RESUMEN El presente artículo trata de mostrar las varias y diversas interpretaciones y posiciones existentes con respecto a la filosofía de Feuerbach, lo cual revela la influencia e importancia de su pensamiento. Así mismo, más allá de los diversos intentos por periodizar la obra de Feuerbach, el artículo trata de mostrar en qué medida es posible afirmar la existencia de un principio interno explicativo de su filosofía, el cual puede encontrarse en el concepto mismo de crítica, referido tanto a su (...) método como a su actitud filosófica. Esta crítica tiene, en cualquier caso, un sentido positivo y trata de reafirmar una concepción plena del ser humano. ABSTRACT This paper tries to show the various and diverse interpretations and positions regarding Feuerbach's philosophy, what reveals the influence and importance of his thought. Likewise, beyond the various efforts to periodize Feuerbach's works, it tries to show how it is possible to affirm the existence of an internal explanatory principle to his philosophy, which can be found in the very concept of critique, referring both to his philosophical method and attitude. This critique has, in any case, a positive sense and tries to reassert a full conception of human beings. (shrink)

This paper deals with the adequacy of the model-theoretic definition of logical consequence. Logical consequence is commonly described as a necessary relation that can be determined by the form of the sentences involved. In this paper, necessity is assumed to be a metaphysical notion, and formality is viewed as a means to avoid dealing with complex metaphysical questions in logical investigations. Logical terms are an essential part of the form of sentences and thus have a crucial role in determining logical (...) consequence. Gila Sher and Stewart Shapiro each propose a formal criterion for logical terms within a model-theoretic framework, based on the idea of invariance under isomorphism. The two criteria are formally equivalent, and thus we have a common ground for evaluating and comparing Sher and Shapiro philosophical justification of their criteria. It is argued that Shapiro's blended approach, by which models represent possible worlds under interpretations of the language, is preferable to Sher’s formal-structural view, according to which models represent formal structures. The advantages and disadvantages of both views’ reliance on isomorphism are discussed. (shrink)

El presente artículo trata de poner de manifiesto, tomando como hilo conductor la polémica Foucault-Derrida, las tensiones que recorren el proceso de la duda en Descartes. En dichas tensiones (entre un orden deductivo y otro demostrativo, así como entre un entendimiento racional y una voluntad razonable) hay un elemento que transita desde la locura hasta la divinidad; dicho elemento opera como un resto que, una y otra vez, reaparece para amenazar todo intento de fundamentación.

Hi everybody! It's a great pleasure for me to be back here at the new, improved Santa Fe Institute in this spectacular location. I guess this is my fourth visit and it's always very stimulating, so I'm always very happy to visit you guys. I'd like to tell you what I've been up to lately. First of all, let me say what algorithmic information theory is good for, before telling you about the new version of it I've got.

This chapter proposes a dynamic relational ontology (DRO) within a critical realist framework and a theory of ontological emergence and downward causation. The proposed DRO does not subscribe to the idea that relations are the sole constituents of reality. Instead, it argues that the existence and identity of every entity must be addressed and explained in terms of three co-relative and interdependent ontological categories: relations, relata, and relational systems. In the second part of this chapter, I will clarify and illustrate (...) the most important epistemological implications of the proposed ontology. Specifically, I will show how ontological emergence and downward-structural causation require the development of interlevel integrative models of explanation, substituting those underpinning traditional reductionist approaches. I will conclude by briefly analyzing a case study specifically related to the domain of the social and human sciences. In particular, I will consider the problem of the emergence of mind and the domain of social relations, with a special focus on the interdisciplinary field called social neuroscience. (shrink)

This essay offers a conception of logic by which logic may be considered to be exceptional among the sciences on the backdrop of a naturalistic outlook. The conception of logic focused on emphasises the traditional role of logic as a methodology for the sciences, which distinguishes it from other sciences that are not methodological. On the proposed conception, the methodological aims of logic drive its definitions and principles, rather than the description of scientific phenomena. The notion of a methodological discipline (...) is explained as a relation between disciplines or practices. Logic serves as a methodological discipline with respect to any theoretical practice, and this generality, as well as logic’s reflexive nature, distinguish it from other methodological disciplines. Finally, the evolution of model theory is taken as a case study, with a focus on its methodological role. Following recent work by John Baldwin and Juliette Kennedy, we look at model theory from its inception in the mid-twentieth century as a foundational endeavour until developments at the end of the century, where the classification of theories has taken centre-stage. (shrink)

