L’article suit dans un premier moment les deux grands fils conducteurs du projet de phénoménologie asubjective qui se constitue à la fin des années soixante et au début des années soixante-dix comme geste critique envers la phénoménologie transcendantale husserlienne, pour ensuite tenter d’identifier les traces de ce que le projet de phénoménologie asubjective (y compris dans ses conséquences métaphysiques) doit à la pensée aristotélicienne, telle qu’elle est reprise par Jan Patočka au début des années soixante.

This article examines how Merleau-Ponty and Patočka confront the two major difficulties of every phenomenological thinking of temporality, corresponding to the two Aristotelian aporias of time: the unity of time and the permanence of the now . Our goal is to show that only a radical account of movement and the structure of appearing, such as that provided by Patočka following his phenomenological renewal of Aristotle, can clarify the true status of the unity of time and of the temporal present, (...) without falling into an excessive subjectivising thereof or an exacerbation of the transcendent pole . As an alternative to the Merleau-Pontian chiasm, Patočka offers a rigorous thinking of the phenomenological correlation, making time appear as a sediment of movement. (shrink)

The paper analyses Patočka’s phenomenological treatment of the concept of space and of personal spatiality. Patočka’s solution is used to assess Heidegger’s approach to the concept of space. Patočka’s phenomenological advancements in regards to his teacher’s developments are considered first through a comparison of their respective concepts of “Earth”, and second, through an evaluation of the reasons of the impossibility of the Heideggerian attempt, in Sein und Zeit, to reduce spatiality to temporality.

L?intention de cet article est de présenter la critique et le remaniement de l?intentionnalité qu?implique l?élaboration d?une phénoménologie asub­jective chez Jan Pato?ka. À cette fin, nous exposerons d?abord les raisons qui amènent Pato?ka à prendre ses distances par rapport au subjectivisme de la phénoménologie husserlienne, et les conséquences de ce dépassement de l?horizon transcendantal de la subjectivité. Et dans un deuxième temps nous tâcherons de suivre les implications de cette destitution du subjectivisme relativement au statut et au sens de l?intentionnalité. (...) La nécessité d?élaborer une phénoménologie asubjective et de propo­ser par là une alternative au subjectivisme et à l?idéalisme implicite de la phénoménologie husserlienne découle chez Pato?ka d?une volonté de rendre compte plus authentiquement, c'est-à-dire plus phénoménologi­quement, de la structure et de la modalité de l?apparaître. En effet, c?est en s?interrogeant sur le comment de l?apparaître que Pato?ka est conduit à affirmer que celui-ci ne peut pas être expliqué à partir d?un sujet qui, avant tout, est lui-même quelque chose d?apparaissant. S?il apparaît à son tour, c?est qu?il est soumis lui-même à la légalité de l?apparaître, au lieu d?en être le principe. À partir de ces considérations, il devient possible de formuler une alternative tranchée entre deux types de phénoménologie, comme le. (shrink)

Le projet phenomenologique de Jan Pato ka peut etre lu comme une tentative de recuperer ce qui, de la Physique d'Aristote (que Heidegger appellait le livre cache de la philosophie occidentale ), a ete oublie par l'histoire de la philosophie. Notre ouvrage se concentre sur un des resultats les plus aristoteliciens de Pato ka, que l'on pourrait resumer ainsi: le mouvement est phenomenologiquement et ontologiquement premier. Mais si le mouvement est premier, cela veut dire que les extases et les determinations (...) du mouvement ne sont, elles, que secondaires, c'est a dire phenomenologiquement et ontologiquement derivees. La matiere et la forme (du monde), l'acte et le possible, le temps et l'espace, l'hypokeimenon (le corps et le sujet) sont secondaires, car sedimentes, deposes par le mouvement, et ne s'eclairent donc fondamentalement que par leur reconduction au mouvement. C'est une telle reconduction que nous avons tache d'accomplir a chaque etape de notre analyse. (shrink)

La question de la temporalité est l’un des aspects les moins étudiés de la pensée de Patočka et elle est très peu discutée dans les débats internationaux concernant ses travaux. Cependant, elle revêt une importance décisive, car elle prépare son projet de phénoménologie asubjective. Cet article se concentre sur le cheminement qui mène à cette conception : il identifie les éléments théoriques et les conséquences asubjectives de l’analyse que le phénoménologue tchèque propose des Leçons pour une phénoménologie de la conscience (...) intime du temps de Husserl. Le temps n’est plus considéré comme l’unité du flux subjectif constitué par la rétention, mais il est compris comme l’ajointement primordial du champ d’apparaître dans sa structure « déjà » unifiée d’espace-temps-qualités. Le fondement de la structure du temps ne peut donc plus être le présent vivant du sujet et son champ de présence. L’aboutissement de ce parcours critique, qui n’est pas analysé ici, nous confirme que la temporalité fait référence aux lois de l’apparaître et reste un enjeu central, car elle agit sur notre compréhension du monde et sur la relation sujet-monde dans l’histoire. (shrink)

