This book is centrally concerned with crucial theoretical and practical aspects of teaching in the national and global borderlands of gender, race, and sexuality studies. The cross-cultural feminist focus of this anthology allows the contributors to consider the various ways in which global and national frameworks intersect in the classroom and in students' thinking, and also the ways in which power and authority are developed, directed, and deployed in the feminist classroom. This volume provides a critical elaboration of provocative, self-reflexive (...) questions for feminist cultural and intellectual practice for the 21st century. In doing so, the volume provides a site for engaged feminist self-criticism for the specific purpose of reinvigorating a critical pedagogical practice grounded in multicultural feminist identities. (shrink)

This research aims to analyses Leibniz’ Monadologic Ontology and his theory of expression as opposed to those readings of Leibniz’ work that define monads as isolated entities that lack that all possible relation. The analysis will also show that, beyond his notion of Personal Identity, underlies a logic of Otherness able to dialogue with contemporary Personalism. This logic of otherness, if our reading of Leibniz is right, it is especially ostensible in the ‘spirits’, which expressive nature establish not only a (...) systematic bond with the totality of beings that integrate the world, but also a notion of Personal Identity. Such notion allows that otherness acquires a prescriptive character: to place us in other’s situation and thus understand their needs and, through this, acknowledge our place in the cosmos. In order to achieve this we will carry four tasks: first, we will analyze in depth the application of his theory of expression to Monadologic ontology and his notio completa. Second, we will appreciate what implicatures have both for the specific case of spirits, emphasizing the communitarian nature of these rational monads. Third, we will rebuild a Leibnizian theory of Personal Identity and finally, we will compare the results with the main Personalists’ body of thesis. (shrink)

A través de esta entrevista a Alejandro Vigo, un referente obligado para quien desea profundizar en el pensamiento de autores como Kant, Aristóteles, Husserl o Heidegger, exploramos los puntos de encuentro entre estas tradiciones, a fin de esclarecer la relación entre identidad práctica, virtud y sentido. Esta entrevista a Alejandro Vigo, además de permitirnos explorar parte de su itinerario intelectual, nos da la oportunidad de reflexionar sobre los alcances y las limitaciones de las propuestas filosóficas de cada uno de estos (...) autores. (shrink)

This research aims to fill a major gap in the relevant literature on small businesses in developing countries, specifically concerning the development of models to better explain economic and environmental performance as a result of environmental compliance, thus moving toward an explanation of the sustainable behavior of these businesses. Data from 186 pottery craft businesses located in three Mexican states (Oaxaca, Puebla and Tlaxcala) reveal that environmental compliance significantly influences economic and environmental performance, with the mediating role of environmental innovation, (...) confirming the Porter hypothesis in the context of small businesses in an emerging economy. Environmental compliance is an important factor in improving the economic and environmental performance of small businesses in emerging economies. (shrink)

The present study aims to verify the psychometric properties of the Spanish versions of the Social Roles Questionnaire (SRQ; Baber & Tucker, 2006), Modern Sexism scale (MS) and Old-fashioned Sexism scale (OFS; Swim et al. Swim & Cohen, 1997). Enough support was found to maintain the original factor structure of all instruments in their Spanish version. Differences between men and women in the scores are commented on, mainly because certain sexist attitudes have been overcome with greater success in the current (...) Spanish society, while other issues, such as distribution of power in organizational hierarchies or distribution of tasks in the household, where traditional unequal positions are still maintained. In all cases, it was found that men showed greater support for sexist attitudes. The correlations between the three instruments were as expected in assessing sexist attitudes that tend to relate to each other. Eventually, we found no empirical evidence for the postulated link between sexist attitudes and traditional gender stereotypes. Our results call for the validity and effectiveness of the classic theories of gender psychology, such as gender schema theories (Well, 1981; Markus et al., 1982) and the notion of a gender belief system (Deaux & Kite, 1987; 2001). (shrink)

Thomas Pogge's Global Resources Dividend relies on a flat tax on the use of natural resources to fund the eradication of world poverty. Hillel Steiner's Global Fund taxes the full rental value of owned natural resources and distributes the proceeds equally. The paper compares the Dividend and the Fund and defends the Global Share, a novel proposal that taxes either use or ownership, does so (when possible) progressively, and distributes the revenue according to a prioritarian rather than a sufficientarian or (...) egalitarian principle. (shrink)

