Les positions philosophiques d'Anthony Collins étaient audacieuses et novatrices, de son rejet de l'idée d'un Dieu doué d'intelligence et de volonté à celui de l'existence d'une âme immatérielle, en passant par sa conception déterministe de la nature et sa vision de l'homme comme machine proche de l'animal, et mue par des pulsions tout aussi hédonistes.

In this paper, I give an analysis of neg-raising inferences as scalar implicatures. The main motivation for this account as opposed to a presupposition-based approach like Gajewski (Linguist Philos 30(3):289–328, 2007) comes from the differences between presuppositions and neg-raising inferences. In response to this issue, Gajewski (2007) argues that neg-raising predicates are soft presuppositional triggers and adopts the account of how their presuppositions arise by Abusch (J Semantics 27(1):1–44, 2010). However, I argue that there is a difference between soft triggers (...) and neg-raising predicates in their behavior in embeddings; a difference that is straightforwardly accounted for in the present approach. Furthermore, by adopting Abusch’s (2010) account of soft triggers, Gajewski (2007) inherits the assumptions of a pragmatic principle of disjunctive closure and of a non-standard interaction between semantics and pragmatics—assumptions that are not needed by the present proposal, which is just based on a regular theory of scalar implicatures. I also show that the arguments that Gajewski (2007) presents in favor of the presuppositional account can be explained also by the scalar implicatures-based approach proposed here. Finally, while the main point of the paper is a comparison with the presuppositional account, I sketch a preliminary comparison with more syntactic approaches to neg-raising. (shrink)

This article discusses the connection between Western socialist parties and technological development during the 1950s. The cases of the British Labour Party (LP), the German Social Democracy (SPD), and the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) let us to examine socialist perspectives in managing technological progress and in conceiving programmes and purposes on scientific research. This choice allows to understand two different aspects: on the one hand, the new pragmatism of socialist and social democratic parties, which was a typical trait of Postwar's (...) socialist revisionism; on the other hand, the predominance assumed by domestic affairs in socialists’ vision, instead international topics. A very specific choice concerns the article's main focus. A large historiographical dispute has started to trace about Postwar Social Democracy's revisionism. Given such historiographical debate, this article firstly explores the behaviour and politics of the LP, the SPD, and the PSI about the the so-called modernization, a process which concerned the entire Postwar Europe. It also discusses programmes or ideas circulations about the 1950s ‘technological revolution’ and the agendas settled by socialist and social democratic parties to govern such global phenomena. (shrink)

libro 1. Il Fedro.--libro 2. L'Ortensio.

While the debate on values in science focuses on normative questions on the level of the individual (e.g. should researchers try to make their work as value free as possible?), comparatively little attention has been paid to the institutional and professional norms that researchers are expected to follow. To address this knowledge gap, we conduct a content analysis of leading national codes of conduct for research integrity of European countries, and structure our analysis around the question: do these documents allow (...) for researchers to be influenced by “non-epistemic” (moral, cultural, commercial, political, etc.) values or do they prohibit such influence in compliance with the value-free ideal (VFI) of science? Our results return a complex picture. On the one hand, codes of conduct consider many non-epistemic values to be a legitimate influence on the decision-making of researchers. On the other, most of these documents include what we call _VFI-like positions_: passages claiming that researchers should be free and independent from any external influence. This shows that while many research integrity documents do not fully endorse the VFI, they do not reject it and continue to be implicitly influenced by it. This results in internal tensions and underdetermined guidance on non-epistemic values that may limit some of the uses of research integrity codes, especially for purposes of ethical self-regulation. While codes of conduct cannot be expected to decide how researchers should act in every instance, we do suggest that they acknowledge the challenges of how to integrate non-epistemic values in research in a more explicit fashion. (shrink)

Even if the “value-free ideal of science” (VFI) were an unattainable goal, one could ask: can it be a useful fiction, one that is beneficial for the research community and society? This question is particularly crucial for scholars and institutions concerned with research integrity (RI), as one cannot offer normative guidance to researchers without making some assumptions about what ideal scientific research looks like. Despite the insofar little interaction between scholars studying RI and those working on values in science, the (...) overlap of topics and interests make collaboration between the two fields promising for understanding research and its ethics. Here, we identify—for the use of RI scholars—the non-epistemic reasons (societal, political, professional) for and against the VFI considered in the literature. All of these are concerned with the beneficial or detrimental consequences that endorsing the VFI would have on society, policy-making, or the scientific community, with some authors appealing to the same principles to argue for opposite positions. Though most of the reviewed articles do not endorse the VFI, it is generally agreed that some constraints have to be put on the use of non-epistemic values. Disagreement on the utility of the VFI lies both on the different epistemic-descriptive positions taken by different authors, and on the scarcity of relevant empirical studies. Engaging critically with the reasons here identified and more in general with the values in science debate will help the RI community decide whether the VFI should be included in future codes of conduct. (shrink)

