The starting point of this paper is Andrej Ule’s book Osnovna filozofska vprašanja sodobne logike [Basic Philosophical Questions of Contemporary Logic] from 1982. Specifically, I focus on his assessment of Frege, Russell and Wittgenstein’s views on the ontological status of logic and its apriority. Ule claims that all three thinkers failed because they did not take into account the role a human being plays in this as the creator of language. In this assessment, I recognize the rejection of metaphysics and (...) the linguistic approach to philosophical issues that were characteristic of analytic philosophy in the past. I shortly describe this position and the role that the discussed authors played in its development. I conclude with my own assessment of the proposed views based on the contemporary, metaphysics-friendly position. (shrink)

Das Ziel der von mir vorgestellten Arbeit ist zu beweisen, dass Nie-Boska komedia (Die ungöttliche Komödie) von Zygmunt Krasiński eine romantische Moralität ist. In Beziehung auf das mittelalterliche Gattungsmodell weise ich nach, dass dieses Drama des polnischen Romantikers in Anlehnung and Moralitätsschema konstruiert worden ist. Dieses Schema gibt die Voraussetzung für die im Werk enthaltene Vision der Welt und des Menschen. Die Anfangskapitel widmen sich der Rekonstruktion und Analyse der im Werk des Authors von Irydion vorgestellten Visionen von außerirdischen Gegenden (...) des Universums, weil die Erde, wie in einer typischen Moralität, nur sein Teil ist. Aus dieser übernatürlichen Wirklichkeit kommen sowohl gute, als auch böse Kräfte, die sich im Laufe des Dramas bemühen, einen Einfluss auf den Helden zu erobern. Sie möchten ihn entweder zur Errettung oder zur Verdammung bringen, was in Konsequenz eine Übermacht im ewigen Ringen zwischen Gott und seinem großen Widersacher - Satan erreichen lässt. Im weiteren Teil meiner Arbeit versuche ich die Kreationsweise der in Nie-Boska komedia auftretenden Engel- und Dämonwesen zu bestimmen und auch auf eventuelle Inspirationsquellen und Entlehnungen zu weisen. Ich will auch die Methoden und Mittel zeigen, mit Hilfe deren sie auf ihr Hauptziel - den Grafen Henryk einwirken. Besonders interessant scheint die Gestalt von Pankracy zu sein, der vielleicht ein Instrument in Händen der metaphysischen Mächte ist. Das Drama von Krasiński halte ich für geistliche Geschichte vom Grafen Henryk. (shrink)

The problem of charging interest has been discussed since the time of Aristotle. It was condemned in the Christian religion in the Middle Ages. Only when the interest was specified as a payment for productive capital was it considered that the borrower, enriched by the money lent, should let the lender benefit in accordance with the principle of fairness. The borrower should share the profit with the lender, and from this moment the percentage is no longer something shameful and neglected. (...) Religious beliefs and accepted moral values have changed over time, adapting to the circumstances, so has the approach to collecting interest from the capital lent. However, there is still a great deal of criticism of excessive interest rates. The purpose of this paper is to present a discussion related to the charging of interest presented in the tradition of economics and also to show some aspects of the problem in relation to the present times, such as excessive debt and responsible lending. (shrink)

The expansion of competition on financial services market forces to search for new ways of development. A bank-insurance cooperation, which is more and more popular in the world and in Poland, becomes an effective remedy to this problem and a factor which stimulates rivalry and competition. The final beneficent of this cooperation is a customer for whom a diverse market offer of financial services means creation of added value. The customer’s satisfaction with that kind of services is important to further (...) development of bank-insurance cooperation. The aim of this work is to estimate whether the services of an integrated bank-insurance offer and insurances with mortgage credits are friendly and useful, and also whether they assure comfort and safety or may cause risk. (shrink)