SUMMARYEarly modern artists who did not have access to Roman Antiquity or needed quick access to it could refer to prints after monuments such as those issued by Antoine Lafréry. But Du Choul's Discours sur la castrametation et discipline militaire des Romains [ … ] De la Religion des anciens Romains was also successful among artists, particularly painters. It was in vernacular language and widely available in French, Spanish and Italian; it was affordable and compact in format ; it had (...) plenty of woodcuts; and it focused on the Roman military life, besides the monuments, for which information could also be found in travel guides. The present essay aims to study how Du Choul's volume circulated, with several examples from Spain and Italy. The Discours will be used as a case study of artists as readers, and I will study aspects previously overlooked such as the book's market price in the early modern period, examples of use of copies of the book by artists and, more broadly, the troubles and challenges encountered by these readers when representing subjects from ancient history. (shrink)

This paper discusses Philippe Van Parijs’ claim that men’s lack of female longevity constitutes an injustice, whether this is caused by asocial factors or by gendered lifestyles. This response argues that, like others, such as John Kekes and Shlomi Segall, Van Parijs underestimates the resources of egalitarian liberalism to avoid this implication. One explanation treats individuals as liable for gendered life-shortening behavior, for example, when they value either life-shortening lifestyles or the choice between lifestyles, and one ca nnot say society (...) has not “done enough” for them. A second explanation claims a trait is not a relative advantage when it is systematically part of a package of traits that do not constitute a relative advantage. A third explanation claims a trait is not an advantage when its value to the trait bearer is conditional, and the relevant conditions are unlikely to be fulfilled. (shrink)

In the city of Elche, every year, on the 14th and 15th of August, a sacred musical play about the death, the Assumption and the Coronation of the Virgin Mary is held. This event, known as the “Misterio de Elche”, is unique in the world. Since the middle of the 15th century it has been performed in the Basilica of Santa Maria and in the streets of the ancient city of Elche, located in the Valencian Community. In this work, classified (...) as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the interior of the temple is transformed into 2 main stages, the scaffold, located in the lower part, and the aerial stage, located in the dome at a height of 27 m. The structure and the traction mechanisms located on the aerial stage allow the aerial devices that take part in the play, “El Araceli”, “La Mangrana” and “La Santísima Trinidad”, to be raised and lowered. It should be noted that between 2 and 5 singing actors are embarked on these devices. This article describes the main characteristics of the aerial stage structure, the 3 apparatus and the mechanical systems used. In addition, the age and modifications of “El Araceli” are analysed, as well as the results of a non-destructive test carried out on this device. (shrink)

G. A. Cohen proposes to eradicate inequality without loss of efficiency or freedom by relying on an egalitarian ethos requiring us to undertake socially useful occupations we would rather not take, and work hard at them, without requesting differential incentive payments. Since the ethos is not legally enforced, Cohen denies it threatens our occupational freedom. Drawing on the work of Joseph Raz, the paper argues that Cohen's proposal threatens our occupational autonomy even if it leaves our legal freedom intact. It (...) also proposes a revised ethos which respects occupational autonomy. (shrink)

This article reformulates Stephan Helmreich´s the ¨microbiomisation of race¨ as the historiality of otherness in the foundations of human microbiome science. Through the lens of my ethnographic fieldwork of a transnational community of microbiome scientists that conducted a landmark human microbiome research on indigenous microbes and its affiliated and first personalised microbiome initiative, the American Gut Project, I follow and trace the key actors, experimental systems and onto-epistemic claims in the emergence of human microbiome science a decade ago. In doing (...) so, I show the links between the reinscription of race, comparative research on the microbial genetic variation of human populations and the remining of bioprospected data for personalised medicine. In these unpredictable research movements, the microbiome of non-Western peoples and territories is much more than a side project or a specific approach within the field: it constitutes the nucleus of its experimental system, opening towards subsequent and cumulative research processes and knowledge production in human microbiome science. The article demonstrates that while human microbiome science is articulated upon the microbial ‘makeup’ of non-wester(nised) communities, societies, and locales, its results and therapeutics are only applicable to medical conditions affecting rich nations (i.e., inflammatory, autoimmune, and metabolic diseases). My reformulation of ¨microbiomisation of race¨ as the condition of possibility of human microbiome science reveals that its individual dimension is sustained by microbial DNA data from human populations through bioprospecting practices and gains meaning through personalised medicine initiatives, informal online networks of pseudoscientific and commodified microbial-related evidence. (shrink)

