This co-edited volume compares Chinese and Western experiences of engineering, technology, and development. In doing so, it builds a bridge between the East and West and advances a dialogue in the philosophy of engineering. Divided into three parts, the book starts with studies on epistemological and ontological issues, with a special focus on engineering design, creativity, management, feasibility, and sustainability. Part II considers relationships between the history and philosophy of engineering, and includes a general argument for the necessity of dialogue (...) between history and philosophy. It continues with a general introduction to traditional Chinese attitudes toward engineering and technology, and philosophical case studies of the Chinese steel industry, railroads, and cybernetics in the Soviet Union. Part III focuses on engineering, ethics, and society, with chapters on engineering education and practice in China and the West. The book’s analyses of the interactions of science, engineering, ethics, politics, and policy in different societal contexts are of special interest. The volume as a whole marks a new stage in the emergence of the philosophy of engineering as a new regionalization of philosophy. This carefully edited interdisciplinary volume grew out of an international conference on the philosophy of engineering hosted by the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. It includes 30 contributions by leading philosophers, social scientists, and engineers from Australia, China, Europe, and the United States. (shrink)

Il saggio approfondisce l’opera di due artisti fondamentali degli ultimi decenni, ovvero Antoni Tàpies e Bill Viola. La loro produzione artistica riesce a sfuggire alla condanna che Th. W. Adorno fa di tutti quei movimenti che rimettono in questione il concetto di arte e la nozione di opera. Questi due artisti salvano lo statuto dell’arte nella società post-industriale, vale a dire in un momento in cui le trasformazioni profonde del sistema culturale rischiano di minacciare la sopravvivenza della creazione artistica, (...) come se la razionalità estetica non potesse che abdicare davanti alla razionalità strumentale. Sono pochi i pittori che come Antoni Tàpies riescono a infondere alla materia inanimata un’irradiazione e una capacità di evocazione tanto intense, mentre per Bill Viola tutte le opere d’arte rappresentano cose invisibili e la stessa tecnologia digitale non è altro che una forma più pura per avvicinarsi a quelle realtà non fisiche e non visibili che stanno sotto alle cose visibili del mondo. La scommessa di Tàpies e Viola riguarda la sopravvivenza dell’arte nell’universo mercantile di una società sempre più amministrata e sottoposta agli imperativi economici; la loro produzione pare mirata a renderci consapevoli della nostra mortalità, offrendo immagini in grado di mettere in connessione la dimensione sensibile e quella spirituale, il visibile e l’invisibile, aprendo lo spazio a una trascendenza che sembrava completamente svanita. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:RUSSELL AND WHITEHEAD ON THE PROCESS OF GROWTH IN EDUCATION1 HOWARD WOODHOUSE Educational Foundations / University of Saskatchewan Saskatoon, Sask., Canada S7N owo 1. RUSSELL, WHITEHEAD, AND PROCESS PHILOSOPHY W ere there no similarities between the philosophies of education of Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead, one would want to know why. Russell, after all, was Whitehead 's student as an undergraduate at Cambridge, his colleague and collaborator for (...) a dozen years working on the manuscript of Pri1!cipia Mathematica published in three volumes from 1910 to 1913, as well as his friend. Moreover, it was the sight of Whitehead's wife, Evelyn, in paroxysms of pain that prompted Russell's mystical experience in 1901, during which he tells us that he became a humanist, pacifist, and advocate of free schooling.2 In this paper, I consider the question of whether or not Russell's account of the process of growth in education is compatible with that of Whitehead. The question is important because it enables one to 1 Presented ar the annual meeting of rhe Association of Process Philosophy of Education, American Philosophical Association Central Division Meeting, Chicago, 25-7 April 1991. Brian Hendley was the respondent. I would like to thank the audience for its penetrating questions, as well as Don Cochrane, Brian Hendley, John McMurtry and Viola Safr for their comments on an earlier draft. 2 Auto., I: 149. For a psychoanalytic interpretation of Russell's "mystical illumination ", see Bennett and Nancy Simon, "The Pacifist Turn: an Episode of Mystic Illumination in Russell's Life", Russell, no. 13 (Spring 1974): Il-12, 17-24. Jo Vellacott believes that the term "pragmatic pacifist" more accurately desctibes Russell's ". Russell and Whitehead on the Process ofGrowth. 139 Whitehead the precise investigation of the natural world. Both the logical method and the precision of ideas that are learned in mathematics form the foundations of science and philosophy. Indeed, the structures of the physical world mirror those of mathematics, since they, too, are based upon relations among entities.1O The kind of understanding afforded by mathematics, therefore, is also the basis of philosophy, since it puts students in contact with long-lasting ideas having fundamental value, and enables them to gain a kind of liberation from the concerns of the everyday world. (2) Both Russell and Whitehead uphold the idea· that science is based on those kinds of sense-experience to which human beings have ready access (colours, sounds, smells, and observable objects, etc.).II The problem facing science at this point is to show how its generalizations are based upon these experiences. For Russell, induction fails because we can never prove the principle on the basis of experience without thereby begging the question.I:'- This is because the prin~iple of induction appeals to the future or to those unexperienced parts of the past or present with which we are not acquainted. As a result, Russell prefers to adopt a hypothetico-deductive method by which it is possible· to move from the sense-experience of everyday life to a systematic understanding of the structures of the universe. In this way, science is able to progress by means of "an application of mathematical probability to premisses arrived at independently of induction."I3 Whitehead also argues for the need for "careful scrutiny" in the manner in which we infer the existence of "the physical world [which] is, in some general sense of the term, a deduced concept."I4 In other words, like Russell, he prefers a more deductive kind of approach, suggesting that the theory of induction is the despair of philosophy.I5 10 Whitehead, The Aims ofEducation, pp. 82, 84, 89, 134, 155-7. Russell, PoM, pp. 448-9,471; PLA in LK, p. 207. II Russell, "The Relation of Sense-Data to Physics" in Mysticism and Logic, pp. 145-79. Whitehead, of course, also includes feelings as integrating features of sense experience that allow us to relate the diverse elements of such experience into a unitary whole; see Process and Reality (New York: Free P., 1969), p. 244 and Part III. 12 Russell, PP, Chap. 6. His argument is mirrored by Whitehead, op. cit., pp. 235-6. lJ Russell, HK, p... (shrink)

