Volume 52, Issue 8, July 2020, Page 832-833.

Edited with New Translation by Richard McKirahan With a New Preface by Malcolm Schofield This book is a revised and expanded version of A.H. Coxon's full critical edition of the extant remains of Parmenides of Elea—the fifth-century B.C. philosopher by many considered "one of the greatest and most astonishing thinkers of all times." Coxon's presentation of the complete ancient evidence for Parmenides and his comprehensive examination of the fragments, unsurpassed to this day, have proven invaluable to our understanding (...) of the Eleatic since the book's first publication in 1986. This edition, edited by Richard McKirahan and with a new preface by Malcolm Schofield, is released on the 100th anniversary of Coxon's birth. This new edition for the first time includes English translations of the testimonia and of any Ancient Greek throughout the book, as well as an English/Greek glossary by Richard McKirahan, and revisions by the late author himself. The text consists of Coxon's collations of the relevant folios of manuscripts of Sextus Empiricus, Proclus and Simplicius and includes all extant fragments, a commentary, the testimonia, a complete list of sources, linguistic parallels from both earlier and later authors, and the fullest critical apparatus that has appeared since Diels’ _Poetarum Philosophorum Fragmenta _. The collection of testimonia includes the philosophical discussions of Parmenides by Plato, Aristotle and the Neoplatonists, most of which had been omitted by Diels. The introduction discusses the history of the text, the language and form of the poem, Parmenides’ use and understanding of the verb ‘to be’, his place in the history of earlier and later philosophy and the biographical tradition. In the commentary Coxon deals in detail with both the language and the subject matter of the poem and pays full attention to Parmenides’ account of the physical world. The appendix relates later Eleatic arguments to those of Parmenides. (shrink)

Various methods have been employed to investigate different aspects of the brain activity modulation related to the performance of a cycling task. In our study we examined how functional connectivity and brain network efficiency varied during an endurance cycling task. To this purpose, we reconstructed EEG signals at source level: we computed current densities in 28 anatomical regions of interest (ROIs) through the eLORETA algorithm, then we calculated the Lagged Coherence of the 28 current density signals to define the adjacency (...) matrix. To quantify changes of functional network efficiency during an exhaustive cycling task, we computed three graph theoretical indices: local efficiency (LE), global efficiency (GE) and Density (D) in two different frequency bands, Alpha and Beta bands, that indicate alertness processes and motor binding/fatigue respectively. This analysis was conducted for six different task intervals: pre-cycling, initial, intermediate and final stages of cycling, active recovery and passive recovery. Fourteen participants performed an incremental cycling task with simultaneous EEG recording and RPE monitoring to detect participants’ exhaustion. LE remained constant during the endurance cycling task in both bands. Therefore, we speculate that fatigue processes did not affect segregated neural processing. We observed an increase of GE in the Alpha band only during cycling, that could be due to greater alertness processes and preparedness to stimuli during exercise. Conversely, although D did not change significantly over time in the Alpha band, its general reduction in the Beta bands during cycling could be interpreted within the framework of the neural efficiency hypothesis, which posits a reduced neural activity for expert/automated performances. We argue that the use of graph theoretical indices represents a clear methodological advancement in studying endurance performance. (shrink)

The aggregation of individual judgments on logically interconnected propositions into a collective decision on the same propositions is called judgment aggregation. Literature in social choice and political theory has claimed that judgment aggregation raises serious concerns. For example, consider a set of premises and a conclusion where the latter is logically equivalent to the former. When majority voting is applied to some propositions (the premises) it may give a different outcome than majority voting applied to another set of propositions (the (...) conclusion). This problem is known as the discursive dilemma (or paradox). The discursive dilemma is a serious problem since it is not clear whether a collective outcome exists in these cases, and if it does, what it is like. Moreover, the two suggested escape-routes from the paradox—the so-called premise-based procedure and the conclusion-based procedure—are not, as I will show, satisfactory methods for group decision-making. In this paper I introduce a new aggregation procedure inspired by an operator defined in artificial intelligence in order to merge belief bases. The result is that we do not need to worry about paradoxical outcomes, since these arise only when inconsistent collective judgments are not ruled out from the set of possible solutions. (shrink)

