Folklore reflects the concept of fear, with which genres such as incantations and prayers are directly associated. These texts establish adialogue with danger, either with commands or supplications, and they indicate what kind of dangers are imminent. By combining psychoanalytical and folklore theories, the paper offers the analysis of the conceptual image of fear and of the defensive function of prayers and incantations within the material of Slovenian incantation and prayer collections: what kind of threats one wants to chase away (...) by incantations or/and magical signs and objects; and what kind of form and use contain the preventive incantations themselves. (shrink)

In this study, Qāḍī Abd al-Jābbār’s views on knowing Allah (ma‘rifatullah) and following issues have been analysed. In this context, either the divine message has reached to a person or not, it is examined whether ma‘rifatullah is obligatory (wajib) upon him. Subsequently, it is discussed whether this obligation is ensured by reasoning (‘aql) or revelation (naql). Furthermore, while keeping in mind the role of intellect (nazar) and argumentation (istidlāl), we have established and evaluated religious state and source of nazar and (...) istidlāl. Also, we discussed to what extend God can be the subject of knowledge and from which aspects He can be known. Besides, we discussed whether ma‘rifatullah is an obligation and if not what its justification is. In addition, we examined whether imitative knowledge (taqlīd) is possible in the case of ma‘rifatullah or not and whether it’s sufficient to know God just by taqlīd without the reasoning at all. Finally, Qāḍī Abd al-Jābbār’s opinions on the religious situation of people to whom the divine revelation did not reach at all and so they lack of knowledge on God. (shrink)

_Freiheit nach Kant_ analyzes Kant’s conception of freedom from a historical and systematic point of view. It considers its position in the history of philosophy, its impact on German Idealism, and finally discusses the systematic relevance of Kant’s theory.

Willensstruktur und Handlungsorganisation in Kants Theorie der praktischen Freiheit provides a detailed reconstruction of Kant’s theory of free volitional self-determination. It systematically reveals all aspects of the theory that intrinsically determine the organization and coordination of action under the guidelines of freedom.

In this paper, we will question Heisenberg’s claim that the unpredictability of the experimental findings of quantum physics also affects the self-evident attitude about the universal and necessary nature of the principle of causality. We will try to answer the aforementioned problem by confronting Heisenberg’s criticism of Kant’s position on the universal and necessary/absolute nature of the principle of causality with Kant’s distinction between perceptual and experiential judgments. The distinction between perceptual and experiential judgments reveals that even in Heisenberg’s experimental (...) results that indicate the smallest degree of expectation, predictability, or uniformity of natural events, universal and necessary conditions of knowledge to which Heisenberg denies absolute value still preexist. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to investigate a peculiar acoustic feature of translation – its echoicity. In the first step, I will revisit the story of Echo, the mythological character who repeats the words of the other and distorts its meaning. Moving from this figure, the article will pose the question of how the mechanism of repetition is structured in translation. This will be done through an analysis of the passages from Benjamin’s “The Task of the Translator”, in which (...) translation is explicitly described as an echo, involved in a chain of multiple resonances. It will be showed that Benjamin’s text as well, especially its terminology, acts through the same multiple resonances. In the last part of the paper, the problem of contradiction will be introduced, making reverberate some concepts and points from Hegelian philosophy, in order to argue the contradictory process of echoing the voice of the other in translation. (shrink)

My goal in this dissertation is to start a conversation about the role of risk in the decision-theoretic assessment of partial beliefs or credences in formal epistemology. I propose a general theory of epistemic risk in terms of relative sensitivity to different types of graded error. The approach I develop is broadly inspired by the pragmatism of the American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce and his notion of the ``economy of research.'' I express this framework in information-theoretic terms and show that (...) epistemic risk, so understood, is dual to information entropy. As a result, every unit increase in risk comes with a corresponding unit decrease in information entropy and epistemic risk may be expressed in terms of entropic change. I explain the significance of this for the selection of priors and the Laplacian principle of indifference. I also extend this notion of epistemic risk to the assessment of updating rules, where a similar duality between risk and information holds. In the dynamic context, epistemic risk is given by cross-entropic change. Here I explore the relationship between risk, the Value of Knowledge Theorem, dynamic coherence, and the role of expected accuracy in the selection of update rules. Finally, I apply these considerations to a social institution where attitudes to error are especially salient -- namely, legal decision-making -- and argue that considerations regarding the relative severity of different types of error are central to understanding evidentiary burdens of proof and the probative value of statistical evidence. (shrink)