The present book is the first to undertake a systematic study of Peirce’s conception of historical knowledge and of its value for philosophy. It does so by both reconstructing in detail Peirce’s arguments and giving a detailed account of the many ways in which history becomes an object of explicit reflection in his writings. The book’s leading idea may be stated as follows: Peirce manages to put together an exceptionally compelling argument about history’s bearing on philosophy not so much because (...) he derives it from a well-articulated and polished conception of the relation between the two disciplines; but on the contrary, because he holds on to this relation while intuiting that it can easily turn into a conflict. This potential conflict acts therefore as a spur to put forth an unusually profound and multi-faceted analysis of what it means for philosophy to rely on historical arguments. Peirce looks at history as a way to render philosophical investigations more detailed, more concrete and more sensitive to the infinite and unforeseeable nuances that characterize human experience. In this way, he provides us with an exceptionally valuable contribution to a question that has remained gravely under-theorized in contemporary debates. (shrink)

Inspired by the literature on extended/scaffolded mind, a debate concerning the contribution of extra-bodily resources to our (extended) emotions is recently gaining traction. Within this debate, inspired by the literature on cognitive artifacts introduces the notion of “affective artifacts”, indicating those objects that exert persistent effects on our feelings, possibly altering our self. However, by focusing on feelings, this notion neglects other facets of emotional episodes. Following Scarnatino’s tripartition between feeling, appraisal, and motivational theories of emotion, I present three varieties (...) of affective artifacts: Feeling, Evaluative and Motivational Artifacts. (shrink)

Debates on situated affectivity have mainly focused on tools that exert some positive influence on affective experience. Far less attention has been paid to artifacts that interact with the expression of affect, or to those that exert some negative influence. To shed light on that shadowy corner of our affective social lives, I describe the workings of an atypical socio-affective artifact, namely, sunglasses. Drawing on insights from psychology and other social sciences, I construe sunglasses as a social shield that helps (...) us block spontaneous emotional expressions, as well as affecting other social processes that heavily depend on the eye region: gaze direction detection, identity recognition, and the sense of intimacy afforded by eye contact. (shrink)

Arranges the work of Viola Cordova, presenting her understanding and interpretation of the interactions between people and nature.