Resumen El objetivo principal de este artículo es analizar la distinción leibniziana entre apercepción sensible y consáentia a la luz de su ontología monadológica, con la intención de esclarecer las diferencias constitutivas entre los tres tipos de mónadas que Leibniz postula, esto es, entre las mónadas simples, las meras almas y los espíritus. Con esto, además de argumentar en contra de la concepción estándar de la apercepción, la cual termina por confinarla al caso específico de los espíritus, sitúo la propuesta (...) del hannoveriano entre dos lecturas contemporáneas: por un lado, aquella que comprende la apercepción como un acto de orden superior reflexivo, esto es, una percepción de la percepción; y, por otro lado, aquella que, al distinguir entre apercepción sensible y consáentia, privilegia una teoría de primer orden para hablar de la primera, reservando los actos reflexivos para la segunda. Aunque la evidencia textual es más afín con la segunda, hay elementos de la primera que permiten matizarla.The main aim of this article is to analyze Leibniz’s distinction between sensitive apperception and ‘conscientia’ through his monadological ontology, with the intention of lighten the constitutive differences between the three types of monads that Leibniz state, that is, between bare monads, souls and spirits. By proving this, my approach not only argues against the standard conceptions of Leibniz's notion of apperception, which ends attributing apperception only to the specify case of spirits, but it abo places the Hanoverian proposal between two contemporary lectures: on one side, an approach that understand apperception as a high order reflexive act, that is, a perception of a perception; on the other side, an approach that distinguishes sensible apperception from ‘conscientia’ in order to privilege a first order theory for the first one, reserving the reflective acts only for the second. Even when the textual evidence is closer to the last one, there are some elements of the first approach that allow us to improve it. (shrink)

Originally, the idea of interviewing Iris Marion Young in Barcelona came about after she accepted an invitation to give a public lecture at the Law School of Pompeu Fabra University in May 2002. I had first met Iris back in 1999, at a conference in Bristol, England, and I was impressed deeply by her personality and ideas. We kept in touch since then and exchanged papers and ideas. She was very keen to come to Spain (it seems that her mother (...) had lived some years in Mallorca) and she finally travelled to Barcelona with her husband and daughter in spring 2002. The lecture, which she entitled "Women, War, and Peace," was meant to be the closing session of a course on Gender and the Law, and was also part of a series of seminars annually organized by the legal philosophy department (the Albert Calsamiglia Seminar). Her work was quite well-known among several Catalan philosophers and political scientists and professor Angel Castiñeira-who, at the time, was the director of Idees (Ideas), a Catalan journal published by the Centre d'Estudis de Temes Contemporanis (Center for the Study of Contemporary Issues)-suggested that she could give a second lecture, which they would publish together with an interview I could prepare. She accepted both proposals, and I started to think of a questionnaire for the interview while I was at Queen's University in Canada earlier that year. Idil Boran, a philosopher and good friend who did her doctorate at Queen's, offered to help me with this endeavour, since she also admired Iris as both a scholar and a person. Together we prepared the questions and sent them to her once she was back in Chicago, as there was not time to conduct the interview in person while she was in Barcelona. In fall 2002, she sent some answers to our questions, but the document was unfortunately incomplete. She was busy at the time, so we didn't want to pressure her to finish the interview. Eventually, the editors of Idees decided to publish the manifest about the war in Iraq subscribed by a large number of American Intellectuals together with fragments of Iris's (antiwar) lectures and an article that she wrote together with Daniel Archibugi, "Envisioning a Global Rule of Law." The interview was thus left unpublished. Both Idil and I thought it would be worthwhile to publish it somewhere else, but, for one reason or another, Iris didn't have the time to complete it and we kept postponing the project. At some point, she said that the questions she left unanswered were too complex or challenging to give a short or quick answer, and that she would need to reflect on them to provide detailed responses. Later, we learned she was ill and we didn't feel it was right to insist on those questions being answered. The issue came up again when she accepted to participate as a keynote speaker at the World Congress of Legal Philosophy held in Granada in June 2005. She then said she would come first to Barcelona (where she and Nancy Fraser had been invited to a workshop by the Catalan Women Institute) and suggested we could sit in a cafe and talk about the issues left out in those unanswered questions. Unfortunately, she had to cancel this trip because of her medical treatment, and I did not have the privilege of sharing time with her again. The following series of questions and responses are the product of this rather extended interview process. (shrink)

