17th Century & Early Modern Philosophy

Se sintetiza la interpretación que da M. Serres de la caracterstica universal de Leibniz en Le système de Leibniz et ses modèles mathématiques (Paris, PUF, 1968). Partes de este escrito fueron presentadas en la Semana de la Filosofía, 25 al 29 de septiembre de 2023, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, UCA, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

En el paragrafo segundo del Ensayo Locke reclama la necesidad de estudiar el entendimiento a traves de un metodo historico. Lo que quiere decir es que se va a limitar a describir lo dado tal como es dado. El problema es el de saber que sea lo dado. A nuestro modo de ver, tanto Locke, como Descartes, como Husserl, lo han entendido bajo supuestos ontologicos que debieran haber sido criticados previamente desde el metodo historico. Esta critica es realizada con todo vigor por Hume en el Tratado. El resultado es una nueva ontologia que genera, a su vez, una manera distinta de entender las matematicas y las ciencias experimentales. Esto es lo que analizamos en el presente trabajo.

The paper analyzes the argumentation that the representatives of Polish neo-scholasticism, Gabryl and Wais, used to justify the existence of God and the immortal human soul. The analysis shows the high intellectual requirements observed by both thinkers. Not only have they avoided naive confessional apologetics, but they were critical when choosing arguments from different philosophical traditions as well. The scientific activity of the two scholars was a reflection of the program of the renewal of scholasticism formulated in Leuven. The features of this program were both restraint in using the term “Christian philosophy” and avoiding confessional apologetics on the one hand and the preservation of its specificity on the other. This specificity was expressed in undertaking the traditional tasks of Christian philosophy: undertaking the justification of preambula fidei and the observation of the negative role of faith.

2014 Summer.This paper provides a comparative analysis of Kant's aesthetic judgment of taste and Open Presence meditation interpreted through a Yogācāra philosophical framework. I begin with an expository analysis of Kant's cognitive and aesthetic judgments, highlighting the presence of attention, form of reflection, and structure of purposeless purposiveness in the judgment. Next, I address the Buddhist idealist Yogācāra philosophical tradition. Through this theoretical lens, I examine Open Presence meditation, with an emphasis on meditative non-dualism, attention, and meditative goals. In the final chapter, I tie together the groundwork laid in the first two chapters into a comparative analysis identifying points of compatibility and contention within the general areas of judgment, attention, purposeless purposiveness, and transformation. Finally, I suggest that, given the results of this analysis, Kant's aesthetic judgment of taste might benefit from being construed a...

Spinoza için yazdığı kısa girişin hemen başında şöyle diyor: "Zamanındaki entelektüel çarpışmalara istekli bir şekilde katılmış olsa da, Spinoza için felsefe, bir silah değildi, hizmetkarlarını yüksek ve belirli bir kutsanmışlık düzeyine taşıyan bir kutsal düzendi." (Scruton, 2002:1). Spinoza, Orta Çağ sonrasında pek az filozofun kurtulabildiği garip ancak teşhis edilebilir bir hummaya kapılmıştı; yüksek ve ulu insan histerisi. Bu humma açık bir şekilde totalist bir dünya ve kozmos algısına yol açıyordu, aslında Orta Çağ'ın kutsal, ve Ahit kitabının tüm gizlerini çözmüş, yüksek dinsel düşünürü yerini seküler bir ulu insana bırakmıştı. Platon filozofokrasisinin doğal üyeleri ortaya sökün etmişlerdi. Evrenin, varoluşun ve düşüncenin tüm gizemini çözmüş ulu bir insan sokaktaki insandan oldukça uzaktı artık, bir aristokratın düşünce yapısıyla bir serfin düşünce yapısı arasındaki farktan daha büyük bir mesafeyle uzaktı onun bilinci sıradan bilince.

Chinese aesthetics is brewing breakthroughs under the situation of reform and opening up, of which practical aesthetics is the earliest representative. This article affirms the positive role of practical aesthetics and, at the same time, points out that it loses beauty’s characteristics due to over-synthesis, does not distinguish between aesthetic behaviour and general practical activities and is trapped in method in the thinking mode of unifying binary opposites. On this basis, the author puts forward ontological aesthetics, introduces the fundamental changes that Heidegger’s ontological thought as a philosophical base will bring, and outlines the main points and theoretical advantages of ontological aesthetics.

