La selección natural ayuda a resolver el misterio de la vida pero no es aplicable para explicar la diversidad cultural. La selección natural es vista, por una parte, como un componente de la imaginación de un mundo industrial cambiante, y, por la otra, como un medio de producir diferencias en el seno de procesos sociales que son claves en la distribución de los genes humanos. La genética es intencionalmente traducida en el mundo social: se subvierte la biología y se la (...) somete a la agencia humana. Tal es una ruptura esencial que enmarca el reservorio genético en el novedoso mundo humano. Los seres humanos deliberan acerca de su condición y, al hacerlo, cooptan la naturaleza. No obstante, esto no es un proceso evidente sino que en sí mismo está infiltrado por los procesos neurológicos, una poderosa razón para mantener una visión dialéctica de la relación entre los genes y los humanos. (shrink)

Abstract: I address the issue of how pretence emerged in evolution by reviewing the (mostly negative) evidence about pretend behaviour in non-human primates, and proposing a model of the type of information processing abilities that humans had to evolve in order to be able to pretend. Non-human primates do not typically pretend: there are just a few examples of potential pretend actions mostly produced by apes. The best, but still rare, examples are produced by so-called 'enculturated' apes (reared by humans) (...) and among them specially those that have been systematically trained to use symbols (so-called 'linguistic' apes). A hypothesis that would explain the lack of pretence in apes is that they lack the mentalistic ability of theory of mind. However, in the last years apes have been demonstrated to possess relatively sophisticated social cognitive skills, some of them ontogenetically appearing in humans alongside with or even after pretend play. As a solution to the paradox, I discuss a model according to which pretence is supported by a mechanism capable of computing intentional relations with non-existing objects or properties (Intentional non-existence), as opposed to mechanisms computing intentional relations with existing, although not necessarily currently perceived, objects (Intentional availability). Apes possess the latter, which allows them to solve a variety of theory of mind tasks, but not the former, which typically prevents them from developing pretence. (shrink)

In 2020, our research collective facilitated a photovoice project titled “Picturing Our Realities: Arts-based Reflections with Central American Youth in Canada,” which brought together young, second-generation, and one-and-a-half-generation (born in another country and moved at a young age) Central American identifying people in Toronto to talk about their experiences growing up as children of immigrants. This photovoice project reveals the ways the civil war and migration process is a haunting presence in the lives of second and 1.5 generation Central American (...) Canadians as they grow up and carve their paths as adults. We can see how unresolved social conflict emerges and shapes family memory, sense of self, understandings of community, and means of engaging in community activism and community work. We argue that this act of remembering and paying homage to previous generations is a means of confronting and resisting past injustices and forming ways of healing from the afterlives of violence. This recognition of the afterlives of mass violence, and the calls of action that this recognition entails, may form a powerful catalyst for community organizing and creating community spaces to respond to historical hauntings and structural violence. (shrink)

This paper reports a longitudinal study on the ontogeny of triadic cooperative interactions in a hand-reared lowland gorilla from 6 months to 36 months of age. Using the behavioural categories developed by Hubley and Trevarthen to characterize the origins of “secondary intersubjectivity” in human babies between 8–12 months of age, I chart the emergence of comparable coordinations of gestures and actions with objects and acts of dyadic communication. The findings show that the categories and concepts of secondary intersubjectivity are applicable (...) to the gorilla, who engages with people in cooperative actions with objects. The ontogeny of triadic interaction in the gorilla was very similar to that described in human infants, but more extended in time and with some peculiarities, such as the absence of pointing and showing gestures, some of whose functions might be taken over by contact gestures which in human infants may appear later in development. The results do not support claims of human uniqueness in the development of cooperative action, but suggest a heterochrony in some aspects of the ontogeny of triadic interactions leading to a divergence between gorilla and human infants within secondary intersubjectivity. Keywords: Triadic communication; secondary intersubjectivity; shared intentionality; cooperation; gorilla. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is making a critical revision of the field of communication –understood as a field of research and reflection– and the way its existence has been tried to be legitimated since the postwar period. Our stance holds that, even though it is possible to find relatively linear and continuous narratives to understand communication, what is regarded here is reaching comprehension of the fragmentation and language games brought together in it. Besides, the core problem does not rely (...) on the consolidation of a linear and scientific epistemological narrative, but on the manner discourse is articulated, giving place to such narratives turning around their political charges and not the supposed scientific value attributed to them. (shrink)

In connection with some known results on uncountable cardinal sequences for superatomic Boolean algebras, we shall describe some open questions for superatomic Boolean algebras concerning singular cardinals.

