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The aim of this paper is to survey informal interpretations of relational semantics for relevant logics in terms of the theory of semantic information. Relational semantics for relevant logics introduced a ternary accessibility relation which was often criticized as unintuitive. The paper presents three interpretations of the ternary accessibility relation based on the framework of situation theory.
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The aim of the paper is to present an ontology of scientific laws as a tool for presentation of results extracted from research articles. The way we represent scientific laws is founded on our classification of scientific laws, which is based on the works of Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz and Władysław Krajewski. The classification isdescribed formally and complemented with the specification of requirements for each type of law, in order to obtain an ontology in the sense of ontological engineering. The ontology is used to represent research results from the domain of agri-food science. We give examples of representation of laws taken from scientific papers and reasoning algorithms that lead to automatic generation of new information and identification of conflicts in the literature.
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While in his book Hyperobjects Morton describes a new type of objects, the section on viscosity represents an attempt to take a distanced position towards hyperobjects. With this revaluation, however, his position becomes quite the opposite, namely engaged, subjective and expressive, marked by an insistence that hyperobjects precede thinking and cannot be described. Morton furnishes examples from a broad range of fields, including music (My Bloody Valentine), film (Twin Peaks), literature (John Donne) and philosophy (Kant, Sartre, Heidegger), which reflects the aesthetic nature of hyperobjects. At the same time, Morton draws on quantum physics and relativity theory and cites examples of the most disastrous ecological crises. The titular viscosity is presented above all in the context of those crises, as an essential feature of the dangerous hyperobjects whose emanations we are observing today.
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Trauma theories have proven an immensely influential framework in the humanities. However, contemporary fictional representations of the Great War all too often focus on soldiers or veterans as the traumatized victims. In epistemological terms, the trauma of war experience has generally been considered superior to civilian trauma, which is related to the grief of losing a beloved person at the front. Focusing on Robert Edric’s In Desolate Heaven (1997) and Jodie Shields’s The Crimson Portrait (2008), Sokołowska-Paryż examines the ideological implications of the literary constructions of the ‘woman in grief.’ Here she draws on cultural trauma theories as well as psychological theories of mourning.
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The paper continues the philosophical treatment of information, and the first idea/ in fact, the premise is that information is a concept, videlicet constructed in/by the human mind as a result of manifold human experiences, so of the multi-mediated contact of the consciousness with the external world to it. But this constructedcharacterof concepts –here, of the concept of information –raises a problem, put in the paper as the second idea: that of the correspondence of the concept of information with the real world, or in other words, that of the objective character of information. Is there this objective character? Why and how do we arrive at this conclusion, and thus what do we mean by information? The third idea mentioned in the paper is that in parallel with the development of sciences which have demonstrated the objective character of information in the inorganic and non-human living worlds, a vulgar dominant “philosophy” has put its mark on the modern and contemporary worldviews and mentalities: that the social information, given and received by humans, would be as “natural and inevitable” as the objective information in the non-human worlds. But, especially,the social information is – however reflective would it be –subjectively created and decided, not governed by physical laws. Nevertheless, this subjective character of information in the humans’ world does not mean that it is tantamount to moral relativity or taste judgements.And – this is the penultimate idea – since the social information takes place in asymmetrical power Relations subordinated to private restrictive interests, and within which those who control matter also control information, it results that the privately controlled social information producesharmful results: because the private interests subordinate all the human consequences to the hic et nunc/ short term and focusedprivategoals. The private control of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) has led to informationbombardments of the masses of human beings –considered only as consumers –in order to buy more and more commodities, including IT gadgets,and programmes which make their beneficiaries vulnerable and infantile. The dominant ideology pictures the privately directed information bombardments as progress, equating them with the importance of information and the right to information. Butthe main feature of the information issued from the privately conducted information bombardments is itsquantitative and qualitative excess, leading to what was called a disease produced by information, informatonosis.Therefore, what is important is to distinguish information from quantitative and qualitative noise/trash, and there are criteria for this: the consequences of information and noise/trash.If so, the last moment of the paper is only a reminder of a “solution” given by the ancient philosophy: the concept of measure. This one has remained for the dominant modern and contemporary thinking a marginal and unpleasant memento.But nowadays,to keep measure seems to be a condition of persistence of both the humans and their creation, i.e. information/culture.
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One of the most puzzling categories in The Unknowable by Semyon Frank is созерцание - a word close to German Anschauung and sometimes used as its translation. The aim of this article is to analyze the meaning of the category of созерцание in Frank’s book and to indicate some of its philosophical sources. First, I discuss the role the term Anschauung plays in the works of Kant and Goethe. The selection of these two authors allows, in my opinion, to describe both Frank's rooting in classical philosophy and the distinction of his approach. One can distinguish two different cognitive acts which are denoted by the word созерцание in Frank’s work: an immediate, non-discursive and synthetic cognition of objective being as well as the cognition of the unconditional being through experience that overcomes the subject-object relation. I argue that the importance of the synthetic and nondiscursive intuitive cognition can be interpreted as Goethe's legacy in The Unknowable. Although Frank's usage of the term созерцание is rather far from Kant’s (which is evident in his neglect of the distinction receptive/spontaneous, fundamental in The Critique of Pure Reason), the problem Frank attempts to deal with, i. e. the possibility of the unconditioned cognition of being was important for the post-Kantian philosophers (Fichte among others) which makes Kant and the German Idealism a crucial context to understand it.