La riflessione politica di Francesco di Meyronnes (m. 1328) contiene un’elaborazione personale connessa ai concetti di sottomissione (subiectio) e obbedienza (oboedientia), e si inscrive all’interno del pensiero teologico-politico del suo tempo, dove il dibattito sul potere assume forme e direzioni molto diverse. Nei suoi scritti, la concezione politica di Meyronnes è espressa attraverso analogie cosmologiche, naturalistiche e metafisiche, in cui il dato filosofico e quello religioso si riverberano all’interno di un discorso circolare che da Dio va all’uomo e dall’uomo a (...) Dio. L’interrogazione dell’uomo, rivolta al funzionamento di ciò che sta al di sopra, ricerca l’ordine migliore tra i vari tipi di potere. Tra potere spirituale e potere temporale esiste un nesso che muove il secondo termine al primo “sicut ad finem”, e grazie ad esso viene nobilitato. L’obbedienza (oboedientia) di uno all’altro, che implica sottomissione (subiectio) – pur trovando il proprio fondamento implicito nello ius naturale e nella lex divina – non avviene se non per mezzo di un atto volontario. (shrink)

Institutions represent a solid basis to organize and stabilize human life in diferent social contexts. They are external events in the world, but they also have a strong anchorage in the mind and in last years many scholars tried to explore their cognitive ground. Starting from the original attempt of Douglass C. North, who at the end of his career tried to establish a program called “Cognitive Institutionalism”, we discuss the merits and the limits of this approach. First, we show (...) that his statements are cognitively onerous as they imply the notions of mental models and beliefs. Instead, we argue that shared institutions do not require such a convergence and that coordination takes place in the form of social practices and habits. Second, we clarify some aspects of North’s cognitive theory avoiding the ontological reading, i.e. explaining in what sense institutions might depend on the human mind and how people are joined into a practice made possible via institutions. (shrink)

Jacopo Zabarella’s two treatises On Methods and On Regressus (1578) are among the most important Renaissance discussions of how scientific knowledge should be acquired, arranged, and transmitted. They belong to a lively debate about the order in which sciences should be taught and the method to be followed in scientific demonstration that roiled the Late Renaissance world for decades. In these famous works Zabarella rejected the views of Ramists and modern Galenists in favor of the pure doctrine of Aristotle, (...) freed from misunderstandings foisted upon it by medieval interpreters. The influence of these works on Galileo’s scientific method and Descartes’ famous Discourse on Method (1637) has long been debated. They are here translated into English for the first time, along with a new Latin text based on the corrected 1586 edition. -/- Volume 1 contains On Methods, Books I-II. (shrink)

Jacopo Zabarella’s two treatises On Methods and On Regressus (1578) are among the most important Renaissance discussions of how scientific knowledge should be acquired, arranged, and transmitted. They belong to a lively debate about the order in which sciences should be taught and the method to be followed in scientific demonstration that roiled the Late Renaissance world for decades. In these famous works Zabarella rejected the views of Ramists and modern Galenists in favor of the pure doctrine of Aristotle, (...) freed from misunderstandings foisted upon it by medieval interpreters. The influence of these works on Galileo’s scientific method and Descartes’ famous Discourse on Method (1637) has long been debated. They are here translated into English for the first time, along with a new Latin text based on the corrected 1586 edition. Volume 1 contains On Methods, Books I-II. Volume 2 contains On Methods, Books III-IV, and On Regressus. (shrink)

In the last few years, a remarkable convergence of interests and results has emerged between scholars interested in the arts and aesthetics from a variety of perspectives and cognitive scientists studying the mind and brain within the predictive processing (PP) framework. This convergence has so far proven fruitful for both sides: while PP is increasingly adopted as a framework for understanding aesthetic phenomena, the arts and aesthetics, examined under the lens of PP, are starting to be seen as important windows (...) into our mental functioning. The result is a vast and fast-growing research programme that promises to deliver important insights into our aesthetic encounters as well as a wide range of psychological phenomena of general interest. Here, we present this developing research programme, describing its grounds and highlighting its prospects. We start by clarifying how the study of the arts and aesthetics encounters the PP picture of mental functioning (§1). We then go on to outline the prospects of this encounter for the fields involved: philosophy and history of art (§2), psychology of aesthetics and neuroaesthetics (§3) and psychology and neuroscience more generally (§4). The upshot is an ambitious but well-defined framework within which aesthetics and cognitive science can partner up to illuminate crucial aspects of the human mind. -/- This article is part of the theme issue ‘Art, aesthetics and predictive processing: theoretical and empirical perspectives’. -/- . (shrink)