The seminar originates from the idea that modern thought – in its  interconnections with other disciplinary fields (in particular  literature, the arts, scientific knowledge, and legal thought) –  constitutes a heritage of theoretical resources that are fundamental  for reconstructing the filiations of the categorical instances and  social and political claims of our era: from the affirmation of civil  and social rights starting from the concept of identity, forged  precisely in the course of the debates on the ‘self’ and consciousness  of early modernity, to the accentuation of the plurality of languages  and ‘forms of life’ that flourish in our societies and the need for a  redefinition of the relationship between individual, community and  environment.
The period from the Renaissance to the American and French Revolutions is generally referred to as early modernity. Certain major events are  a specific expression of this age: the discovery of the Americas and  humanity’s entry into a world-space (with all the political and  cultural consequences this entailed, including the ‘Eurocentric’  narratives of modernity, now challenged by decolonial thought); the  birth of modern states; the advent of experimental science and modern  rationality; the formation of an unprecedented consciousness of  individuality and the emergence of critical thought, fostered by the  invention of the printing press, within European societies that were  experiencing economic-social tensions (linked to the alternation of  economic booms and crises) and (often virulent) intellectual  controversies.
The seminar “Paths to Elsewhere. Knowledge, languages and critical thinking in early modernity” aims to better understand our present from this intellectual and cultural heritage. To this end, the  seminar’s scientific programme is structured around three main themes:
1) the connections between theories on language and imagination and  the social and political dynamics of early modernity (Benedetto  Varchi, Giordano Bruno, Montaigne, Hobbes, Malebranche, etc.);
2) the reflection on individual identity as the basis for a new  relationship with oneself and with others through the analysis of  literary texts (such as Renaissance autobiographies and  seventeenth-century moralistic tradition) and philosophical texts  (Montaigne, Descartes, Locke, Hume, Diderot, etc.);
3) the voices of dissent and critical thought on the relationship  between the individual, knowledge and religious practices with respect  to the dominant conceptions in the institutions and places that are  the repositories of “official knowledge” through an in-depth  examination of “heterodox” books that have been put on the Index  (Spinoza, libertine thinking, the atheist and materialist  Enlightenment) and a reconstruction of their circulation.

Puisqu’il y a un « mouvement défendu » : celui de la Terre, Descartes défend deux autres mouvements qui se déroulent, non dans le monde, mais dans l’homme : le mouvement du cœur, en discutant Harvey, et le mouvement du sang, en approuvant les preuves fournies par Harvey à l’appui de sa brillante démonstration.

In his political thought, seventeenth-and eighteenth-century Italy's premier jurist, Gian Vincenzo Gravina, adopted a Hobbesian state of nature, a Hobbesian social contract, and a Hobbesian idea of law as collective will; he fused these ideas with the Roman legal tradition, a tradition that he trained in and later ordered when he wrote his masterpiece, the Three Books on the Origins of the Civil Law. But Gravina was more than a Roman Hobbesian. While he held a Hobbesian view of political legitimacy, he also held an anti-Hobbesian view of human life's true ends. Gravina set out to restore these true endsreason, virtue, and internal tranquilityand to do that he turned to Plato. In synthesizing Hobbes's legal innovations with prior understandings of law, Gravina demonstrates just how far those innovations reached in eighteenth-century Europe.

Giovan Battista Della Porta fiziognómiai főműve előszavában megállapítja, hogy a fiziognómia nemcsak morálfilozófiai vélekedések tárgya és eszköze, de költők, festők és szobrászok sajátja is, amely segítségével az ábrázolt alak jellemét és érzelmeit közvetítik az értő olvasó/néző számára. E tanulmány célja a fiziognómiai jelek által magyarázott testbeszéd és a lélek művészi ábrázolása közötti kapcsolat vizsgálata ikonográfiai példák segítségével, Andrea Mantegna Az Erény diadala című festményén ábrázolt Erények és Bűnök elemzésével.

Kulcsszavak: Giovan Battista Della Porta, fiziognómia, testbeszéd, Andrea Mantegna, Az Erény diadala

Reading body language and physiognomic signs in Andrea
Mantegna’s The Triumph of Virtue

In the preface to his major work on physiognomy, Giovan Battista della Porta states that physiognomy is not only a subject and a tool of moral philosophy, but also a characteristic of poets, painters and sculptors, through which the character and emotions of the figure are conveyed to the understanding reader/viewer. The aim of this paper is to explore the relationship between body language explained by physiognomic signs and the artistic representation of the soul, using iconographic examples, too, by analysing the virtues and sins depicted in Andrea Mantegna's painting The Triumph of Virtue.

