Materialism Research Articles

Can a Materialistic Philosophy Produce a Moral System? "Epicurean Model"

The main problem in this research was the answer to the question posed about the possibility of the existence of an ethical system based on a materialistic philosophy and not on an idealistic and metaphysical philosophy as was customary in establishing ethical systems. It has nothing to do with idealism or metaphysics. Rather, Democritus adopts the atomic materialist philosophy as its theoretical basis and does not depend on reason or divine laws as a criterion and judgment in moral issues, but rather nature, the sense of pleasure and the avoidance of pain as a spontaneous judgment of human and animal life alike. Herefore, this philosophy resorts to liberating man from the fear of death and the fear of the gods, so that this fear and anxiety do not spoil human life and deprive him of enjoying life itself. We have revealed in this research that the pleasure that the Epicureans are talking about is mainly the pleasure of the stomach, but it is not a reckless and exaggerated pleasure, but rather a pleasure that seeks simplicity and seeks to establish a calm life that is not disturbed by the pain resulting from the pursuit of more pleasures, the results of which are greater pain. The Greek philosopher Epicurus, who lived in the fourth century BC and a contemporary of both the Greek philosopher Aristotle and the philosopher Zeno, the founder of Stoicism that opposed his philosophical school, had established Epicureanism in Athens, Greece, to respond to the questions of the Greek public about the necessities of the historical stage and the decline of civilization after the death of AlexanderMacedonian in 324 BC.

Ecologies of care: drawing//cleaning interiors

Whilst gender has been critical to the analysis and understanding of the consumption of lived, often domestic, interiors, the analysis of a gendered practice of production has been much less considered. Through the work of feminist philosophers Elizabeth Grosz and Karen Barad, corporeal feminism and new materialist philosophy, and relatively new technologies such as the LiDAR scanner and embodied drawing methods, or through the daily acts of cleaning, I aim to reconfigure the structures and material practices through which interiors are produced, experienced and reproduced. Wymering Manor, a sixteenth century house in Cosham, UK, is used as a case study to reconfigure the drawing practices through which interiors are made. The house provides a space of cultural and historical “affect” in the middle of a suburban setting where local people are invited to engage through volunteering or as an audience member to one of its varied events. The volunteers are drawn into the house looking to connect with others, with history and the pleasure of being in a historic building. Through the collective daily acts as hoovering, taking tours, dusting, making tea and decorating, they embody the manor. As a result of the repetition of these gestures, the house becomes part of those that visit it.

Derrida’s Speculative Materialism/Marxism’s Promethean Scientism

This paper examines the relationship between deconstruction and Marxism by turning to recent attempts to read Derrida as a materialist philosopher. Following Martin Hägglund, I propose that Derrida’s critique of logocentrism implies a commitment to certain seemingly materialistic philosophical positions, most importantly, the radical foreclosure of an entity exempt from a transcendental field of differences. However, Derrida’s materialism remains speculative to the extent that it results in a philosophy of infinite finitude itself premised upon a transcendental style of argumentation excluded from scientific verification or falsification. By contrast, I suggest that Marxism with its commitment to Promethean scientism—the claim that all limits on human theory and practice are relative and subject to possible transformation—offers a more radical form of philosophical materialism.

Orthodox Schools of Indian Philosophy

The Indian Philosophy is regarded as the most mature philosophy in the world. Its approach towards the quest regarding creation, the Almighty and Salvation, makes it unique among others. All the six darśanas namely, Nyāya, Vaiśeṣika, Sāṃkhya, Yoga, Mīmāṃsā and Vedānta, provide a different and exclusive angle to the answers of the philosophical quest. The deep insights into these concepts by various sages and scholars, gave birth to various sub-schools, showcasing the divine intellectual prowess of Sanātana Dharma. The present paper communicates in a bird eye of all the 6 darśanas for an aspirant to choose the most suitable one for his salvation. Through this paper, we can come to a conclusion that the last darśana, that is Vedānta provides an amicable solution to current day aspirants. It gives a practical and more easy path of salvation through devotion.