Although G. A. Cohen's work on Marx was flawed by a lack of gender-awareness, his work on Rawls owes much of its success to feminist inspiration. Cohen appeals effectively to feminism to rebut the basic structure objection to his egalitarian ethos, and could now appeal to feminism in response to Andrew Williams's publicity objection to this ethos. The article argues that Williams's objection is insufficient to rebut Cohen's ethos, inapplicable to variants of this ethos, and in conflict with plausible gender-egalitarian (...) ethoses. The article also advocates an understanding of basic structuralism and publicity consistent with feminism, and argues that Rawlsians need not reject plausible domestic egalitarian ethoses on either publicity or liberty grounds. To Michèle, G. A. Cohen's Harriet Taylor. (shrink)

Resumen: El presente trabajo pretende analizar algunos de los postulados principales de la ontología vitalista de Leibniz, en especial su noción de máquina natural y su propuesta monadológica, con la finalidad de demostrar la viabilidad en su pensamiento de una teoría de la acción. Se divide en tres partes: la primera examina la estructura compleja de las máquinas naturales, a partir de la cual se puede observar una composición dual de la acción; a partir de esto, la segunda parte distingue (...) tres tipos de mónadas con la intención de perfilar la posibilidad de una agencia racional; y, finalmente, la tercera parte ofrece algunas conclusiones relevantes para su teoría de la acción, como el papel de la percepción en el proceso de elección y el intelectualismo leibniziano, entre otros.: This paper aims to analyze key postulates of Leibniz’s vitalist ontology, with a special emphasis on his conception of a natural machine and his monadological proposal. It is divided into three sections: first I analyze the complex structure of natural machines, from which a twofold composition of action can be reckoned; hence, the second section identifies three kinds of monads, with the purpose of devising the possibility of rational agency; finally, the third section draws some relevant conclusions for Leibniz’s account of action, as the place of perception in the process of choice and Leibnizian intellectualism, among others. (shrink)

The memories of the teaching we had during the seventies at the Autonomous University of Barcelona show, forty years later, that this teaching was not a matter of a premeditated learning program. However, the diversity of the teachers we knew, their characters and examples, project a certain shadow of a philosophical experience that has been shared by several generations of contemporary Catalan philosophers.

A dominant theme in the ninth of the Heroides, Deianira's letter to Hercules, is Deianira's indignation that Hercules has been defeated by a woman: first by Iole ; then by Omphale . The theme is exploited so insistently that Vessey, who regards the epistle as spurious, sees in this insistence a sign of the forger's clumsiness. consider the exploitation of the motive of‘victor victus’ in Heroides 9, on the contrary, as a strong sign of Ovidian authorship. From the very beginning (...) of the letter, the reader is reminded that if a woman, Iole, has metaphorically destroyed Hercules, another woman is on the point of destroying Hercules in a much more real and literal way, and this woman is none other than Deianira herself. When Deianira writes the letter, she has just sent to Hercules the garment soaked in Nessus' poison that will provoke Hercules' horrible death : thus Deianira, rather than Iole or Omphale, is the woman who vanquishes the unvanquished hero. But this is not only a matter of dramatic irony based on the general lines of the story. Heroides 9 is an elegiac rewriting of Sophocles' Trachiniae , and at the same time is inserted in the time and the ‘body’ of the tragedy. Ironic prefiguration in Heroides is normally realized through intertextual anticipation: thefuture events that are prefigured are present in the texts of the model epic or tragedy. Deianira blames Hercules for bis defeat: quern numquam Iuno seriesque immensa laborum fregerit, huic Iolen imposuisse iugum quem non mille ferae, quern non Stheneleius hostis, non potuit Iuno vincere, vincit amor. (shrink)