In The Leviathan in the state theory of Thomas Hobbes, Carl Schmitt puts forward the claim that there is a ?barely visible crack? in Hobbes's theory of the state that opened the door to liberal constitutionalism. This essay claims that Schmitt's ?thesis of the crack? is composed of two elements: first, Schmitt argues that Hobbes makes a concession to individual conscience in his discussion of miracles; second, Schmitt points out that Hobbes's individualism undermines his notion of the absolute state. As (...) Schmitt relies on an unconvincing critique of Hobbes's discourse on miracles in order to justify his more general claim against Hobbes's authoritarianism, this essay suggests that Schmitt's ?thesis of the crack? is untenable in the form that Schmitt presented it in 1938. An attempt, however, is made to salvage ?the thesis of the crack? by turning to concepts found in Schmitt's Concept of the political and in Political theology. Although Schmitt openly approved of the so?called protection/obedience principle, this essay claims that there are a number of crucial differences between Schmitt's formulation of that principle and Hobbes's own version; an examination of these differences enables us (i) to appreciate the consequences of Hobbes's individualism on his theory of the state and (ii) to shed new light on Howard Warrender's famous claim that Hobbes's sovereign is inherently weak. The essay concludes that in spite of Schmitt's fallacious formulation of the ?thesis of the crack? of 1938, his political theory affords us a rare vantage point from which we can clearly see a case against the association of Hobbes with authoritarianism. (shrink)

Ethical dilemmas in critical care may cause healthcare practitioners to experience moral distress: incoherence between what one believes to be best and what occurs. Given that paediatric decision-making typically involves parents, we propose that parents can also experience moral distress when faced with making value-laden decisions in the neonatal intensive care unit. We propose a new concept—that parents may experience “moral schism”—a genuine uncertainty regarding a value-based decision that is accompanied by emotional distress. Schism, unlike moral distress, is not caused (...) by barriers to making and executing a decision that is deemed to be best by the decision-makers but rather an encounter of significant internal struggle. We explore factors that appear to contribute to both moral distress and “moral schism” for parents: the degree of available support, a sense of coherence of the situation, and a sense of responsibility. We propose that moral schism is an underappreciated concept that needs to be explicated and may be more prevalent than moral distress when exploring decision-making experiences for parents. We also suggest actions of healthcare providers that may help minimize parental “moral schism” and moral distress. (shrink)

Carl Schmitt's friend/enemy principle is exposed to in-depth philosophical analysis and historical examination with the aim of showing that the political follows hostility, violence and terror as form follows matter. The book argues that the partisan is an umbrella concept that includes the national and global terrorist.

Why is it that the laws of war, or international humanitarian law (IHL), allow no justification for breaking the law even if where such conduct would actually produce less humanitarian harm than following the law? In introducing the concept of a humanitarian necessity justification, and complementing existing work on humanitarian exceptions to the jus ad bellum, this paper suggests that it should. It first addresses the puzzle of IHL's existing absolutist stance with regard to compliance with IHL norms; to demonstrate (...) the implications of this absolutist stance, I use three historical case studies in which actors broke the law under a claim of necessity, or a mixed concern for self and others: The Early Warning Procedure employed by the IDF in the West Bank, the paradigmatic case of interrogational torture, and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I then examine whether the domestic necessity defense in criminal law might be transposed onto the international level, ultimately finding that such transposition is impossible given the different assumptions that operate in domestic criminal law and IHL. In further searching for an account for IHL's absolutist stance and the possibility of mitigating that stance, the paper turns to first-order accounts - deontological, consequential, and institutional. I argue that none of these accounts offers a sufficiently convincing explanation for the exclusion of a humanitarian necessity paradigm, and instead, that room should be made for some humanitarian-driven exceptions. Ultimately, the paper offers a blueprint for a definition for a humanitarian necessity justification that would exculpate an actor who violated the laws of war in the name of a greater humanitarian good. The central component of the definition is a requirement that the greater humanitarian good would be for the benefit of the enemy, rather than for oneself. Under such paradigm, the Early Warning Procedure and perhaps even the atomic bombing of Hiroshima (but not Nagasaki) might be justified, while the paradigmatic case of interrogational torture could not. (shrink)

L'application de la notion de structure à l'analyse des systèmes philosophiques est sans doute l'un des développements les plus fructueux de ce qu'on a appelé le structuralisme. La tradition inaugurée par Martial Gueroult et poursuivie par Victor Goldschmidt, Jules Vuillemin et d'autres a conduit à une fondation critique de la notion de système philosophique et a renouvelé profondément la méthode de l'histoire de la philosophie. En cherchant à reconstituer les orientations principales de cette tradition, nous essayons d'abord de distinguer le (...) structuralisme en philosophie du structuralisme en mathématique et en linguistique. Nous prenons comme base de discussion de cette question l'analyse de Gilles-Gaston Granger donnée en 1967, dans Pensée formelle et sciences de l'homme. Ensuite, nous abordons trois problèmes centraux de l'application de la notion de système en philosophie. La question de la clôture des concepts philosophiques ; la question de la vérité ; la question des rapports entre science et philosophie. (shrink)

Hobbes's philosophical discourse is deconstructed as the interplay of the drama of individual behavior as perceived by rational agents and the detached analysis of conflict a by a political geometer . The author solves some long-standing problems in Hobbesian political philosophy (e.g., the role of glory, Hobbes' pessimism) and shows the consistency of Hobbes's attempt to derive absolutism as the only stable political association.