Les technologies numériques facilitent de nombreuses manières nos interactions sociales — communication, échange, délégation, réputation, etc. Quel est l’impact de ces technologies sur les institutions qui sont le support et le cadre de nos vies sociales? Une réponse classique voit ces technologies comme des outils qui renforcent l’initiative individuelle et la possibilité de développer directement des relations en se passant de tiers de confiance. La transition numérique est alors comprise comme désintermédiation. L’article critique cette approche. En ce qui concerne leurs (...) conséquences sociales, les technologies numériques, les technologies numériques devraient elles–mêmes être traitées comme des intermédiaires sociaux spécifiques. Peut–on se fier à ces nouveaux niveaux d’intermédiation sociale? Trois raisons sont identifiées, pour lesquelles, en l’état actuel, ces institutions numériques ne méritent pas notre confiance. Des tentatives actuelles pour bâtir la fiabilité de ces intermédiaires sociaux sont présentées. (shrink)

We propose to develop the problems of selfness, of the tension between the other and the same, and of the singularity, by questioning the philosophies of Kant, Levinas and Stirner, and by reading them trough the theoretical eyes of Jacques Derrida. We will reflect on the irreducibility of the Levinasian other, trying to find out how, to what extent and with what difficulties, the emphasis on singularity can open a dialogical field between, on the one hand, the demand for ethical (...) transcendence required by the encounter with the other, and, on the other hand, the unconditional nature of the moral law in Kantian practical philosophy. After having underlined the limits of the latter, we will compare the non-conceptual and un-graspable character of the other with the radical Stirnerian uniqueness and his need to open the way to what escapes any logocentric chain. The relation between language, singularity and encounter will follow a resumption of Levinasian alterity under a more critical perspective. (shrink)

È possibile delineare due filoni interpretativi sul _Hayy b. Yaqzān_ (_Il vivente, figlio del desto_) di Ibn Tufayl: secondo l’uno, l’opera è uno sguardo realistico su un solitario in una società corrotta e si ispira agli insegnamenti della _Repubblica_ di Platone; secondo l’altro, l’opera ritrae un ideale puro e astratto di vita ascetica e insiste sull’imperativo morale dell’isolamento. Tuttavia entrambe queste interpretazioni precludono qualsiasi possibilità di felicità per l’uomo o per il filosofo all’interno di una società. In altre parole, tendono (...) a interpretare _Hayy b. Yaqzān_ come un tentativo di dimostrare che l’uomo non sia sociale o politico. La perfezione intellettuale e spirituale ricercata attraverso l’isolamento non può, a mio parere, essere separata da uno scopo pratico. L’isolamento del filosofo non viene praticato per distinguersi dalle società imperfette. Al contrario, tale isolamento è intrapreso per condurlo ad una realizzazione più alta e propriamente pratica. Su questa base, sostengo nell’articolo che l’uomo di Ibn Tufayl sia paragonabile allo ζῷον πολιτικόν aristotelico. Attraverso un confronto tra il _Hayy_ di Ibn Tufayl e lo ζῷον πολιτικόν di Aristotele vedremo come Ibn Tufayl si serva dell’_animale sociale/politico_ arabo (_hayawān insī _o _madanī_) di al-Fārābī e lo trasponga dal dominio della città a quello dell’individuo. Analizzando alcuni passaggi chiave, è possibile chiarire come il concetto di ζῷον πολιτικόν sia entrato nella filosofia araba e in particolare nella concezione di uomo di Ibn Tufayl attraverso il virtuoso di al-Fārābī e il solitario di Ibn Bājja. Prevailing academic views on Ibn Tufayl’s _Hayy b. Yaqzān_ (_Living, the Son of Wakeful_) fall into two camps: either the work is a realistic look at an isolated human being amidst a morally bankrupt population and harks back to the teachings of Plato’s _Republic_, or it portrays a pure and abstract ideal of the spiritual life in the footsteps of the natural first man, and insists on the moral imperative of isolation. The difficulty with both interpretations is that they preclude any possibility of happiness for the human person or the philosopher living in a society. In other words, they tend to interpret _Hayy b. Yaqzān_ as an attempt to demonstrate that the human is not essentially social or political. However, the intellectual and spiritual perfection sought through isolation cannot, in my opinion, be separated from a practical purpose. The isolation of the philosopher is not undergone to distinguish himself from imperfect human societies. On the contrary, such isolation is undertaken in order to lead one to a higher, and properly practical accomplishment. On this basis, I argue in this paper that Ibn Tufayl’s man is comparable to the Aristotelian ζῷον πολιτικόν. Through a comparison of Ibn Tufayl’s _Hayy_ and Aristotle’s ζῷον πολιτικόν we shall see how Ibn Tufayl reuses the Arabic _social/political animal_ (_hayawān insī_ or _madanī_) of al-Fārābī and transposes it from the domain of the city to that of the individual. By analysing some key passages, it becomes possible to illustrate how the concept of ζῷον πολιτικόν has entered Arabic philosophy, and particularly in Ibn Tufayl’s conception of man through the lenses of al-Fārābī’s virtuous and Ibn Bājja’s solitary man. (shrink)

