La reelección presidencial puede analizarse desde una doble perspectiva: la perspectiva personal o la institucional. Mirarla desde el ángulo del enfoque personal, le resta posibilidad al debate, por cuanto no puede desconocerse que el presidente Álvaro Uribe genera comportamientos pasionales entre seguidores y contradictores. U nos lo defienden con ardentía por sus logros en seguridad, y otros lo atacan con pasión por el escaso avance en las políticas de empleo y lucha contra la pobreza. Lo cierto es que por este (...) camino, al final los argumentos se reducirían al amor o desamor que sienten los colombianos frente al primer mandatario. (shrink)

This article argues that — despite the value of distinguishing between insiders and outsiders in a contingent and relative sense — there is no fundamental insider—outsider problem. We distinguish weak and strong versions of 'insiderism' (privileged versus monopolistic access to knowledge) and then sociological and religious versions of the latter. After reviewing critiques of the sociological version, we offer a holistic semantic critique of the religious version (i.e. the view that religious experience and/or language offers sui generis access to knowledge). (...) We argue that all evidence for mental states is overt, public, and observable, and, hence, that there can be no significant difference in the access to knowledge of insiders and outsiders. (shrink)

I first show that a growing body of literature about the phenomenological and epistemic role of the structural features of experience can be recruited in favour of the view that absence experience is non‐veridical. Then I argue that such literature is in fact amenable to the view that absence experience is veridical if we rethink our conception of absence, and presence, itself.

The methodology implicit in empirically grounded social scientific studies of religion naturally allies with forms of semantic holism. However, a well known argument which questions whether holism in general is consistent with the fact that languages are learnable can be extended into an epistemological one which questions whether holism is consistent with an empirical methodology. In other words, there is question whether holism, in fact, makes social science possible. I diagnose the assumptions on which that objection rests, pointing out that (...) they are not necessary for semantic holism per se. I argue that a form of semantic holism along the lines advocated by W. V. O. Quine and Donald Davidson can avoid the objection. Moreover, when seen in this light, it has the resources to withstand an even deeper methodological problem. In so doing, though, several important but overlooked implications for the study of religion emerge. (shrink)

With postmodern societies placing a strong emphasis on making full use of one’s time, it is increasingly common to extol busy individuals as more achieving. In this context, although feeling a social expectation to be busy might imply that individuals are regarded as competent and desirable, its accompanying stressors may also detrimentally impact their mental health. Utilising data from a seven-day diary study, the current research examined the relationship between people’s daily perceived pressure to be busy and their daily emotional (...) wellbeing. Multilevel modelling revealed that daily social pressure to be busy was a significant predictor of daily negative affect, anxiety, and depressive symptoms at the within-person level. Of import, individuals’ trait emotional complexity acceptance moderated these relationships, with those lower on emotional complexity acceptance reporting significantly higher negative affect, anxiety, and depressive symptoms on days they felt greater social pressure to be busy. These effects were not observed among those higher on emotional complexity acceptance. Together, the current findings suggest that social pressure to feel busy is generally related to poorer daily emotional wellbeing, and that those with higher trait emotional complexity acceptance have an advantage of maintaining their emotional wellbeing in the face of such a social pressure. (shrink)

Putnam's Model-Theoretic argument purports to show that, contrary to what the metaphysical realist is committed to, an epistemically ideal theory which satisfies all operational and theoretical constraints can be guaranteed to be true. He draws the additional antirealist conclusion that there can be no single privileged relation of reference. I argue that the very possibility of a so-called ideal theory satisfying all operational constraints presupposes a determinate relation of reference, and hence Putnam must assume precisely what he denies.

Fluorescent in situ hybridization technology is one of the most exciting and versatile research tools to be developed in recent years. It has enabled research to progress at a phenomenal rate in diverse areas of basic research as well as in clinical medicine. Fluorescent in situ hybridization has applications in physical mapping, the study of nuclear architecture and chromatin packaging, and the investigation of fundamental principles of biology such as DNA replication, RNA processing, gene amplification, gene integration and chromatin elimination. (...) This review highlights some of these areas and provides source material for the reader who seeks more information on a specific field. (shrink)

Critics and commentators have been dissecting the themes of the Hollywood mega‐blockbuster, from its just war doctrine to its theories on environmental ethics. But there's a philosophical dimension that this otherworldly sex scene captures that most people have overlooked: the Tantra of Avatar. The characters Neytiri and Jake are the narrative vehicles for the telling of this romantic and seductive spiritual journey, which also conveys deeper lessons about how we can live with strength and moral clarity – and perhaps, if (...) we're lucky, achieve a meaningful union with others and the world we share. The love story involves Jake first submitting to Neytiri as his teacher, then accepting her as his guide to becoming the man he needs to be before he can join her in their mind‐blowing embrace. (shrink)

Augustine of Hippo was regarded by sixteenth century Europe as one of the most contested religious and philosophical authorities. Through deep examination of the production, circulation and consumption of Augustine's works, Arnoud Visser reveals the wildly contrasting ways in which he was read and appropriated by publishers, humanist scholars, and individual readers.

