Rethinking “philosophy” to-day, it is necessary to think first of all about ontological foundations of the modern scientific universe description and rethink them on the ground of modern scientific knowledge, because until now there is no any precise scientific conception of the structure of the universe, of reasons and movingforces of its permanent evolution. All of it create basis to propose various unscientific ideas of creationism. Until now most of philosophers associate the motion of Matter on the whole only with (...) its motion in space and in time, mixing philosophical and physical aspects of these two principle categories. Generally speaking, the present-day ontological model of understanding the World, the Universe is constructed purely on the basis of only these two fundamental categories. However, a more deep reflection of the essence of Being, if to realize it on the basis of only these two global categories, brings us to the disappointing conclusion, that in this case we have nothing more except a mechanical motion, i.e. spatial displacement of a material point (or a system of points) relatively some point of counting off. To make it normal and logic we should add to the ontological model one more essential part – the motion in quality. So, in order to create the full and complete picture of the formation and evolution of the material World it is necessary to observe the motion of material forming in the three equivalentphilosophical categories: in space time quality. The ideas of the new conception of ontological model become actual supplementation of really scientific philosophical knowledge on the way of a more objective ontological comprehension of our Being, of the law of development of the human civilization and the Universe as a whole. This knowledge can be successfully used for the description of the realistic paradigm of Being, in explanations of the meaning of Life. (shrink)

This article examines the classification of political doctrines proposed by Boris N. Chicherin in his major work on the history of political thought. Chicherin uses two forms of systematization for...

The article refutes the widespread view that Dostoevsky's Christian beliefs were strictly Orthodox. It is proved that Dostoevsky's religious and philosophical searches' central tendency is the criticism of historical, ecclesiastical Christianity as a false, distorted form of the teaching of Jesus Christ and the desire to restore this teaching in its original purity. Modern researchers of the history of early Christianity find more and more arguments in favor of the fact that the actual teaching of Jesus Christ is contained in (...) that religious movement, which the church called the Gnostic heresy. The exact philosophical expression of the teaching of Christ was received in the later works of J.G. Fichte, whose ideas had a strong influence on the Russian writer. Like Fichte, Dostoevsky understands Christ as the first person who showed the possibility of revealing God in himself and gaining divine omnipotence and eternal life directly in earthly reality. In this sense, every person can become like Christ. Dostoevsky's main characters walk the path of Christ and show how difficult this path is. The article shows that Dostoevsky used in his work not only the philosophical version of true Christianity developed by German philosophy, but also the key motives of the Gnostic myth, primarily the idea that our world, filled with evil and suffering, is created not by the supreme, good God-Father, but by the evil Demiurge, the Devil. (shrink)

This article examines the criticisms that Chicherin directed at the classical Western liberalism that emerged from the works of John Locke, Claude-Adrien Helvétius, Baron d’Holbach, and Jean-Jacque...

The articles analyzes the original concept of immortality, presented by F.M. Dostoevsky in a handwritten sketch written on April 16, 1864, the day after the death of the writer’s first wife. The authors argue that this concept was created under the influence of the ideas of German romantic natural philosophy, in particular G.T. Fechner’s work of The Book of Life After Death (1836). According to the pantheistic ideas of Dostoevsky and Fechner, every person after death continues to exist in the (...) earthly world. Having lost a limited biological body in death, a person can get a more extensive “cosmic” body, covering significant areas of the material universe. His personal spirit continues to exist in mankind, and the degree of his influence depends on what kind of spiritual success he achieved during his lifetime. In the concept of Fechner and Dostoevsky, posthumous life can be very different: great personalities (Goethe, Shakespeare, Napoleon, etc.) acquire an even more significant being than during life, and they continue to influence humankind, which, developing in history, strives for an absolute “synthesis” -the merger of all people into an organic whole and at the same time the merger with the universe. Individuals who, during their lifetime, confined themselves to their selfish interests can even disappear. In this concept, God is defined as “universal Synthesis,” i.e., the goal of the world process and the final merging of everything with everything. Jesus Christ is understood as an absolute, perfect man who, after death, does not resurrect in his previous bodily form, but completely dissolves in humankind and acts as a force guiding it toward unity and synthesis with the material world. (shrink)