Bas Van Fraassen is a nifty philosopher of science. He received his PhD in Pittsburgh in 1966, under the guidance of Adolf Grünbaum, he taught at Yale University, the university of Toronto, the University of Southern California, he has been McCosh Professor of Philosophy in Princeton, and eventually joined the department of philosophy at San Francisco State University, where he has the title of Distinguished Professor of Philosophy. He first gained attention with his book An Introduction to the Philosophy of (...) Time and Space where he tried to develop a formal theory of space and time based on the notion of causality. The book had an enormous legacy, with experts of the likes of John Earman and David Malament joining the debate. However, he achieved V.I.P. status with his classic The Scientific Image, where he defends a combination of empiricism and antirealism towards unobservable entities based on a re-definition of what the scientific enterprise is. His last achievement is the tome Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspectives, where he combines his scientific empiricism with the view that theories are best thought as models or structures, rather than sets of sentences. In this interview, we talk about his philosophical influences and the birth of The Scientific Image during a journey through North-Africa, Turkey and Eastern Europe, we talk about saving the phenomena and suspending judgement over the existence of unobservable entities, living in world full of mysteries and leaving unanswerable questions unanswered, rationality and irrationality, living in a simulation, the historical interplay between theorizing and experimenting, the meaning of particle detectors for an empiricist, the unity of science and physicalism, the condemnation of Galilei by the Church, and the distinction between Appearance and Reality…. (shrink)

Aristotle has interpreted research done by empirical methods using metaphysical concepts extensively. According to some authors, his metaphysically intoned philosophy of biology is compatible with the modern theory of evolution and with some of the essential topics of ecological ethics. We will try to show how the interpretation of the substantial whole, under the aspect of the notion of potentiality, is Aristotle’s contribution to the debates of eco-ethical holism. Furthermore, we will show how Hans Jonas also finds the possibility of (...) valuing the individual organic substance in Aristotle’s works, which are not only representatives of the human species. Hans Jonas pleads for a revision of the modern theory of evolution, which, combined with some of Aristotle’s metaphysical elements, could avoid the reductionism to which it was exposed after Descartes. (shrink)

Neuroscience is one of the most propulsive of all sciences and very often, directly or not, it tries to answer the question: What is man? However, neuroscientific research does not acknowledge the concept of man as a unity of body and soul. The modern scientific research paradigm therefore rests on physicalism, while theologians are turning towards non-reductive physicalism. In this paper, we will highlight a few key points of the theory of philosopher and theologian Nancey Murphy, which is based on (...) the deconstruction of Aquinas's thought about the human soul and its reduction to the physical. We aim to show that she neglected the full scope of Aquinas teachings. In the second part of this paper, for the scientific paradigm of humans we shall propose new-old hylomorphism, and try to complement certain points of such a system with modern neuroscientific views. The aim of this work is to offer advice for the interdisciplinary cooperation between neuroscience, philosophy and theology alongside the guidelines of Aristotelian-Thomistic hylomorphism. (shrink)

These notes discuss formalizing contexts as first class objects. The basic relationships are: ist(c,p) meaning that the proposition p is true in the context c, and value(c,p) designating the value of the term e in the context c Besides these, there are lifting formulas that relate the propositions and terms in subcontexts to possibly more general propositions and terms in the outer context. Subcontextx are often specialised with regard to time, place and terminology. Introducing contexts as formal objects will permit (...) axiomatizations in limited contexts to be expanded to transcend the original limitations. This seems necessary to provide AI programs using logic with certain capabilities that human fact representation and human reasoning possess. Fully implementing transcendence seems to require further extensions to mathematical logic, ie. beyond the nonmonotonic inference methods first invented in AI and now studied as a new domain of logic. (shrink)