ATOMISM, «SUMMA THEOLOGICA» AND B. LIBET’S EXPERIMENTS:CONTRADICTIONS IN SOLUTIONS TO THE PROBLEM OF THE SUBJECT’S FREE WILL

The article deals with the contradictions that arise when solving the problem of the subject’s freewill. A thesis is put forward that these contradictions are caused by the discrepancy between the views on free will and the ontological foundations from which they are derived. This thesis is consistently proved on the basis of both the historical and philosophical material and the modern discussion that unfolded after the discoveries of B. Libet and his followers. An analysis of the ideas of Thomas Aquinas reveals a num-ber of insurmountable contradictions indicating the impossibility of combining the free will of a subject and the theological principle of providentialism. The approaches of the philosophers of the Renaissance and the New Age to the indicated problem are considered, these being associated with an attempt to over-come this contradiction and again turn philosophical thought to natural philosophy. The dialectical ap-proach of Immanuel Kant is presented as taking a certain step toward resolving the contradictions through linking free will with the concept of morality and duty. The philosophical interpretation of B.Libet’s ex-periments is analyzed and the idea of conscious decisions of a person as determined by the activity of his neurons is refuted. Such an erroneous thesis is derived from the «flat ontology»paradigm. The popularity of this approach is due to the difficulty in resolving the psychophysiological problem and the lack of un-derstanding of the mechanisms for the transition of biologically determined processes of the material sub-strate to the field of the ideal. The groundlessness of sucha conclusion is explained by biological reduc-tion and the vulgar materialistic approach of modern authors, similar to the ideas of Democritus or Epicu-rus, who derived free will from the movement of atoms. All the examples considered in the article clearly demonstrate the fallacy of attempts to derive free will or its absence from something external to a person. The thesis that free will must be immanently inherent in man is substantiated. To solve the problem of free will, it is necessary not only to rely on the data of scientific discoveries but also to approach their interpretation dialectically.

The power of time in lyrical poetry by Per Atterbom and Viktor Rydberg

The article focuses on the concept of time in human and global perspective in the poetry of two Swedish authors of the 19th century: Per Atterbom and Viktor Rydberg. These two poets belong to different branches of the Romantic movement. Atterbom represents the early mystic Romanticism and he is one of the first Romantic authors in Sweden. Rydberg is a post-Romantic poet: his poetic works contain features that are characteristic of the literature of Romanticism, but they were written in the last decades of the century. The theme of the power of time is one of the most important for both authors, it determines characters of lyrical heroes and poetics in many of their poems but in different ways. Atterbom represents the destructive power of time. Thus, the main characters of his fairy tale play “The Isle of Bliss”, Hyperborean king Astolf and nymph Felicia, live on a magical island and aspire to escape from Time, but Time overcomes them. Atterbom shows in his poetry that time hasn’t its limits in the world beyond. Rydberg represents the characters who try to apprehend the rules of time. The immortal mythological creatures in his poems (the Tomten, the elf of a river) cannot explain why time has such an influence on man and mankind. This theme corresponds with a philosophical matter of the meaning of human life. The humans in Rydberg’s lyrics do not try to overcome time as they perceive the nature and its rules throw their senses.

From Platonic Gesture to the Theory of Discourses. On Some Unplublished Notes by Badiou on Philosophical Discourse

This article will examine some theses that Badiou developed in the first period of his philosophy, when he was close to the theoretical horizon of Althusserianism. The article traces a route back from the Manifesto for Philosophy to some yet unpublished notes, dating from the late Sixties, on an aborted collective project on materialist philosophy. While, according to the later Badiou – who is also the most well-known – contemporary philosophical discourse should recover the Platonic gesture after Heidegger, it will be shown that the early Badiou, by debating the nature of the Platonic gesture with Macherey, seems to conceptualise philosophical discourse and its function under the inseparable link of dialectical materialism and historical materialism. The article ends with some open questions for a possible theory of discourse that would build on Badiou’s theoretical insights.

