Review by A. Kanamori, Boston University (author of The Higher Infinite), review in The Bulletin of Symbolic Logic: “Notwithstanding and braving the daunting complexities of this labyrinth, José Ferreirós has written a magisterial account of the history of set theory which is panoramic, balanced and engaging. Not only does this book synthesize much previous work and provide fresh insights and points of view, but it also features a major innovation, a full-fledged treatment of the emergence of the set-theoretic approach in (...) mathematics from the early nineteenth century. Much of history is in the details, and much of good history is in tone, emphasis, and the drawing together of different strands. Without being Whiggish, Ferreirós is never far from major synthetic themes, themes that in the main work toward balance and pull back from excesses of emphasis of some recent histories. The main criticism of the book would have to be on matters of broad interpretation. Yet, Ferreirós brings a considerable mathematical acuity and expertise to his enterprise, and this makes his viewpoints the more compelling.” . (shrink)

Modern physics has revealed the universe as a much stranger place than we could have imagined. The puzzle at the centre of our knowledge of the universe is time. Michael Lockwood takes the reader on a fascinating journey into the nature of things. He investigates philosophical questions about past, present, and future, our experience of time, and the possibility of time travel. We zoom in on the behaviour of molecules and atoms, and pull back to survey the expansion of the (...) universe. We learn about entropy and gravity, black holes and wormholes, about how it all began and where we are all headed. Things will never seem the same again after a voyage through The Labyrinth of Time. (shrink)

This article is written in the style and method of an autoethnography that focuses on the author's spiritual journey with God while living with chronic pain. The labyrinth is used as a metaphor and spiritual tool to describe this journey. The author's personal experience with religion and spirituality is described as well as the choice of moving from thinking about God being 'out there', far away and looking upon God's creation to discovering God within - God 'right here'. The affects (...) and effects of living with chronic pain are discussed in reference to the process of walking the circuits of a labyrinth. The role of different people who played a part in this journey is highlighted. This way of writing corresponds with a narrative way of living which concentrates on deconstruction of dominant discourses and looking for outcomes that may lead to hope and transformation. The difference between rainbow hope and reasonable hope is explained and the consequence of choosing reasonable hope is discussed. Transformation of the person through the journey becomes apparent in the article. (shrink)

In the preface to his Theodicy, Leibniz describes the whole of his philosophical work as an attempt to follow Ariadne’s thread through “the two famous labyrinths in which our reason goes astray.” The first and best known of these—the labyrinth of freedom—concerns the relation between contingency and necessity in history. The second—and the one I want to discuss—is what Leibniz calls the labyrinth of the composition of the continuum. The problem itself is relatively simple: how can indivisible and distinct (...) elements constitute a continuum? How, that is, can singularity possibly be thought if the real is everywhere continuous, without interruption or break? Leibniz, as is well known, affirms both extremes of these questions: what really exists are simple unities or wholes, and yet the totality of these unities constitutes a single, organically complete world. While one mode of approach would be to turn immediately to Leibniz’s elaboration of monadic expression and intrinsic predication, I want to examine the effects the problem generates for the specifically Leibnizian conception of the real and the ideal, as well as the transition this entails from the metaphorics of the labyrinth to the figure of the infinite library and the problem of repetition. (shrink)

The Labyrinth is man's symbol for his human condition; it is life itself, and not a prison to be escaped but to be lived in.

The Labyrinth of Mind and World: Beyond Externalism–Internalism. By Chakraborty Sanjit.

As graduates embark on the next phase of their lives, what better way to get them accustomed to the rat race they are about to enter than by introducing them to the philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre? Cleverly told through the story of a pair of rats trapped in the labyrinth of existence, this allegory humorously conveys the key ideas of Sartre's existential philosophy in graphic-novel form - accessible for students and readers of all ages."--Back cover.