Although organizational and situational factors have been found to predict burnout, not everyone employed at the same workplace develops it, suggesting that becoming burnt out is a complex, multifaceted phenomenon. The aim of this study was to elucidate perceptions of conscience, stress of conscience, moral sensitivity, social support and resilience among two groups of health care personnel from the same workplaces, one group on sick leave owing to medically assessed burnout (n = 20) and one group who showed no indications (...) of burnout (n = 20). The results showed that higher levels of stress of conscience, a perception of conscience as a burden, having to deaden one’s conscience in order to keep working in health care and perceiving a lack of support characterized the burnout group. Lower levels of stress of conscience, looking on life with forbearance, a perception of conscience as an asset and perceiving support from organizations and those around them (social support) characterized the non-burnout group. (shrink)

In this article we present the bases for a computational theory of the cognitive processes underlying human communication. The core of the article is devoted to the analysis of the phases in which the process of comprehension of a communicative act can be logically divided: (1) literal meaning, where the reconstruction of the mental states literally expressed by the actor takes place: (2) speaker's meaning, where the partner reconstructs the communicative intentions of the actor; (3) communicative effect, where the partner (...) possibly modifies his own beliefs and intentions; (4) reaction, where the intentions for the generation of the response are produced; and (5) response, where an overt response is constructed. The model appears to be compatible with relevant facts about human behavior. Our hypothesis is that, through communication, an actor tries to exploit the motivational structures of a partner so that the desired goal is generated. A second point is that social behavior requires that cooperation be maintained at some level. In the case of communication, cooperation is, in general, pursued even when the partner does not adhere to the actor's goals, and therefore no cooperation occurs at the behavioral level. This important distinction is reflected in the two kinds of game we introduce to account for communication. The main concept implied in communication is that two agents overtly reach a situation of shared mental states. Our model deals with sharedness through two primitives: shared beliefs and communicative intentions. (shrink)

In the Classical Quarterly for April, 1933, Professor Cornford maintains that the ‘Two Ways’ of Parmenides are not meant as alternatives: ‘The Way of Truth and the Way of Seeming are no more parallel and alternative systems of cosmology, each complete in itself, than are Plato's accounts of the intellectual and sensible worlds.’ I wish here to try to support his general view, which seems to me to be indisputably correct, while differing from Professor Cornford in some important details.

This article is an attempt to present Gödel's discussion on concepts, from 1944 to the late 1970s, in particular relation to the thought of Frege and Russell. The discussion takes its point of departure from Gödel's claim in notes on Bernay's review of ?Russell's mathematical logic?. It then retraces the historical background of the notion of intension which both Russell and Gödel use, and offers some grounds for claiming that Gödel consistently considered logic as a free-type theory of concepts, called (...) intensions, considered as the denotations of predicate names. (shrink)

The paper discusses ten philosophical problems in deontic logic: how to formally represent norms, when a set of norms may be termed ‘coherent’, how to deal with normative conflicts, how contraryto-duty obligations can be appropriately modeled, how dyadic deontic operators may be redefined to relate to sets of norms instead of preference relations between possible worlds, how various concepts of permission can be accommodated, how meaning postulates and counts-as conditionals can be taken into account, and how sets of norms may (...) be revised and merged. The problems are discussed from the viewpoint of input/output logic as developed by van der Torre & Makinson. We argue that norms, not ideality, should take the central position in deontic semantics, and that a semantics that represents norms, as input/output logic does, provides helpful tools for analyzing, clarifying and solving the problems of deontic logic. (shrink)

Human beings frequently attribute anthropomorphic features, motivations and behaviors to animals, artifacts, and natural phenomena. Historically, many interpretations of this attitude have been provided within different disciplines. What most interpretations have in common is distinguishing children’s manifestations of this attitude, which are considered “natural,” from adults’ occurrences, which must be explained by resorting to particular circumstances. In this article, I argue that anthropomorphism is not grounded in specific belief systems but rather in interaction. In interaction, a non-human entity assumes a (...) place that generally is attributed to a human interlocutor, which means that it is independent of the beliefs that people may have about the nature and features of the entities that are anthropomorphized. This perspective allows us to explain the problems that emerge if we consider anthropomorphism as a belief: (i) adults under certain circumstances may anthropomorphize entities even if they perfectly know that these entities have no mental life; (ii) according to the situation, the same entity may be anthropomorphized or treated as an object; (iii) there is no consistency among the entities that are anthropomorphized; (iv) there is individual variability in anthropomorphization, and this variability derives from affective states rather than from different degrees of knowledge about the entity that is anthropomorphized or greater or lesser naivety of the person who anthropomorphizes. From this perspective, anthropomorphism is a basic human attitude that begins in infants and persists throughout life. The difference between adults and children is not qualitative but rather a matter of complexity. (shrink)