Bermúdez identifies the “Interface Problem” as the central problem in the philosophy of psychology: how commonsensical psychological explanations can be integrated with lower-level explanations? In particular, since folk psychology is meant to provide causal explanations on a par with, say, neurobiological explanations, the question of how to understand the relation between the two layers arises naturally. Donald Davidson claimed that the interface problem is actually ill-posed and put forward his version of the “Autonomy Picture”, the view known as anomalous monism. (...) This work reviews Davidson’s proposal in the light of digital universes: we model the key claims of the theory using cellular automata and show that Davidson’s original version of the Autonomy Picture is immune to two arguments against autonomy. (shrink)

This work investigates one of the most widespread yet elusive ideas about our experience of art: the idea that there is something cognitively valuable in engaging with great artworks, or, in other words, that we learn from them. This claim and the age-old controversy that surrounds it are reconsidered in light of the psychological and neuroscientific literature on learning, in one of the first systematic efforts to bridge the gap between philosophical and scientific inquiries on the topic. The work has (...) five chapters. Chapter 1 lays down its conceptual bases: it explains what learning is taken to be in the current philosophical debate and it points out how Bayesian cognitive science (particularly in its predictive processing formulations) might be well-suited to capture the kind of learning involved in our engagement with the arts. The following chapters test this latter hypothesis with respect to particular art forms, namely literature and literary language (Chapter 2), narrative (Chapter 3), and visual art, music and motor activities (Chapter 4). The fine-grained discussions conducted in each of these areas will enable us to see that the relationship between art and learning is indeed fundamental and pervasive. The final chapter (Chapter 5) examines the consequences of this fact for our understanding of the role of art in our epistemic practices, its ultimate usefulness and value, and its place in the interdisciplinary study of the human mind. The upshot is a novel and wide-ranging picture, both philosophically informed and empirically sound, that bypasses many of the problems and dead ends of the current philosophical debate on the topic and captures the deep sense in which art and learning are interrelated. (shrink)

Ibn Bāğğa’s commentary on Aristotle’s On Generation and Corruption (Kitāb al-Kawn wa-l-fasād, Latin De generatione et corruptione) is one of the first commentaries to elaborate on the essential aspect of Aristotle’s text, that is, the analysis of change (μεταβολή, taġayyur). The commentary’s extant parts comprise a consecutive exposition of the contents of Aristotle’s work. However, the commentary may be read more as an introduction or a guide to the topic of generation than as a substitution for the original, as the (...) paraphrases by Averroes seem to have become in the later tradition. The present study provides a new critical edition of the Arabic text and, for the first time, an English translation and a study of the structure of the commentary on the basis of the only two known manuscripts. (shrink)

El presente trabajo se desarrolla a partir de una reconstrucción de los análisis de Roberto Rubio acerca de las dificultades en que incurre la oposición entre enfoque fenomenológico y semiótico, a la hora de aportar posibles soluciones al debate actual en filosofía de la imagen. Después de haber confrontado las perspectivas husserliana y heideggeriana con la teoría derridiana de la escritura, la referencia al arte de Duane Michals permitirá acercar el problema-imagen hacia el pensamiento de la diferencia y del acontecer (...) diferencial, terreno icónico en donde el juego inestable e indefinido de las oposiciones produce toda posibilidad de efecto semántico. (shrink)