Contextualist theories of truth appeal to context to solve the liar paradox: different stages of reasoning occur in different contexts, and so the contradiction is dispelled. The word ‘true’ is relativized by the contextualists to contexts of use. This paper shows that contextualist approaches to the liar are committed to a form of semantic relativism: that the truth value of some sentences depends on the context of assessment, as well as the context of use. In particular, it is shown how (...) Simmons’s and Glanzberg’s contextualist approaches entail relativism. In both cases, the liar sentence gets different semantic evaluations as uttered in a fixed context of use but assessed from different contexts. Shift in context of use alone cannot provide the full explanation of the liar. These contextualist approaches, as originally presented, were thus mischaracterised and they should be re-evaluated according to their full implications. (shrink)

Individual choices are commonly taken to manifest personal preferences. The present study investigated whether social and statistical cues influence young children's inferences about the generalizability of preferences. Preschoolers were exposed to either 1 or 2 demonstrators’ selections of objects. The selected objects constituted 18%, 50%, or 100% of all available objects. We found that children took a single demonstrator's choices as indicative only of his or her personal preference. However, when 2 demonstrators made the same selection, then children inferred that (...) it generalized to other agents of the same kind as the original demonstrator's, but not to agents of a different kind. Lastly, only when both demonstrators blatantly violated random selection (i.e., in the 18% condition) did children generalize the preference even to an agent of a different kind. Thus, from a young age, social and statistical cues inform children's naïve sociology. (shrink)

The information-theoretic point of view proposed by Leibniz in 1686 and developed by algorithmic information theory (AIT) suggests that mathematics and physics are not that different. This will be a first-person account of some doubts and speculations about the nature of mathematics that I have entertained for the past three decades, and which have now been incorporated in a digital philosophy paradigm shift that is sweeping across the sciences.

This paper proposes an integrated-structure notion of interlevel emergence, from a dynamic relational ontological perspective. First, I will argue that only the individualist essentialism of atomistic metaphysics can block the possibility of interlevel emergence. Then I will show that we can make sense of emergence by recognizing the formation of structures of transformative and interdependent causal relations in the generation and development of a particular class of mereological complexes called integrated systems. Finally, I shall argue that even though the emergent (...) structural attributes of such systems are not micro-determined nor micro-reducible, they can still be accounted for by an interlevel integrative neo-mechanistic form of explanation. (shrink)

The global Covid-19 pandemic has resulted in social and economic disruption unprecedented in the modern era. Many countries have introduced severe measures to contain the virus, including travel restrictions, public event bans, non-essential business closures and remote work policies. While digital technologies help governments and organizations to enforce protection measures, such as contact tracing, their rushed deployment and adoption also raises profound concerns about surveillance, privacy and data protection. This article presents two critical cases on digital surveillance technologies implemented during (...) the Covid-19 pandemic and delineates the privacy implications thereof. We explain the contextual nature of privacy trade-offs during a pandemic and explore how regulatory and technical responses are needed to protect privacy in such circumstances. By providing a multi-disciplinary conversation on the value of privacy and data protection during a global pandemic, this article reflects on the implications digital solutions have for the future and raises the question of whether there is a way to have expedited privacy assessments that could anticipate and help mitigate adverse privacy implications these may have on society. (shrink)

From Oedipus to Moses and beyond, Freud's last book has been read with singular obstinacy as addressing a Jewish (or anti-Semitic) question, or as renewing a religious (or antireligious) agenda. Between Athens and Jerusalem, from Judaism to a more general “monotheistic religion,” and from Oedipus (the son) to Moses (the father), scholars have explored or refuted numerous traces the primal murder left and many among the founding fathers, the substitutes to which it gave rise. Yet it is easy to see (...) that the reception of Freud has been fairly consistent in skipping over not so much the general religious (monotheistic, or even civilizational and universal) import of Freud's work, but rather the exorbitant centrality in it of Jesus Christ, the acutely singular question of Christianity and its founder. (shrink)

_Blood_, according to Gil Anidjar, maps the singular history of Christianity. As a category for historical analysis, blood can be seen through its literal and metaphorical uses as determining, sometimes even defining Western culture, politics, and social practices and their wide-ranging incarnations in nationalism, capitalism, and law. Engaging with a variety of sources, Anidjar explores the presence and the absence, the making and unmaking of blood in philosophy and medicine, law and literature, and economic and political thought from ancient Greece (...) to medieval Spain, from the Bible to Shakespeare and Melville. The prevalence of blood in the social, juridical, and political organization of the modern West signals that we do not live in a secular age into which religion could return. Flowing across multiple boundaries, infusing them with violent precepts that we must address, blood undoes the presumed oppositions between religion and politics, economy and theology, and kinship and race. It demonstrates that what we think of as modern is in fact imbued with Christianity. Christianity, Blood fiercely argues, must be reconsidered beyond the boundaries of religion alone. (shrink)