This paper deals with the transnationalism of racial anthropological frameworks and its role in the understanding of human difference during India’s decolonization and nation-building. With attention to the circulation of scientific objects, I focus on the practices and articulations of Irawati Karve, an Indian anthropologist with a transnational scientific trajectory and nationalistic political engagements. I argue that Karve’s adaptation of an internationally validated German racial approach to study caste, ethnic and religious groups contributed to the further racialization of these categories (...) as well as to the racialization of nationalistic projects in Maharashtra and India. I conclude with a reflection on the transnationalization of the coloniality of racialization. (shrink)

Munch-Jurisic’s book thoroughly describes several cases of severe distresses reported and expressed by perpetrators of tremendous acts such as mass murders. Arguing against a simplistic reading according to which these signs of distress are straightforward manifestations of some innate moral nature, and against the optimistic reading according to which they will lead to prosocial behaviors, Munch-Jursic offers compelling reasons to adopt a more complex theory of emotion. In this commentary, I aim to stress the implications of her book for the (...) debate on moral enhancement and for emotion theory in general. However, while I concur with Munch-Jurisic that emotion theory must make room for complexity and indeterminacy, I challenge her claim that motivational theories of emotion are ill-equipped to face the challenges she poses. (shrink)

Many people think that the capacity for criticism and reflection, as well as the attitude of welcoming contingency, the other, and debate, is some internal and well-intentioned energy of open-minded people, as advocated by liberals, whether from the right or the left. What they don’t realize is how much the capacity for reflection and dialogue is an external phenomenon, present in the world itself, produced only thanks to a space of resistances, encounters, and even frustrations, as in the academic and (...) scientific sphere. It prevents my cogito and my precious epistemic schemes from getting out of control, in a dangerous transcendentalist delirium, and taking over the world and the circumstances themselves. The aim of this essay is precisely to understand this aesthetic dimension of science, this ontological feature that crosses its contours, taking as a starting point the concepts of “importance” in Whitehead and “matters of concern” in Bruno Latour. (shrink)

Besides the better-known Nelson logic and paraconsistent Nelson logic, in 1959 David Nelson introduced, with motivations of realizability and constructibility, a logic called $\mathcal{S}$. The logic $\mathcal{S}$ was originally presented by means of a calculus with infinitely many rule schemata and no semantics. We look here at the propositional fragment of $\mathcal{S}$, showing that it is algebraizable, in the sense of Blok and Pigozzi, with respect to a variety of three-potent involutive residuated lattices. We thus introduce the first known algebraic (...) semantics for $\mathcal{S}$ as well as a finite Hilbert-style calculus equivalent to Nelson’s presentation; this also allows us to clarify the relation between $\mathcal{S}$ and the other two Nelson logics $\mathcal{N}3$ and $\mathcal{N}4$. (shrink)

In their attempt to connect the workings of the human mind with their neural realizers, cognitive neuroscientists often bracket out individual differences to build a single, abstract model that purportedly represents (almost) every human being’s brain. In this paper I first examine the rationale behind this model, which I call ‘Platonic Brain Model’. Then I argue that it is to be surpassed in favor of multiple models allowing for patterned inter-individual differences. I introduce the debate on legitimate (and illegitimate) ways (...) of mapping neural structures and cognitive functions, endorsing a view according to which function-structure mapping is context-sensitive. Building on the discussion of the ongoing debate on the function(s) of the so-called Fusiform “Face” Area, I show the necessity of indexing function-structure mappings to some populations of subjects, clustered on the basis of factors such as their expertise in a given domain. (shrink)

