In the following paper we will attempt to offer a panoramic reconstruction of the relations between scientificity [Wissenschaftlichkeit] and the existentiell dimension of Dasein’s being in the framework of Being and Time and in the period immediately following its publication. To this end, we will attempt to (a) offer an account of the positive and negative appropriations of the concept of the existenziell in the reception of Heidegger's opus magnum, next (b) we will offer a systematic reconstruction of the existentiell (...) dimension by recognizing what we will call developmental "vectors", and lastly, (c) we will review the fundamental moments of the ontological-critical science, and (d) show how each of this constitutive moments is affected by “existentiell unboundingness” [existenzielle Unverbindlichkeit]. (shrink)

This paper shows that the interpretation of the ‘Bochumer Schule’, which sees a fundamental continuity from the philosophy of Averroes and Albert the Great to that of Theodoric of Freiberg and Master Eckhart, is not right, both from a merely historical and a strictly philosophical point of view.

El presente artículo examina las diferentes teorías del contenido mental de Dretske y su relación con sus consideraciones epistemológicas para concluir que el hecho de conceptualizar o albergar un determinado contenido es ya un tipo de conocimiento, a saber, conocimiento animal. A continuación el autor discute dicho enfoque sosteniendo, a diferencia de Dretske, que mantener la dicotomía entre conocimiento animal y conocimiento reflexivo resulta virtuosa pues mantiene tanto aquello que puede ser naturalizado apelando a la Historia natural como da razón (...) de las practicas justificatorias que intervienen en el denominado conocimiento reflexivo y que a su juicio es irrenunciable e irreductible. (shrink)

Hegelians normally consider Hegel's philosophical system from two perspectives: metaphysics, interpreting this discipline as the central one to understand the work of the German philosopher, or non-metaphysics, being more relevant alternative interpretations that avoid it. This article presents a study on the senses of reflection. These senses can be extrinsic or absolute. These two senses are the backbones of the Hegelian system. Therefore, by means of a study of whether extrinsic and absolute reflection are notions that guide us towards metaphysical (...) or non-metaphysical readings, we try to give an answer to the debate between the possible interpretations of Hegel. (shrink)

The existence of causal explanations in science has been an issue of interest in Western philosophy from its very beginnings. That is the reason this work, following an idea of Mario Bunge, makes a historical review of this matter. The modern treatment of this subject takes place since the postulation by Popper and Hempel of the D-N model of scientific explanation, whose viability is scrutinized here from different points of view in the current philosophy of science. The main object of (...) this paper is to present two arguments against the possibility of causal explanations in theoretical physics. The first one concerns the existence, in certain cases, of inter-theoretical incompatibilities, and the second refers to the need to resort, in other cases, to concatenations of laws of different theories and disciplines. The final conclusion will be the defence of a form of theoretical explanation, which follows the Popper-Hempel model, but devoid of any ontological and metaphysical connotations. (shrink)

Very few—if any—will doubt Hobbes's aversion to the state of nature and sympathy for civil society. On the other hand, it is not quite news that it would be inaccurate to claim that Hobbes rejected the state of nature entirely. Indeed, he embraced or at the very least tolerated the state of nature at the international level in order to escape from the individual state of nature. Hobbes's recommended exchange of an individual state of nature for an international one does (...) seem to have a smack of contradiction, arguably first noted by Rousseau. There is yet another charge of contradiction lurking around Hobbes's account of the state of nature. Hobbes's political thought would still reflect an ambivalent attitude towards a third instantiation of the state of nature, i.e. civil war. This is one of the main reasons why the political allegiance of Thomas Hobbes has been an issue ever since the publication of De Cive at the very least. This paper deals with Hobbes's differential treatment of the original and the international states of nature and discusses the source of Hobbes's somewhat ambivalent attitude towards civil war. It is here argued that Hobbes can fairly hold his ground vis-à-vis Rousseau's criticism, in spite of the normative resemblance between the international state of nature and the initial state of nature, and that Hobbes ambivalent attitude of attraction and repulsion towards civil war is actually due not so much to opportunism on his part as to the normative autonomy he has granted to the state of nature. (shrink)

Rips et al. claim that the principles underlying the structure of natural numbers cannot be inferred from interactions with the physical world. However, in their target article they failed to consider an important source of interaction: finger counting. Here, we show that finger counting satisfies all the conditions required for allowing the concept of numbers to emerge from sensorimotor experience through a bottom-up process.

In this essay, I deal with the problem of the attribution of psychological predicates to non-human animals. The first section illustrates three research topics where it has become scientifically legitimate to explain the conduct of non-human animals by means of the attribution of psychological predicates. The second section discusses several philosophical objections to the legitimacy of such attributions provided by central thinkers from the last decades. I try to show that these objections —which are related among other questions to the (...) holism of the mental, the indeterminacy of the attributions, and the strangeness of animal concepts— can be alleviated. In the third section, I propose to adopt a literalist view of the attributions in the sense articulated by Figdor. At the same time, I argue that one must draw limits to the conceptual change forwarded by her literalist view, taking into account holistic considerations and the fact that the psychological concepts must retain their core notes. (shrink)

