Philosophical Readings
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To Remake Man and the World…comme si? Camus’s “Ethics” contra Nihilism
Full text linkWhether Albert Camus’s “existentialist” thought expresses an “ethics” is a subject of disagreement among commentators. Yet, there can be no reading of Camus’s philosophical and literary works without recognizing that he was engaged in the post-WW2 period with two basic questions: How must we think? What must we do? If his thought presents us with an ethics, even if not systematic, it seems to be present in his ideas of “remaking” both man and world that are central to his The Myth of Sisyphusand The Rebel. Curiously, however, this apparent recommendation is ambiguous for the fact that while Camus proposes as much he does so “comme si,” i.e., from a perspective of “as if.” A clarification of this qualification is presented here in the light of the fact that Camus’s philosophy of life rejects any nihilist project that countenances either suicide or murder. Thereby, one may argue that Camus indeed has an ethics that remains pertinent to today.
References
Ingrid L. Anderson, “Absurd Dignity: The Rebel and His Cause in Améry and Camus,” Journal of French and Francophone Philosophy—Revue de la philosophie française et de langue française 24(3), (2016): 74-94.
Albert Camus, Lettres à un ami allemande, ed. Jean-Marie Tremblay (Paris: Les Editions Gallimard, 1st Edition, 1948; Revised edition 1972; Electronic edition, 2008).
Albert Camus, Lyrical and Critical Essays, ed. P. Thody, trans. E.C. Kennedy (New York: Vintage Books, 1970).
Herbert Hochberg, “Albert Camus and the Ethic of Absurdity,” Ethics 75(2), (1965): 87-102.
Albert Camus, The Rebel, trans. Anthony Brower (New York: Vintage Books, 1956).
Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays, trans. Justin O’Brien (New York: Vintage Books, 1955).
Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, trans. Joan Stambaugh (Albany: SUNY Press, 1996).
Macmillan Dictionary, “as if”, https://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/british/as-if, accessed 18 July 2019.
Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, trans. W. Kaufmann (New York: Vintage Books, 1966).
Voltaire (Francois Marie Arouet), “On the Death of Adrienne LeCouvreur, A Celebrated Actress,” https://www.poetry-archive.com/v/on_the_death_of_adrienne_lecouvreur.html, accessed 25 July 2019)
The Definitions of Number in Boethius’s Introduction to Arithmetic
No full textThe paper enquires into the reasons why in his loose translation of Introduction to Arithmetic by the Neopythagorean philosopher and mathematician Nicomachus of Gerasa Boethius altered the passage addressing the definition of number. While Nicomachus’s text contains three definitions of number, Boethius lists only two. However, he also pays attention to the definition he omits, even though he does not regard it as a proper definition. In his view it fails to embody the substance of number and is to be understood as a description of the components constitutive of the substance of number. Although this is a possible explanation of Boethius’s dismissal of the definition provided by Nicomachus, the description also occupies an important place in relation to the general characteristic of number, because Nicomachus’s definitions fully correspond to the three basic topics which were central to contemporary arithmetic, viz. the science of number: number as discrete quantity, referring to the properties of numbers and their classifications; number as collection of units, leading to the topic of figural numbers; and number as quantity emanating from unit and subsequently returning to it, corresponding with numerical ratios, sequences and their transfers
Fundamentals of the classification of sciences
No full textThis paper seeks to contribute to understanding the fundamentals of an extensively used classification of modern sciences. It opens by setting out the differences between modern sciences and philosophy and then goes on to refute a common misunderstandings in the classification of sciences: that there is such a thing as a system of sciences sharing a common set of principles and. In their stead, it puts forward a currently accepted classification of the modern sciences. Recognizing that this classification is hardly original, the paper attempts to shed light on the related fundamentals
Entre los pecios del naufragio: la crítica de Horkheimer a la filosofía hegeliana
No full textThe aim of this paper is twofold: on the one hand, to explain Horkheimer’s critique of hegelian philosophy, a critique that develops under the coordinates of the first project of Critical Theory; on the other hand, to show how Horkheimer’s critical reception of Hegel’s work is another indication of the differences within the Frankfurt School between Horkheimer’s positions and those of Adorno y Marcuse
Las sobras de Hegel están por venir
No full textThe purpose of this contribution is to try to answer the following question: "What is the future of Hegel?" In the 90s of the last century, Hegel woke us up from the dogmatic dream of a history of political emancipation on behalf of freedom, as well as from a history of emancipation from nature in the name of technique; now we try to turn Hegel against Hegel in order to make a reading of him valuable to our present, and to the future to come. Perhaps we could find in Hegel a way to escape both fundamentalism, on the one hand, and exclusionary particularisms on the other. Hegel’s work can be read closer to Walter Benjamin’s idea of the redemption of the past by the revolution of the present, pointing at the possibility of a new revolution, which offers no guarantees, but in which human dignity is played. This time to come has to be understood as a feedback loop, not as a linear development
Quantulacumque lucretiana. Nuove piste di ricerca sulla fortuna di Lucrezio nel tardo Rinascimento
No full textThis essay collects evidence of Lucretius’s presence
in areas where researchers have not ventured, convinced
that he was largely a poet who was read for excerpting
precious images but disregarded his materialistic
ideas. This essay proves that he was read by literary theorists,
mithographers, meteorologists, embryologists, scholars
interested in magnetism, and in the causes of dreams.