Though laughter and smiles are a part of our everyday lives, they are not always used appropriately. We need to learn how to laugh, to educate our sense of humor. This book is a meditation on humor in general, the humor we deploy and perceive on a day-to-day basis, and on the ethical dimensions that underpin it. It puts forward a new ethical theory, placing humor at the Archimedean point from which to further our understanding as moral subjects, offering explanations (...) as to our moral conduct and pointing the way towards ethical improvement as both individuals and as a group. After defining what humor is and portraying the current state of play among experts on the subject, the author sets out based on the major contributions made by the great philosophers. Then, taking in such fundamental ethical categories as moral sentiment, virtue, duty, capacity and responsibility, he puts forward his own ethical theory (what he refers to as the ethics of humor), based on both linguistic and biological rational. He unveils a new medical/philosophical method: clinical ethics, capable of interpreting humor as a point where ethics and health intersect. This volume also points out various means by which this ethical theory might be brought to bear on fields such as healthcare, business, education, politics, the mass media and everyday life. Above all, it discovers the role that good humor has to play in health and the instruments used to measure it. Juan Carlos Siurana argues that good humor gives expression to freedom, is universal, and contains within itself the basis of a cross-cultural ethical approach, one that is well worth understanding and teaching. Given that humor crosses over into every dimension of our personal and professional lives, the book is aimed at a broad, multidisciplinary public (philosophers, medical practitioners, nurses, company executives, teachers, politicians, psychologists, journalists, etc.), as well as anyone with an interest in the various registers of humor. He offers both theoretical and practical tools for the ethical improvement of professions, organizations and the public at large. (shrink)

En este trabajo me concentro en el hecho de la argumentación en Karl-Otto Apel, para intentar comprender, según este autor, en qué consiste, por qué es tan importante para la fundamentación de la ética y qué significa argumentar racionalmente. A partir de ahí camino con Apel más allá de Apel mostrando la importancia de incorporar la dimensión del humor para que la argumentación realmente avance hacia la verdad y la justicia. In this paper I concentrate on the fact of arguing (...) in Karl-Otto Apel, to try to understand, according to this author, what it is, why it is so important for the foundation of ethics and what it means to argue rationally. From there I walk with Apel beyond Apel showing the importance of incorporating the dimension of humor so that the argumentation really advances towards truth and justice. (shrink)

Resumen: Una de las nociones más controvertidas dentro de las interpretaciones contemporáneas de la Crítica de la facultad de juzgar, es la de “sentido común”. Junto a éste, Kant propuso un nuevo modelo de validez normativa calificada como “ejemplar”, cuyo planteamiento resulta bastante problemático. El presente artículo propone una lectura y una interpretación de este tipo de validez, a partir de la reactualización realizada por Alessandro Ferrara, y desde el horizonte de la tradición retórica, representada por Aristóteles Con ello se (...) espera un mejor entendimiento del problema en cuestión, y al mismo tiempo, se pretende hacer mucho más comprensibles las posibilidades que Alessandro Ferrara le atribuye a esta forma de la normatividad.: One of the most controversial notions in contemporary interpretations of the Critique of judgment is that of common sense. Along with it, Kant proposed a new model of normative validity called exemplary, whose approach is quite problematic. This article proposes a reading and an interpretation of this type of validity, based on the reinterpretation carried out by Alessandro Ferrara and from the point of view of the rhetorical tradition as represented by Aristotle. It intends to achieve an improved understanding of the problem in question and, at the same time, to make much more understandable the possibilities that Alessandro Ferrara attributes to this form of normativity. (shrink)

La imparable pérdida del poder soberano de los Estados nacionales y el correlativo afloramiento de una constelación postnacional serían dos de las grandes tendencias que, según Habermas, caracterizarían en términos políticos el actual estado de cosas en el mundo. Ante este contexto geopolítico emergente, cuyos lineamientos definitivos aún estarían por definir, Habermas perfila una posible respuesta política en clave democrática: recuperar el proyecto cosmopolita de Kant y avanzar en la juridificación de la esfera internacional. En ese horizonte, compatibilizar la necesidad (...) de una gobernanza global de los asuntos comunes de la humanidad y las exigencias de participación democrática constituye uno de los mayores escollos a salvar. La conformación de una praxis democrática postwestfaliana en concordancia con una estructuración multinivel de las relaciones internacionales podría representar una salida plausible. (shrink)

