(M)any Questions? A Comparison of the Use of Questions in Wittgenstein’s first 37 paragraphs of Philosophical Investigations with Austin’s essay “The Meaning of a Word”

Author(s): Blahoslav Fajmon / Language(s): English / Issue: 1/2014

Wittgenstein’s approach to philosophy is closely related not only to the content but also to the form of his investigations. The following paper presents the uniqueness of Wittgenstein’s writing style, namely his use of questions, by comparing part of his work with Austin’s essay. For this purpose a typology of questions with regard to their function in the text is established and applied. The difference between Wittgenstein’s and Austin’s writing style is then documented by the frequency of certain types of questions, and omission of others, and related to some of Wittgenstein’s remarks about his approach to philosophical inquiry. The difference is then summarized tentatively as one between “pedagogical” and “academic” writing style, which poses questions concerning the translation of Wittgenstein’s investigations into academic prose.

(rec.) Michał Piekarski, Logika-Gramatyka-Pragmatyka. Ewolucja wittgensteinowskiej koncepcji związku języka ze światem, Wydawnictwo UKSW, Warszawa 2015

Author(s): Marek Porwolik / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2015

A Different Take on Humanities

Author(s): Wlodzimierz Bolecki / Language(s): English / Issue: 1/2015

The foreword to this issue focuses on the core functional differences between the humanities and hard sciences (i.e. different approaches to such phenomena as language, translation, teamwork, writing, discipline.s history, publishing, tradition, innovation). Yet, this dichotomy is questioned in the conlusion. The author argues that whenever human artifacts are at stake, both the humanites and experimental sciences are equally hard, because they inquire the same matter, ie. how the products of human cognitive activities were created and what are their social functions. Therefore, the author calls for a new model for interdisciplinary studies.

A Half-Formed Thing, a Fully Formed Style. Repetition in Eimear McBride’s A Girl Is a Half-Formed Thing

Author(s): Katarzyna Bazarnik / Language(s): English / Issue: 2/2018

The article begins with addressing alleged similarities between Eimear McBride’s debut novel A Girl Is a Half-Formed Thing and James Joyce’s works to suggest that they cannot be systematically sustained. Her much praised, experimental style relies on the opposite of Joycean richness. Limited vocabulary, jumbled word order, and lexical and phrasal repetitions are one of the most salient features of her style. McBride applies rhetorical variants of conduplicatio to create an emotionally powerful idiom to narrate an anti-Bildungsroman about a loving sister and her dying brother, her sexual abuse by an uncle and final suicide. So despite some thematic parallels, and linguistic experimentation, A Girl bears only superficial resemblance to the modernist master, which is additionally evidenced by stylometric findings.

A ještě jedna nepřesnost

Author(s): Marie Duží / Language(s): Czech / Issue: 1/2003

Souhlasím s kritikou Bělohradovy argumentace, kterou provedl výše Pavel Materna a chtěla bych doplnit, že ve zmíněném (jinak velice kvalitním příspěvku) je ještě jedna nepřesnost.

A less simplistic metaphysics: Peirce’s layered theory of meaning as a layered theory of being

Author(s): Marc Champagne / Language(s): English / Issue: 4/2015

This article builds on C. S. Peirce’s suggestive blueprint for an inclusive outlook that grants reality to his three categories. Moving away from the usual focus on (contentious) cosmological forces, I use a modal principle to partition various ontological layers: regular sign-action (like coded language) subsumes actual signaction (like here-and-now events) which in turn subsumes possible sign-action (like qualities related to whatever would be similar to them). Once we realize that the triadic sign’s components are each answerable to this asymmetric subsumption, we obtain the means to track at which level of complexity semiosis finds itself, in a given case. Since the bulk of such a “trinitarian” metaphysics would be devoted to countenancing uninterpreted phenomena, I argue that current misgivings about sign-based ontologies are largely misplaced.

