L’arte contemporanea è caleidoscopica: può catapultarci in ambienti complessi o minimali richiedendo la nostra attiva partecipazione, ancorarsi a luoghi particolari, porci di fronte a opere apparentemente indistinguibili da oggetti ed eventi della vita quotidiana, appropriarsi illegalmente degli spazi pubblici, e così via. Questo volume muove dalla premessa che uno dei compiti della filosofia dell’arte sia prestare attenzione a specifiche pratiche artistiche e a teorie sull’arte avanzate in altri ambiti di ricerca, per poi organizzare in maniera perspicua la molteplicità dei dati (...) raccolti. I filosofi possono così costruire teorie quanto più generali possibile per cercare di spiegare ciò che emerge da tali dati. Le ricerche qui presentate si concentrano su alcuni fenomeni, accuratamente scelti nell’ampio panorama dell’arte contemporanea: l’installation art e i suoi rapporti con l’installazione espositiva, l’arte sito-specifica e la sua appartenenza alla più ampia tradizione dell’arte situata, il ruolo delle idee nell’arte concettuale e il carattere sovversivo della street art. Sfruttando l’efficacia esplicativa del concetto di medium artistico, nonché della individuazione di forme e generi d’arte, le analisi qui presentate indagano le ragioni per cui in queste pratiche artistiche sono centrali l’esperienza dello spazio, l’interazione fra opere e pubblico, i luoghi d’installazione delle opere e gli oggetti come portatori di significati. (shrink)

The European Union and the International Criminal Court are two of the most original and interesting elements of the contemporary international situation. Both of them are the result of a delicate balance between ethical issues and political interests and, consequently, institute a complex relationship with states' sovereignty. Their common ground of values has brought the European Union to sustain the International Criminal Court since its preparatory works. Through the analysis of the most significant documents and the ways of the cooperation (...) between these two organisms, this essay focuses on the problems that face the international justice and the possible means of its affirmation. It seems to be drawn a new aspect of international relations, far from the traditional power politics and underpinned by the consent that international organisms can gain among the public opinion through their policy consistence with justice and peace values. (shrink)

Empathy has become a common point of debate in moral psychology. Recent developments in psychiatry, neurosciences and social psychology have led to the revival of sentimentalism, and the ‘empathy thesis’ has suggested that affective empathy, in particular, is a necessary criterion of moral agency. The case of psychopaths – individuals incapable of affective empathy and moral agency, yet capable of rationality – has been utilised in support of this case. Critics, however, have been vocal. They have asserted that the case (...) of autism proves the empathy thesis wrong; that psychopathy centres on rational rather than empathic limitations; that empathy is not relevant to many common normative behaviours; and that rationality is required when empathy fails. The present paper analyses these four criticisms. It will be claimed that they each face severe difficulties, and that moral agency ought to be approached via a multi-tier model, with affective empathy as a baseline. (shrink)

It is now a commonplace that emotions are not mere sensations but, rather, conceptually contentful states. In trying to expand on this insight, however, most theoretical approaches to emotions neglect central intuitions about what emotions are like. We therefore need a methodological shift in our thinking about emotions away from the standard accounts' attempts to reduce them to other mental states and toward an exploration of the distinctive work emotions do. I show that emotions' distinctive function is to engage us (...) with both objective and personal values. Attention to emotions' work reveals that it is precisely their “unruliness” that allows them to play meaningful roles in our lives. (shrink)

To date, 1.7 million US military service personnel have been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. Of those, one in five are suffering from diagnosable combat-stress related psychological injuries including Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). All indications are that the mental health toll of the current conflicts on US troops and the medical systems that care for them will only increase. Against this backdrop, research suggesting that the common class of drugs known as beta-blockers might prevent the onset of PTSD is drawing (...) much interest. I urge caution against accepting too quickly the use of beta-blockers for dealing with the psychological injuries that combat experiences can wreak. Beta-blockers are thought to work by disrupting the formation of emotionally disturbing memories that typically occur in the wake of traumatic events and that in some people manifest as PTSD. Focusing on a single dimension of soldiers' experience in combat, namely, their perpetration of other-directed violence, I argue that some of the emotional memories blunted by beta-blockers play important roles in the recovery of moral aspects of soldiers' selves damaged by experiences of combat violence — specifically, in the achievement of a state of grace— and, therefore, that the use of beta-blockers may come with distinct moral costs. (shrink)