This paper will be concerned with the role acquaintance plays in contemporary theories of introspection. Traditionally, the relation of acquaintance has been conceived in analytic epistemology and philosophy of mind as being only epistemically relevant inasmuch as it causes, or enables, or justifies a peculiar kind of propositional knowledge, i.e., knowledge by acquaintance. However, in recent years a novel account of the role of acquaintance in our introspective knowledge has been offered. According to this novel constitutive approach, acquaintance is, in (...) itself, a sui generis—i.e., non-propositional—kind of knowledge. As we will suggest, a stalemate between David Chalmers’ account of direct phenomenal concepts—as a prototypical example of a causal view—and Anna Giustina’s account of primitive introspection—as a prototypical example of a constitutive view—is looming in the current controversy between the two families of theories. Towards the end of the essay, we will point to some possible ways for a constitutive theorist to break the stalemate. (shrink)

Opera logica.--De doctrinae ordine apologia.

Ignorance about political related issues has long been considered a threat to democracy. This paper revolves around the concept of political ignorance, focusing especially on Ilya Somin’s book Democracy and Political Ignorance and going beyond his standpoint in two ways. First of all, it moves away from the notion of factual knowledge by showing that political ignorance cannot be limited to a matter of information quality. On the contrary, it shows that ignorance concerns the formation of opinions about political facts, (...) which are the bricks with which disagreement is built. Then, using the insights of the Moral Foundation Theory by Jonathan Haidt and his colleagues, the paper argues that moral intuitions represent an additional source of bias that current research on the problem of voters’ ignorance should address. While Somin argues that biased moral values are the outcome of ignorance, Moral Foundation Theory suggests that moral intuitions are a robust determinant of people’s political views as they make factual knowledge partially irrelevant and also make people with different moral minds unable to understand the basis of reciprocal factual argumentations. (shrink)

Ce qu’on désigne du nom de « complotisme » mérite d’être considéré comme un symptôme – un symptôme de dynamiques et de désirs profondément ambivalents – bien davantage que comme un ennemi « inédit ». L’anti-conspirationnisme nous semble aussi dangereux et ridicule que ce qu’il dénonce sous la catégorie de « complotistes ». Comment nourrir les conspirations émancipatrices qui se tissent dans l’ombre sans se laisser aveugler par des fantasmes de complot embrasés par les élites réactionnaires et certaines viralités toxiques?

Ignorance about political related issues has long been considered a threat to democracy. This paper revolves around the concept of political ignorance, focusing especially on Ilya Somin’s book Democracy and Political Ignorance and going beyond his standpoint in two ways. First of all, it moves away from the notion of factual knowledge by showing that political ignorance cannot be limited to a matter of information quality. On the contrary, it shows that ignorance concerns the formation of opinions about political facts, (...) which are the bricks with which disagreement is built. Then, using the insights of the Moral Foundation Theory by Jonathan Haidt and his colleagues, the paper argues that moral intuitions represent an additional source of bias that current research on the problem of voters’ ignorance should address. While Somin argues that biased moral values are the outcome of ignorance, Moral Foundation Theory suggests that moral intuitions are a robust determinant of people’s political views as they make factual knowledge partially irrelevant and also make people with different moral minds unable to understand the basis of reciprocal factual argumentations. (shrink)

