Novelty, the creation of new information, has been the hallmark of Juri M. Lotman’s thought. This issue resurfaces in the discussion of his now famous article “On the semiosphere,” in which Lotman, drawing on Vernadsky, identifies the principles of symmetry, asymmetry, and enantiomorphism as pivotal aspects of the semiotic mechanism of the semiosphere. Specular phenomena and mirror reflections have not only found a prominent place in contemporary semiotic theories of different scholarly traditions – from general semiotics (Eco, Volli) to cognitive (...) semiotics (Sonesson) and to the semiotics of culture (Lotman, Levin) – but they also nail down a key element of the inner mechanism of Lotman’s concept of the semiosphere. By using the analogy of thefacereflecting in amirror, Lotman remarks: “It is also like a face, which, wholly reflected in a mirror, is also reflected in any of its fragments, which, in this form, represents the part and yet remains similar to the whole mirror.” By capitalizing on this excerpt, this study unpacks the significance of Lotman’s idea of specular mechanisms as generators of meaning within the semiosphere. (shrink)

This paper presents a theoretical investigation of the issue of lying from a semiotic perspective and its specific aim is the analysis of the theory of the lie asconceived by Aurelius Augustinus, bishop of Hippo, also known as Augustine or St. Augustine. The latter devoted two short treatises to the issue oflying: De mendacio and Contra mendacium, written in ca. 395 DC and 420 DC, respectively. Th e paper will focus on duplicity and intention to deceive as fundamental and necessary (...) features of the lie. Augustine’s chief contribution to the study of human deception was to have severed the assessment of what is a lie from factual falsity. For Augustine, at the kernel of the notion of lying lies the idea of intentionality. Following this line of thought, the paper singles out two types of intentionality, namely the intention to assert a falsehood and the intention to mislead. On the basis of this double nature of intentionality, the present paper seeks to outline a theoretical framework for the study of species of falsehoods. The outcome is a typology of untruthfulness that envisages a fourfold inventory of falsehoods based on the difference between jokes, errors, lies and pretences. (shrink)

Persons registered to vote in Seattle, Washington for the November, 1986 general election and a September, 1987 primary election were randomly assigned to treatments in two telephoneconducted experiments that sought to increase voter tumout. The experiments applied and extended a "self-prophecy” technique, in which respondents are asked simply to predict whether or not they will perform a target action. In the present studies, voting registrants were asked to predict whether or not they would vote in an election that was less (...) than 48 hours away. This technique, which previously increased turnout in a small study done during the 1984 U.S. Presidential election, was again effective among moderate prior-turnout voters in the second of the present much larger experiments. The failure of the effect in Experiment 1 was plausibly a ceiling effect due to very high turnout for a U.S. Senate contest in the 1986 election. Successful applications of the self· prophecy technique are facilitated by social desirability of the target action (which leads subjects to predict that they will perform it). However, social desirability of the target behavior is not a sufficient condition for the effect, as indicated by an unexpected nonoccurrence of the effect among low prior-tumout voters in Experiment 2. (shrink)

Perceiving and recognizing others via their faces is of pivotal importance. The ability to perceive others in the environment – to discern between friends and foes, selves and others – as well as to detect and seek to predict their possible moves, plans, and intentions, is a set of skills that has proved to be essential in the evolutionary history of humankind. The aim of this study is to explore the subject of face recognition as a semiotic phenomenon. The scope (...) of this inquiry is limited to face perception by the human species. The human face is analysed on the threshold between biological processes and cultural processes. We argue that the recognition of likenesses has a socio-cultural dimension that should not be overlooked. By drawing on Georg Lichtenberg’s remarks on physiognomy, we discuss the critique of the semiotic bias, the association of ideas, and the mechanism of typification involved in face recognition. Face typification is discussed against the background of face recognition and face identification. We take them as three gradients of meaning that map out a network of relationships concerning different cognitive operations that are at stake when dealing with the recognition of faces. (shrink)

O pensamento ético de Levinas, que se volta para o amanhã-agora, porvir, expõe a ideia de que algo (infinito) se infiltra, de modo subversivo, na ordem das palavras e das coisas, indicando a modulação de uma nova subjetividade que diz respeito à concretude da relação com outrem, responsabilidade hiperbólica do para-o-outro.