In einer kühnen Metapher haben einst Hieronymus, Erasmus und Luther die Heilige Schrift als ein Labyrinth bezeichnet, das die Leser bei fortgesetztem Lesen in eine sich sogar steigernde Verwirrung stürze. Beinah im selben Atemzug wird eben dieselbe Heilige Schrift von eben denselben Autoren als der einzige Faden gepriesen, der die Leser aus dem Labyrinth ihres Lebens herausführe. Eines und dasselbe als Labyrinth und als Faden: Diese Figur ist paradigmatisch. Im Labyrinth der Ethik geht es nicht anders zu. Nur wer sich (...) ihm überläßt, findet aus ihm heraus. 24 Beiträge von namhaften Theologen und Theologinnen zur Theologischen Ethik finden sich in den fünf Abschnitten des vorliegenden Buches, das nacheinander "Biblische Grundlagen", "Theologische Systematik", "Ethische Modelle", "Ethische Leitbegriffe" und "Ethik und die Religionen" behandelt: Hans-Dieter Bastian: Zwischen Glauben und Handeln: Bibel-Lesen - Werner H. Schmidt: Glaube und Handeln. Aspekte des Alten Testaments - Wolfgang Schrage: Der 1. Korintherbrief als Paradigma paulinischer Ethik - Michael Wolter: Der Kompromiß bei Paulus - Jörg Haustein: Beobachtungen zum Schriftverständnis ökumenischer Dokumente - Gerhard Sauter: "Schrifttreue" in ethischer Urteilsbildung Günter Bader: Handeln im Namen Gottes - Erich Gräßer: Die ersten und die letzten Dinge. Bemerkungen zur theologischen und ethischen Schöpfungswahrnehmung - Marcin Hintz: Glaube, Tradition, Vernunft: Auf den Spuren theologischer Urteilsbildung im polnischen Protestantismus - Rolf Schäfer: Christliche Glaubens- und Sittenlehre bei Schleiermacher - Karl-Wilhelm Dahm: Herausforderungen für Selbstverständnis und Rolle des protestantischen Pfarrers im Zuge des Modernisierungsprozesses Traugott Jähnichen: Sozialethik auf dem Weg der Ausbildung von Bereichsethiken - Historische Traditionen und perspektivische Herausforderungen - Ulrich Eibach: Christengemeinde und christliches Leben und Handeln in der pluralistischen Gesellschaft - Ludger Honnefelder: Gesundheit unser "höchstes Gut"? Wertentscheidungen im Rahmen der Ressourcenallokation im Gesundheitswesen - Jörg Hübner: Kollektives Handeln im Zeitalter der Globalisierung. Perspektiven für eine zukünftige politische Ethik - Gottfried Hütter: Menschenwürde und Menschenrechte für Tiere? - Tobias Schlingensiepen: Adam, wo bist du? Die Entkontextualisierung menschlichen Lebens als Problem u. Herausforderung evangelischer Ethik Edgar Thaidigsmann: "Ehrfurcht vor dem Leben". Das Problem der Begründung einer Ethik der Verantwortung für das Lebendige bei Albert Schweitzer und Hans Jonas - Konrad Stock: Laster - der "vielnamige Frevel". Eine theologische Erinnerung an ein vergessenes Problem - Ulrich H. J. Körtner: Bildung und Wertebewußtsein. Anmerkungen zum Wertbegriff in der aktuellen Bildungsdiskussion - Hans G. Ulrich: Güter oder Werte? Zur Aufgabe der Theoriebildung in der evangelischen Sozialethik - Hartmut Kreß: Toleranz als Verpflichtung protestantischer Ethik Hans Waldenfels: Unterwegs zu einer interreligiösen Theologie - Sung-Hee Lee-Linke: Interreligiöse Ethik. Ein Modell für die Zukunft? (shrink)