Keywords: Giovan Battista Della Porta, physiognomy, body language, Andrea Mantegna, The Triumph of Virtue

This work aims to provide an adequate solution to the problem of the relation between cogito and sum in Descartes' argumentation. To do so, firstly, we tried to highlight the main defects of the solution proposed by Jaako Hintikka, in his renowned article Cogito, Ergo Sum: Inference or Performance?, released in 1962. We evaluated both the logical interpretation of cogito, ergo sum and the interpretation of ego sum as a performative utterance, either in its technical aspects or in comparison with Descartes' texts. Secondly, we offer an interpretation based on the notion of presuppositional inference, inspired by Frege, from which we try to explain in what sense the distinction between syntax, semantics and pragmatics can solve some common confusions that can be found in the literature on cogito.

Keywords: cogito, performative, logic.

Le present travail part du constat d’un desinteret de Descartes pour les livres. Desinteret motive par la vanite des connaissances seulement vraisemblables qu’ils peuvent vehiculer et par leur materialite meme qui empeche le lecteur de se saisir les verites qu’ils pourraient exceptionnellement renfermer. Ce desinteret personnel de Descartes pour l’objet-livre procede donc d’une reprobation epistemologique qui prend place au sein d’une critique de l’autorite : qu’est-ce qui fait precisement autorite pour connaitre la verite ? Le media imprime peut-il etre l’instrument d’un enseignement de la vraie philosophie ? Qu’est-ce qu’un auteur et qu’est-ce qu’un livre ? Le present travail propose d’interroger la pensee cartesienne sur ces sujets, par le prisme de sa « mise en livre ». L’etude des proprietes editoriales des livres de Descartes constitue ainsi le cœur de cette these et permet de rendre compte du rapport non contradictoire d’un Descartes lecteur, decu par les livres, et d’un Desc...

Uno de los mas importantes problemas que recorren la historia filosofia moderna es el de la conciliacion de la causalidad primera con la causalidad segunda, y el de la determinacion del modo en que cada una de ellas concurre en la produccion de las acciones de las creaturas, cuestion que presenta una especial dificultad en el caso de las acciones libres. Los mas importantes autores de los siglos XVII y XVIII ensayaron diferentes y no siempre satisfactorias respuestas al problema, oscilando entre la supresion de la causalidad creada en funcion de la divina y la absoluta autonomia del causalidad libre creada. Estas respuestas contrapuestas tienen su origen mas o menos inmediato en la irresuelta polemica de auxillis entre tomistas banecianos y jesuitas molinistas, polemica eminentemente teologica que versaba principalmente acerca de la eficacia de la gracia divina respecto de la voluntad humana, en orden a la predestinacion o la reprobacion final, pero que, por ello mismo, tenia import...

The article moves from the idea of monster as a “cultural predicate” referable to a wide linguistic and symbolic repertoire proper to the overall human history. In this perspective, particular attention is paid to the variegated viewpoints on monstrosity that, from the initial teratology of “natural” sign, develops into a teratology of a specifically “social” character. Hence the indication that, from a material standpoint, shows how the transformations of feeling, thinking, and acting related to nowadays work activities, make it possible to associate certain characteristics of monstrosity – clearly not conceivable only in negative terms – to new productive subjects and cooperating singularities.

Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury (1588-1679) is one of the most influential British philosophers of the seventeenth century. The paper reconstructs Hobbes's legal theory, focusing on his definition of law (civil law, as he calls it) found in Leviathan, XXVI, 3. The definition is only apparently simple, since it has been interpreted in different ways, especially with regard to the connections with natural law-and the Hobbesian assertion that civil law and natural law "contain each other". Moreover, the definition of civil law changes in the corresponding paragraph of the Latin version of 1668. What is the meaning of this change? What about the divisions of the law/divisio legis, which-as Hobbes emphasizes-appears in different forms in different writers? Finally, if a good law is "that which is needful, for the good of the people", what is it that dictates the paths to be followed by the sovereign representative, who is also the supreme legislator, when writing a new law? These are the main problems in Hobbes's legal thought that the paper will address.

