The arena of the philosophy of time has been largely concerned with deciding whether tense distinctions reflect absolute metaphysical distinctions or not. After bringing the debate over the metaphysical status of instantaneous velocity to bear on the debate over the nature of temporal passage, I argue that we should further investigate whether aspectual distinctions reflect objective and absolute metaphysical distinctions too. I conclude that those who think that being realist about tense uniquely makes room for the idea that time (...) passes should be realist about the progressive too. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This essay is a critical introduction to the second part of the special issue Time and Reality. The volume contains responses to papers appeared in the first part, as well as many original articles. The aim of this introduction is to frame these works within the general arena of the philosophy of time, highlighting a number of recurrent themes. A central theme that emerges is a difficulty in pinning down the ontological structure underlying dynamicity and passage without postulating (...) a primitive notion of transiency that is conceptually independent from the instantiation of tense properties. I argue that this has far reaching implications. (shrink)

The view from inside maintains that not only to study and understand, but also to profit from financial markets, it is necessary to get as much knowledge as possible about their internal ‘structure’ and machinery. This view maintains that in order to solve the problems posed by finance, or at least a large part of them, we need first of all a qualitative analysis. Rules, laws, institutions, regulators, the behavior and the psychology of traders and investors are the key elements (...) to the understanding of finance, and stock markets in particular. Accordingly, data and their mathematical analysis are not the crucial elements, since data are the output of a certain underlying structure of markets and their actors. The underlying structure is the ultimate object of the inquiry. This chapter examines how the view from inside raises, and deals with, critical issues such as markets failure, information disclosure, and regulation, the notion of data, performativity, and the study of micro-structures. (shrink)

This article is an attempt to formulate a clear definition of the concept of crisis of Western sciences introduced by Husserl in his last work. The attempt will be based on a reading of the Krisis, which will stress its underlying continuity with Husserl’s life-long concerns about the theoretical insufficiency of positive sciences, and downplay the novelty of the idea of crisis itself within Husserl’s work. After insisting on the fact that, according to Husserl, only an account of the shortcomings (...) of the scientificity of Western sciences can justify the claim that they are undergoing a crisis, it will be argued that the common definition of the crisis of the sciences as the loss of their significance for life rests on a misunderstanding. The crisis of Western sciences will be characterized, instead, as the repercussion of the crisis of the scientificity of philosophy on the scientificity of positive sciences. The loss of significance of scientific knowledge for our existence will in turn appear as a further, inevitable consequence of the uprooting of the sciences from the soil of a universal philosophy culminating in metaphysics, and thus, as a phenomenon deeply intertwined with the crisis of Western sciences, but not identical to it. (shrink)

We present a modal logic called (logic of intention and attempt) in which we can reason about intention dynamics and intentional action execution. By exploiting the expressive power of , we provide a formal analysis of the relation between intention and action and highlight the pivotal role of attempt in action execution. Besides, we deal with the problems of instrumental reasoning and intention persistence.

Although Husserlian phenomenology appears to require that practitioners bracket all metaphysical questions and claims, this requirement runs against the evidence of experience in which objects themselves are presented as constituents of experience. Moreover, to completely bracket metaphysical considerations would suggest that phenomenology is compatible with metaphysical views it should in principle deny. Nonetheless, permitting metaphysical claims threatens to contravene the critical limits of phenomenology, to invite claims that would require a perspective different in kind than our own to verify. These (...) tensions raise an important question, namely, what are the metaphysical implications of the phenomenologically intuitive claim that objects themselves are constituents of experience? To answer this question, I draw on a broad swath of thought on transcendental idealism and phenomenology. I argue that a modest metaphysics of appearance is warranted within the critical limits of Husserlian phenomenology. Through discussing and addressing the problems that typically plague transcendental arguments, I show that Husserlian phenomenology permits stronger claims about objects of experience than deflationary accounts allow but does not permit claims about intrinsic properties allowed by some forms of transcendental idealism. (shrink)

