Esse artigo pretende explorar a narrativa de Agostinho acerca de sua adesão ao pensamento gnóstico-maniqueu, livro III das suas Confissões, como momento falacioso do espírito, engenho de simulacro linguístico enganador. O livro III das Confissões de Agostinho de Hipona pode ser lido como análise do filósofo sobre suas próprias condições de assentimento às representações literárias como via de acesso à verdade ou falsidade na medida em que problematiza a via gnóstico- maniqueia outrora trilhada como uma questão de leituras (cf. Conf. (...) III, 4, 7 à III, 5, 10). O jovem leitor denuncia sua pretensão de saber (gnose), uma suposição que o levara ao procedimento de tomar phantasia como referência hipostasiada de significação de verdade. Presume que seja arguto para imaginar e nomear realidades sobre corpos, [que seriam] mais reais do que verdadeiras imagens de corpos, e ao proceder assim nada faz senão imaginar “falsos corpos”, germe de uma perigosa nomeação que chega a pretender pela palavra indicar até mesmo o infinito. Finalmente, um trecho final dos seus Solilóquios II será especialmente esclarecedor para compreender como Agostinho parece apontar para a disposição do espírito por detrás da suposição e significação – para além de simples “sentenças falsas e enganadoras” (cf. Solilóquios II, xv, 29). A perspicácia (acies) do maniqueu faz dele sujeito de uma presunção sedutora, arrogando-se ser capaz de nomear o que está além da possibilidade de qualquer representação ou objetivação. A leitura, no entanto, não será afastada como via de exortação do espírito à verdade, o que lança a hipótese de que outra disposição deva substituir a presunção de saber algo da essência do texto. (shrink)

According to qualitativism, thisness is not a fundamental feature of reality; facts about particular things are metaphysically second-rate. In this paper, I advance an argument for qualitativism from ideological parsimony. Supposing that reality fundamentally contains an array of propertied things, non-qualitativists employ a distinct name (or constant) for each fundamental thing. I argue that these names encode a type of worldly structure (thisness structure) that offends against parsimony and that qualitativists can eliminate without incurring a comparable parsimony-offense.

This volume gathers together for the first time are all the key texts in a crucial debate in modern philosophy, centered on Leibniz's famous 1695 essay, the "New System of the Nature of Substances and their Communication," in which he introduced his strikingly original theory of metaphysics. His "system" became increasingly famous and drew him into discussion and development of these ideas, both in public and in private, with a variety of thinkers, most notably the great French philosopher Pierre Bayle. (...) Woolhouse's and Francks's new English edition gives the only full representation of this debate, and will therefore be essential reading for anyone who wishes to gain a proper understanding of Leibniz's philosophy and its intelletual context. All the texts are newly translated and extensively annotated; many appear in English for the first time. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe historical process underlying Darwin’s Origin of Species did not play a significant role in the early editions of the book, in spite of the particular inductivist scientific methodology it espoused. Darwin’s masterpiece did not adequately provide his sources or the historical perspective many contemporary critics expected. Later editions yielded the ‘Historical Sketch’ lacking in the earlier editions, but only under critical pressure. Notwithstanding the sources he provided, Darwin presented the Origin as an ‘abstract’ in order to avoid giving sources; (...) a compromise he acknowledged and undertook to set right in later editions, yet failed to provide throughout the six editions under his supervision. Darwin’s reluctance to publish the historical context of his theory and his sources, particularly sources which were also ‘precursors’, may be attributed as much to the matter of intellectual ownership as science, or even good literary practice. Of special concern to Darwin were issues of priority or originality over ‘descent with modification’ and especially over Natural Selection. Many later historians have argued that Darwin was unaware of the work of his precursors on Natural Selection. Darwin’s theory was an example of independent discovery, albeit along with such obscure precursors as Matthew or Wells, who were unknown to Darwin until after the publication of the Origin. Both Matthew and Wells had a medical education, like James Hutton or Erasmus Darwin earlier in the eighteenth century, or even Charles Darwin. Evolutionary theory, at least in Britain was a product largely of the medical evolutionists rather than the natural historians which ‘history’ has chosen to select for the focus of attention; and among the medical evolutionists the figure of John Hunter stands out as theorist, experimentalist and teacher: the medical evolutionists were predominantly the product of Hunter’s legacy or of the medical profession and particularly the Scottish Universities. Much recent Darwin scholarship has focused on the private Notebooks, to establish Darwin’s discovery of Natural Selection around 1837–1838 and demonstrate Darwin’s ignorance of his precursors; requiring an explicit acknowledgement by Darwin as the legitimate substantiation of any claim to prior influence. The precursors have been categorized as uniformly obscure or irrelevant to the science of evolution which may be defined exclusively as ‘Darwinian’. The inclination to acknowledge influences, however was not something Darwin was gratuitously given to doing, especially on matters of priority. The Notebooks are not Darwin’s private thoughts; from an early stage he considered them incipient public documents and later sought to protect them as proof of his originality. William C. Wells was not an obscure thinker, but a celebrated scientist whom Herschel, Darwin’s guide to scientific methodology, had recommended as providing a model of scientific method. Darwin discovered Wells through Herschel, and quickly acquired a copy of Wells’ recommended work, no later than 1831, and held it thereafter in his library at Down House. This book, the 1818 edition of Wells’ Two Essays contains a third essay, Wells’ account of Natural Selection. Later, in the Descent of Man Darwin acknowledged his separate discovery of the correlation of colour and disease immunity in man, also earlier recounted by Wells. (shrink)

Study of Yogasūtra of Patañjali with Yogabhāṣya of Vyāsa and philosophy of Osho on Yoga philosophy.

Commentary with 11 supercommentaries, on Brahmasūtra of Bādarāyaṇa, work on Vedanta philosophy.

Problem: Mitterer's critique of the central argumentations of radical constructivists has been mostly neglected until today. The paper presents and evaluates his criticism and, in the second part, outlines a format of constructivism that tries to draw appropriate consequences. Solution: In his critique Mitterer explains why the radical constructivism represented above all by Maturana, Varela, von Glasersfeld or Roth still remains in a dualistic format. In his view Neurobiology is used in their writings as the indisputable basis for deriving far-reaching (...) epistemological consequences. Therefore constructivism evades self-application. To overcome this serious critique a different approach to constructivist thinking is sketched that operates without using any biological or psychological theories, tries to avoid dualism, and elaborates Mitterer's basic argument that the description of an object and the object under description are the same. Benefits: The paper shows what constructivism can learn from a serious critique and how it can be rewritten in a non-dualistic way. (shrink)