Way Of Philosophy Research Articles

“El centauro Quirón”

Como tantas veces sucede con la filosofía de Ortega, una hermosa metáfora le sirve de solución de compromiso para compatibilizar dos versiones en tensión en el seno de su pensamiento. Por una parte, Ortega es fiel a una imagen de la técnica como criatura del deseo y como generadora de problemas, a una visión convencional de la técnica, pero, por otra parte, Ortega ha sido capaz de ver en la técnica unas dimensiones más amplias e interesantes que la de la generalidad de sus contemporáneos.

Nietzsche y los filósofos de la diferencia

La gran influencia de Nietzsche en la filosofía francesa de las últimas décadas del siglo veinte puede ser vista como la inspiración principal para el surgimiento de la llamada «Filosofía de la diferencia». Este artículo retraza los momentos clave de esta influencia, ligando particularmente el resurgimiento de Nietzsche a finales de los años sesenta con la reacción provocada por la poderosa lectura de Heidegger, cuya búsqueda hermenéutica del fundamento y unidad últimas de la filosofía nietzscheana pareció ignorar, según la joven generación de filósofos franceses, la indomable pluralidad de sentidos al interior de los textos del autor del Zaratustra, así como los alcances que su pensamiento radical tendría en la creación de nuevas maneras de filosofar

War or Religion in the Archaeological Record Tiahuanaco, Predatory Empire or Religious Cult?

The nature of the archaeological report has been recently characterized as a reflection of Twentieth century military narratives (Vandkilde, 2003). Here that theory is tested from the results of an earlier formal analysis of archaeological reports (Caldararo,1984) and by contrasting the military narrative with a religious one. The Central Andean site of Tiahuanaco (Tiwanaku) has been designated as the place of origin of a religious cult that spread within the development of a state, expansionist in nature and colonial, though pluralistic. The military nature of this state has been replaced in recent years by a theory of religious cult (Janusek, 2006). The nature of its spread is here paralleled with those of the Kuksu religious movement of Southwest and California Native American peoples as well as the Sanusi movement of North Africa in the Nineteenth century. Tiahuanaco is therefore interpreted as not a military expansion, but rather a spiritual transformation of existing states. This analysis is framed in the context of current theories of warrior cults in archaeological narratives and the nature and style of archaeological reports. Humans are certainly susceptible to ideas and to violence, but in our own time, conversion to philosophical and religious ways of life is a powerful motivation for change as is lifestyle which we have seen in the past fifty years transform the world by global images of modernity. This contrast, war or conversion provides an interesting test of change in the ancient world.

Performance Indicators: The Educational Effect of Publication Pressure on Young Researchers in Environmental Sciences

E career researchers (ECRs) nowadays face a tough competition for positions, grants, tenure track,s and project funding. As for their elder colleagues, ECRs are increasingly evaluated by numerical indices, such as the h-index, impact factors, and length of their publication record. These seem to have become widely accepted as all-round quantitative indicators for the legitimacy and competence of individual scientists. The role of the scientist is becoming increasingly one of knowledge producer, indeed obeying what Erich Fromm called the law of maximum production. As such, he will be judged in terms of return on investment, and is expected to be able to trade his techno-scientific output in exchange for the financial effort made by society in supporting his work. In recent years, the evaluation of the scientific adequacy of researchers (ECRs and more seasoned colleagues alike) by the number of publications has found its way both into the scientific community and into funding institutions as an attempt to condense experience and scientific skills into objective numerical indicators. This development has largely been promoted by the influence of management doctrines initially developed in an economic context. These indicators are supposed to summarize the production and innovation in terms of simple and compact output figures, indeed simple enough for nonexperts to be able to judge of the quality and novelty of a publication. Although it is doubtful whether trying to reduce human ingenuity to simple bibliometrics is in any way appropriate, the corollary is without question an exacerbation of competition both between individuals and research institute in which visibility becomes paramount and the need for quantity may come to replace the need for quality. The dramatic increase in the number of journals and publications observed in recent years could thus constitute a symptom of “indicatoritis”, against which Rene Schwarzenbach has warned, rather than prove the effectiveness of the current competitive model to solve relevant scientific problems. We do not question in the least that writing up and publishing the results of a study is a vital part of the scientific endeavor. This is essential to document ones work and keep other researchers informed of breakthroughs, insights, pitfalls, dead ends, and new possibilities, but is also, as Karl Popper has shown us, a necessary exercise to objectify ones thoughts and sharpen ones own understanding of a specific scientific problem. We do certainly agree that if a research project does not generate a paper, it “might just as well as not have been done”, provided this is the consequence of a faulty experimental setup, and is not due to the reluctance to present “negative” results. Indeed, we do not question the necessity to publish, but the mindset under which an article is written. Upon entering research, ECRs will immediately find themselves under pressure to meet certain expectations in terms of publication record. Schafer et al. 2011 have commented in detail on a variety of specific implications associated with the publication process for ECRs and proposed solutions (with which we fully agree) to reverse what they regard as negative developments. They did not however discuss the educational implications of such a pressure. We firmly believe that the majority of those entering the path of science are genuinely willing to work assiduously and honestly for the common good, and that the enthusiasm they display toward the science is to some degree idealist and naive. Consequently, the initial stage of their training constitutes a decisive period, not only in purely technical terms, but also in a deeper philosophical way. In our opinion, the push to publish at all costs is detrimental to the character development of the scientist. Over time, the practice to “publish or perish” can only weaken the will to work honestly and could lead to increasingly dubious practices, going from publishing superficial and rushed analysis to downright falsified research results, thus undermining trust within the scientific community and equally dramatically from civil society. The expectation to publish