Husserl’s theory of types is most often associated with his account of perception. Here, types operate as pre-predicative frames of experience that guide the perception of objects. In this paper, I will argue that Husserl’s theory of types is also central to his account of intersubjectivity. More specifically, I will show that a foundational kind of typical subjectivity is entailed by his discussion of the sphere of ownness. It is by way of this type that even a solitary subject can (...) tacitly anticipate the possibility of other subjects. It is also this type that is enriched through interactions between actual subjects. (shrink)

According to Husserl, Plato played a fundamental role in the development of the notion of teleology, so much so that Husserl viewed the myth narrated in the Timaeus as a fundamental stage in the long history that he hoped would eventually lead to a teleological science of the world grounded in transcendental phenomenology. This article explores this interpretation of Plato’s legacy in light of Husserl’s thesis that Plato was the initiator of the ideal of genuine science. It also outlines how (...) Husserl sought conceptual resources within transcendental phenomenology to turn the key elements of Plato’s creation myth into rigorous scientific ideas. (shrink)

This book offers a systematic interpretation of the relation between natural science and metaphysics in Husserl's phenomenology. It shows that Husserl's account of scientific knowledge is a radical alternative to established methods and frameworks in contemporary philosophy of science. The author's interpretation of Husserl's philosophy offers a critical reconstruction of the historical context from which his phenomenological approach developed, as well as new interpretations of key Husserlian concepts such as metaphysics, idealization, life-world, objectivism, crisis of the sciences, and historicity. The (...) development of Husserl's philosophical project is marked by the tension between natural science and transcendental phenomenology. While natural science provides a paradigmatic case of the way in which transcendental phenomenology, ontology, empirical science, and metaphysics can be articulated, it has also been the object of philosophical misunderstandings that have determined the current cultural and philosophical crisis. This book demonstrates the ways in which Husserl shows that our conceptions of philosophy and of nature are inseparable. Philosophy's Nature will appeal to scholars and advanced students who are interested in Husserl and the relations between phenomenology, natural science, and metaphysics. (shrink)

We develop a conceptual and formal clarification of notion of surprise as a belief-based phenomenon by exploring a rich typology. Each kind of surprise is associated with a particular phase of cognitive processing and involves particular kinds of epistemic representations (representations and expectations under scrutiny, implicit beliefs, presuppositions). We define two main kinds of surprise: mismatch-based surprise and astonishment. In the central part of the paper we suggest how a formal model of surprise can be integrated with a formal model (...) of belief change. We investigate the role of surprise in triggering the process of belief reconsideration. There are a number of models of surprise developed in the psychology of emotion. We provide several comparisons of our approach with those models. (shrink)

This paper proposes a logical framework for representing static and dynamic properties of different kinds of individual and collective attitudes. A complete axiomatization as well as a decidability result for the logic are given. The logic is applied to game theory by providing a formal analysis of the epistemic conditions of iterated deletion of weakly dominated strategies (IDWDS), or iterated weak dominance for short. The main difference between the analysis of the epistemic conditions of iterated weak dominance given in this (...) paper and other analysis is that we use a semi-qualitative approach to uncertainty based on the notion of plausibility first introduced by Spohn, whereas other analysis are based on a quantitative representation of uncertainty in terms of probabilities. (shrink)

I present a variant of with time, called, interpreted in standard Kripke semantics. On the syntactic level, is nothing but the extension of atemporal individual by: the future tense and past tense operators, and the operator of group agency for the grand coalition. A sound and complete axiomatisation for is given. Moreover, it is shown that supports reasoning about interesting normative concepts such as the concepts of achievement obligation and commitment.

We continue the work initiated in Herzig and Lorini (J Logic Lang Inform, in press) whose aim is to provide a minimalistic logical framework combining the expressiveness of dynamic logic in which actions are first-class citizens in the object language, with the expressiveness of logics of agency such as STIT and logics of group capabilities such as CL and ATL. We present a logic called ( Deterministic Dynamic logic of Agency ) which supports reasoning about actions and joint actions of (...) agents and coalitions, and agentive and coalitional capabilities. In it is supposed that, once all agents have selected a joint action, the effect of this joint action is deterministic. In order to assess we prove that it embeds Coalition Logic. We then extend with modal operators for agents’ preferences, and show that the resulting logic is sufficiently expressive to capture the game-theoretic concepts of best response and Nash equilibrium. (shrink)

