The notion of subject matter is a key concern of contemporary philosophy of language and logic. A central task for a theory of subject matter is to characterise the notion of sentential subject matter, that is, to assign to each sentence of a given language a subject matter that may count as its subject matter. In this paper, we elaborate upon David Lewis’ account of subject matter. Lewis’ proposal is simple and elegant but lacks a satisfactory characterisation of sentential subject (...) matter. Drawing on linguistic literature on focus and on the question under discussion, we offer a neo-Lewisian account of subject matter, which retains all the virtues of Lewis’ but also includes an attractive characterisation of sentential subject matter. (shrink)

This book is about some topical philosophical and methodological prob lems that arise in the study of behavior and mind, as well as in the treatment of behavioral and mental disorders. It deals with such questions as 'What is behavior a manifestation of?', 'What is mind, and how is it related to matter?', 'Which are the positive legacies, if any, of the major psychological schools?', 'How can behavior and mind best be studied?', and 'Which are the most effective ways of (...) modifying behavioral and mental processes?' These questions and their kin cannot be avoided in the long run because they fuel the daily search for better hypotheses, experimental designs, techniques, and treatments. They also occur in the critical examination of data and theories, as well as methods for the treatment of behavioral and mental disorders. All students of human or animal, normal or abnormal behavior and mind, whether their main concern is basic or applied, theoretical or em pirical, admit more or less tacitly to a large number of general philosophi cal and methodological principles. (shrink)

pt. I. Matter: 1. Philosophy as worldview ; 2. Classical matter: bodies and fields ; 3. Quantum matter: weird but real ; 4. General concept of matter: to be is to become ; 5. Emergence and levels ; 6. Naturalism ; 7. Materialism -- pt. II. Mind: 8. The mind-body problem ; 9. Minding matter: the plastic brain ; 10. Mind and society ; 11. Cognition, consciousness, and free will ; 12. Brain and computer: the hardware/software dualism ; 13. Knowledge: (...) genuine and bogus -- pt. III. Appendices: 14. Appendix A: Objects ; 15. Appendix B. Truths. (shrink)

"I regard it as a truly seminal work in this field." — Professor William A. Wallace, author of Causality and Scientific Explanation. Non-technical and clearly written, this book focuses on the place of the casual principle in modern science. The author defines the terminology, describes various formulations, examines the two primary critiques of causality, and more.

This paper investigates the historical origin and ancestors of typicality, which is now a central concept in Boltzmannian Statistical Mechanics and Bohmian Mechanics. Although Ludwig Boltzmann did not use the word typicality, its main idea, namely, that something happens almost always or is valid for almost all cases, plays a crucial role for his explanation of how thermodynamic systems approach equilibrium. At the beginning of the 20th century, the focus on almost always or almost everywhere was fruitful for developing measure (...) theory and probability theory. It was apparently Hugh Everett III who first mentioned typicality in physics in 1957 while searching for a justification of the Born rule in his interpretation of quantum mechanics. The historically closest concept before these developments is moral certainty, which was invented by the medieval French theologian Jean Gerson, and it became a standard concept at least until the Age of Enlightenment, when Jakob Bernoulli proved the Law of Large numbers. (shrink)

This paper introduces a new framework, based on the notion of compatibility space, obtained by adding a primitive incompatibility relation to a state space in the sense of Fine. The key idea inspiring the framework is to modify Fine's truthmaker semantics by taking the notion of incompatibility as primitive, and use it to define other notions. We discuss some interesting features of the framework and explore its advantages over the standard framework of state spaces. We review some applications of the (...) framework, including proofs of soundness and completeness theorems for a number of logics, one way to use compatibility states to mirror Kripke frames, and an exploration of a way to use the new framework to provide truthmaking clauses for modal formulas. (shrink)