Esta contribución presenta como el concepto filosófico de “donación” es reinterpretado en la reflexión de Patočka. Partiendo de la lección husserliana, gracias a la cual las cosas son dadas en la pura inmanencia de la consciencia, él critica esta orientación “subjetivista” porque no desarrolla adecuadamente el tema del aparecer en el campo fenomenal. La segunda sección analiza tres desplazamientos metódicos que abarcan: el rol del sujeto, su relación con la trascendencia, el darse a sí mismo del mundo en su totalidad. (...) La tercera sección compara la reflexión de Patočka con dos referencias cruzadas a algunos intentos similares en la historia de la fenomenología. El tema de “la donación”, por tanto, nos traslada al mayor problema con el que ha trabajado siempre la filosofía: la manifestación del mundo. Patočka intentó esclarecer este problema mediante dos metáforas (el espejo y la pintura), pero también subrayó cómo concierne el modo en el que el hombre interpreta la propia existencia. (shrink)

Le langage exprime la relation entre l'homme et le monde. Cependant, une certaine manière de le comprendre en a fait l'une des figures de l'objectivité que Patočka a critiquée parce que elle ne nous permet pas d'accéder au monde. Cet article montre comment la pensée du philosophe tchèque a oscillé entre deux interprétations possibles: d'une part, le langage est pensé comme une couche essentielle mai qui se réfère néanmoins toujours au niveau plus profond de la perception; d'autre part, il est (...) le fondement même de la perception. La première interprétation est liée à la critique du positivisme logique de Wittgenstein, la seconde à la critique su subjectivisme de Husserl. Toutefois, à la fin de sa vie, Patočka, pour fonder une conception plus large du sens de l'existence, a fondé le langage sur la liberté, véritable fondement de l'être humain. Pour cette raison, le langage devient non seulement un point d'observation de la critique de l'objectivisme, mais il rend également possible un nouvel accès au phénomène de la chair et au contact sensible avec l'objectivité. (shrink)

Il problema del mondo è stato l'interesse teoretico di tutta la vita di Patočka. Questo tema si collega alla domanda classica della filosofia occidentale su che cos'è il reale. Anche la fenomenologia ha indagato questa questione riconoscendo nel mondo un costante presupposto e, insieme, un problema aperto. La presente indagine espone ed analizza il percorso argomentativo del filosofo ceco su questo problema filosofico. In che modo il mondo si dà a noi e qual è il fondamento del suo mostrarsi? Cosa (...) diventa il soggetto, destinatario dell'apparire, se è un momento del manifestarsi del mondo? Il metodo husserliano ha seguito l'analisi della coscienza intenzionale, Patočka, invece, ha parlato di una desoggettivazione dell'apparire e si è mosso a un livello più originario per tentare di cogliere l'emergenza del fenomenale. Il mondo naturale pre-teorico diventa, in questo modo, soltanto una via allo svelamento di una condizione più originaria: la concezione fenomenologico-trascendentale del mondo. Riformulando il concetto di mondo come totalità, alcuni concetti, come quelli di epoché e di apparizione, subiscono una torsione. Il filosofo ceco ha spinto la riflessione filosofica più avanti ed occupa oramai un posto originale nel movimento fenomenologico come lo dimostrano numerose pubblicazioni internazionali nel contesto non più soltanto europeo. Lo spazio aperto tra il senso profondo delle formulazioni di Husserl e il loro ripensamento ci insegna ad apprezzare i risultati dell'indagine fenomenologica nel loro giusto valore, non come verità assolute ma tappe di un percorso; e insieme è di stimolo a proseguire queste aperture, per lo più ancora inesplorate nelle loro conseguenze. (shrink)

In this article, I aim to show how Patočka’s work since the 1960 s has reconceptualized the theory of intentionality. Never abandoning the referential character of the intentional relation, the Bohemian philosopher situates intentionality in its original matrix: the world. This change has the effect of moving the cause of appearing from consciousness to the world, framing it as what appears and what makes appear. Intentionality is not only connected to transcendental consciousness; intentions also must be interpreted as lines of (...) force (Kraftlinien) inside the field of appearing. Patočka moreover locates the origin of all intentional theory in the Aristotelian theory of the soul. Patočka thus wants, on the one hand, to overcome the substantialist argument that considers consciousness a permanent presence and, on the other, to move beyond an idealistic conception of consciousness. Movement is the category that allows us to express these aspects of intentionality. Inserting motion into being is a privilege unique to the soul. (shrink)

