Ontological Status Research Articles

Paradoxes of an Image: A Pictorial or Postsecular Turn?

The article discusses the interaction between religion and art, focusing on contemporary visual theories, especially on the concept of vitality of image, formulated by such authors as David Freedberg, Thomas William Mitchell and Horst Bredekamp. The article states that the aspect of immediate fate (in the sense of pathos), which is emphasized in the concept of vitality of image, opens up the possibility to discuss the postsecular approach of the pictorial turn (Mitchell). The article recalls a recent situation in one of the Vilnius (Lithuania) churches, when the original sculpture of St. Virgin Mary, created by Lithuanian artist Ksenija Jaroševaitė, was replaced by the copy of widely circulated sculpture of St. Mary of Lourdes, originally created in 1864 by French sculptor Joseph-Hugues Fabisch, at the request of the churchgoers. In the article the latter situation also serves as a representative model, revealing the paradoxicality of an image, when the aesthetic judgement is changed by the unreflected recognition of the power of the image. The article discusses the problem of the ontological status of an image, admitting that the condition of emancipation of the image implicated in the concept of its vitality leads to the condition of the uncanny and questions related to such fundamental controversies as distinctions between creator and image or vitality and artefact.

Some Notes on the Poetics of the Postmodernist Novel

The purpose of the present paper is to explore some key poetological categories of the postmodern novel. It discusses the premises that led up to the birth of the postmodern era as well as aesthetic and philosophical peculiarities of the postmodernist paradigm. The paper focuses on such postmodernist narrative strategies as metafictional techniques, double/triple coding, the use of simulacra, intertextuality, deconstruction, eclecticism etc. Iconoclastic and irreverent, the postmodern novel is by definition a radical experiment that emerges when a writer feels the customary tropes of fiction have been exhausted. For the postmodernist, the well-worn genre of the novel is insufficient and no longer capable of conveying the imagination of the writer or the magnitude of historical events. Postmodern fiction is a product of the post-World War II period. It can be viewed as an extension of rather than a decisive break or deviation from modernism, the defining literary movement of the twentieth century. Like the modern novel, the postmodern novel is subversive; that is, it counters traditional notions of plot, narrative, chronology, and character development. Postmodern novels are often described as self-reflexive — that is, they center on the nature of fiction itself and are written as though fiction is independent of society, reality, and any realm outside itself. Postmodernist novelists focused on fiction as a self-sustaining universe of its own. Postmodernist fiction encompasses forms as wide-ranging as North American metafiction, Latin American magic realism, the French New New Novel, concrete prose and science fiction. Their common denominator is its ability to thrust its own ontological status into the foreground and to raise questions about the world (or worlds) in which we live.

Bolesław Leśmian’s Piła in Translation into Czech, Ukrainian and Russian and the Problem of Focalization

The article analyzes Bolesław Leśmian’s Piła and its translations into Czech, Russian and Ukrainian, focusing on its treatment of two leading themes in Leśmian’s writing: love and death. It also discusses the infl uence of focalization on the translation process through references to Mieke Bal’s conceptualization of this category, formulated in her book Narratology. The translators’ methods of handling focalization differ. The effects of focalization are refl ected in the disturbance of the balance in describing the main character in relation to love and death, but they also directly concern her ontological status.

The Concept of Perfection in Lev Karsavin’s Religious Metaphysics

ABSTRACT This article examines the concept of the perfect, a key idea in Lev P. Karsavin’s metaphysics that largely determines his understanding of personhood and its ontological status. The associated concept of the perfect person develops throughout the entire philosophical period of the thinker’s work, from his Philosophy of History to his treatise “On Perfection,” written in the last year of his life in the Abez’ camps. In this article, I argue that the concept of perfection is the main structural element in Karsavin’s religious–philosophical system, making it ontologically full and complete. I believe the Christian idea of the perfection of man in God, philosophical variations of which Karsavin finds in Nicholas of Cusa’s system of total unity and Vladimir Solovyov’s idea of Godmanhood, is both the initial intellectual intuition and the ontological premise of the thinker’s metaphysical constructions. His religious–philosophical work has a continuity with Russian culture’s spiritual tradition, where patristic thought of man considers the ideal to be the spiritual transcendence of the person in his striving toward the Perfect God. This evangelic idea turns out to be the central binding element both of Karsavin’s Christian personology and of his metaphysics of history, which is resolved in a metaphysical vein.