According to Michael Thompson’s defence of neo-Aristotelian naturalism in meta-ethics, (i) ‘[t]he concept LIFE-FORM is a pure or a priori, perhaps a logical, concept’, and (ii) ‘[t]he concept HUMAN, as we human beings have it, is an a priori concept’ (p. 57). Here I show Thompson’s argument for (ii) to be unsound, hoping thereby to shed light on the neglected subject of the a prioricity of concepts more generally.

Seeing total darkness is a peculiar perceptual state: in it, the subject is visually aware of something while seeming to fail to be aware of anything. Recent treatments of the topic (Sorensen 2008, Soteriou 2000) leave this particular puzzle unsolved. Here, I attempt a solution. Following Dretske, I begin by suggesting that the perceptual report ‘S sees (total) darkness’ is ambiguous between two distinct kinds of perceptual states: epistemic and non-epistemic. This will lead to an examination of the metaphysics of (...) what is supposed to be seen. I show, on the one hand, the difficulty of reducing the perception of total darkness to the perception of a particular instantiation of a property, and on the other, that it has important similarities with the perception of (non-particular) ‘stuff’. I propose, finally, that the solution to the puzzle might involve postulating a novel ontological status for total darkness: that of a ‘concrete universal’. Potential implications of interest for particularism and for naïve realism are suggested. (shrink)

A long‐standing aim of cinema – in particular of ‘extreme’, ‘unwatchable’ or ‘feel‐ bad’ cinema – has been to acquaint viewers with extreme suffering. In this article I first offer an explication of that aim in terms of recent work in philosophy of mind, then exploit the resulting framework to examine claims to the effect that a new technological development, Virtual Reality, provides cinema's best shot at achieving that aim.

This article addresses the need to interpret Latin American philosophy from its narrative experience. To do this, we must grasp the reflective style of Latin America as a way of cultural configuration and as a symbol work of its own. In addition, to identify Latin American philosophy as a tactic to respond and resist the strategy of the European hegemonic power is essential. Finally, it is argued it is not possible to think of Latin American identity without practicing a political (...) ethic which transposes the figures of narratives with the figures of history to the justice demand situation in which we find ourselves. (shrink)

Filosofía latinoamericana es para mí una expresión que describe un estilo de reflexión, esto es, la manera como el filósofo responde a las exigencias de su situación con los elementos que tiene 'a la mano' comprendiendo, es decir, creando proyectos. Permítanme aclarar lo que entiendo por estilo.

Technological development is accompanied by a paradox: while it often promises enormous benefits for humanity, it can also lead to inconceivable tragedy, including the instrumentalization of the individual, growing social inequality, environmental impact, etc. What causes this paradox? a) Could it be that the nature of technology generates this contradiction? b) Is it the agent that uses it? c) Or is it the circumstances in which technology is used that determine its suitability or disservice? My aim in this paper is (...) to revise nature, causes and political explanations of the paradox. To do so, the first section will give a historical overview of this phenomenon, the second will assess three proposals that attempt to explain its origin, and, finally, the paper will weigh such approaches from the view of the Frankfurt School. Evaluating the paradoxical conditions that surround technology allows us to better understand its role in our societies. (shrink)

El presente ensayo resume la crítica del filósofo Gilbert Simondon al antropocentrismo moderno y a las concepciones sobre la técnica desarrolladas en el siglo XX por ciertas corrientes filosóficas que provienen, según él, de lo que denomina un humanismo fácil, que circunscriben el desarrollo técnico a la racionalidad instrumental y a la distinción entre medios y fines. La propuesta de Simondon para salir del marco de estas visiones que considera reduccionistas, es ampliar nuestra mirada sobre la técnica, no centrarnos en (...) la relación entre medios y fines y adentrarnos en el conocimiento sobre los modos de existencia de los objetos técnicos. La mirada de Simondon nos invita a repensar nuestra relación con la técnica y, más allá incluso, a revisar nuestras concepciones ontológicas inclinándose por las que hoy conocemos como ontologías relacionales. La técnica para el filósofo francés es un puente entre nuestro pasado ritual y nuestra actualidad que persiste en la co-existencia de todos los seres, vivos y no vivos que conforman el tecno ecosistema. (shrink)