Abstract.The aim of this paper is to examine the work of Tschirnhaus, La Hire and Leibniz on the theory of caustics, a subject whose history is closely linked to geometrical optics. The curves in question were examined by the most eminent mathematicians of the 17th century such as Huygens, Barrow and Newton and were subsequently studied analytically from the time of Tschirnhaus until the 19th century.Leibniz was interested in caustics and the subject probably inspired him in his discovery of the (...) concept of envelopes of lines. (shrink)

_Philosophy of Molecular Medicine: Foundational Issues in Theory and Practice_ aims at a systematic investigation of a number of foundational issues in the field of molecular medicine. The volume is organized around four broad modules focusing, respectively, on the following key aspects: What are the nature, scope, and limits of molecular medicine? How does it provide explanations? How does it represent and model phenomena of interest? How does it infer new knowledge from data and experiments? The essays collected here, authored (...) by prominent scientists and philosophers of science, focus on a handful of mainstream topics in the philosophical literature, such as _causation_, _explanation_, _modeling_, and _scientific inference_. These previously unpublished contributions shed new light on these traditional topics by integrating them with problems, methods, and results from three prominent areas of contemporary biomedical science: _basic research_, _translational_ and _clinical research_, and _clinical practice_. (shrink)

Currently, anomalous lived temporality is not included in the main diagnostic criteria or standard symptom checklists. In this article, we present the Transdiagnostic Assessment of Temporal Experience, a structured interview that can be used by researchers and clinicians without a comprehensive phenomenological background to explore abnormal time experiences in persons with abnormal mental conditions regardless of their diagnosis. When extensive data gathered by this scale are available, it will be possible to delineate well-defined anomalous lived temporality profiles for each psychopathological (...) disorder. This instrument may also prove useful for clinicians by providing a more refined assessment of relevant psychopathological symptoms and an in-depth understanding of the patient’s abnormal behaviour as related to specific types of time experience. In the first part of the article, we provide a brief overview of the phenomenological concept of temporality, including pre-phenomenal and phenomenal time, synthesis, conation and synchronization, and of abnormal time experiences in persons affected by psychopathological conditions. In the following part, we describe the basic structure of the interview that comprises seven categories corresponding to the abnormal features of lived temporality: anomalies of synchrony, of time structure, of implicit time flow, of explicit time flow, and anomalous experiences of the past, the present and the future. The paper also includes a section on administration and scoring of the TATE scale, the complete interview and a Likert table for quantifying the frequency, intensity and interference with daily life of the phenomena explored. (shrink)

In this commentary, I focus on Jones' suggestion of a close connection between the domain of space and that of kinship. I expand on that suggestion by introducing the concept of frame of reference and show how it can possibly participate to the generation of kinship systems.

We discuss the meaning of “being alive” and “being dead.” Our primary aim is to pave the way for a sound and accurate ethical debate concerning these two concepts. In particular, we analyze a metabolic approach and a genetic one and discuss the reasons for their failure to constitute a good starting point for successive debates. We argue that any ethical or social discussion of topics involving life and death must introduce cultural constructs such as, on the one hand, the (...) concept of clinical death and, on the other hand, the concept of existence. We argue that these two cultural constructs, although consistent with biomedical knowledge, cannot be ontologically grounded in it. To conclude, we apply our findings to the case of human embryos. (shrink)

A dispetto della stroncatura di Aristotele, Ippone, nel V secolo a.C., si dimostra un pensatore ben inserito nelle correnti culturali più vive ed interessanti del suo secolo. Accomunato ai Milesi per aver posto l’acqua come principio di tutte le cose, è stato considerato anche un pitagorico per aver affermato l’importanza del gioco dei contrari nel nascere e nell’evolversi delle cose. In realtà, queste caratterizzazioni si dimostrano piuttosto generiche, e l’appartenenza a questa o a quella scuola non dà ragione della specificità (...) della sua posizione nell’ambiente culturale mediterraneo e magno-greco, specificità ben rinvenibile anche nella scarsezza delle testimonianze. Più che l’acqua, per Ippone, ammesso che abbia voluto stabilire un’arché di tutte le cose, è l’umido a giocare un ruolo fondamentale nell’essere e nel divenire delle cose. In questo articolo si tenta anche di tracciare un profilo della storia dell’umido, dai Milesi a Eraclito, ad Alcmeone, a Diogene di Apollonia, fino a Democrito. E si vuole inoltre sottolineare come esso rientri anche nel campo specifico delle sue riflessioni, incentrate soprattutto nel campo biologico ed embriologico, riflessioni sempre obbedienti, più che a teorie generali, all’osservazione dell’esperienza concreta. (shrink)

Desde os anos 90, a corporeidade vem ocupando um papel cada vez mais central nas explicações das ciências cognitivas. Com isso, surgiram críticas contundentes, tanto do ponto de vista empírico quanto conceitual, à suposição de que a representação é a marca do mental. Apesar disso, cientistas cognitivos parecem relutar em desfazer- se do vocabulário representacionalista. Este artigo tenta lançar luz sobre a questão do suposto representacionalismo de um dos principais paradigmas das ciências cognitivas, o Processamento Preditivo, revisando argumentos pela interpretação (...) não- representacionalista de alguns de seus pontos, assim resgatando a ideia avançada pelas teorias da cognição corporificada segundo a qual a atividade exploratória de um organismo em seu ambiente não exige a geração de modelos representacionais acerca do ambiente. (shrink)

A discipline with mythical origins, an almost legendary genesis, with indefinite and unde finable boundaries, with uncertain and controversial results, sociology has always claimed for itself the right to be the science of society, the only scientific discipline entrusted with the study of the entire set of intersubjective relationships and the magnetic field they constitute.