A partir de algumas considerações de Max Horkheimer sobre o potencial crítico do pessimismo schopenhaueriano, o artigo visa mostrar em que medida o sofrimento específico da fome, em especial quando esta é registrada em contextos de pobreza, miséria e escravidão na obra de Schopenhauer, elucida empiricamente o pessimismo metafísico em forma de pessimismo crítico-social. Para tanto, descrevemos algumas presenças dos termos fome (Hunger) e pobreza (Armut) na obra do pensador da vontade para, em seguida, problematizarmos alguns de seus significados. Apesar (...) de não reconhecer um expediente ativo do Estado ou a necessidade de mudanças sociais estruturais em vista de seu combate, a fome enquanto dor ou sofrimento social de todos os tempos ganha em Schopenhauer um olhar crítico muito específico - em relação a outras críticas filosóficas -, que se soma às variadas condenações sociológicas, econômicas etc., a saber, como uma das expressões mais flagrantes das perversidades e mazelas de um mundo que não poderia ser justificado. (shrink)

The question about the scientific nature of computing has been widely debated with no universal consensus reached about its disciplinary status. Positions vary from acknowledging computing as the science of computers to defining it as a synthetic engineering discipline. In this paper, we aim at discussing the nature of computing from a methodological perspective. We consider, in particular, the nature and role of experiments in this field, whether they can be considered close to the traditional experimental scientific method or, instead, (...) they possess peculiar and unique features. We argue that this experimental perspective should be taken into account when discussing the status of computing. We critically survey how the experimental method has been conceived and applied in computing, and some open issues that could be tackled with the aid of the history of science, the philosophy of science, and the philosophy of technology. (shrink)

Experimentation represents today a ‘hot’ topic in computing. If experiments made with the support of computers, such as computer simulations, have received increasing attention from philosophers of science and technology, questions such as “what does it mean to do experiments in computer science and engineering and what are their benefits?” emerged only recently as central in the debate over the disciplinary status of the discipline. In this work we aim at showing, also by means of paradigmatic examples, how the traditional (...) notion of controlled experiment should be revised to take into account a part of the experimental practice in computing along the lines of experimentation as exploration. Taking inspiration from the discussion on exploratory experimentation in the philosophy of science—experimentation that is not theory-driven—we advance the idea of explorative experiments that, although not new, can contribute to enlarge the debate about the nature and role of experimental methods in computing. In order to further refine this concept we recast explorative experiments as socio-technical experiments, that test new technologies in their socio-technical contexts. We suggest that, when experiments are explorative, control should be intended in a posteriori form, in opposition to the a priori form that usually takes place in traditional experimental contexts. (shrink)

Since cognitive neuroscience aims at giving an integrated account of mind and brain, its ontology should include both neural and cognitive entities and specify their relations. According to what we call the standard ontological framework of cognitive neuroscience, the aim of cognitive neuroscience should be to establish one-to-one mappings between neural and cognitive entities. Where such entities do not yet closely align, this can be achieved by reforming the cognitive ontology, the neural ontology, or both. In order to assess the (...) limits and the possibilities of the SOFCN, we will examine a paradigmatic case study: the concept of Broca’s area, which indicates an alleged mapping between the left inferofrontal gyrus and the production of language. We review evidence showing that such a mapping does not hold, thus calling into question either the status of Broca’s area or the validity of the SOFCN. We then propose some strategies for addressing the issue and suggest that it may be solved within the SOFCN by adopting both of the following strategies: first, more accurately defining the relevant neural structures and second, switching the focus of neural ontology from structures to events, individuated by a where conjoint with a how. (shrink)

This essay places Paulo Freire in dialogue with a Black Radical Tradition (BRT) in three distinct yet interrelated ways. First, the paper situates the significance of Cedric’s Robinson’s articulation of a BRT while exploring how contemporary scholars are troubling his disputatious relationship with Marxist social thought. Second, the paper foregrounds Freire’s modest contributions to a BRT in his anticolonial literacy campaigns in Guinea Bissau, Africa. Extending the principles of ‘dialogical cultural action’ in the context of African struggle that Freire documented (...) in the letters compiled in Pedagogy in Process, a robust theorization of solidarity comes into sharper view. Third, the paper calls for further reinvention of Freire pointing to the ways his cogent analysis can be augmented by other racialized groups and radical traditions in solidarity with Black struggle to more explicitly confront the inherent racism and anti-Blackness fundamental to global capitalism. (shrink)

