Hay algunas personas libres que tienen algo semejante a una brújula, por eso en tiempos oscuros necesitamos lo que Albert Camus ofrece: un ejemplo vivo (no una lista de respuestas) de integridad, compasión y buen juicio. Tuvo que elegir (quizá como todos) entre el absurdo y la rebeldía, y después entre una actitud cotidiana de miedo o confianza. Finalmente, Camus nos dice que la naturaleza del ser humano y la belleza del mundo deben equilibrar las ambiciones históricas.

El presente estudio se ocupa de las relaciones entre la forma y el fondo del discurso filosófico; más exactamente, de las implicaciones y consecuencias del texto fragmentario, tanto en sentido teórico como práctico. De manera concreta, el comentario de Lichtenberg, Nietzsche y Adorno permite rastrear en autores de una misma tradición cultural ciertos elementos de continuidad a través de perspectivas históricas y enfoques diferentes. Puede decirse que en este conjunto el pensamiento en forma fragmentaria sirve para una crítica general de (...) la modernidad desde posiciones distintas, pero también complementarias. Por último, se ofrece un boceto de lo que puede ser una teoría compleja del fragmento. (shrink)

El ensayo contrasta dos grandes posturas ante el fenómeno omnipresente de la técnica, en estricta relación con las concepciones profundas de lo racional y lo natural que le subyacen. Ortega por un lado, y Adorno, Horkheimer y Marcuse por otro, son excelentes ejemplos de visiones muy diferentes pero complementarias, que además conjugan aspectos antropológicos, históricos y políticos de gran importancia para ofrecer una panorámica global en este campo, sin reduccionismo alguno, y ayudar así a repensar nuestro presente.

Necesitamos nuevas narraciones para entender un poco más nuestro caótico y muy complejo mundo. En este caso es útil recordar algunos modelos históricos de las relaciones generales entre naturaleza y vida, que están en la base de la biopolítica: a) el tradicional, basado en la ley natural y en los valores de la vida; b) el técnico, basado en la voluntad de poder y en los valores de la libertad; c) el alternativo, basado en la cooperación ecológica entre todos los (...) seres vivos y en ambas clases de valores. Para sobrevivir en esta crisis de civilización hace falta mucho coraje y solidaridad frente a la indiferencia que mata. (shrink)

La crisis global de nuestra civilización y la mezcla cultural propia de nuestro tiempo empujan a la convergencia de diferentes vías de comprensión en un mundo confuso. Filosofía y literatura no son lo mismo, por supuesto, pero se alían en ese propósito porque ambas aportan significado y continuidad frente a la fragmentación de la experiencia. La narración es el punto de intersección entre ambas y por eso resulta muy útil cuando necesitamos iluminar la complejidad de la vida a través de (...) su curso histórico. (shrink)

nowadays it is necessary to understand the Character and Destiny topic from the point of view of emotions because we can integrate some philosophical and neurobiological perspectives better than ever. in this paper the result is deliberately ambiguous for life and for anthropology and Ethics, far away from the usual notions (subject, consciousness, free will, determinism…) and opened, on the contrary, to a multiform discussion in relation to different elements and circumstances.

El presente trabajo se ocupa de las implicaciones filosóficas de la Homeopatía, lo que supone introducir sus principios básicos y algunos datos históricos de interés, para replantear ¿al hilo de su enfoque terapéutico- algunas cuestiones perennes del pensamiento: las relaciones entre ser humano y naturaleza, entre lo universal y lo particular, el holismo y la interdependencia ecológica en sentido lato, la variedad de equilibrios en aras de una visión integral de la salud... El auge social (y crecientemente institucional) de estas (...) prácticas demanda un examen teórico y práctico sin prejuicios, con la intención de servir a un humanismo enriquecido. (shrink)

Spinoza afirma na proposição 31 da Ética III que por natureza todos os sujeitos desejam que os demais vivam conforme seu ingenium. A partir dessa proposição o presente artigo procura refletir sobre os povos indígenas que vivem em contexto urbano na cidade de Blumenau/Santa Catarina. Para a análise, são utilizas as impressões de uma pesquisa ação--participante realizada com mulheres indígenas que migraram para a cidade há mais de cinco anos. No texto é observado que a legislação do Estatuto do Índio (...) é uma das formas que mantém a sobreposição do ingenium branco sobre o indígena. A partir da análise é afirmado que a sobreposição de um ingenium sobre o outro é uma forma de violência afetiva que reproduz a colonização na atualidade. (shrink)

Hoy día es necesario entender la vida en sentido global y eso significa considerar varias dimensiones del tema al mismo tiempo: la ecológica y la biológica, pero también la técnica y la simbólica, pues vivimos –como es bien sabido– en un gran “mundo red”. La interdependencia es la clave, especialmente cuando naturaleza y cultura interactúan e integran el nuevo ecosistema del planeta Tierra como nunca antes lo hicieron, todo lo cual incluye muchos desafíos y riesgos también.Nowadays is necessary to understand (...) Life in a global way and that means toconsider several dimensions of the topic at the same time: the ecological and the biological ones, but also the technical and symbolic ones, because we are just living –as it is well known– in a great “net-world”. The interdependence is the key, above all when Nature and Culture interact and integrate the new ecosystem of the planet Earth as never they did before, and all that includes many challenges and risks too. (shrink)