From Platonic Gesture to the theory of Discourses. On Some Unpublished Notes by Badiou on Philosophical Discourse.

This article will examine some theses that Badiou developed in the first period of his philosophy, when he was close to the theoretical horizon of Althusserianism. The article traces a route back from the Manifesto for Philosophy to some yet unpublished notes, dating from the late Sixties, on an aborted collective project on materialist philosophy. While, according to the later Badiou – who is also the most well-known – contemporary philosophical discourse should recover the Platonic gesture after Heidegger, it will be shown that the early Badiou, by debating the nature of the Platonic gesture with Macherey, seems to conceptualise philosophical discourse and its function under the inseparable link of dialectical materialism and historical materialism. The article ends with some open questions for a possible theory of discourse that would build on Badiou’s theoretical insights.

Dialectical Materialism and its Theory of Knowledge

This article explores the basic tenets of dialectical materialism and its theory of knowledge. Itis relevant to identifying the basics of dialectical materialistic philosophy and its cognitive theory. The article addresses the research problems concerning the primacy of thought or matter, the acceptance of the concept of the immutability of the cosmos or motion of matter,the source of knowledge, the validity of truth and morals, stages of cognition, and the utility of knowledge in changing the world.The article deals with the research problems through the review-based analysis of Marxist criticismsof the dialectical materialist philosophy and its cognitive theory. The article reveals that dialectical materialist philosophy believes in the primacy of matter and the motion of matter. The dialectical materialist theory of knowledge regards the objective world as the primary source of knowledge, rejects the idea of absolute and immutable truths and morals, believes in the dialectical relationship between perceptual and logical knowledge, and gives high priority to the application of the gained knowledge in changing the existing world.

Communities of Care: The Social Ethics of Victorian Fiction; The Science of Character: Human Objecthood and the Ends of Victorian Realism

Communities of Care: The Social Ethics of Victorian Fiction; The Science of Character: Human Objecthood and the Ends of Victorian Realism

Философский идеал образованности: поколение предан(н)ых

The generation that studied philosophy in the 1980s learned to build communism and shape the man of the future, protecting him from the influence of bourgeois values and the ideals of the soulless “golden calf”. These were self-confident students convinced of the working principle of democratic centralism and the universality of philosophical knowledge. This was a young generation of idealists who received a scientific justification for their confidence in the Soviet materialist philosophy of Marxism developed by the previous generation, which was alive, it could be asked questions and discussed at the Faculty of Philosophy of Moscow University. What and how they taught in the 80s helped someone not only survive, but also technologically use management science to build a business or form a monetized personal brand, and someone to stay in philosophy, primarily in teaching philosophy, and build new educational systems of modern Russia and to form new relations for the provision of educational services. Fortunately, the subject of teaching in this generation was not affected.

Beginning at the Beginning: Towards a Trans-actional Music Sociology

Music sociology has proven a fertile arena for the study and theorization of object–subject interaction, with the work of scholars such as Tia DeNora and Antoine Hennion marking its key contribution to the ‘new sociology of art’. Recent years have, however, witnessed no little debate amongst music sociologists about the broader purchase and value of such scholarship, especially considering its apparent challenge to Bourdieu’s critical cultural sociology. This article seeks to contribute to debates in this area by advocating a novel approach to questions about music’s relation to the social, one that seeks less to map the social distribution of taste profiles or explore how listeners make use of music’s affordances than understand the variable ways in which music emerges as something to be attended to (or not) in the first place. Drawing on recent work in relational sociology, the mature philosophy of pragmatist John Dewey as well as new materialist thought, this article explores the potential of a trans-actional prospectus for music sociology. This is an approach that advocates a ‘flat’ social ontology in order to focus on questions about the constitution and configuration of musical events. In so doing, the article argues that if we are to gain a better understanding of music’s varied relation to the social, it is necessary to transcend the residual substantialism implicit in ‘new sociology’ and mediation-focused accounts and adopt an approach capable of integrating concerns of object-ness, emergence and attention with questions of power and inequality.