The article analyzes the original concept of the development of ancient religions and the emergence of Christianity set out in the six-volume work of F.F. Zelinski History of Ancient Religions. Zelnski refutes the well-established idea of the origin of Christianity from Judaism and proves that it was based on the Hellenistic-Roman religion of the early Roman Empire. In this religion, a idea of monotheistic and pantheistic God was formed, which is the basis of all world processes and human actions, at (...) the same time the idea arose of the possibility of a "particle" of God entering a separate human personality. According to Zelinski, it was these ideas that became the basis of Christianity, which radically rethought them, but nevertheless left them close to the beliefs of the majority of the citizens of the Roman Empire; that is why early Christianity quickly spread throughout the empire. The article suggests that Zelinski's flight from Bolshevik Russia in the 1920s and his life in the Polish Catholic environment led to the fact that he refused to develop his ideas to their natural outcome, which could conflict with Catholic teaching. The article reconstructs the result that Zelnski should have come to with the consistent implementation of his ideas: he would have to admit that the teachings of Jesus Christ and early Christianity which arose from the Roman religion and not from Judaism coincides with that religious tradition which the Catholic Church has persecuted in a story called the Gnostic heresy. (shrink)

David E. Over is a leading cognitive scientist and, with his firm grounding in philosophical logic, he also exerts a powerful influence on the psychology of reasoning. He is responsible for not only a large body of empirical work and accompanying theory, but for advancing a major shift in thinking about reasoning, commonly known as the ‘new paradigm’ in the psychology of human reasoning. -/- Over’s signature mix of philosophical logic and experimental psychology has inspired generations of researchers, psychologists, and (...) philosophers alike over more than a quarter of a century. The chapters in this volume, written by a leading group of contributors including a number who helped shape the psychology of reasoning as we know it today, each take their starting point from the key themes of Over’s ground-breaking work. The essays in this collection explore a wide range of central topics—such as rationality, bias, dual processes, and dual systems—as well as contemporary psychological and philosophical theories of conditionals. It concludes with an engaging new chapter, authored by David E. Over himself, which details and analyses the new paradigm psychology of reasoning. -/- This book is therefore important reading for scholars, researchers, and advanced students in psychology, philosophy, and the cognitive sciences, including those who are not familiar with Over’s thought already. (shrink)

This is a broad and ambitious study of the entire history of humanity which takes as its point of departure Marx's theory of social evolution. However, Professor Diakonoff's theory of world history differs from Marx's in a number of ways. Firstly he has expanded Marx's five stages of development to eight. Secondly he denies that social evolution necessarily implies progress and shows how 'each progress is simultaneously a regress', and thirdly he demonstrates that the transition from one stage to another (...) is not necessarily marked by social conflict and that sometimes this is achieved peacefully and gracefully. As the book moves through these various stages, the reader is drawn into a remarkable and thought-provoking study of the process of the history of the human race which focuses on the wide range of factors (economic, social, military-technological, and socio-pyschological) which have influenced our development from palaeolithic times to the present day. (shrink)

The purpose of the research is to develop a new methodological basis for identifying, analyzing and solving problems of international corporations export-import activities and to ground the directions for ensuring their business excellence. The approach originality provides introduction of a conceptual model that aims to eliminate the negative symptoms of international corporations export-import activities based on the results of comprehensive market research, effectiveness of export-import activities and calculation of the integrated indicator of business excellence. The leading corporations of Slovakia and (...) India in the production of bi-axially oriented polypropylene (BOPP) films were the primary basis for this study. The results of the research showed the need to implement a system of managerial innovation for reasoning the directions of ensuring international corporations business excellence. This is achieved because of using logically formalized methods and provides the improvement of organizational and structural interaction of management entities in the process of solving export-import activity problems. Important factors for ensuring business excellence are also the optimization of export and import costs, as well as an increase in export revenue for Slovak companies, and an increase in market share and cost optimization for Indian companies. The practical value of the obtained results is to develop a set of managerial innovations that can improve the efficiency of export-import activities and improve international corporations business. (shrink)

I reconstruct Aristotle’s analytical procedure in Prior Analytics I.45 and its metalogical implications. Aristotle’s analysis unfolds three groups of syllogisms: symmetrically analysable, asymmetrically analysable, and non-analysable syllogisms. From the first and the third group could be extracted 27 combinations of the two mutually non-derivable deductive rules. Aristotle’s reduced deductive system in APr. I.7 with the two moods in the first figure (traditionally called Barbara and Celarent) follows this pattern. I demonstrate that the deductive system with Barbara and Celarent is just (...) one of 27 possible complete deductive systems with the two mutually non-derivable syllogistic rules. On top of that, given the fact that there are two combinations of mutually non-derivable conversion rules, I conclude that Prior Analytics hides in itself 54 complete deductive systems with a minimal number of mutually non-derivable rules. Finally, it is commented what might be the role of analysis; to what extent Aristotle could be aware of possibilities presented here; why he still prefers only one deductive system to many others with the same deductive power. (shrink)