Predictivists use the no miracle argument to argue that “novel” predictions are decisive evidence for theories, while mere accommodation of “old” data cannot confirm to a significant degree. But deductivists claim that since confirmation is a logical theory-data relationship, predicted data cannot confirm more than merely deduced data, and cite historical cases in which known data confirmed theories quite strongly. On the other hand, the advantage of prediction over accommodation is needed by scientific realists to resist Laudan’s criticisms of the (...) no miracle argument. So, if the deductivists are right, the most powerful argument for realism collapses. There seems to be an inescapable contradiction between these prima facie plausible arguments of predictivists and deductivists; but this puzzle can be solved by understanding what exactly counts as novelty, if novel predictions must support the no miracle argument, i.e., if they must be explainable only by the truth of theories. Taking my cues from the use-novelty tradition, I argue that (1) the predicted data must not be used essentially in building the theory or choosing the auxiliary assumptions. This is possible if the theory and its auxiliary assumptions are plausible independently of the predicted data, and I analyze the consequences of this requirement in terms of best explanation of diverse bodies of data. Moreover, the predicted data must be (2) a priori improbable, and (3) heterogeneous to the essentially used data. My proposed notion of novelty, therefore, is not historical, but functional. Hence, deductivists are right that confirmation is independent of time and of historical contingencies such as if the theorist knew a datum, used it, or intended to accommodate it. Predictivists, however, are right that not all consequences confirm equally, and confirmation is not purely a logical theory-data relation, as it crucially involves background epistemic conditions and the notion of best explanation. Conditions (1)–(3) make the difference between prediction and accommodation, and account for the confirming power of theoretical virtues such as non ad-hocness, non-fudging, non-overfitting, independence and consilience. I thus show that functional novelty (a) avoids the deductivist objections to predictivism, (b) is a gradual notion, in accordance with the common intuition that confirmation comes in degrees, and (c) supports the no miracle argument, so vindicating scientific realism. (shrink)

The notions of subject matter and aboutness have been objects of considerable attention among philosophers over the last few years. Current theories of subject matter take sentences to be the primary bearers of subject matter: “sentences have aboutness properties if anything has” (Yablo, Aboutness, Princeton University Press, 2014). However, some subsentential expressions can also be thought of as being about something. Moreover, it appears that the subject matters of sentences depend in a systematic way on the aboutness properties of their (...) subsentential components. In this paper, we focus on the question of what predicates are about. We provide an account of predicative subject matter in which subject matters are assigned to predicates in a natural way, and which can be smoothly integrated with some existing accounts of sentential subject matter. We also argue that the notion of predicative subject matter is a worthy object of study, both within the current debate on subject matter and in its own right. (shrink)

Traditional discussions about the arrow of time in general involve the concept of entropy. In the cosmological context, the direction past-to-future is usually related to the direction of the gradient of the entropy function of the universe. But the definition of the entropy of the universe is a very controversial matter. Moreover, thermodynamics is a phenomenological theory. Geometrical properties of space-time provide a more fundamental and less controversial way of defining an arrow of time for the universe as a whole. (...) We will call the arrow defined only on the basis of the geometrical properties of space-time, independently of any entropic considerations, “the global arrow of time.” In this paper we will argue that: (i) if certain conditions are satisfied, it is possible to define a global arrow of time for the universe as a whole, and (ii) the standard models of contemporary cosmology satisfy these conditions. (shrink)

Summary Opinion is divided as to whether chemistry is reducible to physics. The problem can be given a satisfactory solution provided three conditions are met: that a science not be identified with its theories; that several notions of theory dependence be distinguished; and that quantum chemistry, rather than classical chemistry, be compared with physics. This paper proposes to perform all three tasks. It does so by analyzing the methodological concepts concerned as well as by examining the way a chemical rate (...) constant is derivable with the help of the quantum atomic theory. The conclusion is that chemistry, and in particular quantum chemistry, is not a part of physics although it is certainly based on the latter. (shrink)

PHILOSOPHY: BEACON OR TRAP* There was a time when everyone expected almost everything from philosophy. It was the time when philosophers drew confidently ...

The autopoietic theory and the enactive approach are two theoretical streams that, in spite of their historical link and conceptual affinities, offer very different views on the nature of living beings. In this paper, we compare these views and evaluate, in an exploratory way, their respective degrees of internal coherence. Focusing the analyses on certain key notions such as autonomy and organizational closure, we argue that while the autopoietic theory manages to elaborate an internally consistent conception of living beings, the (...) enactive approach presents an internal tension regarding its characterization of living beings as intentional systems directed at the environment. (shrink)

Philosophies and phobosophies -- The philosophical matrix of scientific progress -- Systemics and materialism -- Technoscience? -- Climate and logic -- Informatics : one or multiple? -- Wealth and well-being, economic growth and integral development -- Can standard economic theory account for crises? -- Marxist philosophy : promise and reality -- Rules of law : just and unjust -- Subjective probabilities : admissible in science? -- Does inductive logic work? -- Bridging theories to data -- Matter and energy : physical (...) or metaphysical concepts? -- Does quantum physics refute realism, materialism and determinism? -- Parallel universes? Digital physics? -- Can functionalist psychology explain anything? -- Knowledge pyramids or rosettes? -- Existence : single or double? -- Conclusion : valuation criterion. (shrink)

In this short paper, we analyse whether assuming that mathematical objects are “thin” in Linnebo's sense simplifies the epistemology of mathematics. Towards this end, we introduce the notion of transparency and show that not all thin objects are transparent. We end by arguing that, far from being a weakness of thin objects, the lack of transparency of some thin objects is a fruitful characteristic mark of abstract mathematics.