«Атмосфера истины»: модели истории философии в неосхоластике и неотомизме

The article shows the development of historical and philosophical problems in Neo-Scholasticism and Neo-Thomism. There are two key goals that authors of historical and philosophical models of the development of intellectual culture sought to solve: primarily, this is the legitimation of Scholasticism as a philosophical tradition, and secondly, its actualization in the context of the philosophical and theological discussions of their time. After the 1840s catholic intellectuals realized a gap to the medieval and post-medieval scholastic tradition, and their historical and philosophical research ceased to be a tool for legitimizing of interpretation of Thomism, which claims to be authoritative. Intervention of scholasticism into the problems of philosophy in the 19th century led to a determination of their relationship to Kant and post-Kantian projects of transcendental philosophy. As a result, Joseph Maréchal SJ formed a project of Transcendental Thomism: he moved from the strategy of legitimizing scholasticism through historical and philosophical material to the strategy of transformation of Thomism to form the program of Scholasticism that would correspond to the “Epoch of Criticism”.

Exploring Factors Affecting Sustainable Consumption Behaviour

Business development policies cover both marketing and sales functions, as they are so intertwined in most firms. Thus, managers should comply with the factors that influence sustainable consumption behaviour. The study aims to investigate the effect of environmental knowledge (EK), materialism (MAT), environmental influences (EI), the promotion of sustainable consumption (PSC), and sustainable consumption behaviour intention (SCBI) on sustainable consumption behaviour (SCB). Although many studies have examined sustainability issues for various groups of countries, activities in this critical field in Bulgaria are severely limited, and integrated research on the subject is non-existent. This paper focuses on the importance of investigating various factors that influence sustainable consumer behaviour. A total of 489 complete and usable responses were collected from participants from all regions of Bulgaria between May 2022 and July 2022. The partial least square-structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) and SmartPLS 4 software were employed to test the hypothesised relationships. The results indicated that EK and MAT significantly affected SCBI. Additionally, the analysis revealed the statistically significant impact of EK, MAT, EI, PSC, and SCBI on SCB. Moreover, this study demonstrated that SCBI significantly mediated the relationships between EK and SCB and between MAT and SCB. Finally, the outcomes of the moderation analysis showed that age moderated the relationship between SCBI and SCB.

«Мнимые противоречия»: предисловие С. А. Рачинского к книге Чарльза Дарвина «Происхождение видов»

This publication introduces the preface by Sergey Rachinsky, a profeccor of the Moscow University, to the book of Charles Darwin «On the Origin of Species». Rachinsky is best known in Russia as an educator and the founder of the school in Tatevo, Tver Oblast, and also as a founder of the temperance society in Tatevo. But in his correspondence Rachinsky repeatedly touches on religious and philosophical matters. For example, he gets into an argument with people like Vasily Rozanov and Leo Tolstoy. In addition, Rachinsky left some religious and philosophical works that are still in manuscript. This unpublished work was written in the 1882. Rachinsky touched upon the issues related to Darwin's theory of natural selection. Some of them had been raised before by his famous Russuan contemporaries, such as Nikolay Strakhov, Dmitry Pisarev, Kliment Timiryazev, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Konstantin Pobedonostsev. By the time that the preface was written, disputes over Darwin had been going on more than two decades. Disputes were related not only to «On the Origin of Species», but also to Darwin's later works. At the beginning of the preface Rachinsky commends the theory of natural selection which had proposed a general law of classification of living beings. The main body of the preface is devoted to Darwin's attempt to incorporate human into a genealogical tree of animal species. Rachinsky points out that Charles Darwin tried to gather some animal's characteristics and to work out the image not merely of a human being but of a Christian. Rachinsky calls it “a futile exercise”. He indicates that the inner human world has no precedent in the animal kingdom and believes that it is a miracle. Citing the principle of energy conservation as an example, and aims to show that “a miracle” exists in this theory. At the end of the preface author points out that Darwin's theory is applicable in some areas of science and it has no any contradictions with Christianity. He also points out to critics of this thesis that Church poses no restrictions to the exploration of nature.