The Forgotten Comedy of the Socratic Turn

Leo Strauss ends his Socrates and Aristophanes with a pregnant assertion: the best account of the Socratic turn is offered by al-Razi in his The Philosophical Way of Life. Al-Razi’s account thus provides two invaluable opportunities: to gain some insight into Strauss’s unique understanding of Socrates, and the chance to examine the problem of Socrates from a nontraditional vantage point. Taking advantage of these opportunities reveals an oft-overlooked moment in the history of political philosophy: Socrates’s discovery of the regime. This essay examines al-Razi’s account while also casting a new light on Strauss’s own scholarship.

Notions of Intuition in the Cognitive Science of Religion

ABSTRACTThis article examines the notions of and counterintuitive beliefs and concepts in cognitive science of religion. Intuitive states are contrasted with those that are products of explicit, conscious reasoning. In many cases the intuitions are grounded in the implicit rules of mental models, frames, or schemas. I argue that the pathway from intuitive to concepts and beliefs may be distinct from that from intuitions to religion, and discuss how Christian theology might best interpret the results of studies in cognitive psychology of religion.In Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR), religious concepts and beliefs have been characterized as or counterintuitive by psychologists (Barrett 2004; Bloom 2004; Kelemen 2004) and anthropologists (Boyer 2001); and others (Pyysiainen 2004, following Sperber 1997) have made use of a notion of representations in their accounts of religious cognition. The word 'intuition' and its variants are, of course, used in several different ways in ordinary language, and have also been used in multiple technical ways in philosophy, psychology, and other academic disciplines. I shall first examine recent uses of terms in CSR, clarifying them in relation to existing usages in philosophy and psychology which contrast states and processes with those that are products of conscious, explicit reasoning. I shall then outline an account of how intuitions are produced in the mind via the rules of what have variously been called mental models, schemas, or frames. In Section 3,1 shall examine a few possible implications of this model-based account of intuition for CSR-particularly, the possibility that a study of the cognitive processes that produce high theological or theologically correct religious views might (somewhat surprisingly) be undertaken separately from the study of folk concepts and beliefs. Whereas the first three sections are explorations in the philosophy of a particular area of cognitive science, the final section will explore two questions from the standpoint of religious belief (and more specifically, Christian theology). First, what sort of religious epistemology enjoys the best fit with the theories in CSR discussed in the article? And, second, what sorts of further research questions are suggested, in turn, by this religious epistemology?1. Overview of UsageOne cannot read very far in the literature of contemporary CSR without encountering claims that particular concepts and particular beliefs are or Indeed, it might seem that there is fundamental disagreement about whether particular concepts and beliefs -say, about the existence of disembodied spirits-should be deemed intuitive or counterintuitive. On examination, however, it will turn out that apparent disagreements are only apparent, and that the parties to them actually share important assumptions about the nature of intuition, and about what makes a concept or a belief intuitive or counterintuitive.1.1 Kelemen, intuitive teleology and intuitive theismBoston University psychologist Deborah Kelemen argues that teleological understanding comes early to children, and indeed predominates their understanding of nature (Kelemen 2004). Young children prefer explanations of natural objects and phenomena in terms of what they are for to causal explanations. By age five, they understand that natural objects do not have human makers, but nevertheless view them in teleological terms (Kelemen 1999a, b, 2003, 2004). And evidence from six to ten-year olds suggests that they relate their assignments of purpose to nonhuman intentional causation (Evans, 2000, 2001; Gelman and Kremer, 1991; Kelemen 2004). She suggests that these research findings tentatively suggest that children's explanatory approach may be accurately characterized as intuitive theism (2004, 199). What Kelemen seems to mean by this is that normal cognitive development includes an earlyarising capacity and disposition to explain objects and events in teleological terms that imply a designer and/or fabricator, that explanations persist in the absence of a perceptible candidate for such a role, and by mid-childhood dispose the child to attribute the causation of some natural objects and events to unperceivable agents. …