This book carries forward the discourse on the mind’s engagement with the world. It reviews the semantic and metaphysical debates around internalism and externalism, the location of content, and the indeterminacy of meaning in language. The volume analyses the writings of Jackson, Chomsky, Putnam, Quine, Bilgrami and others, to reconcile opposing theories of language and the mind. It ventures into Cartesian ontology and Fregean semantics to understand how mental content becomes world-oriented in our linguistic communication. Further, the author explores the (...) liaison between the mind and the world from the phenomenological perspective, particularly, Husserl’s linguistic turn and Heidegger’s intersubjective entreaty for Dasein. The book conceives thought as a biological and socio-linguistic product which engages with the mind-world question through the conceptual and causal apparatuses of language. A major intervention in the field of philosophy of language, this book will be useful for scholars and researchers interested in philosophy, phenomenology, epistemology, and metaphysics . (shrink)

Heliodorus is known for his elaborate narrative technique. This effect is due to ekphrasis, a resource widely used by sophists and recommended in textbooks of rhetoric (Progymnasmata). In the first block of the work, Heliodorus uses this resource, but not randomly. There is an image, literally or metaphorically repeating itself: the labyrinth. Our intention is to demonstrate that the repetitions have a commonality, in addition to a strong hermeneutical appeal. Moreover, the labyrinths are introduced in the part where the (...) narrative is skillfully written in medias res. It is precisely in this passage that the reader, as in a labyrinth, is meanderingly led by several paths, until he reaches the understanding of the opening scene, at the mouth of the Nile. The analysis of the procedures used by Heliodorus leads to the conclusion that the succession of textual or imagethic labyrinths places the reader in a game, from which he can only emerge at the end of the fifth book. (shrink)

In the "Labyrinth of Legitimacy" and Ethos Analysis. Carl Schmitt and Herfried Münkler on the New Wars and New Warriors The article analyzes Münkler's continuation of Carl Schmitt's late work on international law in the book Kriegssplitter and emphasizes its divergent ethical approach.

Georg Lukács was one of the most important philosophers of the twentieth century, his early Marxist work History and Class Consciousness (HCC) of 1923 being considered a hallmark of Critical Theory. But does it still offer, one century after its first publication, productive tools to analyze capitalist societies? To answer this question, we must first untangle the conceptual labyrinth in which the book’s main categories have been enmeshed. To contribute to this end, this paper examines the cogency of Lukács’s later (...) self-criticism (implicit in The Young Hegel and explicit in his 1967 critical preface to HCC) that his early concept of reification conflates the phenomena of alienation and objectification and thereby leads to an acritical and idealist view of capitalism. Our conclusion is that the self-criticism does not hold insofar as the theoretical framework developed in HCC involves an approach to the relation between subject and object that is much more sophisticated than understanding reification merely as the former turning into the latter. (shrink)

This important new book by a major voice in the Social Imaginaries movement offers the most systematic attempt to establish conceptual and historical links between the idea of modernity as a new civilization and the notion of multiple modernities. Arnason demonstrates a theory of globalization that is still compatible with the emphasis on unity and diversity of modernity as a civilization.

This book gathers together for the first time an important body of texts written between 1672 and 1686 by the great German philosopher and polymath Gottfried Leibniz. These writings, most of them previously untranslated, represent Leibniz's sustained attempt on a problem whose solution was crucial to the development of his thought, that of the composition of the continuum. The volume begins with excerpts from Leibniz's Paris writings, in which he tackles such problems as whether the infinite division of matter entails (...) perfect points, whether matter and space can be regarded as true wholes, whether motion is truly continuous, and the nature of body and substance. Comprising the second section is Pacidius Philalethi, Leibniz's brilliant dialogue of late 1676 on the problem of the continuity of motion. In the selections of the final section, from his Hanover writings of 1677-1686, Leibniz abandons his earlier transcreationism and atomism in favor of the theory of corporeal substance, where the reality of body and motion is founded in substantial form or force.Leibniz's texts (one in French, the rest in Latin) are presented with facing-page English translations, together with an introduction, notes, appendixes containing related excerpts from earlier works by Leibniz and his predecessors, and a valuable glossary detailing important terms and their translations. (shrink)

Labyrinths of Love is an interdisciplinary examination of the self, psyche, and soul, providing a comparative analysis from religious, paranormal research and transpersonal theory perspectives. The work creates a unique synthesis that unfolds what it means to be human and demonstrates a visionary epistemology of the self.