This article discusses adult conversion in the Russian Baptist community as the unlearning of old sinful ways of living. Russian Baptists see conversion as an act of repentance, surrendering to Christ, and becoming born again, and as a life-long process of growing in faith. Based on an ethnographic study of the Baptist community in north-western and central Russia, the article discusses the glocal nature of the Russian Baptist community that attracts the kind of people that convert to this faith and (...) the circumstances of their conversion. Russian Baptist conversion is viewed as an act and a process, and conversion is seen as an ethical choice and an unlearning of the old ways of living. (shrink)

This paper relates to a formal statement of the mechanisms that are thought minimally necessary to underpin consciousness. This is expressed in the form of axioms. We deem this to be useful if there is ever to be clarity in answering questions about whether this or the other organism is or is not conscious. As usual, axioms are ways of making formal statements of intuitive beliefs and looking, again formally, at the consequences of such beliefs. The use of this style (...) of exposition does not entail a claim to provide a mathematically rigorous formal deductive system. Conventional mathematical notation is used to achieve clarity, although this is elaborated with natural language in an attempt to reduce terseness. In our view, making the approach axiomatic is synonymous with building clear usable tests for consciousness and is therefore a central feature of the paper. The extended scope of this approach is to lay down some essential properties that should be considered when designing machines that could be said to be conscious. In the broader discussion about the nature of consciousness and its neurological mechanisms, it may seem to some that axiomatisation is premature and continues to beg many questions. However, the approach is meant to be open- ended so that others can build further axiomatic clarifications that address the very large number of questions which, in the search for a formal basis for consciousness, still remain to be answered. Of course, in discussions about consciousness many will also argue that the subject is not one that may ever be formally addressed by means of axioms. The view taken in this paper is 'let's try to do it and see how far it gets'. (shrink)

Hegselmann and Krause have developed a simple yet powerful computational model for studying the opinion dynamics in societies of epistemically interacting truth-seeking agents. We present various extensions of this model and show their relevance to the investigation of socio-epistemic questions, with an emphasis on normative questions.

This article inquiries into the concept of res in the Cartesian metaphsyics. It argues, on the one hand, that res should not be interpreted in line with the traditional scholastic concept of substratum, and on the other hand, that it is nevertheless a technical notion. In particular, the determination of the ego as res cogitans in Descartes' Second Meditation (AT VII 27) must be interpreted in the light of the ontology of the verœ naturœ of the Fifth Meditation. The subsistence (...) of the ego is indeed grounded on the criterion of identification of the true natures, that is on the inseparability of concepts. The ontology of the verœ naturœ is therefore already at work both in the Second and in the Third Meditation before becoming explicit in the Fifth Meditation. (shrink)

The paper, as a continuation of the paper Hanzel , provides a methodological generalization of Newton’s method of theory construction as applied in Book I and Book III of his Principia. It reconstructs also the method of measures applied in those books. Finally, it shows how the term “harmonic law” changes its meaning in the Principia.

This article examines the philosophy of law of the eminent twentieth-century Russian philosopher of law, Pavel I. Novgorodtsev. I demonstrate that his viewpoints express a dialectic between the nat...

This article opposes a view widely accepted in studies concerning the history of modal logic, according to which (i) the approach of C. I. Lewis towards constructing modern modal logic was purely syntactical (i.e. limited to the construction of axiomatic systems S1-S5 of propositional modal logic), and (ii) the notion of a possible world was incorporated into modern logic and philosophy mainly by authors such as Rudolf Carnap and Saul Kripke. The article presents Lewis' definition of a possible world, and (...) his formulation of the truth-conditions of statements containing strict implication as their main connective in terms of possible worlds. The main question of the article is whether it is possible to consider Lewis' work in this area as an early stage of the development of possible world semantics, and if so, in what sense? The article concludes by answering affirmatively, due to soundness and completeness proofs with respect to S5 using Lewis' semantics. (shrink)