Computer simulations are widely used for surrogative reasoning in scientific research. They also play a crucial role in engineering, more specifically in the design of new robotic systems, yet the nature of this role has been little discussed so far in the philosophy of technology literature. The main claim made in this article is that the notion of surrogative reasoning is central to understanding how computer simulations can serve the purpose of designing new robots. More specifically, it is argued that (...) computer simulations can support two forms of surrogative reasoning, which are called model-oriented and prediction-oriented, whose inferential structure is reconstructed to some extent. And it is argued that, when computer simulations are used to design new robots, they are distinctively used in the model-oriented way. By unravelling the structure of the computer simulation-supported methods adopted in robotic design, this article may contribute to a finer-grained understanding of the epistemic processes involved in technological research. (shrink)

Santos-Viola, Maria Paz Nakpil & Mark Joseph Santos (trans.). 2023. Ang aking paglalakbay noong dekada 1980: Pakikipagtagpo sa kawalan ng pagkakapantay at diskriminasyon. In Banwa at Layag: Antolohiya ng mga Kuwentong Paglalakbay ng mga Pilipino sa Ibayong Dagat, ed. Axle Christien Tugano, pp. 86-88. Manila: Limbagang Pangkasaysayan.

Tullio Viola – One of the most relevant aspects of your intellectual career is your reflection on the link between historical and normative arguments with regard to values. This reflection goes back at least to your 1997 book The Genesis of Values, and may be seen to culminate in the methodological chapter of your 2011 book on The Sacredness of the Person, in which you talk about the need for an “affirmative genealogy” of values. As you have made clear (...) many times (most recently in the article... (shrink)

From a gender-historical perspective, this article deals with the history of and discussions around an observed increase in female alcoholism. Since the 1950s, psychiatric, pedagogical and psychological discourses have lamented the increasing consumption of alcohol by women, and identified women’s emancipation as its cause. The article examines the male-dominated debates on female alcoholism up to 1968 and the emerging feminist counter-movement that followed. It analyzes the shifts in the social role of women as expressed in the discussions about ‘the drinking (...) woman’ as well as simultaneous scientific-patriarchal counter-movements. On the one hand, the article shows how a classic concept of addiction is eroding due to the failure of medical treatment attempts and is being replaced by new psychosocial explanatory knowledge. On the other hand, it illustrates how women’s self-help is appropriating and reinterpreting this knowledge. (shrink)

“[I]t is the belief men betray, and not that which they parade which has to be studied.” This short Peircean sentence has been the subject of important yet underrated attention in the reception of Peirce’s philosophy, passing through the art historians Edgar Wind and Erwin Panofsky and arriving finally at Bourdieu. This paper explores the affinities between Peirce’s and Panofksy’s thinking, as well as their historical connections and their common sources, taking its cue from an analysis of the similar arguments (...) the two authors offer to justify the analogy between Gothic architecture and Scholasticism. The fulcrum for the comparison between Peirce and Panofsky is located in the writings of Edgar Wind: a leading figure, this article proposes, in the history of European pragmatism. (shrink)

This essay aims to explore the impact of Object-Oriented Ontology (O.O.O) within the realm of pedagogy, critically examining its departure from humanistic and traditional paradigms. Simultaneously, it presents an alternative perspective on education that decenters the human as an inevitable ground. In a contrasting move, attention is directed towards Bruno Latour and Graham Harman, elucidating key facets of their ideas. This shift also signifies a departure from the conventional realm of “critical pedagogy”, as championed by Brazilian pedagogue Paulo Freire. However, (...) it is crucial to acknowledge and appreciate the contributions and significance of Freire’s work. This essay adopts a left-wing stance, with no intention of launching moral attacks on Paulo Freire, as is sometimes witnessed when reactionaries and conservatives enter the academic arena. Criticisms within these pages focus on the content of Freire’s writings, tracing the trajectory from his seminal work, “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”, published in 1968, to his final piece, “Pedagogy of Autonomy” written in 1996. The aim is not to exhaust all arguments put forth by Freire but to engage with select ideas, since his oeuvre is extremely complex and full of different layers. It is essential to clarify that the critique presented here does not target the character of Paulo Freire but rather delves into some of the theoretical references behind the scenes, particularly the anthropocentrism associated with his ideas. Consequently, this essay emerges as an interdisciplinary endeavor, a conjunction between philosophy and social theory. What doors will this discussion open? What new field of possibilities awaits us? I invite you to dive into this debate, exploring the potential for an Object-Oriented Pedagogy (O.O.P) on the horizon. (shrink)