The motif of reading is placed at the center of Ecce Homo as both a vital problem and a practice in action. Nietzsche undertakes to reread every one of his "so good books" except the one he is currently writing, placing his reader in a position identical to his own. Faced with this ultimate Nietzschean "Library of Babel," the reader will have to re-experience for himself what it means to read his works, and assess his own reading biases in light (...) of the ascending or declining values associated with the text. Rarely noticed by its best commentators, Ecce Homo's "abysmal" mirrored reading device is also that of a labyrinth, haunted by the figures of Ariane and Dionysus, and its singular composition combines the doctrine of eternal return with the selective experiment of reading. (shrink)

Les modifications profondes de notre système socio-culturel font émerger des questions éthiques nouvelles, à l'intérieur de toutes les disciplines qui ont l'homme pour objet, telles l'esthétique, la philosophie, la politique, le droit, la médecine.Pour comprendre ces questions, par-delà leur « actualité ponctuelle », dans le flux vivant de leur constitution, leur approche doit être patiente, complexe, parfois aussi éprouvante qu'une initiation au parcours du labyrinthe. C'est cette tâche difficile que les auteurs de ce livre ont tenté d'amorcer.Leurs contributions sont issues (...) du cycle de leçons publiques qui ont été organisées durant l'année académique 1984-1985, par l'École des sciences philosophiques et religieuses des Facultés universitaires Saint-Louis à Bruxelles. (shrink)

This book consists of four parts: 1) an introduction of about 60 pages, mainly focused on the problem of the continuum in Leibniz; 2) a selection of Leibniz’s papers according to the critical edition prepared in Berlin, with English translation; 3) two appendices with excerpts in English from Leibniz’s papers and from texts of other authors on the continuum; 4) a rich collection of notes and a Latin-English glossary. In what follows I will make some short remarks about each of (...) these parts. (shrink)

A fascinating account of exemplarity in the context of deconstruction.

The problem at the center of this essay is how one can reconcile the continuity of space with a monadological theory of matter, according to which matter is ultimately composed of simple elements, a problem that greatly exercised Leibniz, the Wolffians, and Kant. The underlying purpose of this essay is to illustrate my reading of Kant’s philosophical development, and of his relation to the Wolffians and Leibniz, according to which, (a), this development was fueled by ‘home-grown’ problems that arose within (...) the framework of the Wolffian philosophy from which Kant started out, and, (b), on his journey to critical idealism, Kant gradually moved away from Wolffianism, but closer to Leibniz, which, however, he came to realize only some years after the publication of the Critique of Pure Reason. This reading is illustrated by showing that the problem of how to reconcile the continuity of space with a monadological theory of matter is a problem that Kant inherits from Leibniz and the Wolffians, in whose thinking it already plays an important role, that Leibniz’s mature solution to the problem differs markedly from the Wolffian solution, and that Kant’s early, pre-critical solution is largely Wolffian, while his later critical solution is largely Leibnizian, as he himself notes with gleeful satisfaction. The discussion also reveals that this problem is one of the key problems that fueled Kant’s philosophical development and, eventually, led him to the discovery of transcendental idealism. (shrink)

1.1 Erkenntnisinteresse und Fragestellung -- 1.2 Forschungsüberblick -- 1.3 Eine Typologie imaginärer Bibliotheken -- 1.4 Methodische Vorgehensweise -- 2. Im Fokus der Bibliothek: Theorie der Metapher -- 2.1 Ansätze der Metapherntheorie -- 2.1.1 Grundlagen einer 'modernen' Theorie der Metapher -- 2.1.2 Die Interaktionstheorie von Max Black -- 2.1.3 Hans Blumenbergs Metaphorologie -- 2.1.4 Metapher und 'kühne Metapher' bei Harald Weinrich -- 2.1.5 Zusammenfassung -- 2.2 Die Metapher in der ästhetischen Theorie.

