Preview: In the path of his – most brilliantly described – way to himself St. Augustine arrived at the point in which he could only state: “…and I have become a problem to myself, and this is the ailment from which I suffer.” It is well known how and at what price (both intellectual and metaphysical) he found the way out…
Abstract: In the course of the 20th century the so-called Modern Synthesis of Neo-Darwinism has become the dominant paradigm in modern biology. First, it is explained how and why Darwin’s broad definition of evolution, in which the environment plays an important role, was narrowed down by Neo-Darwinism to a radical gene-centric view. Next, the paradigm shift…
Abstract: The main theme of this essay is f i n i t e l i f e, which is the bedrock of modern biopolitics. In the series of lectures devoted to the ‘birth of biopolitics,’ Michel Foucault defines it as a new system of ‘governing the living’ based on the natural cycle of birth and death, and the law of…
Abstract: In the contemporary humanities there is still a problem with the understanding of the great texts of Western Mysticism – the common interpretations oscillate between taking the mysticism as the pathology or as the supernormality. Different researchers, including psychiatrists, psychologists, theologians and philosophers, are usually presenting theories that are either too narrow or not enough…
Abstract: Do the various ascriptions of “violence,” e.g., to rape, logical reasoning, racist legislation, unqualified statements, institutions of class and/or gender inequity, etc., mean something identically the same, something analogous, or equivocal and context-bound? This paper argues for both an analogous sense as well as an exemplary essence and finds support in Aristotle’s theory of anger…
Abstract: In this paper, the mode in which the self reveals itself in the contemporary world-historical situation will be analysed. Hence, the focus will be on a particular form of technological mediation of the self by examining a recent phenomenon commonly referred to as the s e l f i e. Unlike most psychological studies suggest, it will be argued that selfies enable a human epistemological need…
Abstract: In this paper free volitions are construed as a subclass of reflective judgements in the Kantian meaning, i.e. judgements not involving any fixed concepts but displaying a concept-like form. Judgements expressing volitions and issuing in action may be termed volitional judgements, therefore free volitions are construed as reflective volitional judgements. Due to an element of conceptual novelty and…
Abstract: The paper looks at the idea of grounding human freedom in selfhood, with particular attention to the strategies of “denaturalizing” time, resulting in its separation into different modalities. The perspective of practical philosophy, interested in accounting for and making legitimate the spontaneous first person assumption of being a free agent, is enriched with some historical…
Preview: In the United States Higher Education is undergoing a rapid change. Some aspects of this change are welcome, some are simply the inevitable march of progress, and some changes are troubling. The keepers of the humanities in every generation must consider all three sorts of change and adjust to them as required for the…
Preview: Value Based Practice (VBP) is the position (both practical and theoretical, philosophical and medical), which was derived by Bill Kenneth Fulford from the Natural Language Philosophy. Fulford and his collaborators are interested in the language spoken by all the parties involved in medical care and social work. This language, they claim, is filled…