The article focuses on Patočka early phenomenological thought developed around the concept of the natural world. More precisely, the aim of the article is to explore Patočka recently published manuscript studies and fragments, dating from the first half of the 1940s, in which Patočka attempts to establish a deeper living correlation between man and world based on a certain metaphysical conception of nature which is not, as for Husserl, just one of the horizons which experiencing creates around itself, nor it (...) is just a basis on which the harmony of experiencing and its evironment must develop, but in which nature also includes an aspect which is closed and alien to subjectivity. In this way, the article shows that Patočka makes a step beyond of Husserl's and Heidegger's schemes of a correlation of life and world, understanding and being. The article thus shows that Patočka early writings throw a certain amount of light on his later phenomenological work that had been most notably developed from 1960s onwards. (shrink)

Patočka’s phenomenology of world and life in the early 1940s – This article addresses Patočka’s early phenomenology of life and world. It begins with an introduction that situates Patočka’s reflections on the meaning of the world against the background of Husserl’s phenomenology. Next, it analyzes a rarely studied manuscript, The inwardness and the world, written during an often overlooked period of his thought: the 1940s. The originality of Patočka’s thinking in this period emerges through answering a series of questions about (...) the text: How does the Czech philosopher describe the world? What is reality from the perspective of the manuscript? How does Patočka present experience? Finally, the paper concludes by highlighting the implications of Patočka’s turn away from the relationship between world and subjectivity in this text. His reflections on the naturalness of the world in relation to human and non-human life suggest that, even before Merleau-Ponty, Henry and Levinas – and perhaps more faithfully than Husserl – Patočka was working to revise the concept of transcendental phenomenology. (shrink)

Tra il 1950 e il 1976, malgrado le prove e i contrattempi, Patočka ha ripreso spesso la sua meditazione sul mondo nel quale viviamo e dal quale la scienza ci allontana nello momento stesso in cui ne scopre l’oggettività. I dieci saggi qui raccolti permettono di seguire l’itinerario di pensiero che ha portato il filosofo ceco a porre la questione di una fenomenologia trans-soggettiva e a ripensare, in questa prospettiva, il concetto aristotelico di movimento. Lungo il percorso appare evidente che (...) dal 1910 Husserl liberava il significato fondamentale del “problema” di un mondo naturale; tuttavia, soltanto una fenomenologia che porta a compimento ciò che la Kehre heideggeriana inaugura, ha qualche possibilità di reperire le giustificazioni di un quotidiano in cui mito, lavoro e scienza trovano senso in queste grandi manifestazioni della libertà con l’altro che sono il sacrificio e la cosiddetta vita normale. (shrink)

Nell'anno accademico 1969-1970 - due anni prima di essere privato della libera docenza dal regime politico - Patočka tenne all'università Carlo di Praga le lezioni qui pubblicate, e per la prima volta tradotte in italiano. Esse raccolgono le sue riflessioni più mature sull'esistenza umana e sulla fenomenologia, elaborate attraverso un intenso confronto con Husserl - in gioventù il filosofo ceco fu uno tra gli studenti a lui più vicini - e con quello di Heidegger - di cui ebbe modo di (...) ascoltare le lezioni. Collegando il pensiero sistematico con la prospettiva storica, Patočka rivista a i nuclei teorici della fenomenologia sviluppando una critica della sue fondamenta, che non ne indica la fine, ma suggerisce piuttosto un nuovo inizio non solo di questa scuola filosofica ma anche della stessa filosofia. (shrink)

Il volume presenta la traduzione di un manoscritto che risale agli anni Quaranta del Novecento. Queste pagine appartenevano a un progetto più grande, rimasto incompiuto, attraverso il quale Patočka cercava di elaborare una filosofia dell'uomo e dell'interno. L'obiettivo critico del testo è il biologismo scientifico del tempo. Da un lato vi si possono riconoscere motivi derivanti dall'idealismo tedesco, dall'altro emerge un approccio fenomenologico nuovo. Esso, quindi, riflette i primi tentativi del filosofo ceco di pensare il rapporto tra la soggettività e (...) il mondo. Questo progetto mirava a sviluppare una teoria fenomenologica della soggettività che avrebbe dovuto precedere un'interpretazione filosofica della vita organica non-umana, e muoversi in direzione di una filosofia della vitalità. Con il concetto di "interno", a cui lavora nei manoscritti degli anni 1939-1945, Patočka intendeva sostituire il concetto di "soggetto", rinunciando da un lato alla soggettività trascendentale husserliana, e dall'altro lato al Dasein heideggeriano. (shrink)