In this paper we explore Ronald N. Giere’s contributions to the scientific realism debate. After outlining some of his general views on the philosophy of science, we locate his contributions within the traditional scientific realism debate. We argue that Giere’s scientific perspectivism is best seen as a form of carte blanche realism, that is: a view according to which science is a practice aiming at truth, and can warrantably claim to have attained it, to a certain degree; however, it does (...) not place our confidence invariably in some specific feature of scientific representations. (shrink)

In the recent literature there has been some debate between advocates of deflationist and fictionalist positions in metaontology. The purpose of this paper is to advance the debate by reconsidering one objection presented by Amie Thomasson against fictionalist strategies in metaontology. The objection can be reconstructed in the following way. Fictionalists need to distinguish between the literal and the real content of sentences belonging to certain areas of discourse. In order to make that distinction, they need to assign different truth-conditions (...) to the real and the literal content. But it is hard to see what more is required for the literal content to be true than for the real content to be true. So, fictionalism is an unsatisfactory position. Here I offer a novel reply to Thomasson’s challenge. I argue that the literal and the real content need not be distinguished in terms of their truth-conditions; rather, they can be distinguished in terms of their different subject-matters, leaving it open whether their truth-conditions coincide or not. I explain how replying to Thomasson’s objection is crucial for deepening our understanding of fictionalist strategies in metaontology. (shrink)

According to ontological reductionism, molecular chemistry refers, at last, to the quantum ontology; therefore, the ontological commitments of chemistry turn out to be finally grounded on quantum mechanics. The main problem of this position is that nobody really knows what quantum ontology is. The purpose of this work is to argue that the confidence in the existence of the physical entities described by quantum mechanics does not take into account the interpretative problems of the theory: in the discussions about the (...) relationship between chemistry and physics, difficulties are seen only on the side of chemistry, whereas matters highly controversial on the side of physics are taken for granted. For instance, it is usually supposed that the infinite mass limit in the Born-Oppenheimer approximation leads by itself to the concept of molecular framework used in molecular chemistry. We will argue that this assumption is implicitly based on an interpretative postulate for quantum mechanics, which, in turn, runs into difficulties when applied to the explanation of the simplest model of the hydrogen atom. (shrink)

We propose a method of learning indicative conditional information. An agent learns conditional information by Jeffrey imaging on the minimally informative proposition expressed by a Stalnaker conditional. We show that the predictions of the proposed method align with the intuitions in Douven, 239–263 2012)’s benchmark examples. Jeffrey imaging on Stalnaker conditionals can also capture the learning of uncertain conditional information, which we illustrate by generating predictions for the Judy Benjamin Problem.

This essay addresses the relationships between prescription and description in legal rules. The analysis will focus on the culture-laden connotations of factual categories implied in all legal sentences and/or provisions. This investigation is spurred by the need to assess the impact of cultural difference in people’s understanding of legal imperatives and, symmetrically, how that impact is to be considered in the application of law. Differences in ways of categorizing the world could position the cultural pre-understanding required by law, and the (...) pluralism recognized and protected by constitutional principles and human/fundamental rights discourse, at a crossroads. Hence, even when we find an illegitimacy or an ignorance about what legal rules do not explicitly state but instead implicitly presuppose, this does not exclude that behind that ignorance there may be something worthy of legal protection. A question emerges: is it legitimate and reasonable to consider the ignorantia facti resulting from differing ways of categorizing the factual world as automatically and uncritically subject to the principle ignoratia legis non excusat? The essay continues with an assessment of the possible consequences of ignorantia facti in the administration of justice in multicultural societies and migration contexts. For this purpose, the opportunity for an intercultural use of law—including within national law—will be considered as a means of avoiding the discriminatory application of ignorantia facti. This topic will be addressed by leveraging both semiotic and cultural-anthropological analytical tools, including the well-known greimasien “contrat de véridiction”. (shrink)