Kant’s Cognitive Semantics, Newton’s Rule 4 of Experimental Philosophy and Scientific Realism Today

AbstractKant’s Critique of Pure Reason contains an original and powerful semantics of singular, specifically cognitive reference which has important implications for epistemology and for philosophy of science (and which is entirely independent of Transcendental Idealism). Here I argue that Kant’s cognitive semantics directly and strongly supports Newton’s Rule 4 of Experimental Philosophy in ways which support Newton’s realism about gravitational force. I begin with Newton’s Rule 4 and its role in Newton’s justification of realism about gravitational force (§ 1). I then briefly summarize Kant’s semantics of singular cognitive reference (§ 2), and show that it is embedded in, and strongly supports, Newton’s Rule 4, and that it rules out not only Cartesian physics (per Harper) but also Cartesian, infallibilist presumptions about empirical justification generally (§ 3). This result exposes a key fallacy in Bas van Fraassen’s main argument for his anti-realist Constructive Empiricism, and in many common objections to realism (§ 4). These problems reveal yet a further important regard in which Constructive Empiricism is not (so to speak) ‘empirically’ adequate, not even to Classical Newtonian Mechanics (§ 5). This inadequacy of Constructive Empiricism highlights a chronic empiricist misunderstanding of Newton’s mechanics (§ 6). Finally, Kant’s cognitive semantics improves upon the semantic interpretation of scientific theories, and rectifies the presumption that laws of physics literally ‘lie’ (§ 7). Thus Kant and Newton still have invaluable lessons for contemporary philosophy and history of science (§ 8).

Dwelling in performing as thinking

Merging Heidegger’s thought with the work of the Théâtre du Radeau, I aim at finding a philosophical way of describing the act of performing, and some of its philosophical implications, outside of the horizon of representation. Phenomenology and ontology are applied to theatre mostly with respect to directing and spectating; in the field of performance studies, they are used to read performance as social behavior, leaving theatre behind. Instead, my emphasis on Heidegger’s ontology is directed to consider the phenomenon of performing as a domain of actors and from the aesthetic point of view per se. Emphasizing the experience of the actor and of her lexicon to retell it, I aim at showing how Heidegger’s thought on Being reveals important insights to reconsider the theatrical event as an act of knowledge. I argue that both the philosopher and the artists of Radeau, by rejecting the methodologies, results, and implications of representations, make of the artwork a process for the unconcealment of Being. Laurence Chable’s words on her experience as an actress at Radeau show how performing constitutes a privileged training in embodying such a process.Putting this philosopher and this theatre company in conversation helps locate the role of theatre as a prominent one in the contemporary aesthetic horizon. Such dialogue extends the idea of the work of art as ontic experience to the practice of performing, and suggests to conceive the function of performing as enacted Weltanschauung. The event of the performance becomes in this way a place for welling, with props that become things and actors that become poets.

The Hopeful Liberal. Reflections on Free Markets, Science and Ethics

International crises and their dramatic outcomes notwithstanding, certain long-lived, deeply rooted beliefs are hard to die. Thus we keep hearing leading politicians and revered economic advisors who call for a return to growth and assert that structural reforms are imperative so that market confidence may be re-established and increased competitiveness achieved, without ever pondering upon the fact that these aims are precisely those that guided the global economy before the crisis. Could it ever be that endless growth, market confidence or competitiveness are misguided aims for the world’s economies? In these reflections of mine, I wish to address one of these resilient beliefs. Specifically, in the traditional philosophical way initiated by Socrates, I shall assess some logical knots arising from a hypothesis, that is, the commonplace liberal notion that the so-called “free market” possesses a unique capacity to generate prosperity.

«Перша» філософія й естетика Михайла Бахтіна: спроба подолання трансцендентального підходу у філософській думці

The article analyses M. M. Bakhtin’s early works “Art and Responsibility” and “Toward a Philosophy of Act” which show that the philosophical way of Russian thinker was essentially parallel to the path of Western philosophy from Heidegger to post-structuralism and at the same time was an original attempt to overcome the transcendental approach in philosophy and aesthetics. Bakhtin worked out his original “first” philosophy of being or moral philosophy as polemically opposed to the Western philosophy of mind and especially to Kant’s philosophy. But it was not free from certain transcendental moments connected with the orientation on the phenomenological method which later caused Bakhtin’s evolvution towards hermeneutical philosophy of language and culture.

