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Voter’s Dilemma Within the Culture of ‘Utang-na-loob’ in Philippine Politics
No full textThis article examines the persistent influence of political dynasties and the cultural practice of utang-na-loob (debt of goodwill) in shaping Philippine democracy. The article explores the question of why Filipinos tend to elect political families through Leonardo Mercado’s sakop philosophy as well as insights on utang-na-loob, a moral debt distinct from utang (monetary debt), as articulated by Dionisio Miranda and Leonardo De Castro. The article critiques how sakop and utang-na-loob entrench patron-client relationships, limiting democratic representation and stifling merit-based governance. To address this, this article proposes reforms, including voter education to promote policy-based voting, anti-dynasty laws to curb familial dominance, and media advocacy for transparency. Central also to the solution proposed by this paper is the Church’s role in guiding ethical political participation, drawing much from Jacques Maritain’s philosophy. By blending cultural analysis with ethical reflection, this paper aims to illuminate the tension between Filipino values and democratic ideals, offering pathways for a more accountable political landscape
Gradientology: Foundations of the Primordial Triad — Treatise II: The Logical Insufficiency of the Dyad and the Necessity of Mediational Closure
No full textThis treatise rigorously examines the structural viability of the simplest conceivable relational configuration: the Dyad (R(A, B)). Through formal logical analysis grounded in the Primordial Axiom of Relationality established in Treatise I, we demonstrate that binary relational systems are foundationally incapable of achieving Determinate Being. The Dyad suffers from a fatal structural deficit—the Registration Problem—wherein it cannot verify its own relations without collapsing into logical circularity (internal registration) or infinite regress (external registration). We first define the axiomatic requirements for determinacy, proving that a system possesses determinate being only if its internal relations are registered facts within the system itself. We then subject the Dyad to exhaustive analysis, demonstrating that internal registration leads to tautological collapse (A confirms A), while external registration generates an infinite chain of deferred validation. Both failure modes prove fatal. The systematic elimination of dyadic alternatives compels the derivation of a triadic structure as the unique minimal basis for existence. We prove that exactly three functional primitives—Systematization (E), Constraint (C), and Registration (F)—are both necessary and sufficient for mediational closure. This triadic resolution not only solves the Registration Problem but also establishes the logical foundation for dimensional emergence, setting the stage for the geometric instantiation of reality. The treatise concludes with the geometric implications of the triadic logic, deriving Hutchinsonian Orthogonality, the Configuration Space (Ωconfig), and the dimensional necessity of 3-space as direct consequences of the three primitives. Time emerges as the processing latency of the Inversion Principle, establishing the arrow of temporal asymmetry. This treatise is self contained, establishing the Primordial Axiom of Relationality (Part I) before subjecting dyadic structures to rigorous analysis (Part II), demonstrating their failure, and deriving the triadic resolution (Parts III-IV
Non-literal lies are not exculpatory
No full textOne can lie by asserting non-literal content. If I tell you “You are the cream in my coffee” while hating you, I can be rightfully accused of lying if my true emotions are unearthed. This is not easy to accommodate under many definitions of lying while also preserving the lying-misleading distinction. The essential feature of non-literal utterances is their falsity when literally construed. This interferes with accounts of lying and misleading, because such accounts often combine a literal construal of what is said by an utterance with a falsity requirement for lying. In the presence of non-literal lies such definitions struggle to make plau- sible predictions for non-literal lies and merely misleading utterances together. In this article I aim to fix this by extending Daniel Hoek’s pragmatic account of conversational exculpature to assertions in general. Since this mechanism is designed to compute the intended meanings of non-literal utterances, it straightforwardly predicts non-literal lies to be as such. The lying-misleading distinction is also preserved, because merely misleading utterances arise out of exploiting a different pragmatic mechanism—Gricean additive implicatures. Along the way I also draw some general lessons about assertion and implicatures
Classical Logic
No full textIn this chapter we will introduce Classical Logic, from both a valuational and a proof-theoretical point of view. We will start by defining some basic tools pertaining to both these frameworks, in a general fashion, so they will be useful for subsequent chapters too. Then, we will present Classical inferential Logic, through the sequent calculus LK and boolean bivaluations. We will then prove various metatheorical results about them, such as Soundness and Completeness, Compactness and Decidability. In the second half of the chapter, we will tackle the metainferential side, presenting different concepts of metainferential validity—both semantical and proof-theoretical. We will also show some metainferential versions of the metatheorems previously proved for the inferential part. We end the chapter by proving Cut-elimination and discussing some of its consequences
源思理论之洗心法（MPS三阶法）：明理·洗心·塑格本土化心理调适方法论
No full text摘要：本文立足源思理论“认知决定思想、思想塑造性格、性格系统性调控身心与价值
观”的核心内核，以“人类认知偏差是心理问题与思想困惑的根本根源”为逻辑起点，融
合中国传统修心智慧、现代认知心理学、人格心理学与神经科学的权威研究成果，创
新提出兼具本土文化底蕴、科学实证依据与强落地性的本土化心理调适方法论——洗
心法（MPS三阶法），其中M（Mingli）代表明理、P（Xixin）代表洗心、S（Suge）
代表塑格，三阶路径层层递进、逻辑闭环。同步研发心境五维调衡法（Mood Five
Dimensional Regulation Method, MFDR） 作为本土化原创实操延伸技术。本文从理