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Returning Reader is a study about the „Final Frontier”, a 2018 book about the theory of reading.
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The aim of the presented article is to provide an in-depth analysis of the adequacy of designating Penrose as a complex Pythagorean in view of his much more common designation as a Platonist. Firstly, the original doctrine of the Pythagoreans will be briefly surveyed with the special emphasis on the relation between the doctrine of this school and the teachings of the late Platonic School as well as its further modifications. These modifications serve as the prototype of the contemporary claims of the mathematicity of the Universe. Secondly, two lines of Penrose’s arguments in support of his unique position on the ontology of the mathematical structures will be presented: (1) their existence independent of the physical world in the atemporal Platonic realm of pure mathematics and (2) the mathematical structures as the patterns governing the workings of the physical Universe. In the third step, a separate line of arguments will be surveyed that Penrose advances in support of the thesis that the complex numbers seem to suit these patterns with exceptional adequacy. Finally, the appropriateness of designation Penrose as a complex Pythagorean will be assessed with the special emphasis on the suddle threshold between his unique position and that of the adherents of the mathematicity of the Universe.
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The paper consists of two parts. In the first one I present some general remarks regarding the history of negation and attempt to answer the philosophical question concerning the essence of negation. In the second part I resume the theological teaching on the degrees of certainty (notae theologice) and point to five forms of negation – known from other areas of research -- as applied in the framework of theological investigations.
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I show how classical and quantum physics approach the problem of randomness and probability. Contrary to popular opinions, neither we can prove that classical mechanics is a deterministic theory, nor that quantum mechanics is a nondeterministic one. In other words it is not possible to show that randomness in classical mechanics has a purely epistemic character and that of quantum mechanics an ontic one. Nevertheless, recent developments of quantum theory and increasing experimental possibilities to check its predictions call for returning to the problem of comparing possibilities given by classical and quantum physics to accommodate and prove the existence of a `genuine randomness'. Recent results concerning `amplification of randomness' show that, in certain sense, quantum physics is in fact ‘more random’ that classical and outperforms it in producing a `truly random process'.
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Recenzja książki: Elaine Landry (red.), Categories for the Working Philosopher, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2017, ss. xiv+471.
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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.
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Dr. Rezā Dāvarī Ardakānī, born in 1933, is one of the most important Iranian philosophers of the new era. He is an associate professor at the Tehran University, president of the Academy of Sciences and author of dozens of books and scientific articles. Dāvarī is a philosopher of culture and dialogue. His works on the humanistic concept of comprehension and understanding, Islamic and Western philosophy, are of utmost importance for the philosophical dialogue of modern Iran. His thought evolved on the tradition of Islamic-Iranian philosophy, and can be considered a “disciple” of Western philosophers. Therefore, he is always in search of meanings and concepts that link Western and Islamic-Iranian thought. Of particular importance is Dāvarī’s intellectual pursuit in establishing the atmosphere of civilizational-cultural dialogue in Iran. In this paper, Dāvarī’s scientific biography as well as his philosophical thought will be treated.
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This article is mainly concerned with the reconstruction of JamesFrederick Ferrier’s theory of ignorance. The growing scientific interest towards thesocial dimensions of ignorance is the reason to turn back to the initial explication of the relation between knowledge and ignorance. The inquiry follows Ferrier’s foundation of the theory of ignorance, as well as his views concerning consciousness.A special interest is put on some main theoretical problems explicated in relationto Ferrier’s critique towards the philosophy of mind and mainly towards Reid’s philosophy of common sense.
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A brief introduction into the complex topic of science and technology in totalitarian systems of the 20th century (Soviet communism and German nationalsocialism) is given. The emphasis is placed, in a Popperian spirit, on the essential incompatibility of the scientific method and the totalitarian ideological dogma. As George Orwell emphasized in 1984: „In Newspeak there is no word for ’Science’. The empirical method of thought, on which all the scientific achievements of the past were founded, is opposed to the most fundamental principles of Ingsoc.“ This conflict cannot be overcome due to its structural nature, and efforts have been expended in the totalitarian state mostly to hide it under the cover of massive propaganda rethorics and sophistry. In contrast to unfounded fame and hype, as well as a veil of mysticism still reigning in connection with the alleged great successes of science and technology in totalitarian states, the historical reality suggests something very different. Case studies such as „aryan physics“, national-socialist Wunderwaffe projects, lysenkoism or the tragic absence of ecological conscience in countries of the so-called real socialism all show that pseudoscience is more likely to fill the ideological and social needs of the totalitarian elites. Authenthic science has in the best case been tolerated in such systems, and more often than not was marginalized and exposed to ideological purges in the best spirit of the Orwellian doublethink. The mysticism surrounding the alleged successes of totalitarianism in science and technology is mostly a consequence of the long-term propaganda and the lack of real education in places otherwise infected by a degree of nostalgia toward totalitarianism. One of multiple distorsions of reality brought about by this tendency is underestimation and neglect of many scientists and engineers who were at the forefront of dissident movements.
