This article applies the Kantian doctrine of respect for persons to the problem of sweatshops. We argue that multinational enterprises are properly regarded as responsible for the practices of their subcontractors and suppliers. We then argue that multinationalenterprises have the following duties in their off-shore manufacturing facilities: to ensure that local labor laws are followed; to refrain from coercion; to meet minimum safety standards; and to provide a living wage for employees. Finally, we consider and reply to the objection that (...) improving health and safety conditions and providing a living wage will cause greater harm than good. (shrink)

In this dissertation I develop a general theory of coercion that allows one to distinguish cases of interpersonal coercion from cases of persuasion or manipulation, and cases of institutional coercion from cases of oppression. The general theory of coercion that I develop includes as one component a theory of second-order coercion. Second-order coercion takes place whenever one person intentionally impairs the formation of the second-order desires of another person, or constrains them after their formation, in a way that frustrates or (...) eliminates the possibility of the victim fulfilling certain of his or her first-order desires. The concept of second-order coercion is important because it suggests that a person's autonomy may be violated in ways that have not been previously recognized. In this dissertation I argue that the unique feature of all cases of coercion is that the alternatives available to the victim, with regard to the formation of his or her will, are intentionally constrained by another person in a way that violates the victim's autonomy. A general theory of coercion should be able to explain how institutions may be understood as coercive. I argue that if institutions are understood as social practices maintained for the purpose of achieving some end, then they may be properly understood as capable of coercion. ;This theory of coercion allows me to make two arguments concerning moral responsibility. First, I argue that current discussions of moral responsibility are inadequate because they fail to take seriously the claim that a person may be responsible, at least in part, for having the beliefs and desires that make a particular action a case of coercion. Second, I argue that discussions of moral responsibility are inadequate because they fail to recognize that an agent may not be responsible for the state of his or her will because he or she may have been coerced in a way that has not been previously recognized. (shrink)

This paper examines a doctrine which David Lewis has called 'Humean Supervenience' (hereafter 'HS'), and a problem which certain imaginary cases seem to generate for HS. They include rotating perfect spheres or discs, and flowing rivers, imagined as composed of matter which is perfectly homogeneous right down to the individual points. Before considering these examples, I shall introduce the doctrine they seem to challenge.

En mobilisant les outils analytiques de la logique et de la philosophie du langage contemporaine, D. Vernant propose de définir pragmatiquement divers actes véridictionnels, de construire une logique dialogique de la véridicité et de déterminer les conditions praxéologiques d'établissement du vrai propres aux différents registres de véridicité.

In 1484, humanist philosopher and theologian Marsilio Ficino published the first complete Latin translation of Plato's extant works. Students of Plato now had access to the entire range of the dialogues, which revealed to Renaissance audiences the rich ancient landscape of myths, allegories, philosophical arguments, etymologies, fragments of poetry, other works of philosophy, aspects of ancient pagan religious practices, concepts of mathematics and natural philosophy, and the dialogic nature of the Platonic corpus's interlocutors. By and large, Renaissance readers in the (...) Latin West encountered Plato's text through Ficino's translations and interpretation. -/- In Plato's Persona, Denis J.-J. Robichaud provides the first synthetic study of Ficino's interpretation of the Platonic corpus. Robichaud analyzes Plato's works in their original Greek and in Ficino's Latin translations, as well as Ficino's non-Platonic writings and correspondence, in the process uncovering new aspects of Ficino's intellectual work habits. In his letters and works, Ficino self-consciously imitated a Platonic style of prose, in effect devising a persona for himself as a Platonic philosopher. Plato's dialogues are populated with a wealth of literary characters with whom Plato interacts and against whom Plato refines his own philosophies. Reading through Ficino's translations, Robichaud finds that the Renaissance philosopher seeks an understanding of Plato's persona(e) among all the dialogues' interlocutors. In effect, Ficino assumed the role of Plato's Latin spokesperson in the Renaissance. -/- Plato's Persona is grounded in an extensive study of scholarship in Renaissance humanism, classics, philosophy, and intellectual history, and contextualizes Ficino's intellectual achievements within the contemporary Christian orthodox view of Platonism. Ficino was an influential figure in the early Italian Renaissance: the key intermediary between Greek and Latin, and between manuscript and print, giving voice to Plato and access to the ancient frameworks needed to interpret his dialogues. (shrink)

