Throughout his different attempts Deligny never ceased outwitting the function of education. He preferred the verb « to permit », an infinitive allowing him to sidestep the majority posture expected from one who knows the model and its failures. By his tracing of maps among other things, he replaces the gaze that sees nothing but sad deficiencies in these others with a gaze that could encounter the force and singularity of different relations to the world. How does this position upset (...) the way that anthropologists address themselves to others and establish the relations between heterogeneous worlds ? To what extent could these experiments among the singular inhabitants of the Cevennes constitute an antidote to the standardization that too often speaks, sees and feels in the anthropologists ? Practical and political questions brought up to date by the phrase « nearby stranger ».. (shrink)

Recent controversies about the level of replicability of behavioral research analyzed using statistical inference have cast interest in developing more efficient techniques for analyzing the results of psychological experiments. Here we claim that complementing the analytical workflow of psychological experiments with Machine Learning-based analysis will both maximize accuracy and minimize replicability issues. As compared to statistical inference, ML analysis of experimental data is model agnostic and primarily focused on prediction rather than inference. We also highlight some potential pitfalls resulting from (...) adoption of Machine Learning based experiment analysis. If not properly used it can lead to over-optimistic accuracy estimates similarly observed using statistical inference. Remedies to such pitfalls are also presented such and building model based on cross validation and the use of ensemble models. ML models are typically regarded as black boxes and we will discuss strategies aimed at rendering more transparent the predictions. (shrink)

This paper draws on the notion of the ‘project,’ as developed in the existential philosophy of Heidegger and Sartre, to articulate an understanding of the existential structure of engagement with virtual worlds. By this philosophical understanding, the individual’s orientation towards a project structures a mechanism of self-determination, meaning that the project is understood essentially as the project to make oneself into a certain kind of being. Drawing on existing research from an existential-philosophical perspective on subjectivity in digital game environments, the (...) notion of a ‘virtual subjectivity’ is proposed to refer to the subjective sense of being-in-the-virtual-world. The paper proposes an understanding of virtual subjectivity as standing in a nested relation to the individual’s subjectivity in the actual world, and argues that it is this relation that allows virtual world experience to gain significance in the light of the individual’s projectual existence. The arguments advanced in this paper pave the way for a comprehensive understanding of the transformative, self-transformative, and therapeutic possibilities and advantages afforded by virtual worlds. (shrink)

The present paper is meant to summarise and enlighten the theoretical implications of the twin theories of text comprehension and of text compression. Compatibility and non-exclusiveness of particle-like analysis of language and wave-like analysis of intentionality are also demonstrated within the newly established quantum linguistics framework. The informative state of language is viewed as being relatively stable; once activated and subject to motion, therefore reaching a communicative state, different phenomena occur, which may be observed, analysed and visualised through CPP-TRS observational (...) devices. Relativity theory may therefore be organised in terms of quanta with continuity and no contradiction. (shrink)

Sigieri di Brabante, maestro di filosofia presso la facoltà delle arti dell'università di Parigi, fu uno dei principali esponenti di quell'"aristotelismo radicale" che costituì uno dei principali obiettivi delle condanne del vescovo Étienne Tempier del 1270 e del 1277. Il De aeternitate mundi è la testimonianza di un corso tenuto da Sigieri nel 1272 sul problema se la specie umana sia stata creata nel tempo. Vengono qui esaminate sia in generale le tesi di Sigieri riguardo ai diversi argomenti affrontati, sia (...) nello specifico il problema della causazione per intermediari. Quest'ultimo tema rimanda non solo alle altre opere in cui Sigieri ha affrontato tali problematiche, ma anche ad una tradizione che trae le sue origini nella filosofia greca classica e si sviluppa nel medioevo latino e arabo. Segue la traduzione del testo di Sigieri, condotta sull'edizione critica curata da Bernardo Carlos Bazán. (shrink)

"The papers within this volume articulate the challenges perceived by an individual or a country when its sense of self is confronted by the foreign, the threatening. Migration, exile, and invasion all challenge the individual or the nation to redefine itself and thereby write and rewrite the concept of personal and national identity. This interdisciplinary collection of papers, published for the first time, provide a stimulating and varied set of insights into the ongoing conversation that maps identity"--P. [4] of cover.