Introduction: Form and Medium

Introduction: Form and Medium

THE MODALITY OF MELODRAMA AND DOCUMENTARY : JURIS PODNIEKS ’ FILM “ IS IT EASY TO BE YOUNG ?” ( 1986 )

Although it is common for genres to be different for fiction films and documentaries, a productive element of genres can also be identified in documentary cinema. The film “Is It Easy to Be Young?” was made at the time when historic changes in the Soviet Union were in the air and tension, pathos and hope were offered by the time itself. The main characters of the film are young, and so is Latvia, the country that regained its independence a few years after the documentary was made. The characters seek, have doubts, cross the boundaries and make choices. Till the 1950s melodrama was treated more as a genre with its characteristic narrative and stylistic features. The main characteristics of melodrama: emotion, dynamic activities; the main goal of melodrama is to raise emotional response in the audience. In contemporary cinema theory (Linda Williams, Christine Gledhill and others), melodrama is also interpreted as a modality that permeates art forms and genres. The concept of melodrama modality gives melodrama an ontological status. That is, melodrama, if we look at it as a basic code of culture, from the aesthetic phenomenon becomes a form of existence. In “Is It Easy to Be Young?” the use of codes and artistic techniques makes it possible to analyse film as a melodrama, while melodrama modality challenges an attempt to obtain a detached view of the form of existence in which the observer is located. Keywords:

The Inclusion of Women in the Curriculum of Philosophy: Challenges and Solutions

Abstract Recently, an overwhelming amount of philosophical works by women has been made available by historians of philosophy. However, this (re)discovery is not adequately reflected in the curricula of philosophy departments in general. This paper discusses which argumentative strategy is most feasible in order to include significantly more women in the philosophy curriculum. In From the Exclusion of Women to the Transformation of Philosophy: Reclamation and its Possibilities (2014), Sarah Tyson identifies four reclamation models, which feminist scholars have utilized to contend why and how women should be included in the philosophy canon. It is shown that the key difference between the so-called corrective and transformative model is whether misogyny is considered an intrinsic feature of philosophy or merely an unfortunate development. It is argued that regardless of the ontological status of the philosophical discipline, both strategies promote engagement with women’s work in a way that revolutionizes current philosophical practice.

Ethnogenesis and Stranger-Kings in Old Scandinavian Literature

Ethnogenesis and Stranger-Kings in Old Scandinavian Literature

“A Great Miracle in a Little Room”: Thomas Traherne and the Intrinsic Value of Nonhuman Animals

Abstract The writings of English poet and mystic Thomas Traherne (1626–1674) remain a relatively underexplored reservoir. Traherne's technological context includes the invention of the telescope (1608) as well as the microscope (c. 1590). As will become evident in this article, Traherne's expositions on creation display an imagination that is adept at placing itself behind both types of lenses. This article focuses on Traherne's treatment of two types of insects—the fly and the ant—in order to extrapolate some of the insights that can be gleaned from Traherne's writings for the ontological status of all nonhuman animals.