论原理层面深度厘清洗心法（MPS三阶法）的底层逻辑与学科支撑，以儒释道经典古
籍为核心完成文化溯源与理论论证，精准援引国际心理学界权威实验、临床研究成果
为方法的科学性与有效性提供实证支撑，最终构建出可落地、可操作、无专业门槛的
三阶实践体系，实现从错误认知矫正到思想体系重构，再到性格正向塑型，最终达成
情绪、身心、社会价值观的系统性调控。洗心法（MPS三阶法）既是对源思理论实践
方法论的丰富与完善，也是对中国本土心理学体系的创新构建，打破了西方心理学的
专业化壁垒与传统修心智慧的玄学化局限，为现代人群解决认知型心理问题、实现心
理健康与个人成长提供了全新的本土解决方案，也为构建中国特色心理学理论体系提
供了实践路径参考。本文总字数超8000字，内容兼具学术严谨性与实践指导性，所有
论证均基于真实经典文献与权威科学研究，无任何杜撰与主观臆断
Pope's Call for Universal Brotherhood Reflects Timeless Sikh Values
No full textPope Leo XIV’s recent condemnation of religious violence and call for universal brotherhood at the Council of Nicaea anniversary echoes Sikh teachings articulated five centuries earlier. This article highlights parallels between the Pope’s message and Sikh principles such as rejecting extremism, affirming universal fraternity through “Ik Onkar,” and translating spirituality into service, exemplified by langar. Historic interfaith gestures, such as the foundation of the Golden Temple, reinforce this shared ethos. Amid rising global tensions, these convergent teachings offer urgent guidance for peace and human dignity
Three Principles of Eudaimonia: The axiomatic foundations of ethics, political science, jurisprudence, game theory, human behavior, institutional design, and global governance.
No full textIn a manner analogous to Newton's three laws of motion, this study employs the axiomatic method in its theoretical construction. To address the paradigmatic crisis in contemporary ethics stemming from the "absence of axioms," this paper proposes "Eudaimonist Ethics," which takes "eudaimonia" (human flourishing) as its foundational axiom. The theory first establishes a "Stratified Theory of Eudaimonia" as the psychological basis for behavioral motivation and then rigorously deduces three fundamental principles capable of serving as ethical axioms, namely: 1) Pursue one's own eudaimonia (the factual starting point); 2) Do not infringe upon the eudaimonia of others (the interactive norm); and 3) Jointly construct an environment conducive to eudaimonia (active sublimation).
This paradigm systematically derives core normative concepts such as liberty, good and evil, morality, and law, and further reconstructs fundamental political philosophy notions including government, the state, power, and legitimacy—thereby forming a "logically self-consistent, interdisciplinary new paradigm." Research demonstrates that this paradigm not only resolves with internal coherence the classical dilemmas faced by utilitarianism, deontology, and virtue ethics but also, through its formalization as a "Eudaimonic Game" model (incorporating parameters such as the moral sentiment parameter `f`, the social deterrence parameter `w`, and the cooperation dividend parameter `e`), rigorously proves how morally cooperative behavior can emerge as a stable equilibrium within an expanded framework of rational choice.
Ultimately, the paradigm contends that the "Three Principles of Eudaimonia" constitute an "operational system of ethical consistency spanning from personal norms to global governance," furnishing a unified normative foundation for individual decision-making, historical diagnosis, institutional design, educational reform, and civilizational evolution. This signifies a paradigm shift in ethics, moving from static rule compliance to dynamic order design, while simultaneously elevating the role of the moral agent from an 'optimal solution player' under given rules to a "co-architect of the future order.
Robustness and trustworthiness in AI: a no-go result from formal epistemology
No full textA major issue for the trustworthiness of modern AI-models is their lack of robustness. A notorious example is that putting a small sticker on a stop sign can cause AI-models to classify it as a speed limit sign. This is not just an engineering challenge, but also a philosophical one: we need to better understand the concepts of robustness and trustworthiness. Here, we contribute to this using methods from (formal) epistemology and prove a no-go result: No matter how these concepts are understood exactly, they cannot have four prima facie desirable properties without trivializing. To do so, we describe a modal logic to reason about the robustness of an AI-model, and then we prove that the four properties imply triviality via a novel interpretation of Fitch’s lemma. We then discuss the consequences for explicating a viable notion of robustness for AI. A broader theme of the paper is to build bridges between AI and epistemology: Not only does epistemology provide novel methods for AI, but modern AI also provides many new questions and perspectives for epistemology
Structural Origins of Physical Constants and Laws
No full textThis work presents a structural reformulation of established physical relations using a discrete update framework and an emergent, geometrically organized vacuum medium. The analysis builds on a previously derived set of internal system parameters that characterize update dynamics and transport geometry. Using this parameter set—comprising a system cycle time, an elementary update action, a characteristic structural spacing, and a dimensionless geometric transport factor—several familiar physical constants are rewritten in structural form. These include the speed of light, Planck’s constant, the fine-structure constant, and the vacuum permittivity. No new dynamical assumptions are introduced; the standard empirical content of the relations is preserved. Once expressed in structural variables, a wide range of physical relations—covering energies, forces, impedances, characteristic lengths, and scattering cross sections—can be organized by a small number of recurring transport kernels. Differences between formulas arise from transport order, geometric dilution, counting of update events, and boundary conditions, rather than from distinct fundamental mechanisms. The results indicate that many physical laws can be understood as different geometric realizations of the same underlying update and transport structure, providing a unified structural perspective without modifying empirical predictions