System guarantying deposits in Poland was created during the economy transformation. Its founding was resulted from a tough situation in the bank sector, that is why it was supposed to be an antidotum to clients' problems connected with solvency of the collapsing banks and also with adjusting to the European community law. The aim of this work is to present The Bank Guarantee Fund, an institution belonging to a network of financial security, which main task is to protect the deponent’s (...) interests and to secure the banking system's stability. The work concerns some aspects of the growing interest in insurance systems for banks deposits and revived discussions on this subject during crisis on bank markets. In reply on the crisis, which was started on credit market subprime in USA and then spread on other segments of financial markets in other countries, the ECOFIN took a decision for increasing the obligatory guarantee limits for individual persons and also for accelerating the payment of guaranteed means. The aim of above changes is to increase surety of clients and trust to bank sector. (shrink)

The question of politics is underdeveloped in René Girard's mimetic theory. This can be fairly easily accounted for. First, mimesis is essentially an ethical mechanism. In Girard, it pertains both to a set of moral prescriptions and to an ethos, understood here as a way of being that exchanges harmful repetitions for favorable ones.1 Throughout his work, Girard advances an ethics of generosity that steers clear of reciprocity, which, in his framework, would lead to violence.2 Second, Girard concentrates on social (...) structures and religious institutions that have been developed over the ages to deal with mimetic crises. These structures of containment protect communities from an all-consuming outbreak of violence by... (shrink)

“Representation” and “articulation” are important terms in discussions of multispecies relations. In this article, I propose the term “coarticulation” that describes a process of mutual intelligibility between a human and a nonhuman and of rendering each other capable in new ways. This article argues that the concept of “coarticulation” offers a way to enrich our understanding of our human-nonhuman relations and give ontological consistency to various types of nonhumans that matter to us. It traces the reciprocal imprints that nonhumans and (...) humans make on each other. Not least, it provides an alternative way to think about politics with nonhumans: a politics of cohabitation. (shrink)

This article attempts to respond to the fractional presence of feminist discourse around René Girard’s theory of mimetic desire. I will first briefly examine the relevant critical stands on mimesis and then proceed to rehabilitate it for feminism via an analysis of Judith Butler’s theory of performative gender. By bringing together selected aspects of Girard and Butler’s work, it will be possible to build a constructive dialogue between the two thinkers. Due to the scope of the paper I will not (...) be able to give an exhaustive account of the respective theories, and hence I will discuss only the most relevant aspects. Girard is concerned with giving an account of conflictual mimetic desire in social and cultural.. (shrink)

The present paper consists of two parts. In the first, some issues related to the character of biological experiments conducted under in vitro cultures are portrayed. The relevant aspects of these procedures are explicated from the viewpoint of the experimental botanist. It is a case study for the considerations in the second part, which presents selected philosophical and legal issues involved in biological experiments from the general perspective of philosophical investigations concerning the problem of plants’ axiology. Obviously, the nature of (...) the considerations is limited; not all important questions from the perspective of biology and philosophy have been raised. Nevertheless, the authors hope that the analyzed issues may be interesting for both biologists and philosophers. (shrink)

Artykuł stanowi próbę analizy listu Pico della Mirandoli O języku filozofów, skierowanego do Hermolausa Barbara. W pierwszej części tekstu zaprezentowano kontekst sporu, czyli znamienne dla epoki napięcie między filozofią a retoryką, oraz krytykę filozofii scholastycznej z perspektywy humanistów. Uwyraźnienie stanowiska Barbara pozwala uchwycić sedno sporu z Pikiem, mianowicie:jakiej prawdy – prawdy o czym – powinniśmy poszukiwać? Do analizy stanowiska Pika posłużyły wypreparowane z jego tekstu opozycje: wnętrze/zewnętrze, prawda/pozór, rozum/zmysły i popędy, filozofia/retoryka-sofistyka, człowiek rozumny/człowiek pospolity. Pozwala to uchwycić myśl Pika jako (...) z założenia paradoksalną: okazuje się, że retoryka zarazem zakrywa istotę rzeczy i ją odkrywa. Jest jednocześnie przeszkodą i nieodzownym narzędziem poznania i wyrażania myśli. Dzieje się tak ze względu na nieuchronną historyczność ludzkiej myśli. (shrink)

The book is a reflection over how art functions in late modernity. It emphasizes processes of fictionalizing reality and exposes, how phenomenology can be used to extract this problem on a foundation of aesthetics. It is a panoramic outlook over existing views, but also a self-sufficient theoretical proposal.