There are two no-change objections that can be raised against the B-theory of time. One stems from the observation that in a B-theoretic scenario changes of determinations can only be represented by propositions which have eternal truth values. The other derives from the principle that nothing can vary over a period of time if it doesn’t instantiate a state of change at all the instants of time which compose it. Here I argue that both objections apply to all comparative conceptions (...) of change, regardless of whether they take tense seriously or not. It follows that, contrary to what is widely believed, A-theoretic accounts of time are not immune to no-change objections, just in virtue of being realist about tense. A-theorists must either accept the conclusion that time, according to their account, does not flow, or put forward an account of flow that is not comparative. A number of difficulties with both of these options are discussed. (shrink)

El objetivo es realizar una lectura de Nuestra América de José Martí a la luz de la filosofía de León Rozitchner. La hipótesis es que existe un deseo fundamental en Martí que es el soporte afectivo de su escritura. Primero, se señala que Nuestra América patentiza un reconocimiento del dolor del otro como motor del propio deseo. Luego, se argumenta que la concepción martiana del hombre natural es la principal cifra teórica para leer ese deseo. Y por último, se evalúala (...) potencia filosófica que la noción de hombre natural martiana tiene para el pensamiento nuestro-americano actual. The aim of the article is to provide an interpretation of José Martí’s essay “Nuestra América”, in the light of León Rozitchner’s philosophy. The hypothesis claims that there is a fundamental desire in Martí which is revealed in the affectivity underlying his writing. Firstly, it is argued that Nuestra América makes sustainable the recognition of the pain of the others as a driving force of desire itself. Then, it is explained why Marti’s conception of natural man is the main theoretical device to read that primordial desire. And finally, it is evaluated the efficacy and philosophical-political power that the concept of natural man has for contemporary thought. (shrink)

¿En qué condiciones hay política? Esta pregunta subyace al conjunto de la teoría de Rancière. Para quien no siempre la hay, lo que siempre hay, en cambio, es dominación, una división policial de lo sensible. Aprehender tales condiciones, y lo que ello nos dice sobre esta teoría de lo político, es el objetivo principal del presente artículo. Con tal fin se realizará una lectura interna de dicha teoría, indagando la lógica propia de los materiales ranciereanos, en pos de captar sus (...) potencialidades pero también sus puntos ciegos al problematizar lo político. En definitiva, se realizará una “crítica inmanente” de su teoría, la cual se enfocará especialmente en cómo este autor tematiza la relación entre conocimiento y política. Así, se estudiarán, por un lado, los factores que llevan a que el conocimiento (filosófico, sociológico, etc.) suprima a la política, al litigio que la caracteriza, según Rancière. Esto conducirá, a su vez, a detallar cuáles son las condiciones que él señala como necesarias para que “haya política”. Por el otro lado, y en vínculo con lo anterior, se analizará el estatus que en esta teoría se da a la “igualdad”, en tanto desligarla de toda pretensión de verdad (cognoscitiva) resulta clave en las objeciones a la relación entre conocimiento y política que plantea Rancière, en lo que constituye, al mismo tiempo, uno de los cuestionamientos contemporáneos más radicales de dicha relación. El fin que persigue la crítica inmanente de esta teoría es elaborar los elementos para una nueva problematización de ese lazo entre conocimiento y política, particularmente del lugar que el conocimiento crítico puede tener en una política democrática. (shrink)

