J. T. Hooker argues that at Il. 24.649 πικερτομων must mean ‘taunting’ and, since ‘taunting’ makes no sense, that πικερτομων must have entered our Iliad at this point from a version of the Iliad slightly different from ours in which it did make sense. I wish to argue that πικερτομων has a meaning different from ‘taunting’, which makes good sense of this, and every other, context.

The first part of Chapter 2.21 of the Arthaśāstra deals with the activities of the Customs Superintendent, containing recommendations regarding the collection of customs duty. Scholars have encountered several difficulties in understanding the meaning and purposes of the activities described. An auction-like procedure described in the text has been analyzed by some as the normal operation of a market, with the payments to the treasury mentioned there taken as a hitherto-unknown market tax—the price of trading in the market. Other paragraphs (...) in the text describe seemingly self-contradictory trader actions. Interpretations of these actions have involved the imbuing of traders with complex psychological beliefs regarding the actions of other traders. This article proposes an economic model of the underlying market structure, which leads to a different and integrated reading of the text. In this reading, the author of the text, recognizing the incentive for importers to undervalue their goods, suggests the auction procedure and accom- panying penalty payments to elicit truthful revelation of importers’ valuations and to maximize customs levy collections. By comparing the procedure in the Arthaśāstra to modern-day regulations intended to combat tax evasion, the article provides early evidence of the use of sophisticated mechanisms to elicit truthful value revelation. (shrink)

The gives the detailed analysis of the ratio of freedom and imagination in an unpublished manuscript written by F.V.Y. Schelling, which contains the materials for the lecture course read at Erlangen University in 1820-1821. The author focuses on the question of imagination as a condition for the possibility to unfold the modal differences that provide the hierarchy of predicative definitions. The article shows that both the draft philosophy of mythology and the philosophy of revelation are a direct continuation of the (...) transcendentalist program given by Kant.Those projects bases on the thesis that the consciousness of freedom and consciousness of the law, justified in the “Critique of Practical Reason”, are related one another. Schelling following Kant’s theory, points to the law and to the unconditional imperative of freedom as the main principle which is not only theoretical or practical, but determines the separation of ontological and deontological modalities. At the same time, the formal structure of an imperative as a command has the specific character of “hiden opening”: what is themed in an imperative is not opened as a meaningful opportunity, it is only opened as theopportunity in its difference from necessity. I show in this article that interpreting the Schelling possibility relies on the teachings of I. Kant in his transcendental idealconception, connected with Kant's interpretation of the imagination’s productive ability. In the middle of Schelling’s theological interpretation of Kant's consciousness of lawdoctrine as the “fact of mind” lies the analogy between peacemaking and the ancestral sin of the first people. This concept is the main source of the theory of potency as ontological modalities, developed by Schelling in the 1830s - 1840s in lectures on the philosophy of mythology and the philosophy of revelation. (shrink)

An interrogation of the term 'theory' from the perspective of linguistic discourse Zima offers a new definition of theory from a cultural and sociological perspective, with a view to encountering heterogenerous points of view in critical dialogue.

We develop an axiomatic set theory — the Theory of Hyperfinite Sets THS— which is based on the idea of the existence of proper subclasses of large finite sets. We demonstrate how theorems of classical continuous mathematics can be transfered to THS, prove consistency of THS, and present some applications.

This article focuses on analysis of a handwritten fragment by F. W. J. Schelling “Psychological scheme”, which is a study of main principles of philosophical anthropology. The article reconstructs the circumstances of creating the mentioned text, which are connected with the trusting relationship between Schelling and Bavarian Crown Prince Maximilian; it also highlights the parallels between the text and the earlier Schelling's works exploring philosophical-anthropological problematic: “Philosophical Investigations into the Essence of Human Freedom” and “Stuttgart Seminars”. In the course of (...) terminological analysis of the fragment author displays that the the main source of influence was the work by I. Kant “Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone”. Major problem, considered by Schelling's anthropology, is defining the correlation between intelligible and empirical human character, the main resolving instrument being Schelling’s doctrine of potencies as ontological modalities developed in 1820-1830. (shrink)

Lenin's work "On the Significance of Militant Materialism," written in the spring of 1922, is justly regarded as the philosophical testament of our leader. In it, the tasks of the day were merged with the tasks of the entire epoch on the basis of a profound analysis of reality.

Les colonies de Terre Sainte, en dépit de trois croisades successives, ont abordé le dernier quart du 13e siècle dans un état de faiblesse inquiétant. Le pape Grégoire X a essayé durant cinq ans de redresser la situation par tous les moyens. L'A. retrace tout d'abord la destinée exceptionnelle de ce pape, de son vrai nom Tebaldo Visconti, né à Plaisance en 1210 et mort à Arezzo en 1276. Il étudie ensuite l'action de Grégoire X dans son redressement spirituel de (...) l'Orient latin. Son désir profond de venir en aide à la Terre Sainte s'exprima aussi dans des mesures financières. Les limites de l'action du Saint-Siège sont étudiées ainsi que le soutien logistique des colonies franques de Syrie apporté au pape. L'évolution de la conjoncture internationale compromit sérieusement à partir de 1273 les retombées ses efforts. (shrink)

A remarkable phenomenon in our present-day culture has been the broad interest shown in the history of Russian thought, which is continually, and sometimes even from unexpected quarters, showing itself to be of topical interest. Recently, and particularly in connection with the publication of the works of N. F. Fedorov, there has been an exchange of opinions in the pages of various journals with regard to the essence of his philosophical views, revealing not merely conflicting, but in a number of (...) cases mutually exclusive assessments of those views. (shrink)

The philosopher dealing with problems of the epistemology and logic of scientific knowledge cannot disregard those truly immense changes that have occurred in science in the present century. Moreover, he must interest himself not only in what has been learned in the objective world that is new, but by what new methods and means this knowledge has been acquired, how its structure has changed, what categories define the essence of contemporary scientific theorizing, and its outreach into cognition in the future. (...) Of course, the character, structure, and methods of the scientific acquisition of knowledge are determined in the final analysis by what it is that is being cognized, what things and processes are coming to be known. However, direct influence upon logical concepts in the theory of knowledge is brought to bear in the very process of cognition, in its methods and means of approaching the reflection of the object. (shrink)