Wychodząc od metaforycznego (figuralnego) ujęcia problemu zła, w oparciu o wybrane przemyślenia Leszka Kołakowskiego, rozważania składające się na artykuł zmierzają do namysłu nad „złem w polityce” w sensie niedomagań i nadużyć wolności: pokus władzy autokratycznej i totalitarnej. Dotyczą antropologicznego i politycznego przekraczania granic wolności kosztem (aż do zniesienia) wolności innych. Evil Politics or Trouble with the Devil. Reflections on the Political Demonology of Leszek Kołakowski Proceeding from a metaphorical (figurative) account of the problem of evil, and based on (...) class='Hi'>Leszek Kołakowski’s selected thoughts, this paper’s considerations aim to deliberate on “evil in politics” in the spirit of the shortcomings and excesses of freedom: namely, the lure of autocratic and totalitarian power. At issue is how the bounds of freedom are anthropologically and politically transgressed at the expense (to the point of abolishing) the freedom of others. (shrink)

Leszek Kolakowski delves into some of the most intellectually vigorous questions of our time in this remarkable collection of essays garnished with his characteristic wit. Ten of the essays have never appeared before in English. "Exemplary.

Leszek Kolakowski discusses, in a highly original way, the arguments for and against the existence of God as they have been conducted through the ages. He examines the critiques of religious belief, from the Epicureans through Nietzsche to contemporary anthropological inquiry, the assumptions that underlie them, and the counter-arguments of such apologists as Descartes, Leibniz, and Pascal. His exploration of the philosophy of religion covers the historical discussions of the nature and existence of evil, the importance of the concepts (...) of failure and eternity to the religious impulse, the relationship between skepticism and mysticism, and the place of reason, understanding, and in models of religious thought. He examines why people, throughout known history, have cherished the idea of eternity and existence after death, and why this hope has been dependent on the worship of an eternal reality. He confronts the problems of meaning in religious language. (shrink)

Leszek Kolakowski discusses, in a highly original way, the arguments for and against the existence of God as they have been conducted through the ages. He examines the critiques of religious belief, from the Epicureans through Nietzsche to contemporary anthropological inquiry, the assumptions that underlie them, and the counter-arguments of such apologists as Descartes, Leibniz, and Pascal. His exploration of the philosophy of religion covers the historical discussions of the nature and existence of evil, the importance of the concepts (...) of failure and eternity to the religious impulse, the relationship between skepticism and mysticism, and the place of reason, understanding, and in models of religious thought. He examines why people, throughout known history, have cherished the idea of eternity and existence after death, and why this hope has been dependent on the worship of an eternal reality. He confronts the problems of meaning in religious language. (shrink)

I claim that objective consequentialism faces a problem stemming from the existence in some situations of a plurality of chances relevant to the outcomes of an agent’s acts. I suggest that this phenomenon bears structural resemblance to the well-known Reference Class problem. I outline a few ways in which one could attempt to deal with the issue, suggesting that it is the higher-level chance that should be employed by OC.

ABSTRACT The paper examines between democracy and a utopia of everydayness. The paper refers to the democratic system in Poland through the prism of everyday life and it shows the sources of the rise of populism in the feeling of losing control over our own lives. Therefore, the paper investigates the relationships between everyday life and politics and the complicated connections between everydayness and modernity. The next section is devoted to the emergence of the utopia of everydayness in Herbert Marcuse’s (...) psychoanalytic thought and its appropriation in the student movements of sixties. Finally, the categories of microphysics of emancipation and somapower are introduced and it is shown that these notions can be useful in the construction of the utopia of everydayness which would support the democratic system. (shrink)

First lecture: The end -- Second lecture: The means -- Third lecture: The achievements.

Polish philosopher Leszek Kolakowski is renowned worldwide for wrestling with serious philosophical conundrums with dazzling elegance. In this new book, he turns his characteristic wit to important themes of ordinary life, from the need for freedom to the wheel of fortune, from the nature of God to the ambiguities of betrayal. Extremely lucid and lacking in intellectual pretension, these essays speak in everyday language, spurring the reader’s own thoughts and providing a handle on which to debate and think about (...) the themes. The eighteen essays cover the following topics: power, fame, equality, lying, toleration, travel, virtue, collective responsibility, the wheel of fortune, betrayal, violence, boredom, freedom, luxury, God, respect for nature, superstition, and national stereotypes. (shrink)