L’articolo cerca di rispondere alla domanda se la scelta di Calcidio di usare la parola silva per indicare la materia e, in particolare, il ricettacolo platonico influenzò le teorie dei filosofi di lingua latina del XII secolo, che tanto dovevano al commento di Calcidio al Timeo. In particolare, vengono analizzati alcuni dei più importanti passi sulla silva tratti dalle opere di Gilberto Porretano e Bernardo Silvestre. Al fine di rendere più chiaro l’esame dei brani, è proposta anche una breve ma (...) completa rassegna dei diversi significati del termine silva e delle parole da essa derivate. Il risultato dell’analisi dei testi è che, sebbene nessuna delle tesi sulla silva di Gilberto e Bernardo sia stata direttamente influenzata dalle connotazioni di questo termine, tali connotazioni hanno probabilmente aiutato questi pensatori a comprendere meglio le affermazioni di Platone e Calcidio sulla natura primordiale. (shrink)

This article seeks to examine Ricœur's reflection on metaphor through an intertextual reading. This reading relates The Rule of Metaphor (1975) with lines of thought developed in a series of lectures held at the Centre de recherches phénoménologiques in Paris, from 1973–1974, on the theme From Language to Image, and an essay which appeared in 1978, “The Metaphorical Process as Cognition, Imagination and Feeling”. This work starts with an analysis of Ricœur's interpretation of the Aristotelian theory of metaphor, a theory (...) which the French philosopher principally develops in The Rule of Metaphor. In the other two papers, Ricœur develops his metaphorology through a dialogue with Kant and he reformulates in linguistic terms the doctrine of productive imagination and transcendental schematism, which become the ontological sphere on which metaphorical and narrative activity are founded. Through the long journey of language, Ricœur's hermeneutics builds a bridge between Aristotle and Kant. This article examines this link to understand and explain further, also at the epistemological level, the relationship between metaphor and narrative. (shrink)

This paper explores the «nature» of street art, highlighting its innovative features, the new socio-political status, and the differences between this emerging art form and dominant trends in contemporary visual art. This examination builds on the premise that artistic phenomena can only be considered from a critical perspective that situates questioning within a historical and specific gaze. Therefore, my aim is not to place this art movement within categorial boundaries, identifying the necessary and eternally true characteristics of street art, but (...) to identify the motives and tendencies that constitute it as a movement that runs against the dominant orientations in contemporary art. Building on this comparative analysis, the construens part of this paper explores the salient features of street art more thoroughly and more extensively, through an examination of the works of certain street artists. (shrink)

Science (episteme) -- Division of the sciences according to aims and objects -- Demonstration (apodeixis) -- The axioms of the sciences -- Being or substance (ousia) -- Being before aristotle -- Being in the categories -- The science of being: first philosophy -- Being in metaphysics zeta -- Nature (physis) -- Principles of change -- The four causes or explanations (aitiai) -- Defense of teleology -- Soul (psyche) -- Soul as substance, form and actuality -- What the student of soul (...) investigates -- Perception -- Thought -- Success (eudaimonia) -- The practical science of ethics -- The chief and final good for human beings -- Virtues of character -- Virtues of intellect. (shrink)

In digital game studies, approaches to the aesthetics of games have primarily focused on games’ narrative or sensory qualities, considered the status of games as em...

Il soggetto empirico indagato dagli psicologi trattiene forti legami con il soggetto puro indagato dai fenomenologi. Ne deriva il paradosso di una differenza che è insieme identità. L’analisi fenomenologica allora potrebbe assumere presupposti naturalistici, esito che Husserl ha decisamente escluso, affermando invece la necessità dell’epoché, della ricerca eidetica e il primato della coscienza intenzionale. Le ricerche che vertono sulla coscienza vedono oggi consumarsi un contrasto tra i sostenitori dell’embodiment, secondo cui le neuroscienze sono in grado di spiegare a sufficienza i (...) fenomeni psichici, e i fenomenologi, i quali, basandosi sul concetto husserliano di hyle, configurano una soggettività sensoriale, ovvero una coscienza legata strettamente all’esperienza sensibile. La ricerca di scientificità nel primo caso giunge attraverso le scienze della complessità alla matematizzazione della psiche, mentre nel secondo caso i fenomenologi si appoggiano ai progressi delle neuroscienze. (shrink)