‘Grounding and the indispensability argument’ presents a number of ways in which nominalists can use the notion of grounding to rebut the indispensability argument for the existence of mathematical objects. I will begin by considering the strategy that puts grounding to the service of easy-road nominalists. I will give some support to this strategy by addressing a worry some may have about it. I will then consider a problem for the fast-lane strategy and a problem for easy-road nominalists willing to (...) accept Liggins’ grounding strategy. Both are related to the problem of formulating nominalistic explanations at the right level of generality. I will then consider a problem that Liggins only hints at. This problem has to do with mathematics’ function of providing the sort of covering generalizations we need in scientific explanations. (shrink)

Traditional medicines -- Modern medicine -- Disease -- Diagnosis -- Drug -- Trial -- Treatment -- Prevention -- Iatroethics -- Science or technology, craft or service?

According to Zurek, decoherence is a process resulting from the interaction between a quantum system and its environment; this process singles out a preferred set of states, usually called “pointer basis”, that determines which observables will receive definite values. This means that decoherence leads to a sort of selection which precludes all except a small subset of the states in the Hilbert space of the system from behaving in a classical manner: environment-induced-superselection—einselection —is a consequence of the process of decoherence. (...) The aim of this paper is to present a new approach to decoherence, different from the mainstream approach of Zurek and his collaborators. We will argue that this approach offers conceptual advantages over the traditional one when problems of foundations are considered; in particular, from the new perspective, decoherence in closed quantum systems becomes possible and the preferred basis acquires a well founded definition. (shrink)

Mathematical platonism is the view that abstract mathematical objects exist. Ontological pluralism is the view that there are many modes of existence. This paper examines the prospects for...

The platonism/nominalism debate in the philosophy of mathematics concerns the question whether numbers and other mathematical objects exist. Platonists believe the answer to be in the positive, nominalists in the negative. According to non-factualists, the question is ‘moot’, in the sense that it lacks a correct answer. Elaborating on ideas from Stephen Yablo, this article articulates a non-factualist position in the philosophy of mathematics and shows how the case for non-factualism entails that standard arguments for rival positions fail. In particular, (...) showing how and why non-factualists reject nominalism illuminates the originality and interest of their position. (shrink)

Let R be an o-minimal expansion of an ordered group R has no poles, R cannot define a real closed field with domain R and order R is eventually linear and every R -definable set is a finite union of cones. As a corollary we get that Th has quantifier elimination and universal axiomatization in the language with symbols for the ordered group operations, bounded R -definable sets and a symbol for each definable endomorphism of the group.

Recent work in the philosophy of language attempts to elucidate the elusive notion of aboutness. A natural question concerning such a project has to do with its motivation: why is the notion of aboutness important? Stephen Yablo offers an interesting answer: taking into consideration not only the conditions under which a sentence is true, but also what a sentence is about opens the door to a new style of criticism of certain philosophical analyses. We might criticize the analysis of a (...) given notion not because it fails to assign the right truth conditions to a class of sentences, but because it characterizes those sentences as being about something they are not about. In this paper, I apply Yablo’s suggestion to a case study. I consider meta-fictionalism, the view that the content of a mathematical claim S is ‘according to standard mathematics, S’. I argue, following Woodward, that, on certain assumptions, meta-fictionalism assigns the right truth-conditions to typical assertoric utterances of mathematical statements. However, I also argue that meta-fictionalism assigns the wrong aboutness conditions to typical assertoric utterances of mathematical statements. (shrink)

In this paper we argue that the emergence of the classical world from the underlying quantum reality involves two elements: self-induced decoherence and macroscopicity. Self-induced decoherence does not require the openness of the system and its interaction with the environment: a single closed system can decohere when its Hamiltonian has continuous spectrum. We show that, if the system is macroscopic enough, after self-induced decoherence it can be described as an ensemble of classical distributions weighted by their corresponding probabilities. We also (...) argue that classicality is an emergent property that arises when the behavior of the system is described from an observational perspective. (shrink)

At the beginning of the third section of Book II of Capital, Marx distinguishes between the direct process of the production of capital and the total process of its reproduction. The former includes both the work process as well as the value-creating process. As we shall see, the latter includes both the process of consumption mediated by circulation, as well as the process of reproduction of capital itself. In the different forms assumed by capital within its cycle, and even more (...) in the different forms assumed by this cycle, the movement of individual capital turns out to be a part of the total movement of social capital. (shrink)