A philosophical investigation in machine understanding. The case of implicit meaning

Author(s): Maria Wilkowska / Language(s): English / Issue: 12/2013

The question of machine thinking and understanding, once initiated by Alan Turing, has puzzled scholars from various disciplines. This paper aims at investigating some of the facets involved in the topic of machine language understanding with particular interest devoted to indirect meaning comprehension (more specifically, the implicature). So far as the subject under examination – the chatbot – manages to understand directly conveyed information, still much is to be done with respect to implicit data in which everyday messages (formulated in ordinary language) abound. This situation generates a number of not only hard-science questions but also, more importantly, given the viewpoint of this paper, it gives rise to a considerable amount of philosophically- oriented and frequently neglected issues and dilemmas too. This study is a brief investigation of exactly those phenomena.

A posteriori

Author(s): Maurice Blanchot / Language(s): Croatian / Issue: 23/2018

Mallarme je nekom novopečenom autoru, koji je od njega tražio tekst prezentacije ili podrške, uzvratio: »Užasavam se proslova napisanih iz autorova pera, a sjoš većim mije pravom odbojno kad proslov priredi netko drugi. Pravoj knjizi, dragi moj, predstavljanjeje suvišno, ona osvaja na prvi pogled kao žena ljubavnika i bez pomoći nekog trećeg, muža...«. […]

A priori komunikácie a základy humanitných disciplín

Author(s): Karl-Otto Apel / Language(s): Slovak / Issue: 4/2003

Aký typ vzťahov by sa mal postulovať medzi prírodnými vedami [science] a humanitnými disciplínami [humanities] v kontexte súčasnej spoločnosti?

A TOUCHY SUBJECT: THE TACTILE METAPHOR OF TOUCH

Author(s): Mirt Komel / Language(s): English / Issue: 82/2016

The article proposes an interpretation of metaphors and metaphoric discourse through the perspective of touch. The article first deals with metaphors of touch in the history of western philosophy (especially traditional metaphysics from Plato to Hegel) in order to produce an operative category of touch that will allow, in the second step, to grasp the tactile quality of the metaphors. If metaphors are usually (rhetorics, politics, literature) regarded as a specific form of language able to not only touch the subject matter in the most suitable way but also touch on the target subject (listener/reader), then it is precisely because there is a certain haptic quality involved in language itself, discernible especially in the discourse of those who know how to best exploit metaphors in their endeavours.

A. Platonov’un “Çukur” Eserinde Umudun Kayiplari

Author(s): Reyhan Çelik / Language(s): Turkish / Issue: 76/2013

With the revolution of October 1917 a new political process has begun in Russia. This process has not only changed the daily life of the Russian people, but also has exterminated the humanistic emotions of them. This subject has been the main question of the works of A.Platonov, who observed the sechanges on the people since the begining of the revolution. Although aforementioned difficulties expressed by some writers of that period, due to the tough stance in the works Platonov is considered to be against the regime. However, despite all the pressures he continues to express thoughts clearly. He is one of the most important writers of the twentieth century Russian literature with language, philosophy, as well as the revolution approaches; in his time he reflects the suffering of the people and challenges in society. He attracts attention both the stylistic features of literary art and thoughts of anti-regime. Some of the author’s works have been translated into Turkish. These works are “Dzhan”, “The Foundation Pit”, “Chevengur”. “The foundation Pit” which he has written up in 1930, however, published in 1987 in Russia. In his work “The foundation Pit”, he has drawn the profile of ‘new human’ which has occuerd to get her with the the socialist system. In this work are transferred painful losses, which given to achieve overall collectivization. Voşçev removed from his job because of the thoughtfulness, for the search to truth, will join the ranks of people working for the sake of this hope and in work is expressed what happened in this process. At the same time in work, against the Soviet regime’s utopian thought has created an anti-utopia. In this work the life philosophy of the villagers that live in the Soviet system and their journey to hope has been examined relative to the life philosophy of the period.