G. A. Cohen's critique of Rawls's defence of economic incentives echoes some of J. S. Mill's insights on the subject. Some of Cohen's arguments, however, clash not only with those of Rawls but also with each other as well as with Mill's. A similar charge, however, may be made against Rawls. This article has conciliatory ambitions. It suggests reconciling each author with himself, as well as with each other, by focusing onthe worthof liberty. It stresses the importance of non-pecuniary occupational (...) inequalities and proposes various measures to enhance the worth of the occupational freedom of those with fewer options. (shrink)

Forty years on, G. A. Cohen’s reconstruction and defence of Marx’s theory of history is still widely, and justifiably, considered the best of its kind, and it remains unsurpassed in clarity, argumentation and textual support. This article presents an under-explored critique of the theory that arises once we recognize that it is meant to apply to the circumstances of women as well as men. The article argues that, when extended to women, the reconstructed theory’s predictions fail to materialize, its characterizations (...) of historical stages fall apart, and its functional explanations appear implausible. In addition, although the theory claims to be able to explain the emergence and diffusion of different ideologies by their effects on productive development, it cannot plausibly explain the presence of sexist ideologies despite their pervasive and profound impact across history. The article concludes by showing that these flaws highlight the many respects in which Cohen’s orthodox version of Marxism is a conservative ideology, and one that egalitarians in particular should view with suspicion. Once we analyse the different components of the theory, the idea of a right-wing Marxism no longer seems as odd as it sounds. (shrink)

En este trabajo realizo un examen crítico del reciente libro de Silvana Gabriela Di Camillo sobre la crítica de Aristóteles a la teoría platónica de las Ideas. El libro de Di Camillo es un trabajo muy serio cuya lectura recomiendo ampliamente. Sin embargo, considero que cuatro de las principales tesis que la autora defiende tienen varias dificultades y mi objetivo aquí es presentar argumentos detallados en contra de ellas: la interpretación de la distinción entre argumentos más y menos rigurosos del (...) tratado Sobre las Ideas; la tesis de que la separación es el blanco esencial de las críticas aristotélicas a las Ideas; la interpretación de las opciones que Platón tiene para responder al argumento del tercer hombre, y la tesis de que la separación de las Ideas debe entenderse como homonimia. In this paper I examine Silvana Gabriela Di Camillo's recent book on Aristotle's criticisms of Plato's theory of Ideas. Di Camillo's book is a very serious work that I highly recommend. Nevertheless, I consider that four of the main theses that the author defends face several difficulties and my aim here is to offer detailed arguments against them: the interpretation of the distinction between more and less accurate arguments of the treatise On Ideas; the thesis that separation is the essential target of Aristotle's criticisms against Plato's Ideas; the interpretation of the options available to Plato to reply to the third man argument; and the thesis that the separation of Ideas should be understood as homonymy. (shrink)

...In what follows I lay out Husserl's theory of epistemic justification as he sketches it in Part IV of 'Ideas 1', especially in the section he appropriately titles the "Phenomenology of Reason," understood here to present a phenomenological analysis of how reason is given, namely, how reason manifests itself in conscious life. My claim is that Husserl's "phenomenology of reason," by clarifying the ways in which the "legitimizations of reason" take place can be ultimately understood as a theory of epistemic (...) justification. The theory of epistemic justification discused here is a phenomenological account of the process whereby the thinking subject comes to regards particular beliefs as true and can give reasons to support this claim. (shrink)

Charles Peirce is widely credited as the originator of semiotics, or the general theory of signs, and recognized as the founder of American pragmatism, albeit in that peculiar kind Peirce himself went on to distinguish as “pragmaticism.” The semiotic and pragmatist strands in Peirce’s thought come together in an appraisal of scientific diagrammatic representations. Peirce’s pragmatic maxim entails that the consequences of a sign inform our entire conception of the sign, while his most considered semiotic system entails that a complex (...) sign partakes of iconic, indexical, and symbolic aspects. We illustrate Peirce’s insights by means of the celebrated Feynman Diagrams in Quantum Electrodynamics. We argue that Peirce’s late, post-1903, semiotics provides an adequate characterization of such “hypoicons,” and his pragmatic maxim explains how they can motivate and drive inquiry. We conclude that Peirce’s pragmatic approach to scientific diagrams remains a viable position that skillfully avoids dogmatic scientism and nihilistic skepticism alike. (shrink)