Contemporary literature includes a wide variety of definitions of empathy. At the same time, the revival of sentimentalism has proposed that empathy serves as a necessary criterion of moral agency. The paper explores four common definitions in order to map out which of them best serves such agency. Historical figures are used as the backdrop against which contemporary literature is analysed. David Hume’s philosophy is linked to contemporary notions of affective and cognitive empathy, Adam Smith’s philosophy to projective empathy, and (...) Max Scheler’s account to embodied empathy. Whereas cognitive and projective empathy suffer from detachment and atomism, thereby providing poor support for the type of other-directedness and openness entailed by moral agency, embodied and affective empathy intrinsically facilitate these factors, and hence are viewed as fruitful candidates. However, the theory of affective empathy struggles to explain why the experience of empathy includes more than pure affective mimicry, whilst embodied empathy fails to take into account forms of empathy that do not include contextual, narrative information. In order to navigate through these difficulties, Edith Stein’s take on non-primordial experience is used as a base upon which a definition of affective empathy, inclusive of an embodied dimension, and founded on a movement between resonation and response, is sketched. It is argued that, of the four candidates, this new definition best facilitates moral agency. (shrink)

The climate crisis is an enormous challenge for contemporary societies. Yet, public discussions on it often lead to anger, mocking, denial and other defensive behaviours, one prominent example of which is the reception met by the climate advocate Greta Thunberg. The paper approaches this curious phenomenon via shame. It argues that the very idea of anthropogenic climate change invites feelings of human failure and thereby may also entice shame. The notion of “climate shame” is introduced and distinguished from “climate guilt”. (...) Whereas climate guilt prioritises the flourishing of the environment and is focused on actions and morality, climate shame is concerned with human identity and selfhood. The paper then explores whether shame is a morally destructive or constructive emotion. Making use of both psychological and philosophical literature on shame, it argues that although shame faces many challenges that question its usefulness in moral pedagogy, these challenges can be met with “moral maturity”—moreover, following a utilitarian approach, the overall benefits of climate shame can justify its costs to individuals. My argument is that climate shame holds the potential of being a highly effective moral psychological method of persuasion, capable of inviting wholesale critical reflection on current, environmentally damaging practices and cultivation of more virtuous ways of co-existing with the rest of the natural world and other species. (shrink)

Focussing on some claims by Richard Wollheim and Clement Greenberg, I investigate how the concepts of depicted figure, background of a pictorial scene and ground of a picture are relevant for an understanding of the relation between figurative and abstract pictures, especially when it comes to considering whether abstract pictures can be said to represent pictorially.

As a technique of social control based on the collection of information, surveillance has been a central instrument of any administrative power since the modern era. Surveillance, however, can be carried out in different ways and these can provide important information on the basic features of a particular political system. Indeed, the introduction of surveillance measures has an impact on key relationships of a political system, such as liberty and security, autonomy and authority. When a political system is, like the (...) European Union (EU), in a dynamic and build-up phase, by analysing its surveillance practices one can even discern the trajectories of its developments. The paper analyses two surveillance measures in the EU: the Schengen Information System (SIS) and the Directive 2006/24/EC on data retention. It puts forth the argument that the reference to security as a value enables the EU to compensate its legitimacy deficiencies and to develop into a power system characterised by a more supranational structure than before. (shrink)