Journal of Mathematical Logic, Volume 22, Issue 03, December 2022. We study a new class of NP search problems, those which can be proved total using standard combinatorial reasoning based on approximate counting. Our model for this kind of reasoning is the bounded arithmetic theory [math] of [E. Jeřábek, Approximate counting by hashing in bounded arithmetic, J. Symb. Log. 74(3) (2009) 829–860]. In particular, the Ramsey and weak pigeonhole search problems lie in the new class. We give a purely computational (...) characterization of this class and show that, relative to an oracle, it does not contain the problem CPLS, a strengthening of PLS. As CPLS is provably total in the theory [math], this shows that [math] does not prove every [math] sentence which is provable in bounded arithmetic. This answers the question posed in [S. Buss, L. A. Kołodziejczyk and N. Thapen, Fragments of approximate counting, J. Symb. Log. 79(2) (2014) 496–525] and represents some progress in the program of separating the levels of the bounded arithmetic hierarchy by low-complexity sentences. Our main technical tool is an extension of the “fixing lemma” from [P. Pudlák and N. Thapen, Random resolution refutations, Comput. Complexity, 28(2) (2019) 185–239], a form of switching lemma, which we use to show that a random partial oracle from a certain distribution will, with high probability, determine an entire computation of a [math] oracle machine. The introduction to the paper is intended to make the statements and context of the results accessible to someone unfamiliar with NP search problems or with bounded arithmetic. (shrink)

We show, under the assumption that factoring is hard, that a model of PV exists in which the polynomial hierarchy does not collapse to the linear hierarchy; that a model of S21 exists in which NP is not in the second level of the linear hierarchy; and that a model of S21 exists in which the polynomial hierarchy collapses to the linear hierarchy. Our methods are model-theoretic. We use the assumption about factoring to get a model in which the weak (...) pigeonhole principle fails in a certain way, and then work with this failure to obtain our results. As a corollary of one of the proofs, we also show that in S21 the failure of WPHP (for Σb1 definable relations) implies that the strict version of PH does not collapse to a finite level. (shrink)

We introduce the notion of a Minkowskian Branching Structure ("MBS" for short). Then we prove some results concerning the phenomenon of funny business in its finitary and infinitary variants.

The current heated debate on the deteriorating status of the university raises a range of pertinent questions, including: What role can the humanities play in culture today in the face of the crisis of higher education? To answer this question, the authors begin by problematizing the relationship between culture, the humanities, and education. In the second part of the paper, they examine the changing role of the humanities in conjunction with the understandings of culture, and outline three salient ways in (...) which culture is conceived of today. Subsequently, they focus on the loss of the dominant status that culture suffered when everyday life was discovered in modernity. In the third part, they argue that everyday life, or rather social representations of everyday life and its practices, are currently becoming the chief criterion for assessing culture, the humanities, and education. However, everyday life remains complex both in theoretical conceptualizations and in research observations. For example, everyday life harbors a range of risks and anxieties which are veiled by its own obviousness and reinforced by socialization. The authors conclude that, given this, everyday life in democratic societies calls for the work of understanding, support, affirmation, and criticism, in which the humanities can retain their superior status. In the fourth part, the authors discuss non-consensual democracy, critical community, and the pedagogy of asylum as the forms of organization and action that promote an auspicious interconnection of culture, the humanities, and education. (shrink)

Since its introduction by Hans Reichenbach, many philosophers have claimed to refute the idea – known as the common cause principle – that any surprising correlation between any two factors that do not directly influence one another is due to some common cause. For example, falsity of the principle is frequently inferred from falsifiability of Bell’s inequalities. The author demonstrates, however, that the situation is not so straightforward. There is more than one version of the principle formulated with the use (...) of different variants of Reichenbach-inspired notions; their falsity still remains an open question. The book traces different formulations of the principle and provides proofs of a few pertinent theorems, settling the relevant questions in various probability spaces. In exploring mathematical and philosophical issues surrounding the principle, the book offers both philosophical insight and mathematical rigor. (shrink)

Since its first introduction by Hans Reichenbach, many philosophers have claimed to refute the common cause principle. The situation is not so straightforward, though: validity of the principle remains an open question. The book traces different formulations of the principle, and provides proofs of a few pertinent theorems, settling the relevant questions in various probability spaces. It offers both philosophical insight and mathematical rigor.

The subject of this study considers the role played by the two models in transformation of Polish society: the knightly ethos and the bourgeois ethos. The main research question is whether these patterns are competitive with each other or complementary? Must the chivalric ethos disappear from social consciousness so that a bourgeois ethos can appear in its place, or are these value systems complementary? In the literature on the subject, as well as in common knowledge, one often encounters claims that (...) one can be either a romantic or a pragmatist, and that it is impossible to combine these two attitudes neither in the sphere of ideas nor in action. It is for this reason that the romantic approach derived from the chivalric ethos is now often analyzed within the framework of the so-called critical theory. In other words, it is deconstructed in order to make room for a paradigm that appeals to utilitarianism and constructivism. The thesis of this article is as follows: the romantic chivalric paradigm, despite many differences, is not opposed to the bourgeois paradigm. These approaches serve to realize the same values and virtues, but under different historical conditions and in dissimilar social and civilizational contexts. The text is based on the analysis of the two ethical models presented in sociological literature, in selected literary texts, and in biographies of selected historical figures. The conclusion presents findings of the undertaken analysis. In the author’s opinion, the two ethoses can play positive roles in Poland’s modernization and they are not completely mutually exclusive, as it is the case in some approaches analyzing social transformations that took place in Poland in the 19th and 20th centuries. This conclusion is also valid in the times of change that Poland is facing today. (shrink)

t. 1. Dialektyka.--t. 2. Ontologia i epistemologia.