The quotations culled in this paper point out new paths of
investigation, and prove by and large that in Italy Lucretius
was held as a serious observer of natural phenomena
long before Gassendi made him popular by the middle of
the Seventeenth Century
Giovanni Magrì, Popolo, nazione ed esclusi. Tra mito e concetto, (Roma: Castelvecchi, 2020)
No full textReveiw of Giovanni Magrì, Popolo, nazione ed esclusi. Tra mito e concetto, (Roma: Castelvecchi, 2020
Evaluating MacIntyre’s “Nietzsche or Aristotle” Argument
No full textThe primary focus of this article is to explain how MacIntyre, as part of his project of the critique of modern morality, treats Nietzsche and his genealogical explorations of morality, and how adequate his interpretation is. This article includes an introductory elucidation of his larger project of what he himself rightly calls as disquieting and quieting suggestions (MacIntyre 2011: ch.II). This would enable us to situate our specific problem in a larger and meaningful context and make it more intelligible. It will also explain how MacIntyre places Nietzsche within his own critical endeavor to make a general claim on the enlightenment project of moral philosophy, so that he can make a radical disjunction between the Nietzschean and Aristotelian morality. It follows how MacIntyre interprets certain Nietzschean terms like “will to power” and “Ubermensch” to fit his essential articulation of Nietzsche’s moral theory as a culmination of enlightenment project of individualistic morality and ‘Nietzschean emotivism’. Our aim is to show that MacIntyre’s emotivistic interpretation of Nietzsche is not right; however, despite the recent attempts to place Nietzsche in the virtue ethics camp alongside with Aristotle, MacIntyre has been right to present Nietzsche and Aristotle as polar opposites.
References
Aristotle., Nicomachean Ethics. Trans. W. D. Ross, 1966. [Online] Available from: http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/nicomachaen.2.ii.html [Accessed March 05 2012]
Conway, Daniel. (1986). After Macintyre, Excerpts from a philosophical Bestiary, Soundings; an interdisciplinary journal. Vol.69, No. 3. USA, Penn State University Press.
Daigel, Christine. (2006). Nietzsche: Virtue Ethics … Virtue Politics? Journal of Nietzsche Studies, No. 32.
Hunt, Lester C. (1991). Nietzsche and the Origin of Virtue, London: Routledge.
Kaufmann, Walter. (1974). Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, Princeton University Press: Princeton.
Kirstjansson, Kristjan. (2007). Aristotle, Emotions, and Education. Ashgate Publishing.
Korkut, Buket. (2012). MacIntyre’s Nietzsche or Nietzschean MacIntyre? Philosophy and Social Criticism 38(2), 199-214, Sage Publications.
MacIntyre, Alasdair. (2011). After Virtue, USA, Bloomsbury Revelations.
MacIntyre, Alasdair. (2006). Rival Aristotles: Aristotle against some Renaissance Aristotelians. In Ethics and Politics: Sellected essays, Vol 2. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm. (1990). Twilight of the Idols with the Antichrist, UK, Penguin.
Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm. (1997). Daybreak, Cambridge University Press.
Nietzsche, Friedrich. (2000). Beyond Good and Evil, in Basic Writings of Nietzsche, trans. W. Kauffmann (New York: the Modern Library).
Nietzsche, Friedrich. (2010). The Gay Science: With a prelude in rhymes and an appendix of songs. Vintage.
Slote, Michael. (1998). “Nietzsche and Virtue Ethics.” International Studies in Philosophy 30:3,
–27.Swanton, Christine.(2015). Virtue Ethics of Nietzsche and Hume, UK, Wiley Blackwell
The Concept of Freedom: Effects of Ockham’s Revolution
Full text linkThe notion of freedom is one of the most important topics in philosophy. For centuries different, often opposing, conceptions of freedom were developed. This article deals with the main points of the traditional conception (freedom for excellence) created primarily by Thomas Aquinas, and with the transition of European thought to a different, even contrary conception (freedom of indifference). The author shows how this second conception proposed by Ockham, found its place in the philosophy of such different philosophers as Rousseau, Kant, Sartre, and in the everyday thinking of contemporary people
Semantic Externalism, and Justified Belief about the External World
No full textPhilosophical skepticism about the external world seeks to call into question our knowledge of the external world. Some kinds of philosophical skepticism employ skeptical hypotheses to prove that we cannot know anything about the external world. Putnam tried to refute this kind of skepticism by adopting semantic externalism; but, as is now generally accepted, Putnam’s argument is epistemically circular. Brueckner proposes some new, “simple” arguments that in his view are not circular. In this paper we evaluate Brueckner’s simple arguments for refuting skepticism about the external world, and seek to demonstrate that they fail to prove that we can have knowledge about the external world. However, by appeal to the principle of privileged access, one of the Brueckner’s arguments does indeed succeed in showing that we can have justified beliefs about the external world