Stakeholder theory scholars have recently addressed two crucial calls: the first is for the integration of strategy and ethics, of stakeholder theory and strategic management, and the second call is for the development of a dynamic approach to stakeholder management. I have attempted to answer these calls by developing a theoretical framework that links together stakeholder management, stakeholder commitment to cooperate with the firm, key decision makers’ ethical commitment, and firm strategy. Starting from the basic assumption that managers cannot meet (...) all stakeholders’ demands immediately and in a tailored manner, I contend, first, that an ambidextrous approach to stakeholder management is conducive to stakeholders’ commitment to cooperate for the sustainable well-being of the firm and, second, that firm strategy and key decision makers’ ethical commitment moderate the relationship between an ambidextrous stakeholder management and stakeholder commitment to cooperate. Furthermore, drawing on this theoretical framework, I attempt to address the call for the integration of strategy and ethics by proposing a three-level conceptual model that distinguishes the objectives, the field, and the levers of integration. Finally, I outline a set of propositions that, taken together, represent a first attempt to develop a dynamic approach to stakeholder management. (shrink)

Our account of the problem of the classical limit of quantum mechanics involves two elements. The first one is self-induced decoherence, conceived as a process that depends on the own dynamics of a closed quantum system governed by a Hamiltonian with continuous spectrum; the study of decoherence is addressed by means of a formalism used to give meaning to the van Hove states with diagonal singularities. The second element is macroscopicity represented by the limit $\hbar \rightarrow 0$ : when the (...) macroscopic limit is applied to the Wigner transformation of the diagonal state resulting from decoherence, the description of the quantum system becomes equivalent to the description of an ensemble of classical trajectories on phase space weighted by their corresponding probabilities. (shrink)

A Neuroscientist Offers Evidence of Where the Brain Ends and Consciousness Begins.

The aim of the present paper is to list the usual and some possible meanings--or at least those the writer found the most interesting--of the word 'level,' to specify them briefly, to illustrate them, and to propose some problems in which those concepts are involved. Should this semantical clarification prove useful in clearing the ground for ontological speculation, the thesis would be confirmed that there is no conflict between semantics and ontology as long as the former does not deny the (...) legitimacy of inquiries into the denotata of certain universal words, and as long as metaphysics is not reluctant to linguistic hygiene. (shrink)

In conversation with Marilyn Strathern’s work on kinship and especially on metaphors of intellectual and reproductive creativity, this paper provides an analysis of plagiarism not as a violation of intellectual property but of the kinship relationships between author, work, and readers. It also analyzes the role of figures of kidnapped slaves and children in the genealogy of the modern concept of plagiarism.

Insbesondere die Tragfähigkeit des transzendentalen Idealismus für Kants Metaphysik der Natur sowie die Schlüssigkeit seiner Moralphilosophie stehen in den Beiträgen des Bandes erneut auf dem Prüfstand. Zentrale Konzepte von Kants Transzendental- und Moralphilosophie, wie Substanz, Zeit, Freiheit und der kategorische Imperativ, werdenvor dem Hintergrund der Frage behandelt, wo Kant im Spannungsfeld zwischen traditionellem und modernem Wissenschaftsverständnis zu verorten ist. Bedeutende Vertreter der Kantforschung (u.a. H. E. Allison, P. Guyer, D. Schönecker, M.Caimi, H. Schmitz) liefern im vorliegenden Band Klärungen: Sie ordnen (...) Kant in den Kontext der Tradition und der zeitgenössischen Diskussion ein und ziehen produktive Vergleiche mit Autoren nach Kant, die sich kritisch mit ihm auseinander setzten. Der Band richtet sich an fortgeschrittene Studierende und Kantforscher, die sich einen repräsentativen Überblick über den aktuellen Stand der Debatte verschaffen wollen. (shrink)

Husserl investigated the topic of childhood in a small number of research manuscripts, produced around the 1930s. This essay first presents its rationale for addressing the issue – which was essentially to examine more closely the phenomenon of Einfühlung in the context of his inquiry into intersubjectivity – and illustrates the method of Rückfrage that guided his research. It then offers a reading of Husserl’s phenomenological descriptions of childhood and the related conceptual distinctions, organizing them under the following headings: a. (...) second childhood (das wirkliche Kind); b. Urkindheit, or primal childhood which, in turn is subdivided into: b1. first childhood outside the womb and b2. intrauterine life; c. procreation or generation (Zeugung), from the UrIch to the VorIch. Throughout this reverse reconstruction, a particular focus is given to the importance of the notion of Paarung (coupling or pairing) at all levels of the ego's constitution. The self-constitution of the ego (Ich) always implies a relationship – which differs as a function of the child's specific stage of development – with all that is alien to the ego (Ichfremdes), right back to the unattainable, yet constitutive alterity of birth. (shrink)