Three‐ to 4‐month‐old infants show asymmetric exclusivity in the acquisition of cat and dog perceptual categories. The cat perceptual category excludes dog exemplars, but the dog perceptual category does not exclude cat exemplars. We describe a connectionist autoencoder model of perceptual categorization that shows the same asymmetries as infants. The model predicts the presence of asymmetric retroactive interference when infants acquire cat and dog categories sequentially. A subsequent experiment conducted with 3‐ to 4‐month‐olds verifies the predicted pattern of looking time (...) behaviors. We argue that bottom‐up, associative learning systems with distributed representations are appropriate for modeling the operation of short‐term visual memory in early perceptual category learning. (shrink)

Causal pre-emption scenarios are problematic for the counterfactual framework of causation (CFC) because people judge an action to be the actual cause of an outcome although the outcome would have occurred anyway due to the action of a pre-empted alternative cause. We propose that commonsense causal questions typically probe specific events that actually happened as and how they did, and show that counterfactuals that probe specific events match selections of actual cause, and dissociations only occur with non-specific counterfactuals. In addition, (...) the pre-empted action is often selected as the or an actual cause when it causes the pre-empting action (auto-pre-emption). Judgements of an action’s responsibility for the outcome track judgements of actual cause following the legal sine qua non principle. Agent reproach is also influenced by the agent's intention. The effects of causal dependency structure and counterfactual question type are robust across the intentionality of the pre-empting action and scenario content. (shrink)

There has been increasing interest over the last few decades in the study of the effective content of Mathematics. One field whose effective content has been the subject of a large body of work, dating back at least to the early 1960s, is model theory. Several different notions of effectiveness of model-theoretic structures have been investigated. This communication is concerned withcomputablestructures, that is, structures with computable domains whose constants, functions, and relations are uniformly computable.In model theory, we identify isomorphic structures. (...) From the point of view of computable model theory, however, two isomorphic structures might be very different. For example, under the standard ordering of ω the success or relation is computable, but it is not hard to construct a computable linear ordering of type ω in which the successor relation is not computable. In fact, for every computably enumerable degree a, we can construct a computable linear ordering of type ω in which the successor relation has degree a. It is also possible to build two isomorphic computable groups, only one of which has a computable center, or two isomorphic Boolean algebras, only one of which has a computable set of atoms. Thus, for the purposes of computable model theory, studying structures up to isomorphism is not enough. (shrink)

Pour certains interprètes des Recherches philosophiques , Wittgenstein souscrit à l'idée que l'emploi d'un langage est une institution sociale et que suivre une règle est nécessairement une pratique partagée ; d'autres estiment au contraire — à mon avis avec raison — qu'il admet la possibilité d'un langage parlé par un seul individu et des règles non communes. Je défends l'interprétation selon laquelle la question importante dans les Recherches n'est pas tellement de savoir si un idiolecte est possible que de savoir (...) ce qui découle, pour nos concepts de signification, de compréhension linguistique et de « suivre une règle », du fait que la communication verbale soit — comme c'est normalement le cas — une pratique commune.According to some interpreters of the Philosophical Investigations , Wittgenstein thinks that language-use is a social institution and that rule following is a shared practice. Others hold the opposite view and rightly so. They argue that Wittgenstein thinks there could be a language which is spoken by only one individual and unshared rules. In this paper I defend the following interpretation: The important question raised in the Investigations is not whether or not an idiolect is possible , it is rather what follows with respect to our concepts of meaning , understanding and rule-following from the fact that verbal communication is indeeed a shared practice. (shrink)

Deux des derniers textes philosophiques d'Antoine Arnauld (Dissertatio bipartita…, 1692; Règles du bon sens…, 1693) sont dirigés contre les défenseurs de la « vision en Dieu » des idées ou vérités éternelles. En commentant les textes de Thomas d'Aquin consacrés à la notion de vérité, Arnauld critique Platon, saint Augustin et Jansénius, puis semble adopter une position proche de Descartes sur le statut des vérités éternelles. D'autres textes confirment qu'Arnauld est sans doute le seul des grands post-cartésiens à avoir accepté (...) la thèse dite de la « création des vérités éternelles », et à avoir refusé à la fois l'univocité de la connaissance entre l'homme et Dieu et l'univocité de l'être. Cette fidélité à Descartes donne une place particulière à Arnauld dans l'histoire du cartésianisme, et amène à une question: ne peut-on chercher dans son œuvre une authentique « théologie cartésienne »? Two of Antoine Arnauld's last philosophical texts (Dissertatio bipartita…, 1692; Règles du bon sens…, 1693) are directed against the defenders of the « vision in God » of ideas or eternal truths. Commenting upon Thomas Aquinas' texts about thruth, Arnauld criticizes Platon, Augustine and Jansenius, and seems to adopt a position close to Descartes' about the status of eternal truths. Other texts confirm that Arnauld is probably the only one among the great post-cartesians to accept the thesis called « creation of eternal truths », and to refuse both the univocity of knowledge between God and man, and the univocity of being. This loyalty to Descartes places Arnauld in very specific position in the history of cartesianism, and leads to the following query: can we not find in his work an authentic « cartesian theology »? (shrink)