John Locke's philosophy was deeply affected by medicine of his times. It was specially influenced by the medical thought and practice of Thomas Sydenham. Locke was a personal friend of Sydenham, expressed an avid interest in his work and shared his views and methods. The influence of Sydenham's medicine can be seen in the following areas of Locke's philosophy: his “plain historical method”; the emphasis on observation and sensory experience instead of seeking the essence of things; the rejection of hypotheses (...) and principles; the refusal of research into final causes and inner mechanisms; the ideal of irrefutable evidence and skepticism on the possibilities of certainty in science. The science which for Locke held the highest paradigmatic value in his theory of knowledge was precisely medicine. To a great extent, Locke's Essay on Human Understanding can be understood as an attempt to justify, substantiate, and promote Sydenham's medical method. This method, generalized, was then proposed as an instrument for the elaboration of all natural sciences. (shrink)

Most interpretations of Quantum Mechanics alternative to Copenhagen interpretation try to avoid the dualistic flavor of the latter. One of the basic goals of the former is to avoid the ad hoc introduction of observers and observations as an inevitable presupposition of physics. Non-Copenhagen interpretations usually trust in decoherence as a necessary mechanism to obtain a well-defined, observer-free transition from a unitary quantum description of the universe to classicality. Even though decoherence does not solve the problem of the definite outcomes, (...) it helps to explain why we do not observe superpositions and, according to Zurek’s existential interpretation, why a specific preferred basis emerges through system–environment interactions. The aim of this paper is to show why such interpretation ends up begging the question and provides little progress in understanding the quantum-to-classical transition; the ultimate reason being that preferred bases always correlate to human observation. Benefitting from the technical discussion, some remarks will be offered in the last section regarding the role of classical observations as a necessary condition to make workable the formalism of Quantum Mechanics and scientific activity itself. (shrink)

In this article, I explore how researchers’ metaphysical commitments can be conducive—or unconducive—to progress in animal cognition research. The methodological dictum known as Morgan's Canon exhorts comparative psychologists to countenance the least mentalistic fair interpretation of animal actions. This exhortation has frequently been misread as a blanket condemnation of mentalistic interpretations of animal behaviors that could be interpreted behavioristically. But Morgan meant to demand only that researchers refrain from accepting default interpretations of (apparent) actions until other fair interpretations have been (...) duly considered. The Canon backfired largely because of Morgan's background metaphysical commitment to a univocal, hierarchical, and anthropocentric account of cognitive architecture. I make the case that, going forward, comparative psychologists would do well to pair judicious use of Morgan's Canon with an openness to the existence of non-humanlike animal minds comprising phenomena belonging to distinct cognitive and folk psychological ontologies. And I argue that this case gives us pragmatic reason to reconcile deep—e.g., psychofunctionalist—and superficial—e.g., dispositionalist—approaches to the metaphysics of belief. (shrink)

The paper develops an account of the value of tradition that completes that of Samuel Scheffler and employs it to discuss whaling and bullfighting. The discussion, however, is applicable to many other practices the paper describes, and its relevance extends also beyond animal ethics. Some of the arguments discussed here for maintaining these traditions appeal to their positive aspects, such as their contribution to social or environmental harmony; other arguments focus on the impermissibility of one group criticizing another group’s practices (...) when its own are vulnerable to comparable criticism. Reflecting on the first kind of argument, the paper responds, building on the work of G. A. Cohen and T. M. Scanlon, that the value of tradition, if any, must be conditional. Reflecting on the second, however, the paper disagrees with Cohen and Scanlon on the impermissibility of casting the first stone. (shrink)

The study described in this article examines whether wives' relative resources and material conditions affect husbands' domestic labor within varying economic development contexts. The study tests: whether wives' relative resources increase husbands' regularity of housework participation and whether the effects of wives' relative resources on husbands' regularity of housework participation vary in quantity and effect at different levels of economic development. The study indicates that wives' material conditions and relative resources have no consistent, significant effects on husbands' regularity of housework (...) participation. Levels of national economic development also have little effect. (shrink)