Alexander Herzen and Natalia Zakharina: an Episode from 1838. Love Fever, Christianity and Early Socialism

Alexander Herzen has been the subject of an immeasurable number of biographical works as well as studies in the history of ideas, political philosophy, the history of philosophy, and a number of other disciplines. At the same time, we cannot say that the study of Herzen’s ideas has been exhausted, and while our knowledge of his biography is unlikely to expand significantly, the range of sources published to date is if not exhausted then at least close to it, a detailed study of Herzen within the framework of intellectual history and the history of political thought remains a highly relevant task. This is primarily due to the fact that, as the «big ideologies» of the 19th century recede into the past, it is time to undertake an in-depth analysis not only of the processes of forming their specific versions and debates within the framework of big ideological structures, but also to pay attention to theoretical transfers from one ideological framework to another and, far more important, to consider not from retrospect, knowledge about what these or those ideological and ideological structures will become in their development, but in synchronicity. This arrangement of the cognitive gaze is also close to Herzen’s mature philosophy, with its focus on alternatives (real ones), a history that develops as improvisation-not free of logic, but not subject to strict necessity either. In this article we focus our attention on a small episode of Herzen’s life - his stay in Vladimir in 1838 during several winter and spring months, between his arrival from Vyatka (after granting him relief from exile) and up to his marriage with his cousin Natalia Zakharina. In this small interval of time Herzen devotes almost entirely his time, free from non-burdensome service, to reflections on his past life, autobiographical experiences and love correspondence with his bride (with the latter including numerous material on the first two subjects). This focus on the intimate in the context of a mature romantic and socialist outlook turns out to be both a development of Natalia-Alexander’s «personal myth» and a new, in relation to the years 1834-1837, reflection on possibilities and ways for the self in the aspect of universal, all-important action/behavior/existence.

“What Blood Unites, the Sea Shall Not Divide”: Bohemian Day at the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893

“What Blood Unites, the Sea Shall Not Divide”: Bohemian Day at the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893

Challenging the Sex Binary in Hegel’s Philosophy

Although there is increasing investigation into Hegel’s account of the sexes, the intricate relation of “intersex” to the concept of sexes remains overlooked or marginalized throughout Hegel’s scholarship. This paper aims to examine Hegel’s conceptions of sexual difference and “intersex” as found in his Jena 1805/06 draft and mature philosophy of nature. For this aim, first, I trace how Hegel incorporates (or fails to incorporate) intersex research by his contemporaries. Second, I explore how Hegel’s view on sex difference changes from his Jena draft to the student’s transcript of his Berlin lectures. Third and finally, I show how Hegel’s critical analysis of classification and definition in his mature philosophy of nature and the Science of Logic intervenes in the “hermaphrodite” or “androgyny” discourses. In doing so, I will argue that Hegel challenges the stubborn and even still rampant belief in the strict sex binary, demonstrating the impossibility of drawing any given or ultimate borderline between the sexes.

On Snakes and Ladders

The climate emergency mandates a refocusing of society and education on the relationship between humans and the more-than-human world. Emerging from decades of social constructionism that openly promoted climate science denial, social and educational theorising now engages with new materialist philosophies and the agency of matter. Physicist Karen Barad’s book Meeting the Universe Halfway, cited over 13,000 times, offers an ontological foundation for new materialism based on her idiosyncratic application of quantum physics. While critically reviewing Barad, I found myself unexpectedly “sliding back down” into the terrain of my physicist pastime, rereading quantum mechanics in depth. I reflect here on how this “ontological detour” empowered me to “climb up a ladder” towards the theoretical foundation for my PhD project in climate change education. I argue that ontological grounding and cross-disciplinary engagement are vital for advancing research and gaining perspectives through lateral connections.