RÉSUMÉ : John Searle, Hubert Dreyfus et Charles Taylor défendent la thèse voulant qu’il y ait des formes de «compréhension» ou de «savoir» qui, contrairement aux formes courantes, ne sont pas de nature représentationnelle ou conceptuelle mais sont plutôt du type des «savoir-faire». Cet article examine l’argument avancé en faveur de cette thèse ainsi que l’affirmation de ces auteurs suivant laquelle les Recherches philosophiques de Wittgenstein démontrent que celui-ci, au moins implicitement, l’acceptait. Les conclusions qui découlent de cet examen sont, (...) d’une part, que l’argument n’est pas concluant et, de l’autre, qu’il aurait été récusé par l’auteur des Recherches. ABSTRACT : A thesis held by John Searle, Hubert Dreyfus and Charles Taylor is that there is a kind of “understanding” or “knowledge” that differs from ordinary knowledge in being by nature non-representational or non-conceptual and rather a kind of “know-how.” The aim of this article is to examine the argument in support of their common thesis and their claim that it was endorsed, at least implicitly, by Wittgenstein in the Philosophical Investigations. This examination shows that the argument is not convincing and that Wittgenstein would have rejected it. (shrink)

In this vivid memoir, Denis Guénoun excavates his family's past and progressively fills out a portrait of an imposing, enigmatic father. René Guénoun was a teacher and a pioneer, and his secret support for Algerian independence was just one of the many things he did not discuss with his teenaged son. To be Algerian, pro-independence, a French citizen, a Jew, and a Communist were not, to René's mind, dissonant allegiances. He believed Jews and Arabs were bound by an authentic (...) fraternity and could only realize a free future together. René Guénoun called himself a Semite, a word that he felt united Jewish and Arab worlds and best reflected a shared origin. He also believed that Algerians had the same political rights as Frenchmen. Although his Jewish family was rooted in Algeria, he inherited French citizenship and revered the principles of the French Revolution. He taught science in a French lycée in Oran and belonged to the French Communist Party. His steadfast belief in liberty, equality, and fraternity led him into trouble, including prison and exile, yet his failures as an activist never shook his faith in a rational, generous future. René Guénoun was drafted to defend Vichy France's colonies in the Middle East during World War II. At the same time, Vichy barred him and his wife from teaching because they were Jewish. When the British conquered Syria, he was sent home to Oran, and in 1943, after the Allies captured Algeria, he joined the Free French Army and fought in Europe. After the war, both parents did their best to reconcile militant unionism and clandestine party activity with the demands of work and family. The Guénouns had little interest in Israel and considered themselves at home in Algeria; yet because he supported Algerian independence, René Guénoun outraged his French neighbors and was expelled from Algeria by the French paramilitary Organisation Armée Secrète. He spent his final years in Marseille. Gracefully weaving together youthful memories with research into his father's life and times, Denis Guénoun re-creates an Algerian past that proved lovely, intellectually provocative, and dangerous. (shrink)

From an enactive approach to human activity, we suggest that the use of appearance-enhancing drugs is better explained by the sense-making related to body image rather than the cognitive evaluation of social norms about appearance and consequent psychopathology-oriented approach. After reviewing the main psychological disorders thought to link body image issues to the use of appearance-enhancing substances, we sketch a flexible, dynamic and embedded account of body image defined as the individual’s propensity to act and experience in specific situations. We (...) show how this enacted body image is a complex process of sense-making that people engage in when they are trying to adapt to specific situations. These adaptations of the enacted body image require effort, perseverance and time, and therefore any substance that accelerates this process appears to be an easy and attractive solution. In this enactive account of body image, we underline that the link between the enacted body image and substance use is also anchored in the history of the body’s previous interactions with the world. This emerges during periods of upheaval and hardship, especially in a context where athletes experience weak participatory sense-making in a sport community. We conclude by suggesting prevention and intervention designs that would promote a safe instrumental use of the body in sports and psychological helping procedures for athletes experiencing difficulties with substances use and body image. (shrink)