Tomando como punto de partida la idea de Arendt sobre la banalización del mal -asumido de manera irreflexiva e indiferente en ciertos contextos-, pretendo mostrar algunos mecanismos de la época actual que contribuyen a que el mal sea considerado como algo trivial e inevitable. En particular, existen ciertos automatismos sociales que fomentan el fatalismo o la inconsciencia, lo que a su vez converge en dos realidades transversales que exacerban el daño: la creciente desigualdad y la crisis ambiental.

Vivimos en el Antropoceno, tomado en sentido amplio, donde lo geológico y lo histórico convergen porque la acción humana lo hace posible. El cambio climático y la explotación global de recursos naturales y de las estructuras capitalistas conducen al género humano hacia el colapso de la civilización tal como la conocemos. Hay algunas relaciones importantes entre Antropoceno y colapso que muestran a la vez el poder y la impotencia de la humanidad.

The origins of teacher training programs in Chile have not been addressed in depth apart from Vivanco’s studies. Even though these studies explore the development of these programs in Chile from a chronological perspective, there are no qualitative studies that consider senior academics’ narrations. This qualitative study reconstructs the trajectory of teacher training programs in Chile from a series of interviews with 25 academics in charge of these programs. Results were analyzed in three different periods: 1960-1973, 1973-1990, and 1990 to (...) 2019. Results, discussed in a political and academic context, reveal that these teacher training programs have evolved in a sociopolitical context, generating a series of tensions that substantially impact these training programs. The study finishes with the statement of a series of questions aimed at reflecting upon the state of the art in Chile’s training programs. (shrink)

Computational and information‐theoretic research in philosophy has become increasingly fertile and pervasive, giving rise to a wealth of interesting results. In consequence, a new and vitally important field has emerged, the philosophy of information (PI). This essay is the first attempt to analyse the nature of PI systematically. PI is defined as the philosophical field concerned with the critical investigation of the conceptual nature and basic principles of information, including its dynamics, utilisation, and sciences, and the elaboration and application of (...) information‐theoretic and computational methodologies to philosophical problems. I argue that PI is a mature discipline for three reasons: it represents an autonomous field of research; it provides an innovative approach to both traditional and new philosophical topics; and it can stand beside other branches of philosophy, offering a systematic treatment of the conceptual foundations of the world of information and the information society. (shrink)

Toleration is one of the fundamental principles that inform the design of a democratic and liberal society. Unfortunately, its adoption seems inconsistent with the adoption of paternalistically benevolent policies, which represent a valuable mechanism to improve individuals’ well-being. In this paper, I refer to this tension as the dilemma of toleration. The dilemma is not new. It arises when an agent A would like to be tolerant and respectful towards another agent B’s choices but, at the same time, A is (...) altruistically concerned that a particular course of action would harm, or at least not improve, B’s well-being, so A would also like to be helpful and seeks to ensure that B does not pursue such course of action, for B’s sake and even against B’s consent. In the article, I clarify the specific nature of the dilemma and show that several forms of paternalism, including those based on ethics by design and structural nudging, may not be suitable to resolve it. I then argue that one form of paternalism, based on pro-ethical design, can be compatible with toleration and hence with the respect for B’s choices, by operating only at the informational and not at the structural level of a choice architecture. This provides a successful resolution of the dilemma, showing that tolerant paternalism is not an oxymoron but a viable approach to the design of a democratic and liberal society. (shrink)

In 2016, the European Parliament approved the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) whose core aim is the safeguarding of information privacy, and, by corollary, human dignity. Drawing on the field of philosophical anthropology, this paper analyses various interpretations of human dignity and human exceptionalism. It concludes that privacy is essential for humans to flourish and enable individuals to build a sense of self and the world.

Three classic distinctions specify that truths can be necessary versus contingent,analytic versus synthetic, and a priori versus a posteriori. The philosopher reading this article knows very well both how useful and ordinary such distinctions are in our conceptual work and that they have been subject to many and detailed debates, especially the last two. In the following pages, I do not wish to discuss how far they may be tenable. I shall assume that, if they are reasonable and non problematic (...) in some ordinary cases, then they can be used in order to understand what kind of knowledge the maker’s knowledge is. By this I mean the sort of knowledge that Alice enjoys when she holds the information that Bob’s coffee is sweetened because she just put two spoons of sugar in it herself. The maker’s knowledge tradition is quite important but it is not mainstream in modern and analytic epistemology and lacks grounding in terms of exactly what sort of knowledge one is talking about. My suggestion is that this grounding can be provided by a minimalist approach, based on an information-theoretical analysis. In the article, I argue that we need to decouple a fourth distinction, namely informative versus uninformative, from the previous three and, in particular, from its implicit association with analytic versus synthetic and a priori versus a posteriori; such a decoupling facilitates, and is facilitated by, moving from a monoagent to a multiagent approach: the distinctions qualify a proposition, a message, or some information not just in themselves but relationally, with respect to an informational agent; the decoupling and the multiagent approach enable a re-mapping of currently available positions in epistemology on these four dichotomies; within such a re-mapping, two positions, capturing the nature of a witness’ knowledge and of a maker’s knowledge, can best be described as contingent, synthetic, a posteriori, and uninformative and as contingent, synthetic, weakly a priori, and uninformative respectively. In the conclusion, I indicate why the analysis of the maker’s knowledge has important consequences in all those cases in which the poietic intervention on a system determines the truth of the model of that system. (shrink)