Miguel de Montaigne en Los ensayos parte de una visión de un ser humano cosmopolita, diversa, fluctuante y escéptico. La educación en Montaigne desde el diálogo que tiene consigo mismo, con los otros y con la realidad, lleva a una propuesta de formación en el juicio donde se conjuga el autoconocimiento, la confrontación con las demás personas y con toda la naturaleza, que le permita vivir honestamente y feliz. Como buen humanista, Montaigne mantuvo un contacto con pensadores antiguos como en una conversación, lo cual le permitió ensayarse desde una filosofía que lo enseñó a vivir, basado en una admiración de sus vidas entrelazadas con sus pensamientos. En esta ponencia deseo compartir cómo la educación en Montaigne se sitúa en una filosofía entendida como forma de vida. Se trata de mostrar cómo el ensayo filosófico, forma parte del modo de vida de Montaigne.

La revue philosophique Ithaque (Université de Montréal) a pris l’heureuse habitude de réserver une place, au sein de certains de ses numéros, à des dossiers thématiques issus d'un séminaire enseigné dans une université canadienne. Elle choisit donc chaque année un thème de séminaire parmi ceux annoncés dans différentes universités et demande au professeur qui dispense ce séminaire de retenir à la fin de la session universitaire quelques uns des meilleurs devoirs et de les proposer, après révision et discussion avec l'étudiant, à la revue. Ensuite, la revue procède à une expertise à l'aveugle de chacun des articles et sélectionne tout ou partie des devoirs pour proposer aux jeunes chercheurs (master, doctorat) de les transformer en articles. Le professeur doit alors faire une introduction à ces travaux sélectionnés pour  rappeler le thème initial de son séminaire et éclairer le lien avec les travaux soumis. C’est cette introduction qui est présentée ici. J’invite donc le lecteur de cette simple introduction à consulter les articles de ces jeunes et talentueux chercheurs en philosophie, Linda Deziel-Blais, Ndubuisi Paschal Ezenwaka,  Raphaël Tossings et Samuel Vitel, en se procurant la Revue Ithaque, n°32, Printemps 2023, disponible également en ligne.

This essay unfolds the theological and metaphysical principle that every anterior reality dignifies the 'secondary' that depends upon it by elevating this recipient into communion with itself. Philosophy and poetry, each in their own irreducible way, repeat this naturally-given dynamic anew by contemplatively cherishing the depth-yielding surface and the community-bearing participant, thereby sharing in the Church’s mission to perfect the finite world’s integrity in Christ.

La Vie d’Épicure de Du Rondel n’a pas la prétention des Animadversiones de Pierre Gassendi. Pourtant son ouvrage n’a pas été négligé. Pierre Bayle le cite, Deslandes l’utilise.
L’appréciation de l’épicurisme sous-jacente est conforme à la tradition du libertinage érudit après Gassendi : la personne, la vie, la morale d’Épicure ne sont pas scandaleuses, comme les ont diffamées les ennemis de sa philosophie dès l’Antiquité.  Elles sont même défendables et louables.
Mais elle est conforme aussi à ce que tous les intellectuels repoussent :
son refus d’une providence divine ;
son invention d’une déviation des atomes, serait-ce pour sauver le libre-arbitre.

A presente tese é uma interpretação das noções existenciais da Ética de Spinoza. Seu principal objetivo é esclarecer tanto a distinção entre os conceitos de duração e eternidade, quanto sua unidade no conceito de existência. Com isso, responde a uma discussão deveras persistente em relação aos textos que encerram a Ética, os quais supostamente contêm uma problemática “doutrina da eternidade da mente”. Sua chave de leitura é tomar a relação de imanência entre a substância e os modos como gabarito de inteligibilidade da unidade e distinção entre eternidade e duração. A imanência entre modo (ou singular) e a substância implica tanto a relação de cada singular com a substância, uma relação de pertencimento na qual entendemos a eternidade do singular, quanto as relações dos singulares entre si, uma relação de tensão existencial caracterizada pela duração. Nessa chave, então, modo e substância estão para o ser, da mesma maneira que duração e eternidade estão para a existência, a unidade e distinção de ser entre a substância e as suas modificações nos explica a unidade e distinção existencial entre duração e eternidade. Este texto é composto de momentos diversos: primeiramente, trata das noções básicas para a compreensão da imanência spinozana, isto é, o gabarito de inteligibilidade do qual nos servimos para, em seguida, apresentar nosso entendimento dos conceitos de duração e eternidade e, ato contínuo, responder os problemas que destacamos como principais e mais persistentes em relação a literatura especializada. Desses passos, concluímos que: a eternidade e a duração são a mesma existência, não se reduzem a modos de perceber a existência e são irredutíveis entre si; a definição de eternidade é uma só ao longo de toda Ética; não há propriamente uma doutrina da eternidade da mente nos textos que encerram essa obra; esses textos são orgânicos e consequentes com os antecedentes; a “parte eterna da mente” tem por função a comparação entre a mente do sábio e a do ignorante. No restante do texto, primeiramente demonstramos a insuficiência do que chamamos de “garfo temporal”, que restringe o significado de eternidade a dois sentidos subordinados à noção de tempo, tanto em Spinoza quanto em relação à tradição filosófica em geral. A seguir, revisamos os estudos e discussões, sobre os textos que encerram a Ética, em uma ordem cronológica: começamos pelo entresséculo XIX-XX, no qual tratamos brevemente dos problemas da recepção da obra spinozana e no qual o foco é a questão da pessoalidade da eternidade da mente; em seguida, problematizamos as leituras do conceito de eternidade como “propriedade”, e avançamos até os comentários mais recentes, pelos quais diagnosticamos uma crise daquele que chamamos de “garfo temporal”, bem como problematizamos as recentes especulações acerca do conceito spinozano de essência.