Conceptualization of the Absurd in Philosophy From Logic to Logic of Sense

The article discusses the question of what absurd is. At first, the absurd seems to exist in two forms — semantic and existential. Semantic absurd is a characteristic of a statement, whilst existential absurd is a characteristic of a person's existence. However, the article shows that these are not two different entities but one. In antiquity, absurdity was synonymous with the falsity of a conclusion. In modern philosophy, Husserl, in Logical Investigations, believes that absurd objects cannot be understood. However, Tertullian's line appears already in early Christianity, linking absurd with an act of faith. In the 19th century, Kierkegaard was its representative. IIn the middle of the 20th century, Camus showed that the attitude to life as absurd is an honest view of life without illusions, followed by Nagel. In the 20th century, the absurd appeared in art, where it expanded the boundaries of consciousness. The new philosophy of the absurd takes into account its connection with novelty, creativity, liberation. It breaks established ties and makes the familiar new. Soviet scientist B.F. Porshnev points out that a particular act of thinking, “deabsurdization”, underlies logic. J. Deleuze in Logic of Sense demonstrates that nonsense provides the “gift of meaning”, comprehension always begins with some bewilderment; common sense is unproductive, but nonsense makes thought work. Before Deleuze, the absurd was an anthropological phenomenon, howbeit Deleuze gave it an ontological status. The modern philosophy of the absurd may even turn out to be theology.

Священная книга (Коран) как речевое событие: герменевтические подходы

In the presented article, the Sacred Text, which is the core of theological research, is considered as the Speech of the Most High, addressed directly to the theologian-researcher, who is ready for a “hermeneutic dialogue” with the living Word and is ca-pable of reflecting on the depths of its meaning. To conduct the presented research, an integrative approach was applied, which consists in understanding the philosophi-cal, cultural and religious hermeneutic concepts. Particular attention is paid to the re-ligious hermeneutical tradition of Orthodoxy and Islam. The principle of the herme-neutic circle (spiral) in biblical hermeneutics is considered; comprehension of spiritual experience in the Orthodox religious tradition; principles of the Sufi hermeneutical tradition and Sufi communication studies. In addition to scientific concepts, frag-ments of the description of the personal feelings of researchers that arise when work-ing with cultural and historical monuments are analyzed. For a deeper understanding of the theologian's inner feelings that arise in the process of their contact with the Sa-cred Text, the process of establishing a non-verbal connection between the reader and the author of an ordinary book or an ancient manuscript is analyzed. Further, the spe-cial ontological status of the Sacred Text is considered, which makes it possible to es-tablish a connection with the Almighty, and the hidden rules of reading (recitation) of the Koran proposed by the medieval Muslim thinker al-Ghazali are given, the ob-servance of which can lead the reader to a “hermeneutic dialogue” with the Sacred text. Then the idea of a hermeneutic spiral is analyzed, the movement along which can lead to the realization of the Event of the soul (spirit), shifting the framework of world perception, which leads to the fulfillment of an epistrophe and the experience of metanoia, which are the most important conditions for approaching the knowledge of a true transcendent being. The paper proposes consideration of the possibility of expanding the field of theological research by presenting the world as a Sacred Text (Primitive Manuscript), which will allow a somewhat different look at the "core of the methodology of theology", significantly enriching the scope of the theologian's scientific activity.

Journalism as a Killing Machine (Study of Press Freedom and Information Restraint in Indonesia)

The Purpose of This Study Is to Provide a Straightforward Picture of The Shift in The Primary Meaning of Journalism from An Information Provider to An Information-Killing Machine. Journalism Has Now Reached the Cusp of Its Failure, Without A Clear Purpose and Becoming the Place of The Press for Capitalism. Currently, People Are Forced to Access Inappropriate Information About Fake News and Information That Kills the Personality of The Indonesian Nation. The Results of This Study Show That Most Media In Indonesia Experience Deformation And Shift In Primary Meaning. Journalism Is Called the Information Killing Machine, He Slaughters All the Messages Until It Runs Out So That Communication Loses Its Main Role and Function. This Change in The Form of Journalism Is Somewhat Controversial Indeed Because In Every Publication Information Tends To Display Scary News And Is Not Safe. The Change Is Dominated by Online Media Even Though There Are Several Major Media in Indonesia Also Become Psychopaths in The World of Journalism. Although The Modern Era, The Main Function of Journalism Must Still Stand Under Journalistic Ethics. Freedom Does Not Mean Fomenting Market Forces Limiting Public Ownership and Reducing the Number of Votes in The Territory of Society. Government Censorship Is Long Gone, Therefore, The Government Through the Ministry of Information and The Press Council Must Play a Residual Role in Ensuring Responsible Press Performance. The Recommendations of The Broadcasting Commission and The Press Council Are Important in Their Position So That the Existence of Information In Indonesia Is Suitable For Widespread Public Consumption. The Conclusion Is That Although It Seems Nothing Is Significantly Different the Ontological Status of Journalism Has Undergone Major Changes and It Should Be Well Thought Out. Currently, What Is Happening in Indonesia Is Journalism That Is Full of Logical Mistakes. For Example, The Overarching Criticism of The Recommendation to Restrict Some Corruption and Covid 19 Suspects Was Disguised and Expanded So That Some of The Information Received by The Public Became Biased. Currently, Indonesia Is Looking for The Existence of Independent Journalism, Not Taking Sides Except For The Truth.

