The present article reviews the psychological literature on selected problems of gifted education. It discusses issues which are particularly important from the point of view of the skills and tools used by psychologists, educational specialists, teachers and tutors in their daily work with gifted children and adolescents. The problems described include diagnosis of giftedness in education, types of educational support provided to the gifted, and the requirements placed on teachers of gifted students. A particular emphasis is put on the contemporary (...) research-related and practical challenges faced by gifted support specialists in schools. (shrink)

The "Essentials of Gestalt Theoretical Psychotherapy" offer for the first time in English an insight into the guiding ideas of this integrative psychotherapy method, which is consistently anchored in Gestalt psychology (and in this respect also differs substantially from most streams of Gestalt therapy, with which it should not be confused). The anthology includes ten contributions by authors from Austria, Italy, Germany and the USA. These deal with fundamental questions and concepts of any psychotherapy: The role and meaning of consistency (...) in practical life and in psychotherapy; the question of human epistemic possibilities and an epistemology appropriate for psychotherapy; the personality theory of Gestalt Theoretical Psychotherapy; the basic principles of therapeutic relationship and practice; the role of emotions in the example of phenomenal causality of feelings; the task of diagnostics in Gestalt Theoretical Psychotherapy; a clinical example related to anorexia; Gestalt psychological viewpoints for therapy progress; the role of relational determination in intrapsychic and interpersonal experience. (shrink)

Building on our diverse research traditions in the study of reasoning, language and communication, the Polish School of Argumentation integrates various disciplines and institutions across Poland in which scholars are dedicated to understanding the phenomenon of the force of argument. Our primary goal is to craft a methodological programme and establish organisational infrastructure: this is the first key step in facilitating and fostering our research movement, which joins people with a common research focus, complementary skills and an enthusiasm to work (...) together. This statement—the Manifesto—lays the foundations for the research programme of the Polish School of Argumentation. (shrink)

In a comment to Richard Rorty, Andrzej Walicki underscored the contextual difference between philosophy in a society like the USA and in post-communist countries. Citizens of democratic societies live best with a sense of contingency, situational embeddedness, plural rationalities, and relative truth. In East/Central Europe (ECE), the demand is for epistemological and moral certainty. Walicki did not say how philosophers in ECE are meeting this demand. How do philosophers in post-communist societies respond to the demand for ‘objective and universal (...) standards’ when the prevailing sense is that they have as great a need for clear horizons as the cultures to which they are called on to contribute foundations? In this setting, many philosophers seek to go beyond reflection to ‘reflexivity’—to ascertain the socio-cultural and moral prerequisites of “philosophizing.”. (shrink)

This book is a study in the logic of questions (sometimes called erotetic logic). The central topics in erotetic logic have been the structure of questions and the question-answer relationship. This book doesn't neglect these problems, but much of it is focussed on other issues. The main subject is the logical analysis of certain relations between questions and the contexts of their appearance. And our aim is to elaborate the conceptual apparatus of the inferential approach to the logic of questions. (...) Questions are asked for many reasons and for different purposes. Yet, before a question is asked or posed, a questioner must arrive at it. In many cases arriving at a question resembles coming to a conclusion: there are some premises involved and some inferential thought processes take place. If we agree that a conclusion need not be "conclusive", we may say that sometimes questions can play the role of conclusions. But questions can also perform the role of premises: we often pass from some "initial" question to another question. In other words, there are inferential thought processes - we shall call them erotetic inferences - in which questions play the roles of conclusions or conclusions and premises. The inferential approach to the logic of questions focusses its attention on the analysis of erotetic inferences. This book consists of eight chapters. (shrink)

Borden Parker Bowne was the founder of the School of Philosophy in Boston, taught there for more than a generation, and made a lasting impression on American philosophy. During Bowne’s career at Boston University (from 1876 until his death 1910), many of his students, who later also became professors in different areas, were inspired by his thinking and his person. His basic conviction is that it is the human person that is at the basis of Ontology and Ethics : the (...) person that preserves its identity within change thanks to memory; the person that is active in knowing and choosing; the person that acts deliberately towards values; the person that thinks – all these at least potentially. The purpose of the article is to examine Bowne’s metaphysics, i.e. the roots of his view of Personalism. What emerges is his idea of existence in general and of human existence in particular. This is done also historically, by examining some earlier views of man and reality in general, which were the background for Bowne’s specific ideas. He begins from his idea of existence as active and self-determining, and of nature as activated by the intellect and will of God, the Most-High Person. That is why the human person has the attributes of awareness and self-awareness, freedom and the ability to act, and self-control. The connection of Bowne’s Personalism with idealism also presents the problem of how do we come to discover the notion of person, which is not from simple experience of reality, but is rather developed or postulated. For Bowne the model for the notion of person is the Person of God. If we look at reality from the perspective of God-Person (Person par excellence), there is the danger of theologizing Philosophical Anthropology, and a reality of Bowne’s metaphysics, which wasn’t very popular among many philosophers. Nonetheless Bowne’s ideas were positively received by the Church in America, and were used for many years as the model for defending the Christian world-view against the attacks of naturalism. In that context, his Personalism effectively fulfilled its role, showing the human person to be a spiritual being, ultimately coming from God, the Most-High Person. (shrink)