ABOUT PRACTICAL PROBLEM SOLVING

Author(s): Arto Mutanen / Language(s): English / Issue: 89/2016

Knowledge is, by definition, reliable and, hence, it can be applied to a variety of different problems. Nevertheless, in practical problem solving, we do not rely on mere truthful knowledge, but also on information which frames the practical acceptability. We are not looking for truthful solution but an optimal solution. Optimal solution is found out by optimizing some given (practical) parameters. The optimization is both theory based and practice based process. That is, practical problem solving is a human deliberation that interconnects theoretical and practical knowledge. So, the philosophical foundation of practical problem solving interconnects theoretical and practical philosophy. Especially ethical deliberation plays – or should play – central role in practical problem solving. The complexity of the advanced scientific knowledge needed in solving present day practical problems separates the people who know, from the people who do (decide). The situation makes immediate that we need some deeper pedagogical conviction: we need ecological education.

Acquaintance and Naming: A Russellian Theme in Epistemology

Author(s): Augustín Riška / Language(s): English / Issue: 4/2005

Russell's distinction between knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description has been recently re-examined in frequently controversial epistemological contributions. The present essay reflects upon the pertinent papers by D. F. Pears. J. Hintikka. R. Chisholm, W. Sellars. A. J. Ayer, and others, but is primarily founded on Russell's significant formulations from his writings published between 1910 and 1918. By employing an auxiliary device of a late-Wittgensteinian language game, I explore at first the situation in which human subject is "experiencing" and naming particular objects (Russell's sense-data and sensibilia) and later the subject's acquaintance with universals. The reconstruction of such situations shows that, contrary to Russell's assumptions, even the "purest" acquaintance cannot function without knowledge by description, i.e. without stating propositions about the object of acquaintance (whatever its nature). Then the only "descriptionless" alternative would be a kind of intuitive knowledge ot such objects which is difficult to reconcile with the position held by Russell in the 1910s. Whatever the consequences, this topic retains its fundamental epistemological significance.

Afirmacija ljudskog simboličkim oblicima. Cassirer o jeziku i znanosti

Author(s): Hasnije Ilazi / Language(s): Croatian / Issue: 02/150/2018

In his philosophy of culture, Cassirer refused to understand the human being as homo faber, and he partially accepted to understand the human being as animal rationale. The essence of the human being is composed of his creational acts, and he is creating culture by the way of symbolic forms. The paper will present Cassirer’s theory of symbols as the basis for differentiating human nature from the nature of other living beings, and the base of human existence as the communication in the social surrounding. The human being as a symbolic animal will be elaborated through a relation between language and science, as well as tradition and innovation in the dynamic process of creating culture. Because the paper is presenting an anthropological review of the rule of the symbol in confirming the essence of human being, the goal was to point at the (lack of) rational mechanisms of symbols for manifesting the irrational human nature.

Aforizam u nezgodno vrijeme

Author(s): Jacques Derrida / Language(s): Croatian / Issue: 23/2018

Aforizam je ime. Kao što mu ime kaže, aforizam odvaja, bilježi disocijaciju (apo), završava, razgraničuje, utvrđuje (orizo). Aforizam dovršava odvajajući, odvaja kako bi dovršio - i odredio. […]

Against the Frame

Author(s): Wojciech Kalaga / Language(s): English / Issue: 1-2/2016

The paper explores theoretical foundations of the frame from two semiotic perspectives: that of the Saussurean dyadic sign dominant in the European tradition and that of the triadic sign of the Peircean/American descent. If – within the post- Saussurean agenda – meaning can be fairly easily “framed” and closed in the field of the signified, Peirce’s concepts of interpretant and infinite semiosis implement a mechanism which inherently obliterates the frame. Given this duality of approaches, the contention “No meaning without a frame” is thus true and paradoxical at the same time, and that paradox goes far beyond the Derridean concept of the parergon, which only belongs to both the inside and the outside. The frame, as construed in this paper, is not merely a material or imaginary, inactive partition, but is itself an operational agent which isolates and delineates a text ontologically as the other of the context, and simultaneously subverts that otherness by necessitating further semiosis and its own partial self-erasure. Regarding the interrelations amongst texts and between text and context, the frame is thus envisaged, and investigated in the paper, not so much as a factor of resistance or separation, but as an osmotic boundary facilitating rather than preventing a bi-directional flow of meanings. Putting this in epistemological terms, one may say that interpretation – paradoxically again –requires an enframing of its object, but at the same time it dissolves the stipulated frame and reaches beyond it.