The paper examines the justification of warfare. The main thesis is that war is very difficult to justify, and justification by invoking “justice” is not the way to succeed it. Justification and justness (“justice”) are very different venues: while the first attempts to explain the nature of war and offer possible schemes of resolution (through adequate definitions), the second aims to endorse a specific type of warfare as correct and hence allowed – which is the crucial part of “just war (...) theory.” However, “just war theory,” somewhat Manichean in its nature, has very deep flaws. Its final result is criminalization of war, which reduces warfare to police action, and finally implies a very strange proviso that one side has a right to win. All that endangers the distinction between ius ad bellum and ius in bello, and destroys the collective character of warfare (reducing it to an incomprehensible individual level, as if a group of people entered a battle in hopes of finding another group of people willing to respond). Justification of war is actually quite different – it starts from the definition of war as a kind of conflict which cannot be solved peacefully, but for which there is mutual understanding that it cannot remain unresolved. The aim of war is not justice, but peace, i.e. either a new articulation of peace, or a restoration of the status quo ante. Additionally, unlike police actions, the result of war cannot be known or assumed in advance, giving war its main feature: the lack of control over the future. Control over the future, predictability (obtained through laws), is a feature of peace. This might imply that war is a consequence of failed peace, or inability to maintain peace. The explanation of this inability (which could simply be incompetence, or because peace, as a specific articulation of distribution of social power, is not tenable anymore) forms the justification of war. Justice is always an important part of it, but justification cannot be reduced to it. The logic contained here refers to ius ad bellum, while ius in bello is relative to various parameters of sensitivity prevalent in a particular time (and expressed in customary and legal rules of warfare), with the purpose to make warfare more humane and less expensive. (shrink)

_Der „innere Gerichtshof“ der Vernunft_ explores Kant’s theory of conscience and its historical reception in German Idealism in the context of practical philosophy and the philosophy of religion.

The main focus in the paper is the connection between trust and peace which makes predictability as a necessary condition of the normalcy of life possible, especially collective and communal life. Peace is defined as a specific articulation of the distribution of (political) power within a society. Peace defined in such a way requires a set of rules (norms, or laws) needed for the stability of the established social state of affairs. The main purpose of those norms, laws, is to (...) provide predictability without which stability of such a state of affairs is not possible. The role of trust in this scheme is crucial. However, trust precedes the peace (defined as a set of accepted set of laws), and cannot be obtained by enforcing such normative instruments as laws. Trust is so a component of freedom, the same which contains distrust as its possible component. In this sense peace should be taken as the power of control, first the control over ourselves, the power which makes status and existence of trust possible and feasible. (shrink)

The scientific papers published in a special edition of the journal “Scientia et Fides” are the result of an international scientific project titled “The Dynamic Theodicy Model: Understanding God, Evil, and Evolution.” The project leaders are Prof. Piotr Roszak (Nicolaus Copernicus University) and Prof. Saša Horvat (University of Rijeka), under the auspices of the University of Oxford and the John Templeton Foundation. Other members of the project team include Grzegorz Karwasz, Michał Oleksowicz, Tomasz Huzarek, and Jan Wółkowski.

We present an elementary system of axioms for the geometry of Minkowski spacetime. It strikes a balance between a simple and streamlined set of axioms and the attempt to give a direct formalization in first-order logic of the standard account of Minkowski spacetime in Maudlin and Malament. It is intended for future use in the formalization of physical theories in Minkowski spacetime. The choice of primitives is in the spirit of Tarski : a predicate of betwenness and a four place (...) predicate to compare the square of the relativistic intervals. Minkowski spacetime is described as a four dimensional ‘vector space’ that can be decomposed everywhere into a spacelike hyperplane—which obeys the Euclidean axioms in Tarski and Givant, 175–214 1999)—and an orthogonal timelike line. The length of other ‘vectors’ are calculated according to Pythagoras’ theorem. We conclude with a Representation Theorem relating models \ of our system \ that satisfy second order continuity to the mathematical structure \, called ‘Minkowski spacetime’ in physics textbooks. (shrink)

This paper presents a historical-philosophical reconstruction of Leibniz’s theory of education. In the introduction, I point out the exegetical problems involved in locating Leibniz’s “philosophy of education” within the broader corpus of his works and in uncovering an appropriate theoretical framework within which it is possible to contextualise and reconstruct Leibniz’s thought on education. It is then shown that this framework is provided by Leibniz’s practical philosophy, i.e. his ideas about the optimal state and the common good. I analyse the (...) key theses of Leibniz’s ethics and political philosophy to uncover the background of the idea of the respublica optima and explain how education, in Leibniz’s view, should enable the perfection of the individual and society and contribute to the realisation of the common good. Finally, it is argued that in his educational project Leibniz articulated an idea of the Enlightenment that is far more progressive than the educational ideas of the philosophers we usually associate with the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. (shrink)