Resumen En la actualidad, a la teoría crítica se le objeta su pretensión de fundarse normativamente, por imposibilitarle ello acoger el pluralismo, presupuesto del orden democrático. Partiendo de esa objeción, este trabajo busca sostener que en Horkheimer y Adorno hay elementos con los que avanzar en la elaboración de una teoría crítica “postnormativa”. Esto en estrecha conexión con - lo que Habermas llama - el carácter “postmetafísico” de su pensamiento, es decir, su rechazo a todo intento por fundar el edificio (...) cognoscitivo en una instancia incondicionada. Sobre esta base, se propone un abordaje dialéctico del pluralismo, a partir de la relación entre diferencia y semejanza. Vía por la cual tematizar esa configuración de lo social que posibilitaría ser diferente sin temor. Al mismo tiempo que se caracterizan dos lógicas que entrañan la cancelación de dicha configuración de lo social, de su dialéctico acogimiento del pluralismo: la instauración de un absoluto, por un lado, y la apática frialdad, por el otro. Todo esto con vistas a interrogar el modo en que producimos un conocimiento crítico, a la vez que se busca hacer de él una instancia que contribuya a la democratización de la sociedad establecida.Currently, the critical theory is refuted for its pretensions to have a normative foundation. Because that generate it an impossibility to accept the pluralism, ground for the democratic order. Taking that as starting point, this paper seeks to sustain that in Horkheimer and Adorno work there are elements for the elaboration of a “post-normative” critical theory. This in close connection with - what Habermas calls - the “post-metaphysical” character of their thought, namely, their rejection to any try to found the knowledge’s building in an unconditioned instance. In base of that, this paper propose a dialectical approach of pluralism, through the relationship between difference and likeness. In this way, it is thematized that social configuration that would make possible being different without fear. At the same time, they are characterized two logics that contain the cancellation of that social configuration, of its dialectical acceptance of pluralism: the instauration of an absolute, on one hand, and the apathetic coldness, on the other hand. All of this with the main objective of interrogates the mode in which we produce critical knowledge, at the same time that it looks forward to make of it a instance that contributes to the democratization of the established society. (shrink)

(ENG) The paper examines the first attempts put forward in ancient Greek to build a method for scientific discovery and how they have been progressively neglected. -/- (ITA) L'articolo esamina i primi tentativi effettuati nell'antica grecia di costruire un metodo della scoperta scientifica, e analizza le ragioni che hanno portato al suo progessivo abbandono.

In this paper I try to test the philosophical relevance of the rational action theories. To take this attempt seriously, in my view, implies to discuss two critical points – one of logical nature, and one of empirical nature – in the rational action theories. These points are the intransitivity of the relation «being better than» and the preference reversal phenomenon. Finally, I suggest that the discussion of these critical points can induce a renewed interest towards the pluralism as formulated (...) by Isaiah Berlin in the last 20th century. (shrink)

RESUMEN Este trabajo busca hacer un aporte a la discusión actual en teoría política, específicamente, a las categorías a través de las cuales se indaga la democracia. Con este fin, se propone una crítica a la noción de “identidad política”, la cual avanza por dos caminos: el principal retoma la crítica de Adorno a la lógica identificante y a la relación sujeto-objeto que ella entraña. Sobre esta base se problematiza esa relación sujeto-sujeto que es el lazo político. Como una suerte (...) de excursus de este camino principal, se avanzará en una crítica inmanente del uso que de dicha noción se realiza en una de las filosofías políticas hoy preponderantes: la teoría postfundacionalista. Para ello se realizará una lectura interna de la propuesta de Chantal Mouffe, en tanto representante de dicha teoría, cuya labor se concentra en la indagación de la lógica democrática, tarea en la cual el concepto de identidad juega un papel clave. Por ambas vías se apunta a señalar que la categoría de identidad política contiene la tendencia a cancelar el pluralismo y, con éste, la democracia. Frente a ello se postula una manera distinta de problematizar el lazo político, a través de la noción de mímesis. ABSTRACT This work seeks to make some contribution to the current discussion in political theory, specifically, to the categories through which democracy is studied. With this goal in mind, a critique of the notion of “political identity” is proposed, which proceeds in two ways: the main one takes up Adorno’s criticism of the identifying logic and the subject-object relationship that it entails. On this basis, the subject-subject relationship that is the political link is problematized. As a sort of excursus of this main path, we will proceed to an immanent critique about how this notion is used by one of the main political philosophy lines nowadays: the Post-Foundational Theory. To this purpose, an internal reading of the proposal of Chantal Mouffe is made, because she is a representative of that theory, whose work is focused on the investigation of democratic logics, and gives to the concept of identity a key role. In both ways, it is pointed out that the category of political identity contains the tendency to cancel pluralism and, with it, democracy. Against this, a different way of problematizing the political link is postulated, through the notion of mimesis. (shrink)