Resenhas de Paul Sagar. Adam Smith Reconsidered. History, Liberty, and the Foundations of Modern Politics. Princeton University Press, 2022, por Thiago Vargas (USP-FAPESP) e de Antoine Lilti. L’héritage des Lumières. Ambivalences de la modernité. Seuil ; Gallimard, 2019, por Ciro Lourenço (USP-Paris 1).

This paper aims to provide a brief presentation of Husserl’s lectures dedicated to the philosophy of Fichte, specifically the discussion of the relationship between ethics and religion that the fichtian texts develop in its intermediate phase. The course taught by Husserl, divided into three lessons and presented in the chair of Freiburg between the years 1917 and 1918, seems to clearly show the intimate connection between Husserl proposals on an absolute foundation of ethics and the theory advocated by Fichte about (...) the different stages or degrees of moral development of mankind. More than that, both idealistic philosophical positions conceive a close relation between the conception of an ethical ideal and the defense of a view about human nature that understands it as a pure acting of consciousness. In this regard, the paper aims to indicate, albeit incipiently, how epistemology, ethics, and religion appear intertwined in a systematic manner in the two theories. (shrink)

This paper presents a case of severe uncertainty in the development of autonomous and intelligent systems in Artificial Intelligence and autonomous robotics. After discussing how uncertainty emerges from the complexity of the systems and their interaction with unknown environments, the paper describes the novel framework of explorative experiments. This framework presents a suitable context in which many of the issues relative to uncertainty, both at the epistemological level and at the ethical one, in this field should be reframed. The case (...) of autonomous robot systems for search and rescue is used to make the discussion more concrete. (shrink)

This research aims to explore and describe the experiences of Biodanza practitioners, and to understand its possible benefits for health, from the phenological-existential perspective of Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty and the theory of Rolando Toro, the founder of Biodanza, an integrative practice that aims for organic renewal and re-learn affectivity. For the methodology, a semi-structured interview was chosen because the research was exploratory and qualitative. Ten participants, who practice Biodanza in Ribeirão Preto, were asked questions in order to understand the possible (...) benefits that Biodanzar can bring to their lives and daily lives. As for the discussion of the results obtained, among the interviews accomplished with the research participants, benefits were found in relation to aspects: personal, focused more on perceptions of themselves; social, when focused on perceptions about their ways of being with others in the collective and, finally, aspects related to the connection of the Being with the totality. Based on the results revealed during the study, it can be concluded that Biodanza brings benefits to the well-being and mental health, perceived by participants during their experiences and in their daily lives, although, considering this as an exploratory study, it does not aim to be conclusive. (shrink)

This brief essay unpretentiously seeks to highlight the relevance of some of the central questions in Jean-Paul Sartre's Being and Nothingness, thus aiming to contribute to broadening the scope of the French philosopher's ideas. Without fearing controversy, it presents the correlation between the concept of freedom and the responsibility necessarily implied. Such concepts remind us that this work is current, for it demands to assume its political and ethical unfoldings as unavoidable demands. The debate is built, then, through Sartre's encounters (...) with his peers, highlighting the interlocutions and controversial divergences that mark his itinerary. Finally, the timeliness of the work seems to reside in the historical failure of the humanist project, that is, Being and Nothingness continues to be current, because we are still incapable of promoting a historical situation in which the human being is free. (shrink)

Since the publication of Kitcher’s influential paper The Division of Cognitive Labor, some philosophers wondered about these two related issues: (1) which is the optimal distribution of cognitive efforts among rival methods within a scientific community?, and (2) whether and how can a community achieve such an optimal distribution? Though not committing to any specific answer to question (1), I claim that issue (2) does not depend exclusively on an invisible hand like mechanism, since both intra-scientific and extra-scientific institutions may (...) play a major role. Finally, I examine some practical difficulties of reallocating scientists from a method to another, which leads to stress the importance of well-planned training and recruitment. (shrink)

O presente trabalho constitui-se de uma breve análise dos trechos que vão de 1005b 35 à 1006a 27 do capítulo quatro do livro Gama da Metafísica de Aristóteles e pretende fornecer uma leitura alternativa àquela feita pela tradição acerca da defesa do princípio de não-contradição elaborada nesse texto por Aristóteles. Com a ideia de um roteiro refutativo, pretendemos mostrar que argumentação em defesa do princípio encontra seu sucesso no seguimento desse roteiro provando, via demonstração elêntica, a validade e universalidade deste.