The Translator of Desires: Poems by Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi

Reviewed by: The Translator of Desires: Poems by Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi Allan Graubard (bio) the translator of desires: poems Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi, trans. Michael Sells Princeton University Press https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691181349/the-translator-of-desires 368 pages; Print, $21.51 From 711 to 1492 C.E., there developed in the Iberian Peninsula the Muslim empire of Al-Andulus. There is no question that its influence on Christian-Judaic Europe was profound. Its lead in science, mathematics, and philosophy was equaled by the elegance of its architecture, the refinements it brought to diet, and the beauty of its literature in poetry, especially the poetry of love, to name a few. Near the midpoint of the empire, in 1165, perhaps its greatest poet was born: Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi. From his first several years in Murcia, a town that has survived, now in southeastern Spain (near the Mediterranean), to all the cities and countries he explored thereafter, Ibn 'Arabi aroused exceptional interest. Although his life is not known in great detail, his lyrical gifts as poet and his brilliance as Sufi mystic and philosopher certainly are. Of his family, however, [End Page 169] we do know this: they were affluent members of the khãssa, or high society of Al-Andulus. They probably belonged to the Yemenite clan of the Banñ Tayy', which immigrated to Spain during the initial years of the Arab conquest. And after six or so years in Murcia, they moved to Seville, where Ibn 'Arabi grew up. At the time, Seville offered quite a cosmopolitan mix, where piety and debauchery paralleled each other, the latter especially along the banks of the Guadalquivir where prostitution thrived and poets gathered to sing their songs and discuss their art. Ibn 'Arabi's intensive formal education in religious, literary, and philosophical matters and his gaining notice as a prodigy therein also found its counterpoint at the river. As a result, in 1180 the philosopher and jurist Averroes, among the most celebrated of his day, gives the fifteen-year-old an audience and is struck by his intellect and intuition. One year later, in 1181, Ibn 'Arabi's life suddenly changes. While at a dinner party, above the din and revelry, he hears a voice that stops him in his tracks. The voice—aural hallucination or spiritual visitation?—tells him his fate lies elsewhere. Shaken, he slips away, wandering about until he comes to a local cemetery, where he notices a ruined tomb, and steps in. The back of the tomb opens onto a cave. There, in the relative darkness and silence, he spends a period of time in contemplation. Whether it lasts four days or fourteen months (the length of time is uncertain), he undergoes an ecstatic conversion that elevates him to the highest levels of mystic attainment. Thereafter, he renounces the wealth he was born into and leads an itinerant life in various communities of Sufis, with religious scholars, and with his fellow poets. From Al-Andulus he crosses the sea to Fez, Marrakech, Tunis, Cairo, and more. Then, in 1202, on the Hajj, he finally reaches Mecca. There, he experiences visions that will inspire much of the vast literature and philosophy he produces over the next four decades. That same year, his chance meeting with a beautiful, well-educated young woman, Nizam, who, near the Ka'ba, overhears him reciting a poem he has just composed but not yet written down, is decisive. Perhaps the daughter of a renowned shaykh, perhaps someone else, Nizam's understanding of poetry and love is precise. She tells Ibn 'Arabi that he has missed the boat; love consumes emotions and perceptions. There is no confusion, no "bewilderment" in love, at least of the sort that Ibn 'Arabi was playing with as a conceit. In [End Page 170] matters of love, sincerity requires that the poet be perfectly clear, including the longing that reveals it, the intimacies it grants, and its goal. This encounter, which commentators have likened to Dante's with Beatrice, evolves into a masterwork of the lyrical art, the sixty-one love poems that comprise the current book—first published in 1214, some twelve years after their meeting. Of...