The critical examination of current hypotheses is one of the key ways in which scientific fields develop and grow. Therefore, any critique, including Haidle and Schlaudt’s article, “Where Does Cumulative Culture Begin? A Plea for a Sociologically Informed Perspective,” represents a welcome addition to the literature. However, critiques must also be evaluated. In their article, Haidle and Schlaudt review some approaches to culture and cumulative culture in both human and nonhuman primates. H&S discuss the “zone of latent solutions” hypothesis as (...) applied to nonhuman primates and stone-toolmaking premodern hominins. Here, we will evaluate whether H&S’s critique addresses its target. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence (AI) and molecular biotechnologies (MB) are among the most promising, but also ethically hotly debated emerging technologies. In both fields, several ethics reports, which invoke lists of ethics principles, have been put forward. These reports and the principles lists are technology specific. This article aims to contribute to the ongoing debate on ethics of emerging technologies by comparatively analysing four European ethics reports from the two technology fields. Adopting a qualitative and in-depth approach, the article highlights how ethics (...) principles from MB can inform AI ethics and vice versa. By synthesizing the respective ethical cores of the principles included in the analysed reports, the article derives, moreover, a unified list of principles for assessing emerging technologies. The suggested list consists of nine principles: autonomy; individual and social well-being and prevention of harm; reliability, safety and security; informational privacy; transparency; accountability; communication, participation and democracy; justice, fairness, and non-discrimination; sustainability. (shrink)

The re-use of publicly available (personal) data for originally unanticipated purposes has become common practice. Without such secondary uses, the development of many AI systems like large language models (LLMs) and ChatGPT would not even have been possible. This chapter addresses the ethical implications of such secondary processing, with a particular focus on data protection and privacy issues. Legal and ethical evaluations of secondary processing of publicly available personal data diverge considerably both among scholars and the general public. While some (...) of these uses are met with opposition and criticism, others are quite unanimously viewed as unproblematic. Often, proponents and opponents of such practices invoke the same ethical and legal standards for their opposite conclusions. This state of affairs shows that other considerations besides the public availability of data must play a role. It calls for a theoretical clarification of the additional criteria that should guide decisions about the (legally informed) ethical acceptability of re-processing practices. In order to make a contribution towards this goal, the present chapter maps the ongoing debate and systematises the existing contributions around three lines of argument: a consent-centred position, an approach that focuses on the distinction between data and information, and finally a line of argument that focuses on the contextual norms that govern the flows of information. The chapter further relates these arguments to three underlying conceptions of privacy and data protection: rights-based, structural and contextual, and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of each position in the light of concrete examples. It concludes by arguing for a mixed approach that combines core elements of the structural and contextual approaches. The chapter aims to contribute to existing research in the fields of data, AI and research ethics, and to reconnect the debate with ethical and legal scholarship on privacy and data protection. In doing so, it aims to make a theoretical contribution towards refining existing conceptions of privacy and data protection in order to make them more fit to ‘drive our digital world’ as far as the use of publicly available data is concerned. (shrink)

The present Festschrift was born as a tribute to the scientific production of Rémi Brague. This study collects the interventions of several thinkers, with different scientific profiles, who, fond of reality, have reflected on, and been in dialogue with his thought. Brague has explored many spheres: anthropology, metaphysics, religion, history of religions, aesthetics, ethics, politics, and cosmology – where he recalled those anchors in the sky where mankind throws its roots. We have decided to entitle this collection Europa cura te (...) ipsam! inspired by on the admonition of the famous Medice cura te ipsum. As Brague has repeatedly obser- ved, and recently with no little pessimism, it is now up to Europeans to recover their history and look to their future. We hope that the present work can be a stimulus for today’s thinkers and for generations to come, certain that the search for truth is an endless inquiry where harmony and cooperation among thinkers constitute progress. -/- Contributors: Leonardo Allodi, Rafael Alvira, Jean Baechler, Damiano Bondi, Thomas Buchheim, Virgil Ciomos, Rocio Daga Portillo, Marco Damonte, Chantal Delsol, Phil Devine, Thérèse-Anne Druart, Travis Dumsday, David C. Flatto, Michal Gierycz, Elisa Grimi, John F. X. Knasas, Hans Maier, Sante Maletta, Fr Antonio Malo, Fr Giulio Maspero, Ilaria Vigorelli, Fr Piotr Mazurkiewicz, Isabelle Moulin, José Ignacio Gómez Murillo, Maurits Potappel, John M. Rist, H. Em. Card. Angelo Scola, Hans Seitschek, Wilhelm Vossenkuhl. (shrink)