All It Ever Does Is Rain: Alienation of Labor in the Songs of Bruce Springsteen

While we have been inundated recently with talk of jobs and the need for more jobs, little of this talk explores labor in a more philosophical way. Somewhat surprisingly, the creative practice of Bruce Springsteen captures the role labor plays in our existential condition, in our relationships with one another, and in our understandings of ourselves. Selected songs relate to four aspects of the alienation of labor: alienation from the products our labor, alienation from the process of laboring, alienation from fellow workers, and alienation from ourselves as human beings. Karl Marx discussed the latter variety of alienation at some length in The Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, concluding that “The object of labor is, therefore, the objectification of man’s species life; for he duplicates himself not only intellectually, as in consciousness, but also actively, in reality, and therefore contemplates himself in a world that he has created.” Springsteen has not single-handed exposed the dangers of alienated labor, and alienation of labor is not the only way alienation as a larger socio-cultural phenomenon comes about. But still, so much of contemporary labor drains away our humanity and leaves us feeling confused and incomplete.

Transmitting and Innovating in Confucius: Analects 7:1

Although the saying at Analects 7:1 is well-known and often mentioned in Confucian scholarship, there have been few focused discussions about what ‘transmitting’ means and in what sense it is contrasted to ‘innovating’. This article seeks to argue for the following points. (a) The ‘transmitting/innovating’ relationship should be understood in relation to the Confucian notion of filial piety. Analects 7: 1 is indeed Confucius's self-conception of what he is doing, that is, his way of philosophizing. (b) Traditionally, Confucius's transmitting has been thought to be related to his work on the ancient classics. This is not wrong, but is far from the whole story. Rather, it is primarily about the restoration of the dao. What Confucius transmits is the Dao, and it is for this goal that he worked on the ancient classics. (c) Moreover, since we learn about Confucius's philosophy mainly through the Analects rather than the classics he edited, an appropriate understanding of the ‘transmitting/innovating’ contrast must be related to the ideas in the Analects.

The Color of Change in Continental Feminist Philosophy

journal of speculative philosophy, vol. 26, no. 2, 2012 Copyright © 2012 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA The Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy (SPEP) was the first philosophy conference I attended along with my graduate peers. I gave thanks to the universe that at least everyone dressed better than what I had seen at the American Philosophical Association (APA) as a terrified undergraduate guest during a hire—and that the maleness of the philosophical milieu called the APA would recede for a few days. As silly as these two factors may sound in engendering an increased comfort level with philosophical spaces, it really made a difference. There was a uniform that appeared to pervade the philosophical milieu against which my presence in fashion, comportment, and body fell short. It was at SPEP that I found myself able to take up becoming a philosopher; it was among the feminist here that I could begin to think and take up the question of race. For me, it was always easier to talk about race among the Continental feminists than in the larger population of SPEP. But it was also during this time, as it seems to me now, that race as a relevant and important philosophical topic was beginning to flourish in Continental circles, and thus SPEP as a whole appeared much less hostile than the APA venue, though not wholly without hostility to the exploration of race. The Color of Change in Continental Feminist Philosophy

INTERNATIONAL POLITICS IN XXI CENTURY: PROBLEMS AND OUTLOOKS

The regularity of origin and the essence of phenomenointernational politics are concidered in the article, its correlation with international relations, the potential of philosophical way to the world problems is discovered

Text as action, action as text? Ricoeur, λoƔoσ and the affirmative search for meaning in the ‘universe of discourse’

Ricoeur placed a great deal of importance upon text and the interpretation of text. Bell accepts this by virtue of his extended analysis of the story of Babel, and I hope to offer ways of extending and developing Bell’s arguments to incorporate the ethical demands that Ricoeur placed upon text, upon our interpretation of text and upon action as a form of readable text. This will not include a commentary on discourse analysis, which I am not qualified to give. Ricoeur differed from the structuralist tradition in that he saw the relationship between language and life as taking a dialectical form: debate that presumes the possibility of altering one’s position by grappling with different views, and often taking inspiration from Hegelian dialectics, with their contrasting polarized views and the eventual attempt at affirmative common ground. The term λoƔoσ ( logos) was first used in a philosophical way by Heraclitus to give us the principle of order and knowledge, and yet for Heraclitus the world was dominated by conflict and change. Ricoeur studied this tension within logos between order and disorder, partly by his writing about language and his work on signs and symbols, partly through metaphor and narrative and also through his insights on translation. For him, all these are facets of the need for both Explaining and Understanding as forms of interpretation of language, ethics and action. Ricoeur’s work on logos provides us with an approach that asks whether ethics controls language or vice versa or both and how this fits in with structuralism and later movements. For Ricoeur, signs (words, texts) are not the centres of our perceptual experience. At the heart of our perception are our motivations and our actions, for which we must take responsibility in a sort of provisional affirmation that we will keep trying. In so doing we must doubt (be suspicious of) our own motives just as much as those of others, and see action as a form of readable text.

