore, is necessary for professionals to enter into a “space of reasons”. To insist upon judgements made in the absence of the form of implicit trust at play in biographical familiarity is to demand that radiologists (and other relevantly similar professionals) make judgements regarding whether to trust or mistrust on the basis of reasons capable of being reflected upon, but at the same time leave them without reasons upon which to reflect. (shrink)

La Nouvelle Héloïse di Jean-Jacques Rousseau, pur essendo a tutti gli effetti un romanzo, presenta molti elementi leggibili in chiave di filosofia politica. Tra questi emerge la descrizione di Clarens, la parte più politica dell’opera, che è stata interpretata da alcuni come una sorta di utopia, da altri come un laboratorio della politica, preparatorio di alcune delle tematiche del Contrat social. Entrambe queste interpretazioni hanno dei riscontri nel testo: lo dimostra il fatto che si rintracciano fianco a fianco temi come (...) quelli del dirigismo e dell’eudemonismo e quelli della creazione di un forte sentimento comunitario; il fatto che il problema dell’uguaglianza si pone in modo complesso, a volte affermato a volte negato; il fatto che la conduzione dell’economia della tenuta è retta da forti elementi utilitaristici e, nello stesso tempo, è ispirata dai principi del conseguimento del bene comune e della moderazione nelle fortune; infine, dal fatto che i ruoli di Julie e Wolmar all’interno della comunità invitano a meditare sulla difficile figura del Legislatore del Contrat social, non privo di connotazioni che possono in qualche modo riportarlo al fondatore delle utopie. (shrink)

Knowledge does not float free of the technologies available for its production and presentation. The intimate connection between ideas and praxis - embodied, technological, social - exemplified in any knowledge practice is, in the terms of Ihde & Selinger (2004), an 'epistemology engine'. This refers to the material-semiotic connections that obtain for any specific rendering of an idea. Often this material-semiotic connection is easier to recognise in the case of art than in that of knowledge, where it appears more-or-less obvious (...) that the rendering of an idea in poetic rather than prose form, in musical rather than linguistic form, in plastic rather than digital form, makes a difference to the idea. However, it is also recognisable (if not always actually recognised) in science, where there is a keen awareness of visual media alongside or instead of discursive media. -/- Ideas on the Internet shift and change as they pass through different networks of meaning production and communication, in different media and modalities. Different disciplines and modes of knowledge have either embraced these possibilities of transmogrification or remained aloof. Philosophy is one of the latter, and seems still steadily rooted to the discursive world. However, as a discipline, it overlaps in interesting ways both with science and with art. What are the epistemology-engines that apply to philosophy, and are there specific philosophy-engines? This is the background against which the applications to e-learning in philosophy will be considered. -/- In previous work, I claimed that the nature of philosophical argument cannot simply be assumed to remain constant even in the use of relatively simple discursive technologies such as discussion boards (Carusi 2006). In the present paper I consider a range of other technologies that form the technological culture of philosophy, or which mediate it. The paper aims to open a line of enquiry into these underlying technologies and the kinds of philosophy-engine that emerge from them, individually or by way of a convergence of a set of technologies. In particular, I focus on text-mining techniques, visualisations, and modeling showing what potential they have for disturbing, derailing, re-shaping or transforming the mode, form or substance of philosophy. -/- . (shrink)

This paper discusses the fallacies of combination and division as they are presented by Aristotle in chapter 4 of his Sophistici Elenchi. Aristotle's examples are concise, their discussion is unclear, and it is difficult to distinguish the cases of combination from those of division. I analyse the Aristotelian examples and the interpretations offered so far. I show that these interpretations suffer from a major defect: they fail to identify a common characteristic whereby the Aristotelian examples can be classified as instances (...) of combination or division. In my reconstruction of the examples, I repair this deficiency: I give a single pattern of explanation for the fallacy of combination and another (similar) pattern for the fallacy of division. Thus, it is possible to free Aristotle from the following charges: (i) he did not clearly distinguish between combination and division, and (ii) he reduced combination and division to a single fallacy. My explanation of the fallacies uses the notion of scope of an expression: in modern terminology, the fallacy of combination can be described as ?fallacy of the wide scope?, the fallacy of division as ?fallacy of the narrow scope? (shrink)

Desde sus inicios, la globalización se ha manifestado como un acontecimiento de alcance extraordinario, sobre todo para la superación de las distancias de relaciones y valores entre los individuos. La globalización ha ampliado los espacios de reglamentación, pero ha puesto de manifiesto también como la hiperproducción normativa se corresponde con una inadecuación de las normas para solucionar los problemas sociales complejos. De ahí el conflicto o la “contradicción” creciente entre derecho y sociedad, así como la incapacidad del derecho para producir (...) justicia o hacer justicia, en el sentido de colmar la distancia entre los individuos y entre los individuos y las instituciones. La respuesta aparentemente resolutiva de dicha problemática ha venido de la praxis, de la multiplicación de instrumentos mediadores, que parecen poder detener la situación de emergencia generalizada que caracteriza hoy el mundo de la justicia. La mediación es, al mismo tiempo, el resultado de un proceso radical de innovación en la regulación y de gestión de la conflictividad, y una modalidad comunicativa de las nuevas expectativas de justicia social e individual. (shrink)

The author analyses the legal culture of our time trying to make explicit the dynamics that form the basis of the present socio-normative order through an examination of the essential changes in the world of norms and of regulations in general. In particular, the analysis focusses on the structural transformation of law and on the loss of the traditional space-time dimension of regulation in the context of globalization. In the second place, she indicates the changes in the forms of communication (...) such as the fundamental presuppositions from which the problem of the new rights is tackled. The conclusion is that the regulating and directive function of pre-global law is losing ground to new resolution techniques such as mediation. (shrink)