The movement has great significance for all philosophical problems, both metaphysical and epistemological. In the first part of this article I would like to show how Patočka takes up some theoretical knots of this problem in four essays on Aristotle. These texts explain movement as a fundamental ontological factor. They therefore link it to ontology. In the second part, however, I will use a contribution by Chiurazzi to show that the same theme was in fact also present in the ancient (...) thought of Plato, who was criticised by Aristotle. In the conclusion, I will try to summarise some common ideas about movement, all of which confirm the centrality of a dynamic ontology, and show the richness of the consequences of this approach. One of the most important results is that the basis of movement coincides with what makes life itself possible. In this way, dynamis becomes the very basis of reality itself. (shrink)

This article aims to present one of the main themes that characterize the philosophical reflection of Jan Patočka: the appearing as such. Specifically, this papers is focused on three questions: what (was) appears? How (wie) the world appears? Which is the hidden reason (Grund) that founds appearing, but that remains hidden? The Czech philosopher reaches a conception of phenomenality in which appearance can only be conceived through an a priori structure. This conception leads to a formal transcendentalism of appearing, on (...) the basis of which it can only be thought, but not shown. The formal character of Patočka's approach, however, is a consequence of his speculative method. This speculative method, nevertheless, is problematic because on the one hand the structure of appearing is only responsible for its own laws (and not for what appears), on the other hand Patočka states that the phenomenal sphere also has a practical and vital function. The article traces the way the philosopher proceeds on this theme, which points he analyzes it discusses and which difficulties he exposes himself to. Although Patočka's reflection seems to postulate more than what he can justify (neglecting appearing as experiencing), it offers a strong hint to rethink the roots of the major phenomenological themes still remaining open. (shrink)

Following a brief presentation of the main results of R. Barbaras’ contemporary essay in phenomenological cosmology, L’appartenance, we propose to examine what appear be two internal tensions: a) the apparent inflation of the importance of the conceptuality of spatiality for describing the type of adjointment that unites subjective life and the life of the world, and b) the competition between two opposing ontological models of mobility in the description of subjective life (or of the living in general): a model of.

Le livre de Dragoş Duicu présente l’oeuvre de Patočka comme une phénoménologie du mouvement dont il opère l’archéologie conceptuelle en effectuant un retour à Aristote, ce qui permet aussi de situer Patočka dans le paysage phénoménologique. Il est établi tout au long de l’ouvrage que le mouvement est le sens d’être de l’être, dès lors compris comme physis, et de l’existence elle-même qui est mouvement de part en part, force voyante. Ce qui pour la tradition philosophique échappe au (...) mouvrement est en vérité toujours une extase du mouvement, déposé par lui, et s’avère dès lors secondaire, dérivé, car sédimenté. La philosophie de Patočka se donne donc indissociablement comme une ontologie et une phénoménologie du mouvement, l’auteur proposant un approfondissement cosmologique de la phénoménologie largement étayé sur une théorie de la sédimentation. Le livre offre une interprétation aussi érudite qu’originale de la cosmologie et de l’anthropophénoménologie patočkiennes.The book of Dragoş Duicu, presents the work of Patočka as a phenomenology of movement wherein he operates a conceptual archaeology by returning to Aristotle, and which allows him to situate Patočka in the phenomenological landscape. It is established throughout the work that movement is the meaning of being, therefore understood as physis, and that existence itself is all-around movement, force voyante. That which in the philosophical tradition escapes from movement is always in truth an ecstasy of movement, laid by the movement, which happens to be secondary and derivative, for it is ‘sedimented.’ The philosophy of Patočka presents itself therefore inseparably as an ontology and phenomenology of movement, as the author proposes a cosmological deepening of phenomenology largely supported by a theory of sedimentation. The book offers an interpretation as scholarly as it is original of the Patočkian cosmology and anthropo-phenomenology.Il libro di Dragoş Duicu presenta l’opera di Jan Patočka come una fenomenologia del movimento di cui l’autore svolge un’archeologia concettuale, che risale fino ad Aristotele, e al tempo stesso una ricollocazione all’interno del paesaggio fenomenologico. Il libro è attraversato da un filo rosso: il movimento è il senso d’essere dell’essere, in quanto physis, e dell’esistenza stessa, in quanto movimento anch’essa da cima a fondo, movimento o forza veggente. In questa prospettiva, ciò che per la tradizione filosofica si sottrae al movimento è sempre in verità un’estasi del movimento, depositata dal movimento stesso e proprio perciò secondaria, derivata, sedimentata. La filosofia di Patočka si offre, indissociabilmente, come un’ontologia e come una fenomenologia del movimento, come mostra Duicu sulla base di un approfondimento cosmologico della fenomenologia patockiana largamente incentrato su una teoria della sedimentazione. Il libro offre quindi un’interpretazione tanto erudita quanto originale della cosmologia e dell’antropologia patočkiane. (shrink)