The overflow of scientific literature stimulates poor reading habits which can aggravate science's reproducibility crisis. Thus, solving the reproducibility crisis demands not only methodological changes, but also changes in our relationship with the scientific literature, especially our reading habits. Importantly, this does not mean reading more, it means reading better.

In recent years there has been a wealth of studies investigating how memories are allocated in the hippocampus. Some of those studies showed that it is possible to manipulate the identity of neurons recruited to represent a given memory without affecting the memory's behavioral expression. Those findings raised questions about how the hippocampus represents memories, with some researchers arguing that hippocampal neurons do not represent fixed stimuli. Herein, an alternative hypothesis is argued. Neurons in high‐order brain regions can be tuned (...) to multiple dimensions, forming complex, abstract representations. It is argued that such complex receptive fields allow those neurons to show some flexibility in their responses while still representing relatively fixed sets of stimuli. Moreover, it is pointed out that changes induced by artificial manipulation of cell assemblies are not completely redundant—the observed behavioral redundancy does not imply cognitive redundancy, as different, but similar, memories may induce the same behavior. (shrink)

Tradução de Schopenhauer und die Gesellschaft, de Max Horkheimer, artigo publicado em 1955 no Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch da Schopenhauer-Gesellschaft.

It is well known that Charles S. Peirce's first attempt to construct a theory of metaphysical categories, already displaying the triadic pattern that would later become the keystone of his philosophy, directed itself towards the three English personal pronouns: I, IT, THOU.2 As many scholars have already noted, these three spheres of the phenomenal world identified by the young Peirce prelude to the 1867 "New List" (Quality, Relation and Representation) as well as to the later categories of Firstness, Secondness and (...) Thirdness.But apart from their documentary significance as the seed of Peircean metaphysics, the writings on I, IT and THOU also have a philosophical interest in their own right, one which deserves to.. (shrink)

Este artigo pretende apresentar uma discussão sobre a possibilidade de identificarmos as possíveis contribuições das viagens de descobrimento, enfatizando as navegações portuguesas, para a construção do pensamento científico moderno. Por um lado, é analisado o valor da experiência direta valorizada pelos portugueses como critério de certeza acerca das afirmações sobre o mundo geográfico que acabaram por colocar em questão a concepção de mundo difundida a partir dos clássicos antigos – os gregos – e, por outro lado, é apresentado uma concepção (...) de ciência moderna que comporta as contribuições dos chamados homens práticos, como os navegadores, cuja atividade marítima promove um debate, no campo da geografia e cartografia sobre a própria constituição do mundo, sem, contudo, romper definitivamente com a tradição cosmológica. A nossa análise é realizada por meio de uma discussão crítica com a historiografia existente. (shrink)

Volume 28, Issue 5, September 2020, Page 966-986.

This article explores the philosophical foundations of Adam Smith's concept of authority, focusing on its connections to ‘admiration' and the ‘love of systems'. Its primary objective is to analyse how Smith integrates moral, epistemological, and aesthetic principles into his political philosophy to explain the subordination conferred by wealth, which he identifies as the most effective form of authority. Drawing on the Wealth of Nations, Lectures on Jurisprudence, and Theory of Moral Sentiments, the article argues that Smith sees authority as rooted (...) in human tendencies to admire systems that harmonize and explain phenomena while evoking beauty and coherence. Furthermore, this admiration includes social and political arrangements. As a result, political systems that ‘promote happiness’ are admired for their practical benefits and their ability to evoke a sense of beauty: like finely crafted machines, they inspire admiration through their elegance and order. (shrink)