Mit Beginn des Jahres 2014 erscheinen die Bände der renommierten "Wiener Reihe" ausschließlichim Verlag Walter de Gruyter.Das äußere Layout der Bände wird modernisiert, inhaltlich und personell jedoch wird das Profil der seit mehr als zwei Jahrzehnten erscheinenden Buchreihe von Kontinuität geprägt sein. In den Beiträgen des vorliegenden Bandes wird gefragt nach dem Ort der Künste in der Gesellschaft der Gegenwart. Auf der Suche nach Antworten richtet sich der Blick ins 20. Jh. zurück: Eine sich zu einem autonomen gesellschaftlichen Teilbereich ausdifferenzierende (...) ästhetische Sphäre konnte sich einerseits zu einem selbstreferentiellen, nur eigenen Gesetzen verpflichteten System entwickeln, andererseits konnte sie ihre unter dem Vorzeichen von Autonomie gewonnene Distanz von der Gesellschaft zur Kritik an den bestehenden Verhältnissen, zum Engagement für eine andere Ordnung einsetzen. Die divergierenden Wege von Modernismus und Avantgarde sind im Verlauf des 20. Jh.s von Politik und Ökonomie durchkreuzt worden. Während die Avantgarden des frühen 20. Jh.s durch Verstrickung in totalitäre Politik in Misskredit geraten sind, ist nach der Jahrhundertmitte die abstrakte, hermetische, sperrige Formensprache des Modernismus zum herrschenden Jargon des Marktes geworden. Gegenwärtig findet, nicht zuletzt unter dem Eindruck neuer kommunikationstechnologischer Revolutionen, eine umfassende Ästhetisierung statt, gleichzeitig erlebt gesellschaftskritische, engagierte Kunst einen Boom. Den Fragen, was Kunst jenseits der Illusion ihrer Autonomie von der Gesellschaft in Zukunft sein, welche Stellung sie in der Gesellschaft einnehmen und wie sie diese verändern kann, ist dieses Buch gewidmet. (shrink)

Network analysis views complex systems as networks with well-defined structural properties that account for their complexity. These characteristics, which include scale-free behavior, small worlds and communities, are not to be found in networks such as random graphs and lattices that do not correspond to complex systems. They provide therefore a robust ground for claiming the existence of “complex networks” as a non-trivial subset of networks. The theory of complex networks has thus been successful in making systematically explicit relevant marks of (...) complexity in the form of structural properties, and this success is at the root of its current popularity. Much less systematic has been, on the other hand, the definition of the properties of the building components of complex networks. The obvious assumption is that these components must be nodes and links. Generally, however, the internal structure of nodes is not taken into account, and links are serendipitously identified by the perspective with which one looks at the network to be analyzed. For instance, if the nodes are Web pages that contain information about scientific papers, one point of view will match the relevant links with hyperlinks to similar Web pages, and another with citations of other articles. We intend to contribute here a systematic approach to the identification of the components of a complex network that is based on information theory. The approach hinges on some recent results arising from the convergence between the theory of complex networks and probabilistic techniques for content mining. At its core there is the idea that nodes in a complex network correspond to basic information units from which links are extracted via methods of machine learning. Hence the links themselves are viewed as emergent properties, similarly to the broader structural properties mentioned above. Indeed, beside rounding up the theory, this approach based on learning has clear practical benefits, in that it makes networks emerge from arbitrary information domains. We provide examples and applications in a variety of contexts, starting from an information-theoretic reconstruction of the well-known distinction between “strong links” and “weak links” and then delving into specific applications such as business process management and analysis of policy making. (shrink)

This paper seeks to shed light on an unwritten chapter in the history of Tartu semiotics, that is, to draw a parallel between Juri Lotman and Emile Benvenisteon the status of natural language among other systems of signs. The tenet that language works as a ‘primary modelling system’ represents one of the trademarksof the Tartu-Moscow school. For Lotman, the primacy assigned to natural language in respect to other systems of signs lied in the fact that the former functions as a (...) ‘model’ for the latter thus regarded as ‘secondary modelling systems’. Yet how does language carry out its function of being a model for other sign systems? Is language the only primary modelling system? This paper seeks to foster the abovementioned claim of the primacy of natural language and argues that this issue deserves a closer inspection. In order to follow this route, it suggests a parallel between Lotman and Benveniste arguing that there exist several points in common that lead to a convergence of positions between these two remarkable scholars. The paper explores such a possibility, arguing that Lotman’s and Benveniste’s positions open up an interesting debate with specific reference to the relations laid down between language and other system of signs. (shrink)

C'est un truisme de constater que la déontologie professionnelle des avocats est, depuis une vingtaine d'années environ, en pleine évolution. Il importe de préciser celles des règles qui peuvent légitimement s'adapter aux conceptions du monde moderne et réaffirmer celles qui sont irréductibles car elles constituent la base même de la profession. Me Remo Danovi analyse les diverses facettes de ces changements en mettant bien en lumière ce qui doit demeurer, à travers tout, " la loi d'Antigone ".