In the last chapter of In the beginning was the deed: realism and moralism in political argument, Williams raised the question of truthfulness in politics and warned that the media, particularly, television, and the market of communication in general, work in ways contrary to truthfulness -understood as the combination of the virtues of sincerity and accuracy. In this paper we would like to carry on Williams’ line of thinking in connection with the impact of the new social media platforms on (...) politics. Where Williams focused on television, we will consider the impact of the internet public sphere. After reviewing how the digital social media encourages motivated reasoning in general, we propose to focus on two main phenomena derived from it: the rise of conspiracy theories and the moralization of politics. Conspiracy theories epitomize the risk of self-deception Williams was concerned to signal. On the other hand, the process of moralization of politics triggers sectarianism and hate for the “others”, the outgroup. Both phenomena are not exclusive of the internet sphere, but both are boosted by it, and entail a lack of interest in truth and truthfulness, and in this way they threaten the value of truth for democracy. (shrink)

This paper critically examines the forays into metaphysics of The Dual Nature of Technical Artifacts Program (henceforth, DNP). I argue that the work of DNP is a valuable contribution to the epistemology of certain aspects of artifact design and use, but that it fails to advance a persuasive metaphysic. A central problem is that DNP approaches ontology from within a functionalist framework that is mainly concerned with ascriptions and justified beliefs. Thus, the materiality of artifacts emerges only as the external (...) conditions of realizability of function ascription. The work of DNP has a strong programmatic aspect and much of its foray into metaphysics is tentative, so the intent of my argument is partly synthetic: to sum up these issues as they are presented in the literature and highlight some recognized problems. But I also go beyond that, suggesting that these problems are foundational, arising from the very way in which DNP poses the question of artifact metaphysics. Although it sets out to incorporate objective aspects of technology, DNP places a strong focus on the intentional side of the purported matter-mind duality, bracketing off materiality in an irretrievable manner. Thus, some of the advantages of dualism are lost. I claim that DNP is dualistic, not merely based on “duality”, but that its version of dualism does not appropriately account for the material “nature” of artifacts. The paper ends by suggesting some correctives and alternatives to Dual Nature theory. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the search for explainable models and interpretable decisions in AI must be reformulated in terms of the broader project of offering a pragmatic and naturalistic account of understanding in AI. Intuitively, the purpose of providing an explanation of a model or a decision is to make it understandable to its stakeholders. But without a previous grasp of what it means to say that an agent understands a model or a decision, the explanatory strategies will (...) lack a well-defined goal. Aside from providing a clearer objective for XAI, focusing on understanding also allows us to relax the factivity condition on explanation, which is impossible to fulfill in many machine learning models, and to focus instead on the pragmatic conditions that determine the best fit between a model and the methods and devices deployed to understand it. After an examination of the different types of understanding discussed in the philosophical and psychological literature, I conclude that interpretative or approximation models not only provide the best way to achieve the objectual understanding of a machine learning model, but are also a necessary condition to achieve post hoc interpretability. This conclusion is partly based on the shortcomings of the purely functionalist approach to post hoc interpretability that seems to be predominant in most recent literature. (shrink)

In van Benthem (2008), van Benthem proposes a dynamic consequence relation defined as${\psi _1}, \ldots,{\psi _n}{ \models ^d}\phi \,{\rm{iff}}{ \models ^{pa}}[{\psi _1}] \ldots [{\psi _n}]\phi,$where the latter denotes consequence in public announcement logic, a dynamic epistemic logic. In this paper we investigate the structural properties of a conditional dynamic consequence relation$\models _{\rm{\Gamma }}^d$extending van Benthem’s proposal. It takes into account a set of background conditions Γ, inspired by Makinson (2003) wherein Makinson calls this reasoning ‘modulo’ a set Γ. In the (...) presence of common knowledge, conditional dynamic consequence is definable from (unconditional) dynamic consequence. An open question is whether dynamic consequence is compact. We further investigate a dynamic consequence relation for soft instead of hard announcements. Surprisingly, it shares many properties with (hard) dynamic consequence. Dynamic consequence relations provide a novel perspective on reasoning about protocols in multi-agent systems. (shrink)

The Thomistic comprehension of the immortality of the soul, in its extraordinary greatness and originality, is built upon the Angelic’s most sublime discovery: the act of being. However, we can already find in the Egyptians some contributions —although indirect— to this comprehension. Regarding the nature of the soul, there are some intuitions of great relevance around the Osiris Trial, the structure of the soul and its relation with the body and the post mortem evolution phases. These intuitions will be assimilated (...) into the Greek metaphysics, assumed and raised by Thomas Aquinas and, based on his genius, continued by the transcendental anthropology. (shrink)

In Book I of Plato’s Republic, Thrasymachus famously maintains that ideas of morality and justice are nothing more than an ideology indoctrinated in “the weaker” to benefit “the stronger.” This is Thrasymachus’s challenge to morality: the thesis that some social arrangements, including some moral norms, are products of ‘false consciousness.’ False consciousness occurs when a dominant social group shapes the beliefs and desires of a subordinate group in such a way that the subordinates act for the benefit of the dominants, (...) but against their own interests. In this paper, I grant that some moral norms emerge or persist because of false consciousness. However, I shall argue that these norms actually have the function of impartially promoting the interests of all persons in their range of application. Even if the actual effect of false consciousness norms is to benefit a powerful class while being harmful and discriminatory toward others, the true function of false consciousness norms is the intended effect that they were designed to have. And the crucial feature of false consciousness norms is that their designers—particularly subordinates—teach, preach, follow, and enforce them with the intention of promoting the mutual interests of everyone to whom the norms apply. (shrink)