The metaphor of the labyrinth in the second half of the XX century becomes an iconic model of the postmodern world order. In musical culture, the phenomenon of the labyrinth has acquired the meaning of a symbol of intertextuality, a game with cultural codes and musical heritage of the past, multivariance, variability, uncertainty. The ballet "Labyrinths" by Alfred Schnittke is an example of the embodiment of the labyrinth paradigm and is the object of research. The subject of the study (...) is the peculiarity of the implementation of the idea of the labyrinth at the compositional and dramatic level of the ballet cycle. In the light of the author's individual interpretation, the labyrinth model takes the form of a "macrolabirint" and a "microlabiint", where the macrostructure is the construction of the whole, and the microstructure is the last, fifth part. The novelty of the research lies in the consideration of the compositional and dramatic features of the ballet "Labyrinths" in the context of the metaphor of the labyrinth. The concept of the "macrolabyrint" contributed to the relief display of the principles of symmetry and centralization inherent in the labyrinth of the classical Cretan type. Symmetry in the ballet cycle found expression in the structure of the extreme parts, in their author's division into sections, the presence of a reprise in Maestoso and Meno mosso, a single tonal organization interspersed with modal episodes, the assertion of the third c–e in the intonation system of the parts. Centralization of the Cretan labyrinth was reflected in the endowment of the fourth part with the properties of the culmination point, characterized by an increase in sonorous qualities, an abundance of cluster verticals, and heterogeneous stratified tissue. The concept of "microlabirint" contributed to the depiction of the multivariance of the maze-confusion in the fifth part of the ballet. The nonlinear movement of the characters along the branched labyrinth model was carried out by the interaction of contrasting sections correlated with deviation into various emotional states. The conducted research allowed us to conclude about a new interpretation of the labyrinth paradigm in ballet in the light of Schnittke's individual author's handwriting. (shrink)

With the help of Kierkegaard and Wittgenstein the problem of image and language and, related to that, the problem of ethics and aesthetics is developed. The train of thought begins with the early Wittgenstein, who can be seen as a ‘logoclast’ - ‘Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent’ - seeing possibilities for showing the ethical and the religious in art. Via Kierkegaard’s critique of the aesthetic image we then come to a critique of the shared presupposition of (...) ‘logoclasm’ and ‘iconoclasm’, namely that image and language are two separate ways, a right and a wrong one. The critique of this presupposition leads us to Wittgenstein’s later philosophy, where we find a fundamental qualification of the separation of word and image, and to a more complete Kierkegaard, where neither language nor image have exclusive rights. The ways are not separate and it is not true that one of them is right and the other wrong; moreover, there are no two great ways; image and language, both with Wittgenstein and Kierkegaard, are each exceedingly diverse. (shrink)

This sharply intelligent, consistently provocative book takes the reader on an astonishing, thought-provoking voyage into the realm of delightful uncertainty--a world of paradox in which logical argument leads to contradiction and common sense is seemingly rendered irrelevant.

This is a survey of the concept of continuity. Efforts to explicate continuity have produced a plurality of philosophical conceptions of continuity that have provably distinct expressions within contemporary mathematics. I claim that there is a divide between the conceptions that treat the whole continuum as prior to its parts, and those conceptions that treat the parts of the continuum as prior to the whole. Along this divide, a tension emerges between those conceptions that favor philosophical idealizations of continuity and (...) those that are more readily available for mathematico-scientific use. (shrink)