Bricks and boxes -- Between Scylla and Charybdis -- Lessons from the history of science -- Placeholders -- Black-boxing 101 -- History of science 'black-boxing style' -- Diet mechanistic philosophy -- Emergence reframed -- The fuel of scientific progress -- Sailing through the strait.

This article gives a practice-based overview of the implementation aspects of Corporate Responsibility. After discussing the success factors for implementing Corporate Responsibility, the article describes a model for implementing Corporate Responsibility. Special attention is given to the success factors in the subsequent phases of implementation (sensitivity to the organizational environment, awareness of core values and clear leadership), to ensure that the most optimal results attainable for the organization can be reached. The implementation-model is clarified by looking at experiences in implementing (...) Corporate Responsibility at Chiquita. (shrink)

For many centuries, philosophers have debated this question: “Does God exist?” Surprisingly, they have paid rather less attention to this distinct – but also very important – question: “Would God’s existence be a good thing?” The latter is an axiological question about the difference in value that God’s existence would make (or does make) in the actual world. Perhaps the most natural position to take, whether or not one believes in God, is to hold that it would be a very (...) good thing if such a being were to exist. After all, God is traditionally thought to be perfectly powerful and good, and it might seem obvious that such a being’s existence would make things better than they would otherwise be. But this judgment has been contested: some philosophers have held that God’s existence would make things worse, and that, on this basis, one can reasonably prefer God’s non-existence. We first distinguish a wide array of axiological positions concerning the value of God’s existence which might be held by theists, atheists, and agnostics alike. We next construe these positions as comparative judgments about the axiological status of various possible worlds. We then criticize an important recent attempt to show that God’s existence would make things worse, in various ways, than they would otherwise be. (shrink)

This book discusses some of the most challenging ideas emerging out of the research program on institutional diversity associated with the 2009 co-recipient of 2009 Nobel Prize in economics, Elinor Ostrom, while outlining a set of new research directions and an original interpretation of the significance and future of this program.

Are concepts stable entities, unchanged from context to context? Or rather are they context-dependent structures, created on the fly? We argue that this does not constitute a genuine dilemma. Our main thesis is that the more a pattern of features is general and shared, the more it qualifies as a concept. Contextualists have not shown that conceptual structures lack a stable, general core, acting as an attractor on idiosyncratic information. What they have done instead is to give a contribution to (...) the comprehension of how conceptual structure organized around such a stable core can produce contextually appropriate representations on demand. (shrink)

In the “Sala dei Mesi” of Palazzo Schifanoia the months and the zodiacal constellations go from right to left, while the decans (three for every sign) go in the opposite direction. This problem was not clarified by Aby Warburg in his well-known essay Italian Art and International Astrology in the Palazzo Schifanoia of Ferrara (1912). The purpose of this paper is to investigate the reasons of this double direction.

The paper analyses the significance of the modern concept of „symmetry“ for the understanding of the concept of „intuition“ in Kant's philosophy of geometry. A symmetry transformation or automorphism is a structure preserving mapping of the space into itself that leaves all relevant structure intact so that the result is always like the original, in all relevant respects. Hermann Weyl was the first to show that this idea can be drawn on Leibniz's definition of similarity: two figures are similar if (...) they are only distinguishable through the simultaneous perception of them ( comperceptio ): „an automorphism carries a figure into one that in Leibniz's words is ‚indiscernible from it if each of the two figures is considered by itself‘“. The author argues that, under the light of this definition, Leibniz's notion of „comperceptio“ turns out to play a similar role for the notion of „intuition“ in Kant's philosophy of space and time. Both cases are about the „difference between conceptual definition and intuitive exhibition“, as Weyl puts it. This result has on the one hand an exegetical significance: it frees Kant's notion of „intuition“ from every vague reference to the „visualisation“ of geometrical figures; on the other hand a theoretical one: it makes easy to compare Kant's philosophy of space and time with modern developments of sciences, in which as Weyl first showed, the concept of symmetry plays a fundamental role. (shrink)