The paper concerns a form of experiencing time which is specific for haiku poetry. Haiku is an expression of the momentary glimpse of time. Haiku poetry treats the moment uninstrumentally, neither as a result of the past nor as a transition to future deeds. Seen this way, the moment arises on the stream of time as a unique, existential experience. It is my attempt to explain the phenomenon of this experience of “now” as I explore the metaphors of “background”, “figure” (...) and “composition”. (shrink)

I provide some considerations on scientific thought experiments, focusing on their epistemic value. First, I outline the distinctive features of scientific thought experiments, provide some historical background and, as an illustration, describe two thought experiments: Galileo's on falling bodies and Stevin's on inclined plane. I take thought experiments in physics as an example from which more general conclusions can be drawn - about thought experiments in other natural sciences, but also in philosophy, mathematics, and other sciences. Further, I present Kuhn's (...) epistemic puzzle as well as some proposed solutions. This closely relates to the question what kind of processes are involved in scientific thought experimenting. The satisfactory answer must consider scientific discoveries. I outline the mental model account as the most promising account since it best incorporates the findings of cognitive science. I conclude with two issues that the account needs to resolve and the role cognitive science can play in this. (shrink)

The bucket experiment in Newton’s Principia is quite simple. Nonetheless, physicists as well as philosophers and historians of science are still debating its purpose and success. I present two interpretations found in the literature. According to the first, Newton tries to prove absolute rotation and thus the existence of absolute space. According to the second, he tries to provide a definition of absolute rotation as it is used in his mechanics. Closely connected to this is his rejection of Descartes’ explanation (...) of rotation and of motion in general. I conclude with a short discussion on whether the bucket experiment can be classified as a thought experiment. (shrink)

Conventionalists about modality deny that the world has a modal structure. Metaphysical necessity is not a real feature of the world, but a linguistic necessity grounded in conventions governing our use of words. In this paper, I focus on Allan Sidelle’s conventionalist account and especially on his claim that the idea of real necessity should be abandoned since it is puzzling. My strategy for the defense of the realist notion of modality is twofold. First, the ontology of undifferentiated stuff, which (...) underlies his conventionalist account, is itself very puzzling and in need of further defense. Second, the alleged problems of the realist interpretation are based on an empiricist view of the world. (shrink)

This paper shows that Wittgenstein’s situational approach applied to Hume’s is-ought problem leads to the conclusion that this famous Hume thesis is false both in its original version (lack of logical value of deontic sentences) and in its modern understanding (logical separation of deontic sentences and sentences about facts).

Fiodor Dostoyevsky in his oeuvre indicates certain attitudes, which are often recognized in the process of man's thinking and behavior. They are conditioned by the manner he perceives reality and they in themselves appoint simultaneously this way of world perception. Some of those occurrences resemble in a great manner the defense mechanisms, which are described in the later literature. A first mechanism that was analyzed is pursue simplification, which causes a man to believe that thanks to the achieved knowledge he (...) will be able to set in order and fix imperfect reality. Such attitude enforces simplified vision of the world, which in turn helps in self-deception. Dostoyevsky's heroes have problems to recognize true motives of their own behaviors or they intentionally attribute nobler incentives to themselves. Therefore the next described attitude is reluctance to acknowledge the truth. The Russian writer rejects generally accepted disjunctivity of the 'truth and false' category and he attributes the final might to acknowledge something as true or false to the man's will. On account of innate laziness and refractoriness, man chooses the simplest solutions, which in point of fact dismiss possibility to see real reasons for all failures. It makes impossible to undertake activities, which could indeed change something. Man is characterized by irresponsibility for his actions and words. A word looses its causative meaning and becomes purely a decoration, an ornament. All these make that learning the truth, as one of the elements propelling development of the philosophy, was not impossible but it was unwanted. (shrink)