Scholars and policy makers often refer to the “information society”. And yet, it is more accurate to speak of societies, each different, some of which may qualify as information ones at different levels of maturity. Through exploration of the concepts of expectations, education and innovation, this paper explores what it means for an information society to be more or less mature than others, and the impact of this on the ongoing digital revolution.

The subject is Sextus Empiricus, one the chief sources of information on ancient philosophy and one of the most influential authors in the history of skepticism. Sextus' works have had an extraordinary influence on western philosophy, and this book provides the first exhaustive and detailed study of their recovery, transmission, and intellectual influence through Late Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Renaissance. This study deals with Sextus' biography, as well as the history of the availability and reception of his works. (...) It also contains an extensive bibliographical section, including editions, translations, and commentaries. (shrink)

This paper contributes to the current debate on the nature of semantic information by offering a semantic argument in favour of the veridical thesis according to which p counts as information only if p is true. In the course of the analysis, the paper reviews some basic principles and requirements for any theory of semantic information.

Can knowledge provide its own justification? This sceptical challenge - known as the problem of the criterion - is one of the major issues in the history of epistemology, and this volume provides its first comprehensive study, in a span of time that goes from Sextus Empiricus to Quine. After an essential introduction to the notions of knowledge and of philosophy of knowledge, the book provides a detailed reconstruction of the history of the problem. There follows a conceptual analysis of (...) its logical features, and a comparative examination of a phenomenology of solutions that have been suggested in the course of the history of philosophy in order to overcome it, from Descartes to Popper. In this context, an indirect approach to the problem of the criterion is defended as the most successful strategy against the sceptical challenge. (shrink)

Information plays a major role in any moral action. ICT have revolutionized the life of information, from its production and management to its consumption, thus deeply affecting our moral lives. Amid the many issues they have raised, a very serious one, discussed in this paper, is labelled the tragedy of the Good Will. This is represented by the increasing pressure that ICT and their deluge of information are putting on any agent who would like to act morally, when informed about (...) actual or potential evils, but who also lacks the resources to do much about them. In the paper, it is argued that the tragedy may be at least mitigated, if not solved, by seeking to re-establish some equilibrium, through ICT themselves, between what agents know about the world and what they can do to improve it. (shrink)

The culture that characterises mature information societies is now evolving from being a culture of signs and signification into a culture of proxies and interaction. Through a definition and discussion of proxies and degenerate proxies, this paper analyses the factors behind this evolution and the potential implications for such a major societal transformation.

This introduction presents the project of a one-day meeting on the future of philosophical research, hosted by the Institute of Philosophy, School of Advanced Study, University of London, on 13 January 2012. The meeting brought together several distinguished philosophers and scholars in their roles as journal editors and publishing experts, in order to clarify and discuss the future of philosophical research. This symposium in Metaphilosophy collects a selection of the papers presented at the meeting and some invited articles.

I argue that, according to Descartes, even mathematics is not immune from doubt and absolutely reliable, and hence fails to grant the ultimate justification of science. Descartes offers two arguments and a corollary to support this view. They are sufficient to show that the mathematical atheist cannot justifiably claim to have absolutely certain knowledge even of simple mathematical truths. Philosophical reflection itself turns out to be the only alternative means to provide knowledge with a stable foundation.

The answer to some of the longstanding issues in the 20th century theoretical physics, such as those of the incompatibility between general relativity and quantum mechanics, the broken symmetries of the electroweak force acting at the subatomic scale and the missing mass of Higgs particle, and also those of the cosmic singularity and the black matter and energy, appear to be closely related to the problem of the quantum texture of space-time and the fluctuations of its underlying geometry. Each region (...) of space landscape seem to be filled with spacetime weaved and knotted networks, for example, spacetime has immaterial curvature and structures, such as topological singularities, and obeys the laws of quantum physics. Thus, it is filled with potentialparticles, pairs of virtual matter and anti-matter units, and potential properties at the quantum scale. For example, quantum entities (like fields and particles) have both wave (i.e., continuous) and particle (i.e., discrete) properties and behaviors. At the quantum level (precisely, the Planck scale) of space-time such properties and behaviors could emerge from some underlying (dynamic) phase space related to some field theory. Accordingly, these properties and behaviors leave their signature on objects and phenomena in the real Universe. In this paper we consider some conceptual issues of this question. (shrink)