Positive Psychology has been instrumental in promoting wellbeing science in the modern era. However, there are still ways in which positive psychology interventions and positive education programmes can be improved to achieve more robust and sustained effects. One suggested method is to make wellbeing more salient and tangible through the use of objective tools that assess the relationship between psychological and physiological wellbeing, and enable wellbeing status and change to be seen. With the addition of an interdisciplinary team, as well (...) as technology-enabled and pedagogically sound learning tools and approaches, the potential for positive outcomes and impact increases exponentially. Monitoring wellbeing progress in this way can provide evidence, motivation and belief in positive psychology and wellbeing interventions. This can lead to engaged learning, sustained benefits and systemic impact. Positive psychology needs to strategically extend on the emerging work in this field to help everyone, including policy makers, notice and value wellbeing. (shrink)

In two papers earlier in his career, Siméon Rajaona—one of Madagascar's most famous intellectuals—argues that Westerners have tended to distort the Malagasy worldview by interpolating Western notions into their understanding of it. As a result, the authentic characteristics of the Malagasy mind have been missed by many in the West. He claims that when compared to Westerners, Malagasy have a distinct notion of truth, a different style of reasoning, a different conceptual connection with the world, and a distinct ethical system. (...) His work on this topic is pioneering and insightful. We think that Rajaona is correct on some points but that others are overestimated. In the essay, we explain his work and raise challenges for most of his claims and express agreement with him in parts. While we express skepticism about his claims involving truth, reasoning, and conceptual connection, we agree with him that there is a distinctive Malagasy ethics, though it has analogues in the West. At the end of the paper, we sketch what we take to be distinct elements in the Malagasy worldview relative to Rajaona’s claims. (shrink)

Es mag überraschen, in einer der Religion und Offenbarung gewidmeten Schrift ein einleitendes Kapitel moralischen Inhalts zu finden: Die »Theorie des Willens«, die bedeutendste Erweiterung in der zweiten Auflage der Offenbarungskritik. Die Einschiebung dieses Kapitels macht die Beziehung zwischen Moral und Religion noch deutlicher, wodurch sich Fichte auf eine charakteristische Tendenz der deutschen Aufklärung bezieht. Ein erster Grund dieser fichteschen Stellungnahme liegt in der geistigen Bildung des jungen Gelehrten, der zur moralischen Thematik und zur Begeisterung für Kants moralisches System aus (...) einem ursprünglichen theologischen und religiösen Interesse heraus kommt: In den unmittelbar der Offenbarungskritik vorangehenden Jahren ist dieses Interesse besonders dem Problem der Gnade und der menschlichen Freiheit gewidmet. Ich beschränke mich auf die drei wichtigsten Schriften der jugendlichen fichteschen Periode, oder besser der sogenannten »vorkantischen« Periode, die Predigten An Mariä Verkündigung und Ueber die Absichten des Todes Jesu und das Fragment Einige Aphorismen über Religion und Deismus ; in all diesen Schriften ist die Annahme der sich auf den Menschen auswirkenden Gnade Gottes, die ihm Versöhnungs- und fortschreitende Annäherungsgelegenheiten zur moralischen Vollkommenheit gibt, der Bedingung unterworfen, daß der Mensch von seiner moralischen Verantwortlichkeit nicht abgehalten wird, daß er sich sozusagen nicht einer untätigen Erwartung des göttlichen Gefallens überläßt. Er soll dagegen, je nach der Wohltat, die er von Gott bekommen hat, das Bessere anstreben, und das ist auch das Kriterium, wonach Gott ihn beurteilen wird. Dieses aktive Bemühen um die eigene Rettung kann aber nur aus der Beachtung und aus dem Gehorsam gegenüber der Stimme des eigenen Gewissens, und nicht aus der Ausübung einer nur formalen Gerechtigkeit oder aus der Befolgung besonderer Kultusformen hervorgehen. Wie Fichte mit ausdrücklichem Bezug auf Paulus behauptet, wird man vor Gott nicht durch Werke gerechtfertigt, sondern durch die Ausübung eines Glaubens, der in seiner vollkommensten Form von der christlichen Religion vertreten wird und vor allem ein und dasselbe mit einer »Verfassung der Seele« ist; das führt zu jener »genauen Beobachtung unsrer eignen Seele«, die uns erlaubt, die von Gott in unsere Seele gebrachten Veranlassungen zur moralischen Besserung mit Klarheit zu erfassen. Die wahre Religion hat die Rolle, die Sinnlichkeit auszurotten und die »sanften Neigungen des Menschen, Güte, Sanftmuth, Gefälligkeit« zu erwecken: Fichte spricht von einer »Religion des Herzens«, aus dessen Güte und Wohlwollen eine »warme, lebendige Überzeugung« kommt, die auf ein inneres »Gefühl des Guten« gegründet ist und die religiöse Wahrheiten zur moralischen Triebfeder macht. In den kurz nach der Lektüre der ersten Kritik Kants geschriebenen Aphorismen ist das Gleichgewicht zwischen intellektuellen und sinnlichen Bestandteilen durch den von Fichte hervorgehobenen Widerspruch zwischen dem Gesichtspunkt des Herzens und den Forderungen der Spekulation in Frage gestellt: In der Spekulation würde man verlangen, eine rein vernünftige Erklärung des Glaubens zu geben, dessen innigste Natur aber, als der Bestrebung zu einem vertrauten und persönlichen zuerst auf die Empfindung gegründeten Verhältnis zu Gott einer solchen Beanspruchung eben nicht gerecht werden kann. Nur der von Kant herausgestellte Unterschied zwischen praktischer und spekulativer Vernunft wird Fichte die Mittel für die Überwindung dieses Widerspruchs geben, und damit auch die Möglichkeit, die Harmonie zwischen Philosophie und Religion wieder zu bestätigen: In einer bemerkenswerten Stelle der Aphorismen sieht Fichte nämlich eine völlige Übereinstimmung zwischen der kantischen Kritik und den Grundsätzen der Apostel über die Grenze der menschlichen Vernunft in den Untersuchungen der Glaubensdinge. (shrink)