This paper is a contribution to the study of the four classical Italian pragmatists: Papini, Prezzolini, Vailati and Calderoni. They are seen more as representatives of a pragmatist movement than as singular systematic thinkers. The center of Italian pragmatism was the periodical, Leonardo, where these authors discussed and presented an original and provocative understanding of pragmatist philosophy. Thier understanding of pragmatist philosophy has often been underestimated by the subsequent literature. They showed a good comprehension of the novelty brought by American (...) pragmatism but, ignoring some of the most important epistemic aspects of Peirce’s and James’s theories, their philosophical proposals often missed consistency. However, even in their misunderstandings, they signaled a need and possibly a weakness of the whole pragmatist movement. Italian pragmatists underlined the importance of the concreteness of individuals in the realization of universal laws of mathematics and logic, physics and psychology. But, this attitude suffered from some serious tensions between metaphysical assumptions and methodological claims. (shrink)

Praxeologism from the napolitan institutionalist phenomenological school is discussed, in the work “Forze, leggi e poteri” by Gino Capozzi, in relation to the Italianius-philosophical tradition. The reflections of the napolitan school center on the individual and his activity, an activity that is..

The article tries to retrace the emergence of kant's "critique of pure reason". Already in the sixties, Kant faced the problem of metaphysics and came to the result that the conclusions of pure reason have only a subjective value. Hereby the material content of transcendental dialectic was reached. Only afterwards kant examined the underlying ontology and came to his transcendental idealism. On this new base kant should have had to revise his former critique of special metaphysics. However, He did this (...) only partially. (shrink)

For God's knowledge in all cultures have, therefore, humans are supposed to be easily understood. However, to find out the exact number of steps, so that we can from this world to make the conclusion that God exists, but why is still very difficult. This paper attempts to point out why the case. Reason to silt, to analyze all human beings are familiar with the cognitive activities of the universality of the difficulties faced, if, to analyze the experience we can (...) get the reality is very difficult, then to analyze our experience outside the awareness of God does it mean even more difficult. Therefore, in this paper should first study our knowledge of the world. The results are as follows: human cognition is for action of a different cognitive structure; each object has its own cognitive activity, and in accordance with certain specifications; and these norms are in our cognitive effort within. All these cognitive operations are located in three levels: 1) experiences, but the object of our knowledge there is "information." 2) As has been seen all the information we obtain one kind of intellectual . Then we have the knowledge to the intellectual to express a concept, and use this concept to think about this object. 3) by judge is correct), we have absolute certainty and understanding provided by the object, to our knowledge there are objects of this object. To our understanding of the world a reality, but reality does not explain why this would exist. For the "existence" of the issues raised by the end lead to the existence of an absolutely transcendent entity of the cognitive, physical such as an infinite intellectual ability to explain his own existence and the existence of the world . Der Artikel versucht zu zeigen, warum, obwohl die Gotteserkenntnis sich in allen Kulturen findet und deshalb fur den Menschen eher naheliegend sein muβ, es dennoch schwierig ist, die Schritte genau zu ermitteln, die uns erlauben, von der Welt her auf die Existenz Gottes zu schlieβen. Der Grund liegt in der allgemeinen Schwierigkeit, die allen, Menschen vertraute Erkenntnistätigkeit zu analysieren. Wenn es schon schwierig ist, unsere Erkenntnis der erfahrbaren Wirklichkeit zu analysieren, urn so mehr ist dies der Fall, wenn es um die Erkenntnis eines höchsten Wesens jenseits unserer Erfahrung geht. Im Artikel wird deshalb zuerst unsere Erkenntnis der Welt untersucht. Das Resultat ist folgendes: Die menschliche Erkenntnis besteht in einer Struktur verschiedener Erkenntnisakte, deren jeder ein eigenes Objekt hat und gemäβ Normen stattfindet, die unserem Erkenntnisstreben innewohnen. Diese Akte verteilen sich auf drei Ebenen. 1) In der Erfahrung erkennen wir ein Objekt als bloβ gegeben, als "Datum". 2) Mit der Einsicht erfassen wir in den Daten ein Intelligibles. Infolgedessen driicken wir das erkannte Intellibible in einem Begriff aus, mit dem wir das Objekt denken. 3) Mit dem Urteil bejahen wir absolut das gegebene und verstandene Objekt und damit erkennen wir es als ein Seiendes. Damit haben wir eine Wirklichkeit der Welt erkannt, aber nieht erklart, warum sie existiert. Die Frage nach der Existenz fuhrt schlieβlich zur Erkenntnis eines absolut transzendenten Wesens, das als ein unbegrenztes Intelligibles imstande ist, die eigene Existenz sowie die Existenz der Welt zu erklären. (shrink)