In this paper we discuss Priest’s account of change and motion, contrasting it with its more orthodox rival, the Russellian account. The paper is divided in two parts. In first one we take a stance that is more sympathetic to the Russellian view, arguing that Priest’s arguments against it are inconclusive. In the second part, instead, we take a more sympathetic attitude towards Priest’s objections. We argue, however, that if these objections pose insurmountable difficulties to the Russellian account, then they (...) pose the same difficulties also to Priest’s favoured Hegelian account, and for the same reasons. (shrink)

The way scientific discovery has been conceptualized has changed drastically in the last few decades: its relation to logic, inference, methods, and evolution has been deeply reloaded. The ‘philosophical matrix’ moulded by logical empiricism and analytical tradition has been challenged by the ‘friends of discovery’, who opened up the way to a rational investigation of discovery. This has produced not only new theories of discovery, but also new ways of practicing it in a rational and more systematic way. Ampliative rules, (...) methods, heuristic procedures and even a logic of discovery have been investigated, extracted, reconstructed and refined. The outcome is a ‘scientific discovery revolution’: not only a new way of looking at discovery, but also a construction of tools that can guide us to discover something new. This is a very important contribution of philosophy of science to science, as it puts the former in a position not only to interpret what scientists do, but also to provide and improve tools that they can employ in their activity. (shrink)

Economics has developed into one of the most specialised social sciences. Yet at the same time, it shares its subject matter with other social sciences and humanities and its method of analysis has developed in close correspondence with the natural and life sciences. This book offers an up to date assessment of economics in relation to other disciplines. -/- This edited collection explores fields as diverse as mathematics, physics, biology, medicine, sociology, architecture, and literature, drawing from selected contributions to the (...) 2005 Annual Conference of the European Society for the History of Economic Thought (ESHET). There is currently much discussion at the leading edges of modern economics about openness to other disciplines, such as psychology and sociology. But what we see here is that economics has drawn on (as well as contributed to) other disciplines throughout its history. In this sense, in spite of the increasing specialisation within all disciplines, economics has always been an open discipline and the chapters in this volume provide a vivid illustration for this. -/- Open Economics is a testament to the intellectual vibrancy of historical research in economics. It presents the reader with a historical introduction to the disciplinary context of economics that is the first of its kind, and will appeal to practising economists and students of the discipline alike, as well as to anybody interested in economics and its position in the scientific and social scientific landscape. -/- Table of Contents -/- Introduction: Economics in relation to other disciplines Richard Arena, Sheila Dow and Matthias Klaes Part I. Economics in relation to the humanities and social sciences 1. The social science of economics Brian J. Loasby 2. Economics and literature Bruna Ingrao 3. Happiness: what Kahneman could have learnt from Pietro Verri Pier Luigi Porta Part II. Economics in relation to the life and natural sciences 4. Newtonian physics, experimental moral philosophy and the shaping of political economy Sergio Cremaschi 5. Evolutionary biology and economic behaviour: re-visiting Veblen's instinct of workmanship Mark Harrison 6. Medicine and economics in pre-classical economics Alain Clément and Ludovic Desmedt Part III. Economics and mathematics 7. Mathematics as the role model for neoclassical economics Nicola Giocoli 8. The role of econometric method in economic analysis: A reassessment of the Keynes-Tinbergen debate, 1938-43 Giovanna Garrone and Roberto Marchionatti IV. Economics and architecture 9. Economics and architecture Maurice Lagueux 10. Economic policies and urban development in Latin America Michele Alacevich and Andrea Costa V. Economics and geography 11. ‘Space’ in economic thought Giovanna Vertova 12. Economics, geography and colonialism in the writings of William Petty Hugh Goodacre Part VI. Economics and sociology 13. Economics and sociology: Gustav Schmoller and Werner Sombart on social differentiation Joachim Zweynert 14. Is Homo Oeconomicus a 'bad guy'? Isabelle This Saint-Jean -/- . (shrink)

What is a financial crash, and why does it happen? The answers to these fundamental questions require an investigation of the ontological and epistemic state of the financial markets which will identify the causes of a financial crash, the entities involved, and the relations between them.To this end, I examine several theories on financial systems which have conceptualized financial crashes. I analyze how these theories: a) identify different causes of a crash; b) deal with the basic entities and units of (...) analysis; c) define what we can know about those causes and entities, and what they can reveal about an impending crash. On this basis, I outline some ontological and epistemic preconditions that are necessary for a financial crash to occur. I also examine an example of a price drop on the stock market and the role played by the epistemic and ontic states of the market in that event. (shrink)