Within the context of exploring new electronic arts' aesthetic regions and unexampled connections between generative art, games and mythology, my practical artistic research was led to focus on labyrinthine structures as exquisite legendary spatial gaming devices and as possible pathways to gain deeper humane insights, resulting into discoveries of original methods of labyrinth formation by means other than human. Labyrinths and mazes are inextricable paths, human made millennial structures that provide spatial challenges often connected with feedback, compression, entanglement and (...) hyper complexification of goal oriented displacement. They are perhaps the most ancient example of structure for spatial and serious games. Novel methods for labyrinth creation ‐ non-human methods ‐ are introduced and exemplified through artistic constructs. These new methods utilize non-human bioelectronic techniques and are initially grouped into three distinct sub-categories: the 'open' method, the 'mathematical flower' method, the 'animal' method. Four case examples of artistic non-human labyrinths resorting to the introduced novel methods are explored: k. video games (2007, 2010), Wolfanddotcom video game (2017), 8-bit Maze Gardens vegetable paintings (2018‐present), Ant Ennae Labyrinths bio-electronic apparatus (2019‐present). (shrink)

This article reconstructs and interprets the evolution of the Minoan myth’s reception in literature, fine arts, and urban development during the twentieth century. The author’s understanding of this evolution is based on three assumptions: a) myth is a polysemantic symbol of metaphysical and historical origins and function; b) myth reflects the relationship of the cognitive vs. creative mechanisms of human activity; and c) as symbolic, myth’s form must be treated as an image as much as it is a narrative. As (...) a motif in literature and the arts, the Minoan myth in particular has displayed all three of these aspects by allowing first its heroic narrative and, more recently, its formal structure and visual setting to serve as porte-paroles of ongoing social and civilisational transformations: aestheticisation, deconstruction of cognitive and political hierarchies, technicisation, and intensive urbanisation. The displacement of the narrative and of the figure of the Minotaur is interpreted from the perspectives of psychoanalysis and post-structuralism. (shrink)

The academic literature has viewed drivers of corruption in isolation and, consequently, failed to examine their synergistic effect. Such an isolated view provides incomplete information, leads to a misleading conclusion, and causes great difficulty in curbing corruption. This paper conducts a systematic literature review to identify the drivers of corruption in the construction industry. Subsequently, it develops a system dynamics (SD) model by conceptualizing corruption as a complex system of interacting drivers. Building on stakeholder and open systems theories, the proposed (...) SD model shows how the complex reinforcing relationship between authoritative, organizational, cultural, and financial drivers of corruption further increases corrupt practices. The new model also provides lessons that can be helpful in the development of policy frameworks to control corruption in the construction industry. To achieve success in the fight against corruption, the findings of this research suggest that (1) corruption must be understood at both the organizational and state levels, (2) anticorruption practices must be informed by ethically grounded stakeholder management strategies, and (3) anticorruption reforms must go hand-in-hand with strategies to tackle the economic downturn. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the methodological issues related to the obstacles and potential horizons of approaching the philosophical traditions in Islam from the standpoint of comparative studies in philosophy, while also presenting selected case-studies that may potentially illustrate some of the possibilities of renewing the impetus of a philosophical thought that is inspired by Islamic intellectual history. This line of inquiry is divided into two parts: the first deals with questions of methodology, and the second focuses on ontology and phenomenology (...) of perception, by way of offering pathways in investigating the history of philosophical and scientific ideas in Islam from the viewpoint of contemporary debates in philosophy. A special emphasis will be placed on: (a) interpreting the ontology of the eleventh century metaphysician Ibn Sīnā (known in Latin as: Avicenna; d. 1037 CE) in terms of rethinking Heidegger’s critique of the history of metaphysics, and (b) analyzing the philosophical implications of the theory of vision of the eleventh century polymath Ibn al-Haytham (known in Latin as Alhazen; d. ca. 1041 CE) in terms of reflecting on Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology of perception. (shrink)

Since antiquity the Phaedo has been considered the source of "the twin pillars of Platonism" -- the theory of ideas and the immortality of the soul. Burger's attempt to trace the underlying argument of the work as a whole leads to a radical rethinking of the status of those doctrines.