During the sixties, a most curious symbiosis took hold between Heinz von Foerster then the Director of a top-notch and lavishly funded US laboratory [Biological Computer Laboratory, 1958–1975] and the Chilean neuroscientist Humberto R. Maturana professor at the Universidad de Chile. The chance encounter between them triggered a long-lasting friendship and a fundamental change in our understanding of Systems Science. In particular the contributions of Biology of Cognition and Autopoiesis are important to understand this change and the years 1968–1973 are (...) particularly relevant. In this period, Maturana published, as a Technical Report of BCL, the foundational document The Neurophysiology of Cognition. Later, in 1973, the book De Maquinas y Seres Vivos put forward the notion of Autopoietic Systems. Also, between 1971 and 1973, the Allende government tried to cybernitize the Chilean economy with the SYNCO project. In that project, Maturana and von Foerster played a role by teaching Cybernetics to the engineers and administrators of this technological dream. During this same time, Cybernetics was important in Chile and Professors Maturana and von Foerster although not directly involved in the day-to-day running of SYNCO were important in that unique effort. When a military coup deposed Allende and sent Chile into a tailspin of right-wing retribution, von Foerster, a foreigner who loved Chile and its people, did his outmost to assure the safety of many people involved in this unique Latin American Cybernetics dream. (shrink)

In the Western philosophical tradition, thinkers linked to classical realism have resorted to two images to illustrate the realist conception: that of the object that scientists think exists “outside them” and that of the object that “does not depend on them” because they cannot modify or change it at will. Agazzi has exposed in his work why “inside”, “outside” and “Independence” do not seem to him to be schemes usefully applicable in the discussion of realism. This article presents a brief (...) synthesis of the intellectual career of the Italian philosopher and physicist Evandro Agazzi, explaining the influence of Gustavo Bontadini’s objectualism on his epistemological proposal; subsequently, it develops Agazzi’s response to the dispute between idealism and realism based on concepts such as resistance, referentiality, protocolarity and operationality. Finally, a conclussion is offered by way of closure. (shrink)

Constituye un lugar común en la filosofía de Kant, reducir el papel del cuerpoal aporte que las intuiciones sensibles ofrecen para el conocimiento fenoménico.Otro lugar común lo constituyen las restricciones que para con éstos,se establecen dentro de la filosofía moral. Desde ambos horizontes lasfunciones tanto de la sensibilidad como de la corporalidad, se presentancomo subordinadas, bien al entendimiento teórico, bien a la razón práctica.El propósito de este artículo está destinado a señalar el rol de primer ordenque ambas facultades, poseen para (...) la comprensión del todo de la existenciahumana. Para ello, ciertas consideraciones kantianas ofrecidas en su Antropologíaen sentido pragmático, como en su estética filosófica, resultan reveladorasdel alto valor que ambos fenómenos tienen para su filosofía. (shrink)

El objetivo principal de este artículo es diseñar un método para detectar qué cosas pueden considerarse “evidentes”. Comienza analizando cómo se ha entendido la evidencia en la tradición aristotélica y tomista hasta nuestros días. Después del estudio histórico, en el Capítulo III se procede a realizar un análisis sistemático de la noción de evidencia y sus clases. En este trabajo se descubren diez características que aparecen en las cosas evidentes (en las ideas, en los primeros principios, nociones más básicas, pruebas, (...) etc.). Definidas estas diez características, la forma de diseñar una prueba de evidencia resulta fácil. El Capítulo IV hace esto: primero se diseña un test negativo, que muestra que algún argumento no es evidente, y luego un test positivo, que indica que alguna idea, principio, prueba, etc. parece ser evidente. Terminamos este trabajo con algunas consideraciones sobre cómo este test-dual puede funcionar en la ciencia del derecho. (shrink)

It is analyzed the subject of the metabolization of the knowledge on the part of a rural community from its practical relation with a group of scientists, whose operational base constitutes a located laboratory of marine Biology in the locality of Mehuin in Chile. Product of this relation, and inadv..

Este artículo pretende identificar las metáforas fundantes a partir de las cuales se reorganiza la cosmovisión local y en las que se basan las prácticas de resistencia de las comunidades frente a la intervención modernizante del Estado y del sector privado. El caso a considerar lo constituye la ..