Reflection on the natural/artificial, real/imaginary, subjective/objective dicotomies is increasingly the subject of debate on systems of communication, which make more and more widespread use of expert and/or intelligent advanced technologies.This paper analyses different forms of communication operating in a socio-technical system. The analysis is concerned with changes in creativity and participation of the human being in the decision and production processes within various contexts of social life. It is thus important to verify the possibility of an interpolation between vital world, (...) social system, and information technologies in order to understand a possible interrelation between therational and therelational components in the presentsocio-technical system. (shrink)

The question of the mimesis metaphorike in Aristotle is developed, in the interpretative perspective of this work, through an itinerary that defines it in relation to poetical thought, ontology and in its gnoseological and epistemological aspects. The pages that the philosopher has explicitly dedicated to the metaphor might be considered as examples in a sort of reflection-guide to understand the link existing, according to Aristotle, between language, thought and being. At the same time they offer a fundamental theoretical element to (...) proceed in the search for that unity by analogy that has occupied a great part of the Aristotelian interpretative tradition. The hermeneutical perspective of this work represents a critical position in relation to the most common interpretations of the theory of the metaphor in Aristotle (that explain it in linguistic-semiotic terms) and tries to retrieve and bring to light the metaphysical horizon and the “referentialist” vocation that mark the reflection of the Greek philosopher. Yet, notwithstanding this background, Aristotle’s reflection manages to generate a realism that is not quashed in the opposition object-subject, inner world-outside world, but that is able, even today, to offer fundamental parameters to think of the relationship between language, world and thought in terms that are not any longer those of a world defined through a totalising linguistic dimension. In this sense, the Aristotelian doctrine of the metaphor constitutes today a fundamental theoretical paradigm to think deep and critically the kind of relation that might exist between arts and truth and, also, between language and world. (shrink)

This book explores what it means to exist in virtual worlds. Chiefly drawing on the philosophical traditions of existentialism, it articulates the idea that — by means of our technical equipment and coordinated practices — human beings disclose contexts or worlds in which they can perceive, feel, act, and think. More specifically, this book discusses how virtual worlds allow human beings to take new perspectives on their values and beliefs, and explore previously unexperienced ways of being. Virtual Existentialism will be (...) useful for scholars working in the fields of philosophy, anthropology, media studies, and digital game studies. (shrink)