The aim of this book is to present and analyze philosophical conceptions concerning mathematics and logic as formulated by Polish logicians, mathematicians and philosophers in the 1920s and 1930s. It was a remarkable period in the history of Polish science, in particular in the history of Polish logic and mathematics. Therefore, it is justified to ask whether and to what extent the development of logic and mathematics was accompanied by a philosophical reflection. We try to answer those questions by analyzing (...) both works of Polish logicians and mathematicians who have a philosophical temperament as well as their research practice. Works and philosophical views of the following Polish scientists will be analyzed: Wacław Sierpiński, Zygmunt Janiszewski, Stefan Mazurkiewicz, Stefan Banach Hugo Steinhaus, Eustachy Żylińsk and Leon Chwistek, Jan Łukasiewicz, Zygmunt Zawirski, Stanisław Leśniewski, Tadeusz Kotarbiński, Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz, Alfred Tarski, Andrzej Mostowski and Henryk Mehlberg, Jan Sleszyński, Stanisław Zaremba and Witold Wilkosz. To indicate the background of scientists being active in the 1920s and 1930s we consider in Chapter 1 some predecessors, in particular: Jan Śniadecki, Józef Maria Hoene-Wroński, Samuel Dickstein and Edward Stamm. (shrink)

Quantum mechanics implies many paradoxes (e.g. Schrödinger's cat, double-slit experiment, non-locality) which are in contradiction to our ordinary experience. To comprehend quantum theory we must revise our understanding of such matters as the objective nature of reality, the nature of causality, and the nature of a complex system and its relation to its components. Finally, common sense seems to be an epistemo-logical obstacle in our understanding of the quantum picture of the world.

In the paper a decision procedure for S5 is presented which uses a cut-free sequent calculus with additional rules allowing a reduction to normal modal forms. It utilizes the fact that in S5 every formula is equivalent to some 1-degree formula, i.e. a modally-flat formula with modal functors having only boolean formulas in its scope. In contrast to many sequent calculi for S5 the presented system does not introduce any extra devices. Thus it is a standard version of SC but (...) with some additional simple rewrite rules. The procedure combines the proces of saturation of sequents with reduction of their elements to some normal modal form. (shrink)

Until the time of Karl Marx and John Stuart Mill, philosophers generally held economics to be an integral element of moral philosophy. These days, the language of values—moral, aesthetic, and cognitive—dominates philosophic discourse, even though contemporary philosophers rarely hold economics to be integral to moral philosophy. Examining the thought of Friedrich Nietzsche and the art of Marcel Proust, Edward Andrew provides the first sustained critical analysis of values discourse, an analysis that deconstructs its content and its form.

An interview with Ed Casey where we discuss the intersections of his philosophical work with current political issues, including the Israel-Palestine conflict.

The aim of the article is to present some of the newest meta-mathematical results concerning set theory and to discuss on this basis the problem whether and to what extent set theory can serve as a basis for mathematics.

Heidegger’s thinking, according to his own testimony, is rooted in two traditions of philosophy: Platonic-Aristotelian ontology and Husserl’s phe­nomenology. Heidegger’s claim that the original understanding of Being is lost and has to be rediscovered conjoins the phenomenological claim that there is a certain mode of seeing that enables a revelatory philosophical insight. I would like to show how Heidegger combines both these claims in his supposition that the original philosophical conceptuality, as developed by Plato and Aristotle, was lost but can (...) be retrieved by means of applying the phenomenological method to the interpretation of texts. Furthermore, I would like to interpret this retrieval in the context of Heidegger’s project of “overcoming metaphysics” and Nietzsche’s suggestion that “Plato was essentially a pantheist, yet in the guise of a dualist”. (shrink)

Głównym przedmiotem książki jest ewolucja sensów nadawanych pojęciom wolności, tolerancji i sprawiedliwości. Rozumienie tych terminów jest istotne dla refleksji o polityce, zwłaszcza takiej, która nie unika etycznego i ekonomicznego kontekstu. Praca opisuje proces przemiany znaczenia tych idei odwołując się do obszernego materiału teoretycznego. Zarówno wolność, jak sprawiedliwość oraz tolerancja były tradycyjnie pojmowane jako brak (negatywnie). Wolność ujmowano na ogół jako niepodleganie przymusowi, tolerancję jako brak nietolerancji, a sprawiedliwość jako stan niezachodzenia niesprawiedliwości. Współcześnie upowszechnia się odmienna ich charakterystyka. Wolność bywa utożsamiana (...) z możnością działania, tolerancja z akceptacją, a nawet afirmacją odmienności, a sprawiedliwość ze „sprawiedliwością społeczną” opartą na przymusie redystrybucji dóbr. Książka oprócz rekonstrukcji tej przemiany poddaje też bardziej szczegółowej analizie jej konsekwencje. Teoretycznym zwieńczeniem owej transformacji jest koncepcja państwa opiekuńczego. (shrink)

This paper describes a kind of poem which reveals an exception to the instruction to know thyself.

This paper rejects an attempt to define what an idiot is for when Henry Sidgwick tries to clarify the doctrine that each individual should be given as much freedom from interference as possible.

Political thought of the war and occupation period continued the ideological and program searches started already before 1939. The concept of democracy was mostly associated with the values such as individual freedom, civil rights, safety of citizens, society of the state; cooperation among nations in the fields of politics, economy and protection of peace. The author deals with topics like: democratic international order; democratic political order and economic system. The author concludes the article with a few synthesizing remarks.

Artykuł stanowi syntetyczna próbę spojrzenia na historyczny rozwój filozofii życia z perspektywy pytań o człowieka. W jej dziejowej ewolucji wyodrębniono trzy okresy z uwzględnieniem specyfiki każdego z nich. Spoiwem wszystkich odmian filozofii życia jest otwarta, dynamistyczna koncepcja człowieka, będąca częścią wizji nieustannie stającego się świata. W takim ujęciu pytanie o człowieka odnosi sie do przesłanek rozumienia: naturalnych korzeni, dziejowej egzystencji czy ładu aksjologicznego.