Women have been marginalized in different contexts and situations. Religion, and to be more specific Catholicism, is a tradition that has divided men and women but more importantly women themselves as they represent the dichotomy of good and evil. Michèle Roberts's heroines are inspired through biblical characters who will replace the binary system of being for dualities and pluralities in the same woman as part of their identities. This paper considers the feminist procedure of Adrienne Rich's re-visioning, re-imagining and re-writing, (...) Julia Kristeva's notion of abjection plus a touch of Bakhtinian `open bodies' in the light of Catholic myths. The conclusion of this essay aims to present and celebrate Roberts's heroines in relation to their sexuality and religion. (shrink)

The foundation of morality, and mainly, the possibility of moral sentiments that are universal and inalienable, is a central problem in Maine de Biran’s philosophy. Many studies focus on the part played by the self in Maine de Biran’s late philosophy, but relatively few consider with precision the importance of the concept of sympathy in this context. In this paper, I would like to show that this concept, which Biran mobilizes from his first to his last writings, is an important (...) conceptual resource in his enterprise of founding morality. I will draw on three main texts that cover almost the entire period in which he wrote, namely, his Mémoire sur l’influence de l’habitude sur la faculté de penser ([1802] 1987), his Mémoire sur les perceptions obscures ou sur les impressions générales affectives et les sympathies en particulier ([1807] 1984), and his Fragments relatifs aux fondements de la morale et de la religion ([1819] 1859). The main finding is that sympathy occupies a central place in this enterprise of moral foundation but undergoes profound and almost contradictory conceptual re-elaborations throughout Biran’s intellectual journey. Although in his first philosophical texts Biran concentrates on the fundamental dimension of organic sympathy, he rejects it almost entirely in his last texts in favor of an analysis of the sympathy between the selves. (shrink)

Tras un breve recuerdo del debate centenario sobre la filosofía cristiana, el autor discute la nueva propuesta de Alasdair MacIntyre de mejorar una «filosofía católica» en el contexto de nuestra moderna crisis en la relación entre fe y razón. El autor comparte el diagnóstico sobre nuestra situación presente en las universidades de investigación y sobre su exclusión pragmática de la filosofía y la teología, las cuales, en el mejor caso, son reducidas a disciplinas especializadas sin relevancia para otras disciplinas, y, (...) en la mayoría de los casos, son simplemente expulsadas del ámbito de la investigación científica. La propuesta dialéctica de MacIntyre en Tres versiones rivales de la ética y en Dios, Filosofía, Universidades, aparte de otras obras menores, se examina críticamente y se presenta como una forma nueva de comprometer a los pensadores católicos y no católicos en una confrontación abierta y fructífera, en lugar de nuestro confinamiento actual en mundos cerrados de investigación falsamente científica. After a brief recollection of the century long debate about Christian philosophy, the author discusses Alasdair Maclntyre’s new proposal to enhance a «Catholic philosophy» in the context of our modern crisis of the relationship between faith and reason. The author shares the diagnosis about our present daj situation of research universities and their pragmatic exclusion of philosophy and theology, which, in the best case, are reduced to specialized disciplines with no import for other disciplines, and, in most cases, are just expelled from the realm of scientfic research. Maclntyre’s dialectical proposal in «Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry» and in «God, Philosophy Universities», and in some other minor works, is critically examined and presented as a new way to engage Catholic and non Catholic thinkers in an open and fruitful confrontation, in stead of our present confinement in closed worlds of falsely scientific research. (shrink)

In this paper, I put forth a novel interpretation of how the third categories under each heading in the table of categories are derived. Drawing on a passage from the first Critique and a letter to Schultz, I argue that in order to derive these categories, a special act of the understanding is required. I propose that we interpret this special act as consisting of an application of the third logical function under the corresponding heading that unites the combination of (...) the first and second categories so as to produce the third. (shrink)

This essay introduces and defends Emilio Uranga's philosophical intervention in his 1952 text, Análisis del ser del mexicano. Here, to begin with, a case is made that the Análisis can be read as an effort at decolonizing philosophy. This is followed by a consideration of recent criticisms of “la filosofía de lo mexicano,” which naturally extend to Uranga's text, since this is the philosophical tradition in which we find it. Finally, a defense is given against these critiques and a suggestion (...) is made that in order to properly understand the Análisis it is crucial that one understand both its liberatory impulse and its method. (shrink)