My Ph.D. dissertation written under the supervision of Prof. Tomasz Placek at the Institute of Philosophy of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. In one of its most basic and informal shapes, the principle of the common cause states that any surprising correlation between two factors which are believed not to directly influence one another is due to their common cause. Here we will be concerned with a version od this idea which possesses a purely probabilistic formulation. It was introduced, in (...) the form of a general principle, by Hans Reichenbach in his posthumously published book "The Direction of Time". The central notion of the principle in Reichenbach's formulation, and of the current essay, is that of screening off: two correlated events are screened off by a third event if conditioning on the third event makes them probabilistically independent. Reichenbach's principle marks also the beginning of a new field of philosophy: namely, that of ``probabilistic causality''. For the most part, the current essay can be seen as an effort at checking how far one can go with the purely statistical notions revolving around Reichenbach's idea of common cause. In short, the answer is ``surprisingly far''; in some classes of probability spaces all correlations between ``interesting'' events possess explanations of such sort. However, this fact lends itself to opposing interpretations; more on that in the conclusion. Chapters 6 and 7 contain mathematical results concerning these issues. The screening-off condition requires an equality of a probabilistic nature to hold; chapter 8 is a short discussion of slightly weakened versions of the condition, which hold if the sides of the above mentioned equality differ to a small degree. In chapter 2, after some mathematical preliminaries, we study the various formulations of the principle which might be said to stem from the original idea of Reichenbach. We also examine a few of the most salient counterarguments, which undermine at least some of the formulations. Chapter 3 is of a formal nature, dealing with various probabilistic notions which can be thought of as generalizations of Reichenbach's concept of common cause. The next chapter concerns the relationship between the idea of common causal explanation and the Bell inequalities. In chapter 5 we briefly present the form of Reichenbach's principle which can be found in the field of representing causal structures by means of directed acyclic graphs. (shrink)

The peculiarity of Marx's investigation method is the use of idealization, i. e. idealizing assumptions are introduced, the laws, being in force under these assumptions, are being established, and then these assumptions are being removed with the simultaneous modification of the law. This method has not been recognized in the contemporary methodology because it assumes the essentialist vision of reality while contemporary methodology developed from the phenomenalism which negates the differentiation between essence and experience.

According to the commonsensical model of educating researchers, young researchers must first acquire the knowledge achieved thus far and then solve new problems by developing applications of the accepted theory. This model, which presupposes a positivist theory of science, is incapable of explaining why the major breakthroughs in science have been carried out by young researchers. On the idealizational view of science, it becomes clear that commonsensical model must be rejected and replaced with an alternative, according to which the primary (...) duty of young researchers is to revise the existing theories. It is the young researchers who are usually creative enough, ignorant enough, and exhibit a sufficient degree of nonconformism, to be capable of developing really new scientific theories. (shrink)

The present paper is intended to take up the basic issue in Marxist epistemology: does the development of human cognition include mechanisms that ensure the attainment of, or approximation to, the absolute truth?But to take up this issue we have to define the concept of absolute truth. This is why the paper begins with comment on the assumptions we adopt. This is followed by explanations of the concept of the absolute truth and that of relative truth and some of derivative (...) concepts, too. Section 3 is concerned with the problem of whether the absolute truth is attainable, and with the role played in the process by the correspondence principle, which is reconstructed in a specified way. (shrink)

We investigate how Dutch Book considerations can be conducted in the context of two classes of nonclassical probability spaces used in philosophy of physics. In particular we show that a recent proposal by B. Feintzeig to find so called “generalized probability spaces” which would not be susceptible to a Dutch Book and would not possess a classical extension is doomed to fail. Noting that the particular notion of a nonclassical probability space used by Feintzeig is not the most common employed (...) in philosophy of physics, and that his usage of the “classical” Dutch Book concept is not appropriate in “nonclassical” contexts, we then argue that if we switch to the more frequently used formalism and use the correct notion of a Dutch Book, then all probability spaces are not susceptible to a Dutch Book. We also settle a hypothesis regarding the existence of classical extensions of a class of generalized probability spaces. (shrink)

Niniejszy artykuł przedstawia poglądy oryginalnego polskiego filozofa z pierwszej połowy XX stulecia – Jana Stachniuka. Wyróżniającymi elementami tej koncepcji z zakresu filozofii społecznej są jego rozważania dotyczące kultury, swoistej,,wspakultury”, historiozofii, roli mitów w społecznym bycie.