L’épuisement du biographique ? Le titre de cet ouvrage interpelle. Certes, travailler sur des sources biographiques, produire des biographies et penser à partir du biographique pose un certain nombre de questions, théoriques, épistémologiques comme méthodologiques. Faut-il cependant conclure à son épuisement, à une nouvelle éclipse, à la répétition de son histoire mouvementée, faite de soupçons récurrents et de revalorisations répétées ? Cet ouvrage part d’un constat : « le siècle passé sembl..

La posmodernidad es una tendencia emergente a lo largo del siglo XX, un proceso general de la cultura occidental que fue aglutinando síntomas contrapuestos, y que acabó por dominar la escena filosófico-cultural a medida que avanzaba el siglo. En la época de la multiplicación de los discursos y del triunfo universal del mercado, y tras la pérdida posmoderna de los horizontes totalizantes de la civilización, se impone cartografiar de nuevo nuestra comprensión de la realidad. Índice: Prólogo de Miguel Morey.- Introducción.- (...) Notas para una genealogía de la posmodernidad.- De la crítica de la alienación a la fragmentación de la subjetividad.- Últimas tribulaciones (¿la decadencia de la posmodernidad?).- Cronología filosófica del siglo posmoderno.- Bibliografía. (shrink)

This commentary criticizes nonverbal methods of assessing theory-of-mind on the basis of prior training of the critical response because they would encourage simple, nonmentalistic, associative solutions even in subjects with mentalistic capacities. I propose instead a new experimental paradigm based upon the use of spontaneous responses in less artificial situations. This method has already provided positive evidence of some level of ToM understanding in nonhuman primates.

Francisco de Goya y Lucientes (1746–1828) manifeste dans les 82 gravures de la série Les désastres de la guerre, réalisées entre 1810 et 1815, un cri de protestation contre la violence du soulèvement du Dos de Mayo suite à l’invasion des troupes napoléoniennes, la guerre d'indépendance espagnole (1808–1814) et la Restauration bourbonienne qui s'ensuivit en 1814. Mais au lieu de développer une vision héroïque de la guerre Goya y représente la force des oppositions en prise avec la bestialité et brosse (...) un paysage humain qui mêle le sublime et l’horreur mais aussi des harmonies funèbres qui jouent avec les hommes emportés par l’Histoire. (shrink)

En este artículo nos proponemos exponer, a partir de los límites conceptuales encontrados a los planteamientos arqueo-genealógicos de Michel Foucault, la posibilidad de plantear, en dos momentos –arqueo-genealógico y gubernamental–, una “ética de la insubordinación reflexiva”. Es decir, una “ética de la libertad inmanente” al débil que al decir su palabra, denuncia y al denunciar cuestiona al tirano y su mundo al habar y actuar con –y por– los otros. Esta ética de la intersubjetividad planteada como una ética de la (...) insumisión concertada, crítica y deliberada, pensamos, puede derivar de ciertas “condiciones enunciativas” encontradas en las dos últimas investigaciones concernientes al “decir veraz” o el “hablar franco” expuestos en El gobierno de sí y de los otros y El coraje de la verdad. (shrink)

In this paper, we study astral symbols such as wheels, swastikas, triskelions and lunar crescents when they appear in votive offerings dedicated to Celtic divinities in the Western regions of the Roman Empire. From the presence of these symbols in numerous funeral steles and in archaeological contexts related to death in areas of intense Celtic cultural presence, we formulate the hypothesis that the Celtic divinities related to these symbols throughout the Roman West have an astral character and, in addition, a (...) mythological and ritual connection with the funerary world. (shrink)

En 1996 se encendió la mecha de una pequeña revolución en la psicología y filosofía de la cognición social: como reacción crítica a un intento de explicar el desarrollo del conocimiento social en el niño como una integración paulatina de perspectivas de primera y tercera persona (Barresi & Moore), algunos psicólogos propusieron la idea de la perspectiva de segunda persona como enfoque alternativo para entender la cognición social y resolver algunos de sus problemas tradicionales. En esta nota reviso el libro (...) de Pérez y Gomila, una de las más detalladas y mejor desarrolladas exposiciones de las implicaciones interdisciplinares del enfoque de segunda persona, y propongo algunos temas de discusión inspirados por el libro, tales como la inextricable interacción entre las distintas perspectivas personales desde el principio del desarrollo y la dificultad de separar con claridad las propiedades distintivas de la segunda y tercera persona con las conceptualizaciones actuales. (shrink)