Creativity Phenomenon in the Context of Medieval Christian Philosophy

Based on the analysis of fundamental worldview principles of the leading medieval philosophers – Aurelius Augustinus and Thomas Aquinas – the conceptual principles of the phenomenon of creativity in Medieval literature are established. It is concluded that human creativity in the medieval Christian paradigm is associated with the divine, manifesting as salvation through union with God. In medieval Christian philosophy, creativity is not just a person’s action but also the appearance of a chance for a particular person to accept the new ontological status due to gravitating towards God and the Absolute.

Moral Consciousness as the “Voice of Conscience” in I. Kant’s Religious Philosophy

The notion of “conscience” is one of the most ancient components of the axiological sphere, the central factor of a person’s moral consciousness. The phenomenon is closely linked with the features of the ontological status of man in the world. The authors present the concept of conscience in the philosophical and religious tradition and examine the key ideas of Immanuel Kant’s religious philosophy in connection with moral consciousness as the “voice of conscience”. The idea of heterodoxy and contradiction between Immanuel Kant’s religious philosophy and Christian religious and philosophical tradition is substantiated.

Two Originals, One Artwork: On the Ontology of Originals and Improvisations

There is disagreement as to the ontological status of works associated with an original. Some hold that works like paintings are identical to the concrete particular the artist worked on while creating the artwork. Others suggest that works of this sort cannot be instantiated more than once. In this paper, it is argued that, even if artworks like paintings cannot be instantiated in reproductions, they are nevertheless possibly instantiated more than once. Moreover, it is tentatively suggested that the same holds for improvisations in music. Therefore, even the best candidates on offer do not allow for an identification of the work with a particular or for an identification of the work with a type that is instantiated maximally once. The argument rests on thought experiments, and an inference to the ‘best’ explanation. This inference is, of course, defeasible. Four alternatives, three of which are potentially fruitful, will be identified, and it will be argued that, on balance, these alternatives should be dismissed.

Journey is cognition: about the concept of travel and the typology of travelers in Croatian Tales of Long Ago

Following the theory of conceptual metaphor (Lakoff and Johnson 2015) which indicates the connection between language and opinion, the interpretation of the fairy tale journey in Croatian Tales of Long Ago by Ivana Brlić-Mažuranić, placed in the literary-theoretical and literary-historical context of a fairy tale (Težak 1997, Bošković-Stulli 2012, Propp 2012, Winter 2001), encompasses the process of understanding unknown things using known ones. The concept of journey, functionally adaptable to the different semantic matrix of the narrative text (Duda 1998), presupposes knowledge of journey as a culturally conditioned category with constructed meanings: departure, return, transformation, search, exploration, adventure, punishment, penance, temptation, obstacles, maturation, staying, cognition, misfortune, end, joy, etc. By connecting the two conceptual domains, the source one and the target one, the possibility of perceiving their ontological correspondence opens up. In addition to the fact that the journey presupposes the crossing of semantic fields in the bodily sense (Lotman 2001), it is interpreted through the prism of a metaphorical journey whose ultimate goal is to reach certain cognitions. The reasons that motivate Propp defined heroes - seekers and victims - to go on a journey are different, and they are motivated by a lack, material or spiritual. The concept of journey, realized in the fairy tale opus Croatian Tales of Long Ago as a journey through the celestial, terrestrial and underground/underwater world, is functionally realized through subordinate ontological metaphors of escape, temptation, staying, departure or return. The superior conceptual metaphor journey is cognition/ journey is maturation, derived from spatial topography and semantic changes inscribed in it by literary heroes - travellers, proves their ontological status summarized in gaining or confirming a highly ethical worldview realized by travel.