One of the foundational problems of biochemistry concerns the conceptualisation of the relationship between the composition, structure and function of macromolecules like proteins. Part of the recent philosophical literature displays a reductionist bias, that is, the endorsement of a form of microstructuralism mirroring an out-dated biochemical conceptualisation. We shall argue that such microstructuralist approaches are ultimately committed to a potentialist form of micro-predeterminism whereby the macrostructure and function of proteins is accounted for solely in terms of the intrinsic properties and (...) potentialities of the components of the primary structure as if they were self-contained or essentially immutable entities. We shall instead suggest that a conceptualisation of the relationship between proteins’ composition, structure and function consistent with contemporary biochemical practice should account also for the causal role of the cellular, organismal and environmental relations in protein development. The analysis of the folding process we propose suggests that microstructure-laden reductionist approaches are ontologically indefensible. Rather than a potentialist form of micro-predeterminism, our analysis ultimately supports a relational-construction-based view of protein development and potentialities formation, which requires an indispensable analysis of the dynamical interplay between the micro-level of the parts and the macro-level of the relational structures of their systems. (shrink)

This collection of new essays presents cutting-edge research on the semantic conception of logic, the invariance criteria of logicality, grammaticality, and logical truth. Contributors explore the history of the semantic tradition, starting with Tarski, and its historical applications, while central criticisms of the tradition, and especially the use of invariance criteria to explain logicality, are revisited by the original participants in that debate. Other essays discuss more recent criticism of the approach, and researchers from mathematics and linguistics weigh in on (...) the role of the semantic tradition in their disciplines. This book will be invaluable to philosophers and logicians alike. (shrink)

The medical profession is observing a rising number of calls to action considering the threat that climate change poses to global human health. Theory-led bioethical analyses of the scope and weight of physicians’ normative duty towards climate protection and its conflict with individual patient care are currently scarce. This article offers an analysis of the normative issues at stake by using Korsgaard’s neo-Kantian moral account of practical identities. We begin by showing the case of physicians’ duty to climate protection, before (...) we succinctly introduce Korsgaard’s account. We subsequently show how the duty to climate protection can follow from physicians’ identity of being a healthcare professional. We structure conflicts between individual patient care and climate protection, and show how a transformation in physicians’ professional ethos is possible and what mechanisms could be used for doing so. An important limit of our analysis is that we mainly address the level of individual physicians and their practical identities, leaving out important measures to respond to climate change at the mesolevels and macrolevels of healthcare institutions and systems, respectively. (shrink)

Often institutions or individuals are faced with decisions where not all claims can be satisfied. Sometimes, these claims will be of differing strength. In such cases, it must be decided whether or not weaker claims can be aggregated in order to collectively defeat stronger claims. Many are attracted to a view, which this chapter calls Limited Aggregation, where this is sometimes acceptable and sometimes not. A new version of this view, Local Relevance, has recently emerged. This chapter seeks to explore (...) and evaluate this view. In order to do so, the chapter offers a more precise interpretation of this basic approach, calling it ‘Sequential Claims-Matching’. The chapter shows how Sequential Claims-Matching avoids problems that dog other Limited Aggregation views but suffers from difficulties and ambiguities of its own. In particular, the chapter shows that it is hard to accommodate some core Limited Aggregation intuitions around tie-break cases within the Local Relevance view. (shrink)

Physicians frequently encounter situations in which their professional practice is intermingled with moral affordances stemming from other domains of the physician’s lifeworld, such as family and friends, or from general morality pertaining to all humans. This article offers a typology of moral conflicts ‘at the margins of professionalism’ as well as a new theoretical framework for dealing with them. We start out by arguing that established theories of professional ethics do not offer sufficient guidance in situations where professional ethics overlaps (...) with moral duties of other origins. Therefore, we introduce the moral theory developed by Christine M. Korsgaard, that centres around the concept of practical identity. We show how Korsgaard’s account offers a framework for interpreting different types of moral conflicts ‘at the margins of professionalism’ to provide either orientation for solving the conflict or an explanation for the emotional and moral burden involved in moral dilemmas. (shrink)