This paper aims to explore an overlooked aspect of deep-fake technology, specifically its application as a protective tool for concealing the identities of targeted individuals or whistleblowers. Since its emergence in 2017, deep-fakes have been intertwined with various sociotechnical imaginaries. Traditionally, deep-fake technology has been portrayed as a potential threat to privacy and a weapon for disseminating false information, evident from its definitions which emphasize its deceptive nature and malicious use. Moreover, the origins of deepfakes, such as the creation and (...) online distribution of altered pornographic material with harmful intentions, further reinforce this perception. As a result of blurring the boundaries between reality and fiction, truth and falsehood, these synthetic media forms not only pose a risk of disinformation and deception but also offer unexplored avenues for creative expression. Thus, this study examines deep-fake technology as a form of ‘digital camouflage’ by analyzing its usage in David France’s documentary film _Welcome to Chechnya_ (2020). The argument presented in this paper suggests that this illustration challenges the dominant narrative surrounding deep-fakes and highlights an ethical and potentially positive application of this technology. (shrink)

In Being Another Way, Dustin Klinger recounts the history of how medieval Arabic philosophers in the Islamic East grappled with the logical role of the copula 'to be,' an ambiguity that has bedeviled Western philosophy from Parmenides to the analytic philosophers of today. Working from within a language that has no copula, a group of increasingly independent Arabic philosophers began to critically investigate the semantic role that Aristotle, for many centuries their philosophical authority, invested in the copula as the (...) basis of his logic. Drawing on extensive manuscript research, Klinger breaks through the thicket of unstudied philosophical works to demonstrate the creativity of postclassical Islamic scholarship as it explored the consequences of its intellectual break with the past. Against the still widespread view that intellectual ferment all but disappeared during the period, Klinger shows how these intellectuals over the centuries developed and refined a sophisticated philosophy of language that speaks to core concerns of contemporary linguistics and philosophy. (shrink)

En examinant la métaphore de la « Navigatio vitae », on aborde le rapport, dans l’œuvre de Blumenberg, entre le fond non thématisé et opaque de « l’a-conceptuel », et ce qui est explicite et focalisé, les concepts. Les métaphores – en particulier les métaphores « absolues » – assument, dans ce contexte, le rôle d’orientations de la pensée qui ne peuvent se cristalliser en concepts purs, mais qui guident l’attention dans des confrontations avec la réalité et guident donc non (...) seulement l’imagination, mais la théorie elle-même. Le mythe aussi se situe sur le plan de l’a-conceptuel, mais il a la tâche de faire retrouver aux hommes la familiarité avec le monde. Et il est «toujours au travail », constituant déjà une forme de rationalisation des événements. Une comparaison entre les positions blumenbergiennes de Arbeit am Mythos et celles du Schelling de la Philosophie der Mythologie clôt l’article. (shrink)

Atran's putative module for folk biology is evaluated with respect to evidence from patients showing category-specific impairments for living kinds. Existing neuropsychological evidence provides no support for the primacy of categorization at the generic species level. We outline reasons for this and emphasize that such claims should be tested using inductive reasoning tasks.

In this new book, Florian Klinger gives readers a basic action-theoretical account of the aesthetic. While normal action fulfills a determinate concept, Klinger argues, aesthetic action performs an indeterminacy by suspending the action's conceptual resolution. Taking as examples work by Tino Sehgal, Kara Walker, Mazen Kerbaj, Marina Abramović, Cy Twombly, and Franz Kafka, the book examines indeterminacy in such instances as a walk that is at once leisurely and purposeful, a sound piece that is at once joyous and (...) mournful and mechanical, or, a sculpture that at once draws one in and shuts one out. Because it has irresolution as its point, aesthetic action presents itself as an unsettling of ourselves, our ways, our very sense of who we are. As performers of such action, we don't recognize one another as bearers of a shared human form as we normally would, but find ourselves tasked anew with figuring out what sharing a form would mean. In conversation with philosophers such as Kant, Hegel, Wittgenstein, and Anscombe; political thinkers such as Marx and Lorde; and contemporary interlocutors such as Michael Thompson, Sebastian Rödl, and Thomas Khurana, Klinger's book makes a case for a conception of the human form that systematically includes the aesthetic: an actualization of the form that is indeterminate and nevertheless rational. The book gives the project of Western philosophical aesthetics a long-overdue formulation for our present that aims to do justice to contemporary aesthetic production as it actually exists. It will appeal to those working in philosophy, art, and political thought. (shrink)

The present study investigates and thematizes the interrelation between face masking, concealment, and deceit. It starts from the premise that the significance of disguise and deceit in the history of ideas should be reversed as these methods of the management of human appearance are not only regarded as coercive methods to manipulate and exert power over others but also as tactics skillfully used by the weak in order to outmaneuver those who are in a position of power. The study traces (...) the matrix of simulation and dissimulation as forming the structure of deceit, it reviews some of the main theories of disguise within the field of semiotics, and it singles out two main dimensions of disguise, one geared upon dynamism and the other based on the static features of the face. This study suggests that classifications of masks elaborated in semiotic theory hitherto are useful but insufficient to encompass the full scope of such phenomenon. For this reason, the study provides a new typology of masks. (shrink)

Delusion is an exceptional test case for the principal categories of common sense and philosophical thought such as ‘reason’, ‘truth’ and ‘reality’. Via an engagement with the legacy of Freud and the most remarkable results of 20th-century psychiatry, the author’s aim is to analyse the paradoxical forms of delusion and to shed light on the logics that underlie and orient its specific modalities of temporalization, conceptualization and argumentation.