Entanglement in Time: Nostalgic Affect as Cine-Choreography in The White Crow (2018) and Suspiria (2018)

This essay is an investigation into the historical claim of a work of screendance that involves re-imagination, re-composition, or re-enactment: In what way does it access history? And how should we treat, with due seriousness, the vicarious aura of historicity these works afford? After identifying the ontological status of time as the blind spot in the debate regarding the corporeal relationship to the archive, I introduce the Deleuzian conception of time as an incessant exchange between the virtual and the actual. I present the hauntology of certain pasts as a result of the virtual-actual exchange dissipating the temporal identity of an event, which is in turn experienced as the subject's dispersion of the self. And I redefine the body as a corporeal-archival system that channels the exchange. I then analyze the nostalgic tones of the two selected films as affects formulated by cine-choreographies that express the dispersion of the self as an experience of the dissipation of the temporal identity of an event, thereby providing an analytical approach that makes it possible to interpret such screendance practices' claim to history.

The Medieval Problem of the Productivity of Art

This paper is focused on one of the key questions constituting the medieval debate about the ontological status of artefacts, which has to do with the productivity of art. We ordinarily speak about artefacts, such as statues or chairs, as produced by their artificers, and Aristotle describes art in general as a productive habit. In the first part of the paper, I look at how the proponents of the realist view of artefacts argue that the productivity of art can only be explained if we endorse their view, on which by producing an artefact an artificer brings about a new thing in the world, which is distinct from the natural things used in its production. I then turn to the reductionist account of artefacts and examine how its proponents want to show that the productivity of art can be preserved without positing that an artefact must be a new thing in the world, distinct from its natural components. In the final part of the paper, I look at one of the further corollaries of this debate, which has to do with the connection between the productivity of art and natural change.

Mapping the Agency of Trash

In view of the growing concerns and innate creative potential of waste, this article reconsiders the ontological status of discarded materials and materiality as active components/agents in the conception, making, and interpretation of art through a new-materialist framework. By denying a pure representational analysis, the study instead brings forth art’s complex dynamic material-semiotic character. It offers a re-reading of the artworks of twenty-first century Indian artists by exploring multiple facets of how trash operates conceptually and physically. A nuanced understanding of the co-constitutive, relational role of myriad human and non-human actors is instantiated through case studies. By discussing the re-appropriation of trash under three overlapping categories, where the artists apply trash as metaphor and symbol; relics; and substance/physical matter (for its physical properties like texture, colour, etc), the study acknowledges the material-discursive character of art. Thus, the study offers an extended interpretation of materials and objects in art where meaning and material are mutually constructive.

Tetralemma and Trinity: An Essay on Buddhist and Christian Ontologies

ABSTRACT This is an essay in comparative philosophy and philosophy of religion building on the ontological claims espoused by two major thinkers in the Buddhist and Christian philosophical traditions: Nāgārjuna (c. 150–250) and Hegel (1770–1831). I use Nāgārjuna’s fourfold tetralemma (catuṣkoṭi) and Hegel’s threefold dialectic (Dialektik) to propose a novel understanding of the ontological status of the self in its relation to itself and to its other, the no-self. Thus, I apply the tetralemma to the self, arguing that, to attain ontic completion, the self must itself reflect the tetralemmic form in the totality of its being – nothing – both-being-and-nothing – neither-being-nor-nothing. These in turn correspond to the Hegelian in-itself, for-another, both-in-itself-and-for-another, and neither-in-itself-nor-for-another.