U ovom radu autor izlaze Hajdegerovo shvatanje sustine tehnike kao opasnosti i mogucnost umetnosti kao ono-spasonosnog. U tom smislu autor smatra da Hajdeger promislja sustinu tehnike kao i umetnosti polazeci od povesne konstelacije istine bivstvovanja ili udesa razotkrivanja. Ovo povesno promisljanje podrzano je Hajdegerovim etimoloskim analizama pojmova poiesis i techne.

U ovom clanku se razmatra Gadamerovo shvatanje vaznih hermeneutickih pojmova predrasude, autoriteta i tradicije. Izvodjenje razumevanja, u kojem su predrasude neizbezne, odredjeno je kao proces njihovog neprekidnog korigovanja. Pozitivno vrednovanje pojmovnog para autoriteta i tradicije karakteristican je motiv filozofske hermeneutike, za koju autoritet ne poseduje negativni prizvuk, vec je zasnovan na slobodnom i racionalnom prihvatanju. Povezanost razumevanja sa tradicijom je dinamicni odnos, u kojem ni tradicija ni subjekat razumevanja ne ostaju nepromenjeni. Odatle se izvode dve implikacije: da se smisao nekog (...) teksta ne moze iscrpsti i da je njegovo razumevanje beskonacan proces; i da suspenzija predrasuda uspeva tek tamo gde ih takoreci 'filtrira' tradicija. Autor istice napetost u Gadamerovom shvatanju hermeneuticke produktivnosti tradicije i vremenskog odstojanja kao instance koja doprinosi razumevanju. (shrink)

The notes that Martin Heidegger made in the so-called Black Notebooks stimulated, immediately after publication, intense discussions, especially on the issue of anti-Semitism and National Socialism. Does Heidegger’s personal fondness for these ideologies reflect on his philosophical work? In this essay, one important topic related to these issues in Black Notebooks is discussed – the topic of university. It became more frequent on three occasions, marked by significant events in Heidegger’s professional biography: taking over as rector of the University of (...) Freiburg, leaving that position, and exclusion from teaching as part of the postwar denazification of Germany. It turns out that the understanding of the university in the Black Notebooks corresponds to the ideas presented in Heidegger’s rector’s speech, and that this understanding is not equally National Socialist, but expresses the philosopher’s “populist” thinking. Although he possesses some elements of vocabulary that were present in Nazi propaganda, Heidegger integrates his views on the reality and future of the university with his other ideas – a critique of reducing knowledge to technical aspects, a critique of isolating science into independent fields, and a critique of Western thought. (shrink)

Nove tehnologije omogućavaju nove postupke i prakse koji moraju da se moralno i pravno opravdaju. IVF i surogat materinstvo, pored ostalih, spadaju u takve nove prakse. Stara pravila o tome šta je dopušteno a šta mora da se zabrani ponekad nisu dovoljna, a ni analogije obično nisu dovoljne. Da bi se došlo do prihvatljive linije razdvajanja izmedju opravdanog i neopravdanog postupanja treba izvršiti adekvatnu etičku analizu tih fenomena. IVF, tehnologija oplodnje „in vitro“, iako na prvi pogled izaziva sumnjičavost, ne sadrži (...) u sebi nikakav prima facie moralni problem. IVF se može uzeti prosto kao tehnika lečenja neplodnosti ili smanjene plodnosti, što je jedan problem koji pogadja veliki broj ljudi danas. Prigovori koji se mogu staviti ne izgledaju odlučujući a koristi koje se ovom tehnikom postižu su očigledno veoma velike. Ali ta tehnika je povezana sa druga momenta, donacijom genetskog materijala i surogat materinstvom, koji povlače razne vrste pitanja koja mogu biti od velikog moralnog i pravnog značaja. U tekstu se, sa etičkog stanovišta, analiziraju najvažnija od tih pitanja i naznačava kriterijum demarkacije koji razdvaja opravdane postupke od onih koji nisu opravdani ili zahtevaju ograničenje kroz pravnu i moralnu regulaciju. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Kant-Studien Jahrgang: 106 Heft: 3 Seiten: 487-506.