The results of Cubitt et al. on the spectral gap problem add a new chapter to the issue of undecidability in physics, as they show that it is impossible to decide whether the Hamiltonian of a quantum many-body system is gapped or gapless. This implies, amongst other things, that a reductionist viewpoint would be untenable. In this paper, we examine their proof and a few philosophical implications, in particular ones regarding models and limitative results. In more detail, we examine the (...) way these theorems model many-body quantum systems, and we question what, if anything, is the physical counterpart of the models used by Cubitt et al. We argue that these models are non-representational and that, even if they are so artificial that it is hard to imagine a physical system arising from them, they nonetheless offer an opportunity to learn about the world and the relation between mathematics and reality. On this basis, we draw the conclusion that their results do not undermine the reductionist viewpoint in a strong sense but leave the question open in a weak sense. (shrink)

Science continually contributes new models and rethinks old ones. The way inferences are made is constantly being re-evaluated. The practice and achievements of science are both shaped by this process, so it is important to understand how models and inferences are made. But, despite the relevance of models and inference in scientific practice, these concepts still remain contro-versial in many respects. The attempt to understand the ways models and infer-ences are made basically opens two roads. The first one is to (...) produce an analy-sis of the role that models and inferences play in science. The second one is to produce an analysis of the way models and inferences are constructed, especial-ly in the light of what science tells us about our cognitive abilities. The papers collected in this volume go both ways. (shrink)

reasoning is a risk-aversion strategy: it aims at minimizing as much as possible the possibility of doing mistakes, but in order to reach this goal it pays a cost, that is the fact that the novel epistemic gain it offers is small or negligible.

Le but de l’article est d’établir des relations entre, d’une part, la caractérisation générale kuhnienne de l’incommensurabilité comme impossibilité de traduire l’une dans l’autre les taxinomies de théories scientifiques rivales et, d’autre part, la version plus spécifique de l’incommensurabilité proposée par Hacking, laquelle porte sur des théories concurrentes s’étant stabilisées en relation à des équipements de laboratoire et des techniques de mesure différents. Sur la base d’une analyse, inspirée des travaux de Duhem, de la nature des taxinomies scientifiques, on soutiendra (...) que l’approche linguistique kuhnienne est inadéquate pour rendre compte de la manière dont les termes scientifiques s’appliquent à la nature dans le domaine des sciences de laboratoire, au sein desquelles le rôle des opérations de mesure est essentiel. L’analyse introduira la notion de taxinomie duale et celle de caractère ostensif d’une théorie. Il apparaîtra que, une fois ces deux notions prises en compte, il devient possible de poser les bases d’une version taxinomique élargie de l’incommensurabilité, susceptible de fournir un cadre commun pour la discussion des exemples introduits par Kuhn et Hacking. (shrink)

I investigate the construction of the mathematical concept of quaternion from a methodological and heuristic viewpoint to examine what we can learn from it for the study of the advancement of mathematical knowledge. I will look, in particular, at the inferential microstructures that shape this construction, that is, the study of both the very first, ampliative inferential steps, and their tentative outcomes—i.e. small ‘structures’ such as provisional entities and relations. I discuss how this paradigmatic case study supports the recent approaches (...) to problem-solving and philosophy of mathematics, and how it suggests refinements of them. In more detail, I argue that the inferential micro-structures enable us to shed more light on the informal, heuristic side of mathematical practice, and its inferential and rational procedures. I show how they enable the generation of a problem, the construction of its conditions of solvability, the search for a hypothesis to solve it, and how these processes are representation-sensitive. On this base, I argue that: 1.the recent development of the philosophy of mathematics was right in moving from Lakatos’ initial investigation of the formal side of a mathematical proof to the investigation of the semi-formal, heuristic side of the mathematical practice as a way of understanding mathematical knowledge and its advancement. 2.The investigation of mathematical practice and discovery can be improved by a finer-grained study of the inferential micro-structures that are built during mathematical problem-solving. (shrink)