This article is a presentation of the problem of human nature in Dostoevsky's writings. Its author does not agree that the great Russian thinker would give his assent to any of the two opposing ideas: neither that man is good by nature nor that his fate from the moment of birth is tragic. Dostoevsky has proved that freedom constitutes the core of human being. When this freedom is used in a wrong way man becomes bad, and if it is used (...) according to Jesus Christ teachings, he may attain righteousness due to His Grace. In such circumstances, there is no space for any predetermination. Man is free, if he wants to be free. He has got free will. He is always responsible for everything he has done. Dostoevsky uses the term n a t u r e in two different meanings. The first one is essential and refers to the notion of freedom. Consequently, Dostoevsky claims, human nature is beyond full cognition. The second meaning of the term nature refers to the attributes of a particular nation. The differences between nations are further evidence of freedom, which manifests in an infinity of ways. Nature understood as such can be changed and comprehended. The change requires much effort over a long period of time but can by achieved. To capture the full picture of the problem of human nature in Dostoevsky's ultimately it works, both meanings of the above notion should be the taken into consideration. (shrink)

The article analyses the scientific work of Bohdan Jałowiecki, highlighting his influence on the development of interdisciplinary urban studies in Poland. By integrating elements of sociology, geography and spatial planning, Jałowiecki contributed significally to the internationalisation of Polish scientific thought, including the intoduction of the French concepts of Henri Lefebvre and Manuel Castells. The introduction of the idea of social production of space and rational electicism in research methodology allowed for a deeper understanding of socio-spatial processes. The article discusses Jałowiecki's (...) assessment of development policies during socialism and systematic transformation, incuding his early warnings against the uncritical adoption of the dogma of economic growth. Jałowiecki emphasised the importance of socialising spatial planning and citizen participation in decision-making processes, stressing the need to integrate economic and spatial planning in order to fully reflect the public interest and shape the spatial order. (shrink)

Scholars in multispecies ethnography, the ontological turn, new materialisms, science and technology studies (STS), assemblage urbanism and other movements within the posthumanities broadly considered often treat cosmopolitics, initially proposed by Isabelle Stengers and subsequently taken up by Bruno Latour, as a single coherent concept. However, Stengers’s cosmopolitics differs considerably from Latour’s. The difference is most clearly visible in their contrasting positions on the concept of universality. Even though their divergence on universality could be considered a minor philosophical dispute among intellectual (...) allies, it should not be underestimated. It determines what sort of political practice each of these philosophers envisions with cosmopolitics. Their visions of political practice are substantially different. This article will examine Latour’s and Stengers’s diverging positions on universality, delineate the two types of cosmopolitics, and, finally, analyze what sort of political practice each of these cosmopolitics implies. (shrink)

Black holes entered scientific literature as early as at the end of eighteenth century. They had been known at that time as dark stars, but their concept did not find its way to physics or astronomy, and had been abandoned for more than one hundred years. I shall sketch historical developments and discuss present mathematical and observational status of black holes.

Recent debates within broadly considered posthumanities have been populated by various conceptual personae. One such figure is the diplomat. First proposed in this context by Isabelle Stengers in her Cosmopolitics series, the diplomat has been subsequently taken up and further developed by Bruno Latour, particularly in his AIME project, and most recently by Baptiste Morizot in Les Diplomates. This article traces the metamorphosis of this conceptual character in the work of Stengers, Latour and Morizot. As all three versions are relatively (...) close to each other, this article proposes three companion figures: the heretic (for Stengers), the designer (for Latour) and the amateur (for Morizot) that allow us to carefully examine the differences between, and the specific stakes of, each iteration of the diplomat. Furthermore, the article critically evaluates the theoretical pertinence of the diplomat figure for each philosopher’s project and considers its potential for thinking about the future of our more-than-human worlds. (shrink)