Le developpement de la « nouvelle astronomie » ou « nouvelle philosophie » des la fin du XVI e siecle en Europe provoque un essor formidable de la litterature du voyage cosmique des les annees 1630, notamment en Angleterre ou l'opposition theologique ne se manifeste pas aussi violemment que sur le continent. La litterature du voyage cosmique n'a certes pas attendu le XVII e siecle pour faire son apparition. Il suffit de se tourner vers l'Antiquite et de lire, par exemple, L'Histoire vraie de Lucien de Samosate, 2 le Somnium Scipionis de Ciceron ou encore le De Facie in orbe lunare de Plutarque, pour se convaincre que l'idee de voyager dans l'espace fascinait deja l'humanite. L'apport du XVII e siecle ne concerne donc pas tant la thematique que le mode narratif du recit de voyage cosmique. Jusque-la le voyage dans l'espace relevait entierement du mode merveilleux. 3 Or l'invention du telescope permet de verifier visuellement un certain nombre d...

Resumen. El objetivo de este artículo es mostrar qué significa conocimiento trascendental en la Crítica de la razón pura de Kant, especialmente a partir de una explicación de las razones por las que este modificó en la segunda edición la definición ofrecida en A 11s. En primer lugar, me centro en la concepción de la ontología de Wolff y Baumgarten, y explico por qué la definición de conocimiento trascendental que Kant ofreció en la primera edición había de resultarle insatisfactoria. En segundo lugar, profundizo en las razones de la corrección introducida por Kant en 1787 (B 25). Sostengo que solo esta última formulación revela la originalidad del conocimiento trascendental con respecto a la ontología de Wolff y Baumgarten, debido a que tal formulación clarifica que el conocimiento trascendental se centra en nuestro tipo específico de conocimiento (unsere Erkenntnißart), frente a la indeterminación de la que, según Kant, adolece la ontología de sus predecesores. Finalmente, planteo una breve discusión crítica sobre la base de estos resultados.

Abraham Abulafia, a 13th-century Sephardic Kabbalist and brother Luis de León, a 16th-century Spanish theologian, develop in their exegesis a mystic of language that can be divided into mysticism of words and mysticism of letters. The love of the Hebrew language and the conviction that it is the language of God lead both of them to believe that each of its parts is sacred. Abraham Abulafia, wanting to penetrate the secrets of the Holy Scriptures, develops a hermeneutic method of reading it, in which the adept, after special preparation, delves into the inspired text to transform into the divine letter of the Hebrew alphabet. United with the Creator, he becomes capable  of prophesying, and it is the main goal of the prophetic or ecstatic kabbalah developed by the Sephardic sage. Luis de León does not go that far, but by identifying the name with God, he comes to the conclusion that the letters, having a double function, encompass the whole of existence, becoming self-sufficient. In the texts of a Catholic religious from a family of converts, and in particular in the treatise Meditations  on the Divine Name, one can find numerous traces of the Sephardic method, which proves that the cultural heritage of the Jews expelled from Spain in 1492 survived in the minds of their grandchildren. The author, taking on the above-mentioned text by Luis de León, Light of Intellect and Book of the Sign of Abraham Abulafia, presents the mysticism of the language, with particular emphasis on the mysticism of the word and letters, which combine to form numerous forms of God’s names. Both Abraham Abulafia and Brother Luis de León, in their understanding of the Scriptures, were both faithful to tradition – for example, when they reached for the authority of another Sephardic, Abraham ibn Ezra – as innovative, in keeping with the spirit of Jewish exege- sis in which, as succinctly expressed by the Hasidic rabbi Nachman from Bracław: „It is forbidden to grow old!”
Dostawca treści:
Biblioteka Nauki