Neuroökonomie und Neurokapitalismus. Am Beispiel des Vertrauens

Abstract The relatively young discipline of neuroeconomics has taken an interest in forms of interpersonal trust from its very inception in an attempt to correct one-dimensional overrationalistic pictures of homo economicus. This article analyzes the notion of trust as present in these studies, but also takes a look at typical philosophical ways of criticizing neuroscientific uses of everyday concepts such as trust that insist on their irreducible semantic complexity. It is suggested that these critical approaches are justified, but often underrate the extent to which everyday concepts change or modify their meaning under various social, economic and political pressures. If this is granted, it becomes possible to take a deepened look at the neuroeconomic concept of trust. While it is true that this concept is under the influence of an every_day concept of trust it can be shown that this everyday concept of trust gradually takes on a reduced economic twist. If this fact remains unrecognized neuroeconomics in particular and neuroscience in general can take on ideological functions in reflecting back to society a seemingly natural understanding of trust that is, in truth, highly shaped by economic forces.

La philosophie entre science et humanisme

We hear frequently about the crisis of the humanities. The crisis of the humanities we experience nowadays is due to the economic logic of the capitalist system that everything is evaluated according to economic and social utility. Deeper reason for the crisis could be found in modern and contemporary humanities which lost their ideal of cultivating humanity for better life by nourishing human heart and mind. Philosophy confronts the same crisis by becoming a science, or the science providing ground for other sciences, and stopping to ask and reflect on the meaning of life. Other extreme is to make philosophy just a writing. At this point Kant is invited to suggest the way for philosophy between science and writing. Philosophy has at least three necessary conditions: human’s thinking ability (argumentd and counterarguments), the practice of this talent on available texts, and a vast field of concrete life. Philosophy is not merely a science, a doctrine and not merely an edifying discourse, but also and primarily a way of life to control one’s passion, to rectify one’s heart and mind and to reflect on the meaning of life.

The Place of Philosophy between Science and the Humanities

AbstractWe hear frequently about the crisis of the humanities. The crisis of the humanities we experience nowadays is due to the economic logic of the capitalist system that everything is evalu-ated according to economic and social utility. Deeper reason for the crisis could be found in modern and contemporary humanities which lost their ideal of cultivating humanity for better life by nourishing human heart and mind. Philosophy confronts the same crisis by becoming a science, or the science providing ground for other sciences, and stopping to ask and reflect on the meaning of life. Other extreme is to make philosophy just a writing. At this point Kant is invited to suggest the way for philosophy between science and writing. Philosophy has at least three necessary conditions: human’s thinking ability (arguments and counterarguments), the practice of this talent on available texts, and a vast field of concrete life. Philosophy is not merely a science, a doctrine and not merely an edifying discourse, but also and primarily a way of life to control one’s passion, to rectify one’s heart and mind and to reflect on the meaning of life.

Utopian Performatives and the Social Imaginary: Toward a New Philosophy of Drama/Theater Education

Abstract Drama/theater education lives in the tension of being a discipline rooted in the fine arts and humanities that has been transplanted into the social science of education. This paper suggests that a more aesthetic and philosophical reflection on what drama/theater does and can do in educational settings frees us from the scientized and instrumental concerns of more traditional social science research approaches in education. In this regard, and in moving toward the articulation of a new philosophy for drama/theater education (and its sister field of applied drama/theater), the recent work of performance theorist Jill Dolan and philosopher Charles Taylor is presented. Dolan’s notion of the utopian performative suggests that in certain performance contexts, spectators experience fleeting yet powerful “glimpse[s] of utopia” based on feelings of deep empathy and “lucid intersubjective understanding.” Taylor’s philosophy of the social imaginary suggests that society itself is created and sustained by collective acts of the imagination that are constantly in flux and flow and are possible to harness in the cause of social justice and change. Drawing on the work of these thinkers, and selected others, a new philosophical way of seeing drama/theater education as the collective creation of socially imagined performative utopias is offered for further consideration and development.

The Third Way of Philosophizing: The Topic of Scientism in the Perspective of Hermeneutic Realism

The Third Way of Philosophizing: The Topic of Scientism in the Perspective of Hermeneutic Realism