As the title asserts, it is impossible to teach the theory of special relativity without deceiving the student, which means that everyone who already accepts the theory as truth has been deceived. The resulting problem from this deception is, not only is science being held back as people not being told truth, these people are passing their deception onto others, even using time dilation as an answer to the distant starlight problem which many use to attack the account of Biblical (...) creation instead of focusing on the error which yields such exaggerated stellar measurements. The focus of this paper is to expose many of the deceptions within physics texts used to deceive the student, along with several lies which have been told in support of the theory, such as GPS requiring relativity, the Hafele-Keating experiment, muons, etc., while also revealing Einstein’s confusion concerning light. (shrink)

Discusses the influential French philosopher, and examines the connections he drew between philosophy and architecture.

Sont réunies dans cet ouvrage six études des principaux représentants de ce qu’il est convenu d’appeler «l’école de Brentano». Les deux premières, publiées originellement en 1919 dans un ouvrage en hommage à Brentano, sont deux mémoires en souvenir du philosophe qui décrivent sa vie et son activité philosophique de ses débuts à Würzburg jusqu’à son couronnement à Vienne. Le premier est de Husserl qui décrit en détail l’enseignement qu’il a reçu de Brentano à Vienne et explique les raisons qui l’ont (...) amené à se distancier du maître. Carl Stumpf, le premier étudiant de Brentano, signe le deuxième dans lequel il fournit une description remarquablement riche et documentée de la vie et de l’enseignement de Brentano durant la période de Würzburg, et il est considéré, dans les études brentaniennes, comme une référence incontournable sur cette période. Les quatre autres études de cet ouvrage sont des contributions importantes des étudiants de Brentano à la philosophie. Nous publions pour la première fois en français l’étude classique de Christian von Ehrenfels «Sur les qualités de forme» que d’aucuns considèrent comme le texte fondateur de la psychologie de la forme. Cet article est aussi une référence incontournable pour Alexius Meinong et les membres de son école à Graz, et nous traduisons ici son article intitulé «Sur les objets d’ordre supérieur et leur rapport à la perception interne», dans lequel il conclut sa longue réflexion sur les qualités de forme et met en place les idées centrales de ce qu’il appellera quelques années plus tard la théorie de l’objet. On doit la cinquième étude au philosophe polonais Kazimierz Twardowski dans laquelle il propose une analyse originale de la relation entre les actes (fonctions) et leurs contenus (formations). Il s’agit d’une conférence prononcée à Vienne en 1914 sous le titre de «Fonctions et formations, quelques remarques aux confins de la psychologie, de la grammaire et de la logique» qui se veut une tentative de réponse à l’objection de psychologisme. Enfin, l’article d’Anton Marty «Sur le rapport entre la grammaire et la logique», publié en 1893, aborde un thème central dans les études brentaniennes et il est exemplaire des nombreux travaux de Marty dans le domaine de la philosophie du langage. Ces textes sont précédés d’une étude intitulée «Le legs de Brentano» dans laquelle nous présentons les grandes lignes du programme philosophique de Brentano, la généalogie de son «école» ainsi que quelques-uns des débats suscités par les textes reproduits dans cet ouvrage. (shrink)

Remarques critiques sur l'ouvrage de Christiane Chauviré, Sandra Laugier, Jean-Jacques Rosat, Wittgenstein : les mots de l’esprit. Paris, Vrin, 2001,.

Special issue of the journal Revue philosophique in homage to the centenary of Franz Brentano's death. Contains a substantial introduction and contributions from Alain de Libera, Kevin Mulligan, Barry Dainton, and Uriah Kriegel.