Entre justification et explication, entre dire et faire, la destruction. Est-ce une chose ou un événement? Un geste, une oeuvre ou une opération? Un thème ou un titre? Est-ce même bien un mot? Qu'appelle-t-on destruction? Avec Heidegger, Derrida en appelle à la destruction. Oui, à la destruction. L'a-t-on entendu? Comme Heidegger (et c'est aussi ce "comme" qu'il s'agira d'examiner ici), Derrida nomme et renomme la destruction. Il lui donne le temps et le nom, une renommée. Il la surnomme "déconstruction", par (...) exemple, ou, plus tard, "mal d'archive". Comme Heidegger, Derrida travaille, traduit et retraduit la destruction, faisant parfois comme si tous ses mots, tous les mots et les phrases qu'il propose et déploie à propos de la destruction, entretenaient des rapports sans rapport, rapports déjà trop clairs, ou encore bien obscurs. Qu'appelle-t-on destruction? Après Heidegger, Derrida s'y est attardé, lui qui parlait, encore et encore, de destination et de destruction, lui qui nous a rappelés si souvent à la destruction qui arrive, partout où elle arrive. Posons que c'était l'un de ses combats, l'une de ses longues guerres (avec lui-même, d'abord, et avec la destruction). Sera-ce finalement la nôtre? Est-il aujourd'hui temps de penser - après Heidegger, avec Derrida -, temps de combattre aussi peut-être, au moins d'écouter, la destruction qui vient? Est-il encore temps de témoigner de la destruction qui croit? (shrink)

As science studies scholars, one of our basic tasks is to draw the boundaries that will de?ne our units of inquiry and constrain the chronological and geographical limits of our studies. Without these boundaries, the categories of our analysis remain imprecise. Fortunately, we now have an extensive toolkit to help us with this task. With paradigms, research programs, epistemic cultures, or styles of reasoning, historians, philosophers, and sociologists of science now have a large set of resources for locating the ?ssures (...) and discontinuities in science. The papers from the focused discussion of this issue of Spontaneous Generations present us with an opportunity to take a step back and examine the ways that science studies scholars are currently drawing boundaries. In reviewing the articles for this discussion, our aim as editors was to re?ect on what boundaries scholars were paying attention to and what use we can make of these boundaries. (shrink)

This article presents, first, the theoretical framework about democratic schools based on a three-year research project “Demoskole: Democracy, Participation and Inclusive education in schools” funded by Spanish Government. Secondly, it analyses some democratic educational practices and, finally, it communicates some implications of what is supposed to improve the democratic quality of schools increasing the participation of pupils.

In this article I address the issue of the ontological conditions of possibility for a naturalistic notion of emergence, trying to determine its fundamental differences from the atomist, vitalist, preformationist and potentialist alternatives. I will argue that a naturalistic notion of ontological emergence can only succeed if we explicitly refuse the atomistic fundamental ontological postulate that asserts that every entity is endowed with a set of absolutely intrinsic properties, being qualitatively immutable through its extrinsic relations. Furthermore, it will be shown (...) that, ironically enough, this metaphysical assumption is implicitly shared by all the above mentioned alternatives to Emergentism. The current article concludes that the notion of organization by itself is not enough, and that ontological emergence can only be justified by assuming a relational ontological perspective that, in opposition both to atomism and holism, defends that the existence-conditions, the identity and the causal behavior of any emergent systemic property can only be conceived, and explained, as constructed by and through specific networks of qualitatively transformative relational processes that occur between the system’s components and between the system and its environment. Additionally, I try to explain how one can make sense of the idea that an emergent phenomenon is both dependent on, and autonomous from, its emergence base. (shrink)

In this paper I discuss a prevailing view by which logical terms determine forms of sentences and arguments and therefore the logical validity of arguments. This view is common to those who hold that there is a principled distinction between logical and nonlogical terms and those holding relativistic accounts. I adopt the Tarskian tradition by which logical validity is determined by form, but reject the centrality of logical terms. I propose an alternative framework for logic where logical terms no longer (...) play a distinctive role. This account employs a new notion of semantic. (shrink)

Some relevant distinctions between the notions of complexity, non-linearity, self-organization and emergence are addressed.

Feelings are conscious mental events that represent body states as they undergo homeostatic regulation. Feelings depend on the interoceptive nervous system (INS), a collection of peripheral and central pathways, nuclei and cortical regions which continuously sense chemical and anatomical changes in the organism. How such humoral and neural signals come to generate conscious mental states has been a major scientific question. The answer proposed here invokes (1) several distinctive and poorly known physiological features of the INS; and (2) a unique (...) interaction between the body (the ‘object’ of interoception) and the central nervous system (which generates the 'subject' of interoception). The atypical traits of the INS and the direct interactions between neural and non‐neural physiological compartments of the organism, neither of which is present in exteroceptive systems, plausibly explain the qualitative and subjective aspects of feelings, thus accounting for their conscious nature. (shrink)