Suppose that the basic structures of two societies conform to Rawls’s principles of justice. One of these societies, however, includes—in addition to a just basic structure—an egalitarian ethos that further reduces inequalities that do not benefit the least advantaged. G. A. Cohen and others have argued that the second society is more just, thus rejecting any restriction of Rawls’s principles of justice to the basic structure. Andrew Williams has revived the basic structure restriction in the form of a publicity requirement. (...) This paper highlights various problems with this attempt. In addition, it shows that an egalitarian ethos admits various plausible reformulations that could meet Williams’s publicity requirements. This only amounts to a partial victory for Cohen, however. In fact, the Rawlsian position could come out of this discussion strengthened, not because it can resist the egalitarian critique, but because it can incorporate its essence in the form of a set of more precise and specific public rules. (shrink)

El personalismo, en general, surge como una respuesta en contra del afán moderno de dar validez sólo aquello que es mesurable y empíricamente verificable, i.e., contra la tendencia positivista a olvidar la centralidad de la persona “como creadora y depositaria del sentido de la realidad”. Cara al positivismo imperante del siglo XIX y XX, encontramos la propuesta antropológica de Edith Stein, quien asume el método fenomenológico de su maestro para articular una sólida visión de lo humano, capaz de reivindicar su (...) dignidad constitutiva. El presente libro del profesor Rubén Sánchez, en este sentido, nos permite no sólo reparar en el recorrido intelectual que realizó la filósofa de Breslau para consolidar su antropología, sino también sumergirnos, en palabras de Gonzáles Di Pierro, en “todos los niveles de este personalismo steiniano”. Se trata, pues, de un texto que, sin menoscabo de la hondura y complejidad del pensamiento de Stein, nos permite ahondar en su propuesta antropológica desde un lenguaje sencillo y accesible para todo público. (shrink)

Robert Sparrow argues that because of women's longer life expectancy philosophers who advocate the genetic modification of human beings to enhance welfare rather than merely supply therapy are committed to favouring the selection of only female embryos, an implication he deems sufficiently implausible to discredit their position. If Sparrow's argument succeeds, then philosophers who advocate biomedical moral enhancement also seem vulnerable to a similar charge because of men's greater propensity for various forms of harmful wrongdoing. This paper argues there are (...) various flaws in Sparrow's argument that render it unsuccessful. The paper also examines whether dimorphism reduction is a more desirable outcome than male elimination, thereby further illustrating the difficulties besetting the distinction between therapy and enhancement. (shrink)

Se busca rastrear la imagen que Platón tiene de Heráclito y articularla con la estructura argumentativa del Cratilo, para comprender las necesidades textuales a las que responde la doctrina del flujo perpetuo, es decir, la discusión sobre la corrección (ὀρθότης) del nombre. Gracias a la inclusión del testimonio heraclíteo, resulta posible rastrear la presunta consolidación de la tesis sobre los nombres primarios y los secundarios como el eje de la separación entre dos planos de realidad (uno estable y uno móvil) (...) y de la teoría de las Ideas -es decir, como la base de la epistemología platónica presente en los diálogos de madurez-. The article seeks to trace the image Plato has of Heraclitus and connect it with the argumentative structure of the Cratylus in order to understand the textual needs that give rise to the doctrine of perpetual flux, that is, the discussion regarding the correctness (ὀρθότης) of names. The inclusion of Heraclitus's testimony makes it possible to trace the alleged consolidation of the thesis regarding primary and secondary names as the axis of separation between two levels of reality (one stable, the other, changing) and the theory of Ideas -that is, as the basis of Plato's epistemology as set forth in the late dialogues-. (shrink)

This article shows firs that the text hitherto known as the Prologue to the Works of Propositions by Meister Eckhart is in fact his treatise On Being, What is, and Nothing, to which he himself refers in his Sermons and Lectures on the Twenty-fourth Chapter of «Ecclesiasticus». The article also analyses the relationship between the two extant commentaries on Genesis by Eckhart: the Expositio on Genesis and the Book of the Parables of Genesis.

The rationalization of a choice function, in terms of assumptions that involve expansion or contraction properties of the feasible set, over non-finite sets is analyzed. Schwartz's results, stated in the finite case, are extended to this more general framework. Moreover, a characterization result when continuity conditions are imposed on the choice function, as well as on the binary relation that rationalizes it, is presented.