A fim de responder à pergunta: "o que pode bem significar conhecer, racionalmente, o Absoluto e quais são os instrumentos de tal empreendimento?", o Autor se propõe a reexaminar a concepção de Deus e do Absoluto em Hegel e suas recepções. Trata-se de responder ainda a questões fundamentais que lhes são correlatas: Como pode a razão, unicamente com os seus meios, alçar-se a um tal empreendimento? O que significa conhecer um tipo de existência que se subtrai aos sentidos e à (...) experiência tal como a compreendemos no sentido filosófico não metafísico? (shrink)

L’objectif poursuivi dans cette étude est de mettre en avant un empirisme «de style husserlien» et d’en indiquer les avantages sur l’empirisme ordinaire. D’abord, partant d’une définition classique due à Chisholm et Sellars, l’auteur énumère les principales thèses de l’empirisme au sens ordinaire et en discute quelques difficultés intrinsèques à la lumière des critiques de Chisholm, Sellars, Goodman et d’autres. Il tente ensuite de montrer que, par son «principe des principes», Husserl a proposé une forme originale d’empirisme, plausiblement moins problématique (...) que ses variantes classiques. L’argument est que l’empirisme de style husserlien échappe aux difficultés énumérées par sa double dimension réflexive et normative. (shrink)

Le présent ouvrage collectif contient les Actes d'un colloque international bilingue sur l'action, les attitudes et la décision que nous avons organisé en hommage à notre regretté collègue J.-Nicolas Kaufmann à Trois-Rivières du 3 au 5 octobre 2002. L'ouvrage présente et discute d'hypothèses, d'enjeux et de théories contemporaines sur l'action, les attitudes, la rationalité et la décision. La première partie intitulée Pensées, actions et engagements contient des contributions de John Searle, Daniel Vanderveken, Candida Jaci de Sousa Melo et Raimo Tuomela (...) traitant de problèmes généraux de la philosophie de l'esprit et de l'action. Dans la deuxième partie de l'ouvrage intitulée Phénoménologie, ontologie et philosophie de l'esprit, nous avons regroupé, autour d'un texte de Nicolas Kaufmann, quatre études qui traitent diversement de la contribution de la phénoménologie classique, principalement de la phénoménologie de Husserl, à des questions centrales de la philosophie contemporaine dans les domaines de la philosophie de l'esprit, de la théorie de l'action et de l'ontologie formelle. La troisième partie de l'ouvrage, Causalité et naturalisme, réunit trois contributions qui portent sur des questions centrales de la philosophie contemporaine. Daniel Laurier se penche sur la question de savoir si le normativisme sémantique est compatible avec le naturalisme sémantique, alors qu'André Leclerc et Wilson Mendonça s'intéressent à la notion de causalité mentale et examinent différents arguments qui contestent le bien-fondé de cette notion. La dernière partie de l'ouvrage intitulée Rationalité et décision réunit trois contributions logico philosophiques de Storrs McCall, Mathieu Marion et Michel Paquette qui traitent de la rationalité des agents lors de leurs prises de décision et délibérations. (shrink)

Le déficit d’explicabilité des techniques d’apprentissage machine (AM) pose des problèmes opérationnels, juridiques et éthiques. Un des principaux objectifs de notre projet est de fournir des explications éthiques des sorties générées par une application fondée sur de l’AM, considérée comme une boîte noire. La première étape de ce projet, présentée dans cet article, consiste à montrer que la validation de ces boîtes noires diffère épistémologiquement de celle mise en place dans le cadre d’une modélisation mathéma- tique et causale d’un phénomène (...) physique. La différence majeure est qu’une méthode d’AM ne prétend pas représenter une causalité entre les paramètres d’entrées et ceux de sortie. Après avoir proposé une clarification et une adaptation des notions d’inter- prétabilité et d’explicabilité telles qu’on les rencontre dans la littérature déjà abondante sur le sujet, nous montrons dans cet article l’intérêt de mettre en œuvre les distinctions épistémologiques entre les différentes fonctions épistémiques d’un modèle, d’une part, et entre la fonction épistémique et l’usage d’un modèle, d’autre part. Enfin, la dernière partie de cet article présente nos travaux en cours sur l’évaluation d’une explication, qui peut être plus persuasive qu’informative, ce qui peut ainsi causer des problèmes d’ordre éthique. (shrink)

Whole brain failure constitutes the diagnostic criterion for death determination in most clinical settings across the globe. Yet the conceptual foundation for its adoption was slow to emerge, has evoked extensive scientific debate since inception, underwent policy revision, and remains contentious in praxis even today. Complications result from the need to relate a unitary construal of the death event with an adequate account of organismal integration and that of the human organism in particular. Advances in the neuroscience of higher human (...) faculties, such as the self, personal identity, and consciousness, and dynamical philosophy of science accounts, however, are yielding a portrait of higher order global integration shared between body and brain. Such conceptual models of integration challenge a praxis relying exclusively on a neurological criterion for death. (shrink)