The access of Poland to the EU caused the creation of the consumer protection system which consists of legal controls and different institutions such as e.g. UOKiK, BA, RZu. The aim of the study is to show problem of protection of bank services market consumer. The range of bank services is limited here to mortgage loans. Changes on the mortgage loan market in Poland during 2005–2008 are analysed in this work. The crisis on financial markets and its consequences have also (...) been considered. The author presents the bank actions in the face of consumers during the crisis and the possibilities of the solving the disputes with dissatisfied consumers. (shrink)

This contribution considers the question of scale in Peter Sloterdijk’s work in relation to some of the recent tendencies in contemporary French thought. It examines theoretical conditions for approaching philosophy as an exercise in constructing grand narratives and interrogates the legitimacy of such a gesture after poststructuralist critique. What is to be gained from new grand narratives?

This text focuses on the possibility of acquiring universal knowledge by individual subjective consciousness as determined both corporeally and culturally. Along with the appearance of the “question” of the cultural Other the attempts of European philosophers to establish a kind of a universal sphere—intellectual basis for an intercultural dialogue—became more intensive, but still often limited by their relation to the values and ideas of the only one culture. In other words, the attempts to search the community of human kind in (...) an intellectual sphere often led to the universality being the “universalized particularity”, maintained by the empty signifiers. But there is also another philosophical tradition, in which the “universality” of ideas, concepts or values is being perceived as a quasi-universality or pluri-versality, mediated by human organic and cultural interactions, and is being derived rather from “beyond”—from the condition of embodiment—than from “above,” the pure intellectual cognition. I focus on three instances of moving from the order of body towards the quasi-universal values: on Bartolomé de Las Casas’s posing a problem of the universal values in the context of intercultural dialogue, on Michel de Montaigne’s reflections on human nature and Walter Mignolo’s naturalistic foundation of the comparative studies. I chose these examples, because they offer a clear and expressed attempt to reformulate the very idea of possible universality in the context of the desired intercultural dialogue, but within the optics of the embodied subjectivities. (shrink)

I critically discuss the contextualist approach to essentialism, which was developed as an explanation of the seeming inconstancy of our essentialist intuitions. The problem is supposed to be that we vacillate a great deal in judging what properties an object has essentially from one occasion to another, which obviously undermines the reliability of our essentialist intuitions. Contextualists solve the problem by combining the metaphysical view that objects have essential properties with the semantic thesis that the term “essentially” is a context (...) sensitive expression. Once we are aware of the context shifting, the conflict of intuitions turns out to be onlyapparent. My aim is to show that contextualism is not the answer that a proponent of essentialism should adopt. First, I outline the contextualist strategy and argue by help of an example that our linguistic practice does not seem to support the contextualist claim that “essentially” is a context-sensitive term. Secondly, the contextualist strategy deals only with the vacillation of intuitions in one person, but offers a very unfavorable explanation of the conflict of intuitions among different persons. Thus, contextualists face the challenge of proving the reliability of essentialist intuitions nevertheless. I conclude with David Lewis’s proposal in order to illustrate that the contextualist approach only provides the appearance, but not the real essentialism. (shrink)

Since 1996, when David Chalmers introduced the zombie argument against physicalism in The Conscious Mind, numerous works of ever-increasing technical complexity and nuanced argumentation have been written on the conceivability and possibility of zombies. In this paper, I focus on the main points of the argument. First, I discuss the conceivability of zombies. I briefly outline three other thought-experiments in order to determine what is expected of a good thought-experiment and its workings. Next, I turn to Chalmers' defense of their (...) conceivability, where the key consideration is to present conceivability as a credible a priori method that can entail metaphysical possibility. I conclude that Chalmers does not manage to create a credible link between conceivability and possibility, thus failing to show that zombies are not only conceptually possible, but also metaphysically possible. The most problematic idea is the identification of logically possible worlds with metaphysically possible worlds. Chalmers' main aim is to defend conceivability as an a priori method of acquiring modal knowledge, but by limiting it to the rational domain, the acquired knowledge is not knowledge of the objective reality, but of the content of our thoughts. (shrink)