I defend Hume's account of tragic pleasure against various objections. I examine his account of the emotions in order to clarify his "conversion theory". I also argue that Hume does not give us a theory of tragedy as an aesthetic genre, but rather elucidates the felt experience of a particular work of tragedy. I offer a partial reading of King Lear by way of illustration. Finally, I suggest that the experiences of aesthetic pleasure, and aesthetic sadness, share certain qualities. "Tragic (...) pleasure" is possible, in part, because the pity of tragedy is realised through the pleasure of the aesthetic. (shrink)

'It is ... exactly because Hecuba is nothing to us that her sorrows are so suitable a motive for a tragedy.' Oscar Wilde Much of the contemporary debate concerning the nature and role of fictive emotions has argued that we do feel garden-variety emotions for fictional characters; the puzzle has been to account for this, given our knowledge of their fictional status. In this paper I argue that many of the emotional responses we have towards fictional characters are nothing like (...) the emotions we feel in ordinary life. The implications for our engagement with literary fictions are subsequently examined. S. Afr. J. Philos. Vol.22(3) 2003: 267–275. (shrink)

Esej poskuša izslediti pravni, reprezentativni in družbeni status migrantskih Drugih v ≫zaprti družbi≪ Nemške demokratične republike ali Vzhodne Nemčije (NDR) kot primer, kako je Nemčija imela dobiček od delovnih migracij na obeh straneh zidu. Opisuje, kako so bile od ponovne združitve Nemčije do danes migracije predstavljene kot nenadna in začasna težava, kar zakriva kolonialno in rasistično preteklost ter nekropolitično sedanjost. Esej preučuje proces družbene dediferenciacije v družbi, ki jo obvladuje država NDR, in kako so družbene tehnike ustvarjanja drugosti in etnizacije (...) v obliki zakonov za tujce spodbujale diskriminacijo in rasizem proti ≫tujcu≪ (Simmel), zlasti gastarbajterem. Ob pogledu na proces ≫dvojne transformacije≪ po padcu berlinskega zidu in poznejši ponovni združitvi esej preučuje, kako so prekrivajoči se procesi ustvarjanja drugosti kot sodobnega ekvivalenta izraza ≫orientalizem≪ (Edward Said) oblikovali in še naprej oblikujejo ponovno združeno Nemčijo. (shrink)

Le politiche di sicurezza hanno assunto nel corso degli ultimi decenni un ruolo centrale all’interno dell’Unione Europea (UE) e ne costituiscono attualmente uno dei settori più controversi. Nel porsi come attore in grado di garantire sicurezza, l’Unione assume da un lato sempre più compiti e funzioni che sin dall’inizio dell’età moderna sono stati prerogativa del potere statale, senza poter direttamente avvalersi, dall’altro lato, dei principi di legittimazione propri dello Stato. Gli sviluppi recenti delle politiche di sicurezza UE, inoltre, sono fortemente (...) condizionati dai processi di digitalizzazione. Questi favoriscono l’emergere di nuovi modi di intenderle, caratterizzati da un approccio “preemptivo”. Questo denota un modo di affrontare la criminalità che si concentra sugli effetti piuttosto che sulle cause e, attraverso la formulazione di prognosi, mira a intervenire prima che determinati avvenimenti si manifestino al fine di evitarli. Il libro esplora questi sviluppi e discute se, alla luce di essi, i principi fondamentali di legittimità dell’UE siano in grado di esercitare effettivamente la propria funzione di limitazione del potere e tutela dei diritti fondamentali. Attraverso analisi di pratiche concrete quali l’utilizzo e il potenziamento di grosse banche dati, tra cui il sistema di informazione Schengen (SIS), l’analisi dei codici di prenotazione recentemente introdotti dalla Direttiva PNR e l’incremento dell’interoperabilità tra le banche dati europee, il volume mette in atto un approccio filosofico “critico-realistico”, che si ancora nella realtà ma non rinuncia alla normatività e all’elaborazione di proposte alternative. Nel far ciò, le ricerche qui esposte intendono offrire un contributo agli ambiti disciplinari della filosofia politica e della filosofia del diritto, e, più specificamente, dei Security Studies e degli European Studies. (shrink)