This article discusses some difficulties of the theory of color propounded by Meinong in his Re-marks on the Color Solid and the Mixture Law of 1903. First, I argue that Meinong’s geometrical approach faces at least three sets of difficulties related to the following assumptions: colors pos-sess a “nature” that can be grasped through intuition; they are separated from each other by continua in color space; there are an infinite number of a priori relations between colors. Second, I confront the (...) geometrical approach with Wittgenstein’s grammatical approach, contending that the latter escapes these difficulties. (shrink)

Einstein’s theory of Special relativity is founded on an error made by Hendrick Lorentz. It is not necessary to expose the mathematical inconsistencies of special relativity, since the theory collapses by simply exposing the error made by Lorentz. In doing so, it not only causes special relativity to collapse, but also general relativity, and the many theories built upon these two deceptive theories. There are many claims of tests made which supposedly prove SR or GR, such as the eclipse of (...) 1919, the Hafele-Keating experiment, GPS, the orbit of Mercury, and muons. The error of these will also be shown as well as an area of astronomy which has been negatively impacted by SR. The epistemology approach to special relativity: you can know it is a false theory when the theory requires deceiving the student for acceptance and the tests which support the theory can be proven false. (shrink)

During the last thirty years, most linguists and philosophers have assumed that meaning can be represented symbolically and that the mental processing of language involves the manipulation of symbols. Scholars have assembled strong evidence that there must be linguistic representations at several abstract levels--phonological, syntactic, and semantic--and that those representations are related by a describable system of rules. Because meaning is so complex, linguists often posit an equally complex relationship between semantic and other levels of grammar. The Semantics of Syntax (...) is an elegant and powerful analysis of the relationship between syntax and semantics. Noting that meaning is underdetermined by form even in simple cases, Denis Bouchard argues that it is impossible to build knowledge of the world into grammar and still have a describable grammar. He thus proposes simple semantic representations and simple rules to relate linguistic levels. Focusing on a class of French verbs, Bouchard shows how multiple senses can be accounted for by the assumption of a single abstract core meaning along with background information about how objects behave in the world. He demonstrates that this move simplifies the syntax at no cost to the descriptive power of the semantics. In two important final chapters, he examines the consequences of his approach for standard syntactic theories. (shrink)

What are the processes, from conception to adulthood, that enable a single cell to grow into a sentient adult? The processes that occur along the way are so complex that any attempt to understand development necessitates a multi-disciplinary approach, integrating data from cognitive studies, computational work, and neuroimaging - an approach till now seldom taken in the study of child development. Neuroconstructivism is a major new 2 volume publication that seeks to redress this balance, presenting an integrative new framework for (...) considering development. In the first volume, the authors review up-to-to date findings from neurobiology, brain imaging, child development, computer and robotic modelling to consider why children's thinking develops the way it does. They propose a new synthesis of development that is based on 5 key principles found to operate at many levels of descriptions. They use these principles to explain what causes a number of key developmental phenomena, including infants' interacting with objects, early social cognitive interactions, and the causes of dyslexia. The "neuroconstructivist" framework also shows how developmental disorders do not arise from selective damage to the normal cognitive system, but instead arise from developmental processes that operate under atypical constraints. How these principles work is illustrated in several case studies ranging from perceptual to social and reading development. Finally, the authors use neuroimaging, behavioural analyses, computational simulations and robotic models to provide a way of understanding the mechanisms and processes that cause development to occur. (shrink)

Comment penser la métaphysique en protestant? Le parent pauvre de la Réforme et de la modernité méritait qu'on s'y attarde. Pour la première fois, et de manière originale et profonde, Denis Müller, expert reconnu de l'éthique, vient lui donner ses lettres de noblesse. Cette pensée exhumée par le biographe intellectuel de Calvin et de Barth se découvre alors terrestre, proche de la création et de la vie pratique ; elle anime d'un feu nouveau les notions d'existence, de raison et (...) de transcendance. Ce sont elles qui, dans cette nouvelle approche, s'en trouvent explorées, questionnées et revisitées. Avec pour paradoxale pierre angulaire, la tristesse. Quel trésor cache en effet la mélancolie? Convoquant tour à tour les figures de Vincent Van Gogh, d'Arthur Rimbaud, de James Joyce, puisant dans les productions artistiques le ressort de cette métaphysique subversive, cet ouvrage est une invitation à l'introspection pour penser l'expérience universelle de l'existence. Et s'ouvrir à son secret. Un immense traité de vie."--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)