After a brief discussion of Kreisel’s notion of informal rigour and Myhill’s notion of absolute proof, Gödel’s analysis of the subject is presented. It is shown how Gödel avoids the notion of informal proof because such a use would contradict one of the senses of “formal” that Gödel wants to preserve. This Gödelian notion of “formal” is directly tied to his notion of absolute proof and to the question of the general applicability of concepts, in a way that overcomes both (...) Kreisel and Myhill’s conceptions. This paper aims to contribute to the present-day debate on informal and epistemic mathematics, focusing on what appears necessary for a better understanding of the issues at stake. (shrink)

Il volume vuole consentire l'avvicinamento del grande pubblico ad argomenti scientifici difficili ma sempre più presenti nella vita quotidiana. I temi vengono affrontati anche sotto il loro aspetto medico, legale e socioeconomico.

This article focuses on the relationship between memory, female identity and the history of women: issues and areas of scholarship that have a comparatively recent history, but already present a rich spectrum of contrasting approaches and studies. In the case at hand, interpretations rooted in Foucault’s genealogical approach are contrasted with more recent postcolonial studies, against the backdrop of the political history of European and American feminism, a position that can scarcely be reduced to the more familiar terms of the (...) debate between philosophers and neuroscientists. The writing that springs from female memory is not the function of an alleged specificity of the female brain, but the product of the ability of a specific cultural subject to construct a genealogy from the point of view of its unprecedented reality: a seemingly minor “supplement,” but one that has the power to subvert the main corpus of history and knowledge, as Virginia Woolf already showed in magisterial terms as early as 1929. (shrink)

The following discussion' of the manuscript tradition of Simplicius' commentary on Aristotle's Physics i-iv originated in an examination of the tradition of the fragments of Parmenides. It is therefore illustrated not only from Simplicius but particularly from the texts of Parmenides quoted by him. This will not be misleading, since, though many of these texts are quoted by Simplicius more than once, there is little or no sign in any manuscript of interpolation from one passage to another and it is (...) not likely that any scribe could have interpolated the text from an independent manuscript of Parmenides. (shrink)

As when by night the glassOf Galileo, less assured, observesImagined lands and regions in the moonJohn Milton, Paradise Lost Most artists are afflicted with more than common stupidity, and this makes them even more desperate than they need be, and so they make themselves even more stupid than they really are, and so they make themselves artistically impotent – because, by panicking (consciously or unconsciously) at their own nonsense, they lose all self-respect and can produce either nothing...

This essay analyses the specific rhetoric of degeneration which was observable in the antisemitic polemic discourse of the last decades of 19th century. It provides an overview of the representation of Jewish art und artists as it took shape in the antisemitic literature of the Wilhelminian epoch. The growing emphasis placed by psychiatrists and racial theorists on the pathologies of the,,Jewish race“, such as hysteria or degeneration, resulted in the tendency to pathologize Jewish art and artists, which were deemed responsible (...) for the alleged decline of German culture. Mere aesthetic categories underwent a process of reduction and ideologization and were finally used for defamatory purposes, as shown in the case of the antisemitic denigration of Heinrich Heine. In order to demonstrate this, the analysis outlines the strict dichotomic logic of these argumentations, as the definition and consolidation of an ideal German essence was usually based on the construction of a degenerated Jewish identity. (shrink)

This paper presents and discusses a novel approach to indeterministic belief revision. An indeterministic belief revision operator assumes that, when an agent is confronted with a new piece of information, it can revise its belief sets in more than one way. We define a rational agent not only in terms of what it believes but also of what it desires and wants to achieve. Hence, we propose that the agent’s goals play a role in the choice of (possibly) one of (...) the several available revision options. Properties of the new belief revision mechanism are also investigated. (shrink)

This chapter seeks to shed light on the origins, nature and scope of Hobbesian amity. It explores Hobbes's stance on two concepts – sociability and friendship – that a long tradition of writers, inspired by Aristotle, have employed to explain why and how people form bonds and live peacefully in political associations. The association that Hobbes postulated between friendship, power, and contract filled some readers with indignation. In the Aristotelian tradition, the concept of friendship helped explain the transition from the (...) family to the village and finally to the polis. The chapter argues that the “constancy” of amity among Hobbesian citizens does not derive from reciprocity of love or care but from a shared understanding of the Leviathan's function and the joint endeavor to support its accomplishment. The Leviathan provides the conditions of mutual trust and positive disposition that make friendship possible, and not vice versa. (shrink)

This article focuses on the case of conjoined twins in a selection of quodlibetal questions by John Peckham, Henry of Ghent, Remigius dei Girolami and John of Naples, in a period of time between th...

ment on the same propositions, and is plagued by impossibility re- 2. What is the role of independence in judgment aggregation sults. In this paper we study the central notion of independence in..