Der Wechsel der philosophischen Auffassung des λόγος von Platon über Aristoteles bis zu den Stoikern hat die Entstehung der philosophischen Grammatik bedingt. Aus dieser philosophischen Grammatik entwickelt sich die hellenistische Grammatik, die von da an die Verfassung und den Gebrauch der europäischen Sprachen bestimmt. Sie stützt sich vor allem auf die aristotelische und stoische Logik und Grammatik. Indem sie sich aber von ihren philosophischen Wurzeln entfernt, legt sie den Grund für die weitere Entwicklung der nichtphilosophischen Grammatik bei den Römern. Mit (...) dem Auftritt der hellenistisch-römischen Grammatik gelangt die Vergessenheit des Wesens des λόγος und zugleich des Wesens des Sprechens zu ihrem ersten geschichtlichen Höhepunkt. Die geschichtliche Erinnerung an die griechische philosophische Herkunft der Grammatik und besonders an die frühgriechische vor-grammatische Erfahrung des λόγος, in welchem das Wesen des Sprechens selbst zum Wort kommt, hat die Aufgabe, das Gehör für das sprechende Sagen zu wecken, das sich der Herrschaft der Grammatik zu entziehen vermag. (shrink)

In this text, I intend to follow Franklin Leopoldo e Silva’s reflections on the Teaching of Philosophy in Secondary Schools. Along the way, I try to show the central role that Franklin Leopoldo e Silva attributes to the History of Philosophy in order to understand the Teaching of Philosophy, with regard to both the function and the content of this teaching, and how this ensures the fundamental role for the critical power of Philosophy in the formation of high school students.

It is undeniable that inductive reasoning has brought us much good. At least since Hume, however, philosophers have wondered how to justify our reliance on induction. In important recent work, Schurz points out that philosophers have been wrongly assuming that justifying induction is tantamount to showing induction to be reliable. According to him, to justify our reliance on induction, it is enough to show that induction is optimal. His optimality approach consists of two steps: an analytic argument for meta-induction (that (...) is, induction over inductive methods) and an application of meta-induction to empirical findings concerning the predictive accuracy of our actual inductive practices as compared to various non-inductive methods. The present article agrees with Schurz’s general conclusion but also argues that it leaves an important aspect of our inductive practices unaccounted for, to wit, that these practices have so far been highly successful; to satisfy the optimality requirement, induction only needs to be as successful as random guessing. To explain the success of induction, I turn to insights from social epistemology, also highlighted in Schurz’s work, and make these formally explicit in a framework that combines the Hegselmann–Krause model for opinion dynamics and Carnap’s system of λ rules. Within this framework, I use a standard evolutionary algorithm to show how communities of interacting agents may, through variation and selection, come to consist of highly successful inductive reasoners. (shrink)

Radical “Westernizing” transformations in extra-European countries, from Peter I’s Russia to Meiji Japan, are traditionally presented as a response to pressures from the more militarily and technologically advanced European powers. This corresponds to the general tendency to view war as the driving force behind early modern state-building. However, the question remains: how exactly did such transformations happen, and what explains their timing? Why did some countries, such as Russia, embark on radical institutional restructuring that threatened large sections of the traditional (...) military classes in the absence of any obvious existential threat, while in others even clear and immediate dangers failed to ignite a full-scale “Westernization”? This article seeks to complicate the “bellicist” narrative of “Westernizing” transformations and to generalize about the role of elite conflict in propelling “self-strengthening” reforms. It argues that “Westernizations” in extra-European polities were enabled by breakdown of domestic political balance and driven by “challengers” emerging in the course of these conflicts, as they strove to maximize their power. Factional struggles accompanying “Westernizations” are interpreted here not as a conservative reaction against reforms, but as a process that preceded and enabled institutional restructuring. (shrink)

The sequent system LDJ is formulated using the same connectives as Gentzen's intuitionistic sequent system LJ, but is dual in the following sense: (i) whereas LJ is singular in the consequent, LDJ is singular in the antecedent; (ii) whereas LJ has the same sentential counter-theorems as classical LK but not the same theorems, LDJ has the same sentential theorems as LK but not the same counter-theorems. In particular, LDJ does not reject all contradictions and is accordingly paraconsistent. To obtain a (...) more precise mapping, both LJ and LDJ are extended by adding a "pseudo-difference" operator which is the dual of intuitionistic implication. Cut-elimination and decidability are proved for the extended systems and , and a simply consistent but -inconsistent Set Theory with Unrestricted Comprehension Schema based on LDJ is sketched. (shrink)