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Koji je to problem koji želimo da rešimo kada pokušavamo da konstruišemo racionalni ekonomski poredak? Pod određenim poznatim pretpostavkama, odgovor je prilično prost. Ako posedujemo sve relevantne informacije, ako možemo da počnemo iz datog sistema preferenci i ako posedujemo potpuno znanje o dostupnim sredstvima, problem koji nam ostaje je čisto logički. To jest, odgovor na pitanje šta je najbolja upotreba dostupnih sredstava implicitno je sadržan u našim pretpostavkama. Uslovi koje rešenje ovog problema optimuma mora da ispuni su potpuno razrađeni i daju se najbolje izraziti u matematičkoj formi. U najkraćem, oni glase: marginalne stope supstitucije bilo koja dva dobra ili faktora moraju biti iste u svim svojim različitim upotrebama. Ovo, ipak, nesumnjivo nije ekonomski problem sa kojim se društvo suočava. I ekonomski račun koji smo razvili kako bi razrešili ovaj logički problem, iako je bitan korak ka rešenju ekonomskog problema društva, još uvek ne pruža odgovor. Razlog tome je što „podaci“ od kojih ekonomski račun počinje nikad nisu za čitavo društvo „dati“ pojedinačnom umu, koji onda može da odredi implikacije, niti ikad mogu da budu dati na taj način. [...]
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Prikaz/The review of: Derek Beales, Enlightenment and Reform in Eighteenth-century Europe, I.B. Tauris & Co. Ltd, London, 2005
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Marx noted in the Preface to the 1867 edition of Capital that beginning is difficult in all sciences. His work on this text reflected Marx and Engels’s view that there was only one science: history, embracing nature and society. Unsurprisingly, the natural sciences shaped their work in important ways. My article notes the impact of Darwinism, thermodynamics and cell biology in Marx’s analyses and examines the third of these in detail. When Marx eventually settled on the value-form of the commodity as his starting point in Capital, he described it as the economic cell form of the capitalist mode of production. This reflected a new step in his critique of political economy. For, in contrast to his account of two previous methods of political economy outlined in the 1857 Introduction, his subsequent interest in cell biology suggested a third method that would sublate and supersede them. The commodity provided the simplest, most apparent, and most immediate elementary unit of the capital relation and would serve both as a presupposition in his analysis and its eventual posit (result) as the analysis unfolded all its contradictory and dynamic implications for the logic of capital. This reflects his re-reading of Hegel’s Science of Logic, which was also concerned with the choice of starting point in exploring an organic totality. The cell analogy was useful as Marx sought the best starting point for his critique. In this context, I identify six parallels between cell biology and Marx’s analysis of the capitalist mode of production that might have influenced his starting point and subsequent analysis. But they remain analogies and guided neither his substantive research nor its presentation, which reflects the historical specificities of the capital relation. The article ends with some general conclusions on discovery, methods, and the method of presentation.
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This article elaborates one possible development of Marx’s legacy 200 years after his birth. It responds to the influence of post-structuralism and its related ‘cultural turn’ on academic Marxist analyses by examining the material and discursive dimensions of changing social relations in capitalist social formations. In this context, it proposes a cultural political economy approach to bridge the theoretical divide between constructivism and structuralism. It suggests that, given his long-standing interests in language and semiosis as key aspects of the critique of economic, political, and social life, Marx can fruitfully be read as a proto-cultural political economist. It is further suggested that Marx’s contributions to the critique of political economy can be enhanced by articulating them with the work of two later critical theorists, namely, Antonio Gramsci and Michel Foucault. Accordingly, this article stages an encounter between Marx, Gramsci and Foucault to explore the interface between the semiotic and extra-semiotic aspects of social relations and then identifies four modes of selectivity as a heuristic tool for examining the production of hegemony and the remaking of social relations.
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This paper analyses the possibility of left populism to trigger class consciousness with what Laclau calls populist subjects. The author argues that populist subjects and class consciousness are not identical nor interchangeable concepts in respect to the classical Marx and Engels notion on the proletarian class. In the first part of the paper, the author sets a description of populism based on its three key features: reaction, the notion of the people, and the struggle. In the second part, the idea of class consciousness is analysed, showing that class consciousness is necessarily political. In the third part of the paper, the idea of left populism is explored by using the findings of the second part of the paper, showing structural inconsistencies in the idea of the populist subject.
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