I will contrast two conceptions of the nature of mathematical objects: the conception of mathematical objects as preconceived objects, and heavy duty platonism. I will argue that friends of the indispensability argument are committed to some metaphysical theses and that one promising way to motivate such theses is to adopt heavy duty platonism. On the other hand, combining the indispensability argument with the conception of mathematical objects as preconceived objects yields an unstable position. The conclusion is that the metaphysical commitments (...) of the indispensability argument should be carefully scrutinized. (shrink)

This essay, between serious and facetious, addresses an apparently secondary implication of the planetary tragedy produced by Covid-19. It coincides with the ‘problem of the veil,’ a bone of contention in Islam/West relationships. More specifically, it will address the question of why the pandemic has changed the proxemics of public spaces and the grammar of ‘living together.’ For some time—and it is not possible to foresee how much—in many countries people cannot go out, or enter any public places, without wearing (...) a sanitary mask. In short, almost all of us, by obligation or by urgent advice from the public authorities of the various countries, will not live the public sphere with our faces uncovered. The alteration of the social context affecting many Western countries will inevitably involve also the ‘local’ perception of the Islamic veil and—as a matter of equality—the consistency of the prohibition of wearing it. What will thus become of the ban on wearing it in public places established by some countries such as France and asseverated by the ECHR? If everyone can and will have to go around with their faces covered, why should only Islamic women be discriminated against? Will not the change in boundary conditions produced by Covid-19 also induce Western people to re-categorize the meaning of the veil? And will this re-categorization not directly affect the ‘fact’ of wearing the veil, that is, its empirical perception? And still, will this psycho-semantic change not show how empirical perceptions are cultural constructs rather than ‘objective facts,’ as such allegedly independent from the observer’s point of view? Consequentially, will the plurality of perceptions and cultural meanings related to the gesture of covering one’s own face not gain renewed relevance in determining the legitimacy of wearing the veil? The socio-semantic earthquake produced by Covid-19 compels us to rethink this and other issues orbiting around the translation of ‘facts’ into legal language; furthermore, it highlights the instrumentality of many ideological/partisan and ethnocentric assumptions passed off as objectivity regarding those alleged ‘facts.’ The essay will attempt to provide an answer to the above questions by proposing a semiotic-legal approach to intercultural conflicts and, indirectly, the pluralism in law. (shrink)

Recently the CJEU decision in the case of ‘Ewa Glawischnig-Piesczek v. Facebook Ireland Limited’ has raised the issue of the transcultural/trans-territorial signification of hate speech and hate crimes. Taking a cue from this decision and the related semiotic/legal implications, the paper proposes an analysis of the semio/pragmatic conditions for the production of performativity inherent in hate speech across different cultural universes of discourse. Given that web-based digital communication is global—at least, potentially—regardless of any spatial/political compartmentalization, it crosses different semio-cultural circuits. (...) This trans-spatiality implies transcultural crossings that can multiply and even transfigure the semantic implications of the original signifier and the related prognoses of ‘semantic effectiveness.’ Cultural boundaries therefore may function as a kind of ‘horizon of events’ for hate speech and, more inclusively, all linguistic acts and their legal signification/classification. The question then arises regarding whether and to what extent the performativity of hate speech is able to withstand the variation of cultural boundary conditions. Insofar as cultures are universes of experience, the issue to be investigated broadens, and ends up invoking the question of whether or not the production of performativity implicitly presupposes and tacitly epitomizes the semio-pragmatic implications/consequences (or, in Peircean terms, ‘bearings’) coextensive with cultural universes of experience. Were this the case, it would seem to call into question the very possibility of ‘making things only with words,’ or more explicitly, the alleged meaning of ‘linguistic acts.’. (shrink)

L'autore parte dall'analisi dei problemi etici espressi nei linguaggi della poesia, della tragedia e della storiografia, per passare poi alla lettura delle maggiori opere del pensiero antico, fornendo di ognuna puntuali introduzioni. Un'attenzione particolare, alla fine di ogni capitolo, è dedicata all'eredità moderna e al significato attuale dei problemi dell'etica antica, proponendo in modo esplicito un collegamento fra ricostruzione storica e discussione teorica contemporanea.