_Riassunto_: Il dibattito contemporaneo sull’impatto causale degli stati mentali e delle decisioni consce sui fenomeni naturali e sociali fa largo uso di dati ricavati da test neurofisiologici e comportamentali, che esplorano il ruolo di processi cognitivi inconsci e interpretazioni post-hoc caratterizzate da intenzionalità dichiarativa. I dati neuroscientifici sono spesso utilizzati per sostenere una prospettiva fisicalista che privilegia il determinismo neurocognitivo rispetto alle discussioni sul libero arbitrio. Tuttavia, questa impostazione tende a ignorare, almeno parzialmente, il dibattito sui limiti epistemologici e tecnici (...) nella generazione dei dati e i pregiudizi filosofici insiti nelle interpretazioni. Questo lavoro evidenzia tali limiti, proponendo un’analisi filosofica della relazione complessa tra razionalità, esercizio del libero arbitrio e costruzione dell’identità personale. Distinguendo il concetto di scelta autentica da quello di impulso o spinta ad agire, si sostiene una concezione enattiva e fenomenologica dell’azione umana libera, offrendo così un’interpretazione del libero arbitrio che respinge l’eliminativismo come inadeguato. Rifiutando un dualismo semplicistico, il libero arbitrio viene definito come la capacità di una soggettività incarnata, situata ed enattiva di interagire con un ambiente naturale e sociale attraverso compiti che implicano processi stratificati di valutazione e decisione. In conclusione, si argomenta che, sebbene le scienze fisiche e psicologiche possano indagare le basi dell’esecuzione dell’azione, non sono in grado di risolvere né di spiegare l’aspetto più complesso del processo decisionale stratificato ed esteso. Questo riguarda la relazione intenzionale tra la persona, considerata nella sua interezza, e un mondo ricco di valori, che conferisce senso e orientamento alle scelte individuali. Parole chiave: Libertà; Persona; Cervello; Inconscio; Determinismo/Eliminativismo; Thomas Fuchs _Embodied freedom. The role of person in decision-making_ _Abstract_: The contemporary debate on the causal impact of mental states and conscious decisions on natural and social phenomena extensively relies on data derived from neurophysiological and behavioral tests. These tests investigate the role of unconscious cognitive processes and post-hoc interpretations characterized by declarative intentionality. Neuroscientific data are often employed to support a physicalist perspective that prioritizes neurocognitive determinism over discussions of free will. However, this approach tends to partially overlook the epistemological and technical limitations inherent in data generation and the philosophical biases embedded in interpretations. This paper highlights these limitations by proposing a philosophical analysis of the complex relationship between rationality, the exercise of free will, and the construction of personal identity. By distinguishing the concept of genuine choice from that of impulse or urge to act, it advocates for an enactive and phenomenological conception of human free action, offering an interpretation of free will that rejects eliminativism as inadequate. Rejecting a simplistic dualism, free will is defined as the capacity of an embodied, situated, and enactive subjectivity to engage with a natural and social environment through tasks involving layered processes of evaluation and decision-making. In conclusion, it is argued that while physical and psychological sciences may explore the foundations of action execution, they cannot resolve nor explain the more complex aspect of the stratified and extended decision-making process. This aspect concerns the intentional relationship between the person, considered as a whole, and a world rich in values, which gives meaning and direction to individual choices. _Keywords_: Freedom; Person; Brain; Unconscious; Determinism/Eliminativism; Thomas Fuchs. (shrink)

In the present paper we use the theory of exact completions to study categorical properties of small setoids in Martin-Löf type theory and, more generally, of models of the Constructive Elementary Theory of the Category of Sets, in terms of properties of their subcategories of choice objects. Because of these intended applications, we deal with categories that lack equalisers and just have weak ones, but whose objects can be regarded as collections of global elements. In this context, we study the (...) internal logic of the categories involved, and employ this analysis to give a sufficient condition for the local cartesian closure of an exact completion. Finally, we apply this result to show when an exact completion produces a model of CETCS. (shrink)

This contribution analyses the scientific and political meaning of the concept of ‘population’ within Thomas Robert Malthus’ thought. It is here argued that by encapsulating ‘population’ in a scientific principle, the author not only aimed at contrasting radical and revolutionary theories of his time; he was also looking for a renovation of the role principles hold in scientific reasoning. He considered this crucial for delineating a plausible science for such an elusive political object as society. Through an examination of key (...) passages of Malthus’ theoretical production – his critique of previous definitions of ‘population’, his reassessment of the natural history of society, and the use of selected metaphors to explain his political thought – it is possible to observe how the author attempted to naturalize society and the inequalities arising from its historical laws. As shown in the conclusions, Malthus’ scientific and political effort was directed towards questioning possibilities to reduce the history of social relations to a path of rational progress, which is consistent with the way he re-conceptualized ‘population’ as regarding the fate of the people and their chances to transform the future in the plausible outcome of their political action in the present. (shrink)

The paper proposes a novel longitudinal approach to the study of the rhetorical effects of media by combining Audience Research (e.g. Schrøder et al., 2003), Social Semiotics (e.g. Kress and van Leeuwen, 1996, 2001; van Leeuwen, 1999; Machin and Mayr, 2012) and Relevance Theory (Sperber and Wilson, 1995). After introducing a more nuanced model of RT’s contextual effect, the paper reports an empirical case study to explicate the methodological approach. Evidence is provided that a specific text can have a long-lasting (...) effect on an audience: a hierarchy of effects and the cognitive circumstances under which this may happen are discussed. (shrink)