Lorsque Jacques Gaffarel publie en 1629 ses Curiositez inouyes, il opère un geste éditorial qui n’est pas sans scandaliser la Sorbonne. Si cet ouvrage contient bien des éléments philosophiques problématiques du point de vue confessionnel, c’est surtout son rapport à la notion polymorphe de curiosité qui invite à produire une lecture politique. Gaffarel profite en effet d’une zone lexicale floue pour se positionner contre la Doctrine curieuse de Garasse (1624).

This article aims to defend Locke against Quine's charge, made in his famous "two dogmas" paper, that Locke's theory of knowledge is badly flawed, not only for assuming the dogmas, but also for adopting an "in-tolerably restrictive" version of the dogma of reductionism. It is shown here that, in his analysis of the epistemological status of scientific laws, Locke has effectively transcended the narrow idea-empiricism which un-derlies this version of reductionism. First, in order to escape idealism, he introduced the notion of "sensitive knowledge of the particular existence of finite beings without us," broadening thus his initial definition of knowledge in terms of the "perception of the agreement or disagreement of ideas" — a definition compatible with Quine's interpretation. Sec-ondly, after showing that we can have virtually no a priori knowledge of universal truths about substances, Locke extended the notion of "sensi-tiv...

The purpose of the paper is to use the concept of postsecularism to interpret some selected themes of the British and German Romanticism. Postsecularism is here understood in the sense given to this term by Jürgen Habermas, as a thought which: 1) takes Western secularization to be largely an accomplished fact, but at the same time: 2) claims that religion is an important source of meanings suitable for the secularized public sphere of (post)modern societies. The main contention of the paper is that one can find the roots of the postsecular thought thus understood in the period of Romanticism, in the works of such authors as William Wordswort, William Blake or Novalis. The Romantics assume that the main Christian intuitions, symbols or themes may be “saved”, but only within a highly idiosyncratic and heterodox conceptual framework.

In this paper we will meditate about subjectivity. The way Descartes thought subjectivity was critiqued by Martin Heidegger in his early years and it is matured in the treatise of Being and time. If our philosophy appears as a critic to modernity, our critic to modern subjectivity must confront cartesian philosophy. Firstly, we will approximate to the problem from Hermeneutics of subject by Foucault. After this, we are going to revise how cartesian subjectivity was set and how it limited itself. We will study Heidegger’s contribution for critiquing Descartes in his early years. With his help we will try to demonstrate how modern subjectivity is an artificial product motivated by concern about the world, which in fact Descartes tried to overcome with his philosophy. As a conclusion and proposal, we will introduce Jean Paul Sartre ́s thoughts in Being and nothingness, in which subjectivity isn’t comprehended from a modern optic, being based in the other.

Die Kritik am Substanz- und am Kausalitätsbegriff. Aspekte der Philosophie von David Hume - Lecture held at the Volkshochschule Meidling within the Programme UMP-University Meets Public, Vienna 23rd November 2011. In Humes Werken "Eine Untersuchung über den menschlichen Verstand" und "Ein Traktat über die menschliche Natur" werden wir mit erstaunlichen Kritiken bezüglich fundamentaler Konzepte wie Substanz und Ursache konfrontiert. Der Vortrag wird die Kritikstrategie von Hume ausführlich durchgehen.

Chinese logic and Aristotelian logic are very different. The communication between these two language games is generally difficult. But, the attempt to understand the unfamiliar and the novel are commonalities of human beings. To understand different ways of thinking, effort must be made from both sides. The evidence that strongly supports this argument is the discourse between Jesuit and Chinese mathematicians in 17 century China. They applied a common rule, Pointing Out, which make it possible, while doing geometry, for Aristotelian logic to be understood gradually by the Chinese. This dialogue is an excellent example of keeping space open for the sense of wonders. This is the hope for human knowledge.

This article discusses Margaret Cavendish's position on reality and fiction in dreams and her role within the moderate skepticism of her philosophy. While Cavendish argues that there is no distinction between dream-like and waking depictions, she does not consider the difference between fact and fiction to be sharp or relevant. We will argue that, although Cavendish promotes a philosophical discourse that articulates reason –that seeks to know reality— and fancy —which constructs fictions—, considers that
only "elevated" poetic fantasies are competent for the construction of this discourse.