Ako nakladať s referenčným systémom úplne odlišnej kultúrnej tradície?

Author(s): Marína Carnogurská / Language(s): Slovak / Issue: 3/1999

Až teraz vlastne chápem, prečo som na medzinárodnej transdisciplinárnej konferencii s názvom Diskurz - Intelektuáli - Sociálna komunikácia, zorganizovanej Kabinetom výskumu sociálnej a biologickej komunikácie SAV v roku 1996 v Bratislave, upútala pozornosť prof. Flewa, rovnako ako naopak on, spomedzi všetkých ostatných zahraničných .účastníkov, najväčšmi upútal moju pozornosť i môj filozofický záujem oňho.

AL-FÂRÂBÎ

Author(s): Deborah L. Black / Language(s): Bosnian / Issue: 1-2/2017

Ono malo podataka o životu Abû Nasra al-Fârâbîja dolazi uglavnom od srednjovjekovnih arapskih biografa čiji rukopisi datiraju između četvrtog/desetog i sedmog/trinaestog stoljeća. Najraniji iskaz iz Ibn al-Nadîmovog (u. 380/990) Kitâb al-fihrista daje samo oskudne podatke o al-Fârâbîjevom životu; kasnija izvješća dodat će na ovu osnovu opsežne popise njegovih spisa, podatke o njegovim učiteljima i učenicima i nekoliko anegdota čija je vjerodostojnost upitna. Al- Fârâbî je vjerovatno bio turskog podrijetla, rođen oko 257/870 u Fârâbu u Turkestanu. Iako su nam pojedinosti o al-Fârâbîjevom ranom obrazovanju prilično nepoznate, izvješća potvrđuju da je proučavao logiku kod kršćanskih učenjaka Yuhanne ibn Haylâna (u. 910) i Abû Bishr Matte (u. 940), jednog od prevoditelja Aristotelovih djela u arapski jezik. Budući da je Bagdadska škola bila glavni nasljednik u arapskom svijetu filozofskoj i medicinskoj tradiciji Aleksandrije, al-Fârâbîjeva povezanost s tim učiteljima oblikovala je jednu od najranijih veza između grčke filozofije i islamskog svijeta.

All the Superhero’s Names

Author(s): Olga Poller / Language(s): English / Issue: 2/2016

In this paper I concern myself with The Superman Puzzle (the phenomenon of the substitution failure of co-referential proper names in simple sentences). I argue that the descriptive content associated with proper names, besides determining the proper name’s reference, function as truth-conditionally relevant adjuncts which can be used to express a manner, reason, goal, time or purpose of action. In that way a sentence with a proper name “NN is doing something” could be understood as “NN is doing something as NN” (which means “as-soand-so”). I argue that the substitution of names can fail on modified readings because the different descriptive content of proper names modifies the main predicate differently. Here I present a formal representation of modified predicates which allows one to model intuitively the different truth-conditions of sentences from The Puzzle.

An Anscombean Reference for ‘I’?

Author(s): Robert J. Stainton,Andrew Botterell / Language(s): English / Issue: 54/2018

A standard reading of Anscombe’s “The First Person” takes her to argue, via reductio, that ‘I’ must be radically non-referring. Allegedly, she analogizes ‘I’ to the expletive ‘it’ in ‘It is raining’. Hence nothing need be said about Anscombe’s understanding of “the referential functioning of ‘I’”, there being no such thing. We think that this radical reading is incorrect. Given this, a pressing question arises: How does ‘I’ refer for Anscombe, and what sort of thing do users of ‘I’ refer to? We present a tentative answer which is both consistent with much of what Anscombe says, and is also empirically/philosophically defensible.