Phenomenology, epistemic issues in

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jane Howarth
Keyword(s):  
Practical Knowledge ◽  
Modern Science ◽  
Phenomenological Method ◽  
Radical Critique ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
Postmodern Thought ◽  
Continental Tradition ◽  
The Mind

Phenomenology is not a unified doctrine. Its main proponents – Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre and Merleau-Ponty – interpret it differently. However, it is possible to present a broad characterization of what they share. Phenomenology is a method of philosophical investigation which results in a radical ontological revision of Cartesian Dualism. It has implications for epistemology: the claim is that, when the foundations of empirical knowledge in perception and action are properly characterized, traditional forms of scepticism and standard attempts to justify knowledge are undermined. Phenomenological method purports to be descriptive and presuppositionless. First one adopts a reflective attitude towards one’s experience of the world by putting aside assumptions about the world’s existence and character. Second, one seeks to describe particular, concrete phenomena. Phenomena are not contents of the mind; they all involve an experiencing subject and an experienced object. Phenomenological description aims to make explicit essential features implicit in the ‘lived-world’ – the world as we act in it prior to any theorizing about it. The phenomenological method reveals that practical knowledge is prior to propositional knowledge – knowing that arises from knowing how. The key thesis of phenomenology, drawn from Brentano, is that consciousness is intentional, that is, directed onto objects. Phenomenologists interpret this to mean that subjects and objects are essentially interrelated, a fact which any adequate account of subjects and objects must preserve. Phenomenological accounts of subjects emphasize action and the body; accounts of objects emphasize the significance they have for us. The aim to be presuppositionless involves scrutinizing scientific and philosophical theories (Galileo, Locke and Kant are especially challenged). Phenomenology launches a radical critique of modern philosophy as overinfluenced by the findings of the natural sciences. In particular, epistemology has adopted from science its characterization of the basic data of experience. The influence of phenomenology on the analytic tradition has been negligible. The influence on the Continental tradition has been greater. The phenomenological critique of modern science and philosophy has influenced postmodern thought which interprets the modernist worldview as having the status of master narrative rather than truth. Postmodern thought also criticizes the positive phenomenological claim that there are essential features of the lived-world.

Freeing the Mind through the Body: Women's Thoughts on Physical Education in Late Qing and Early Republican China

NAN Nü ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 316-358
Author(s):  
Denise Gimpel
Keyword(s):  
Physical Education ◽  
The Body ◽  
Republican China ◽  
Female Development ◽  
Late Qing ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
Early Republican ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Present Text

AbstractPhysical education (tiyu/ticao) was an important topic in China at the turn of the nineteenth century. Healthy citizens were to provide the foundations of a healthy China, one that could find its rightful place among the strong nations of the world and no longer be considered the "sick man of Asia." Many texts dealt with the kind of physical education that was perceived as necessary, and the physique was an issue in both educational regulations, school curricula and general reform demands. However, as elsewhere in the world, there was a clear distinction made between what was felt appropriate and necessary for men and women. Moreover, as the present article shows, there was also a clear gender line in the manner in which physical training and culture were functionalized by individual writers. By highlighting some of the different approaches to and interpretations of the concept of tiyu/ticao, the present text seeks to demonstrate how it could be used to maintain the status quo by simply remolding the subordinate female role but also to seek a real autonomous realm for female development.

Inédit 2 (1984): Les universaux de la narrativité

Semiotica ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 (214) ◽  
Author(s):  
Algirdas J. Greimas ◽  
Paul Perron
Keyword(s):  
Life Sciences ◽  
Human Sciences ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
Middle Way ◽  
Comprehensive Theory ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
Propositional Form ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Mind

AbstractThis lecture delivered at Victoria College, University of Toronto, concentrates on defining the status to be accorded to any universals. Underlining his desire that semiotics avoid epistemological dissensions and focus instead on establishing its effectiveness, Greimas recalls that he has adopted an “agnostic” constructivist stance and thus declined to affirm whether universals exist in the world or only in the mind. Following Hjelmslev’s middle way, he has identified a set of undefinable terms, then employed them to define each other in a coherent deductive axiomatic. Empirically, he distinguishes different kinds of universals. Absolutely necessary such terms include the interdependent concepts of description and relation. He further distinguishes between paradigmatic and syntagmatic universals. The former notably include the elementary category of the collective semantic universe, nature-culture, and that of the individual semantic universe, life-death. For his fundamental syntactic universal, Greimas declined to adopt the traditional propositional form comprising subject, copula, and predicate, and has opted instead for an alternative featuring a verbal kernel to which are articulated actants defined through grammatical cases. Semiotics identifies these and other hypothetical universals as metalinguistic terms which describe language and other systems of representation, and which define the conditions of their production and comprehension. In contrast to narratology, semiotics thus situates narrative universals within a comprehensive theory of meaning, with a goal to develop the bases of the human sciences in a manner parallel to the foundations of the life sciences.

scholarly journals Fire in the mind: changing understandings of fire in Western civilization

2016 ◽  
Vol 371 (1696) ◽  
pp. 20150166 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen J. Pyne
Keyword(s):  
Natural Science ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Modern Science ◽  
Western Civilization ◽  
Human History ◽  
Human Thought ◽  
The World ◽  
The Mind

For most of human history, fire has been a pervasive presence in human life, and so also in human thought. This essay examines the ways in which fire has functioned intellectually in Western civilization as mythology, as religion, as natural philosophy and as modern science. The great phase change occurred with the development of industrial combustion; fire faded from quotidian life, which also removed it from the world of informing ideas. Beginning with the discovery of oxygen, fire as an organizing concept fragmented into various subdisciplines of natural science and forestry. The Anthropocene, however, may revive the intellectual role of fire as an informing idea or at least a narrative conceit. This article is part of the themed issue ‘The interaction of fire and mankind’.

scholarly journals ŽMOGIŠKOJI ERDVĖ: KULTŪRINĖ KRAŠTOVAIZDŽIŲ IR VIETOVIŲ FENOMENOLOGIJA

Problemos ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 79 ◽  
pp. 103-114
Author(s):  
Tõnu Viik
Keyword(s):  
Phenomenological Method ◽  
Cultural Form ◽  
The Gaze ◽  
Theory Of Meaning ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
Specific Meaning ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Spatial Formations

Straipsnyje fenomenologiniu metodu analizuojamas kraštovaizdžio ir kitų erdvinių struktūrų suvokimas. Erdvinė struktūra suprantama kaip erdvės sritis ar teritorija, turinti specifinę prasmę, kurią patiria stebintis subjektas. Aiškinant, kaip erdvinė struktūra įgauna prasmę, kuri ją apibrėžia kaip kraštovaizdį, namus ar šalį, remiamasi Husserlio prasmės konstitucijos teorija. Teigiama, kad, be subjekto pozicijos ir objektų suvokimų sekos, konkretaus erdvinio darinio prasmę lemiantis elementas yra tai, ką Husserlis vadino „suvokimo prasme“ (Auffassungssinn). Ji apibrėžia konkrečiam erdviškumui būdingą žiūrą. Kai tokia „suvokimo prasmė“ tampa intersubjektyviai galiojanti ir institucionalizuota, ji įgyja statusą kultūrinės formos, kuri funkcionuoja kaip visoms visuomenėms prasmę perteikiantis pasaulio interpretavimo automatas. Galiausiai tvirtinama, kad žmogiškųjų aplinkinių pasaulių (Umwelten) erdviškumas leidžia kurti ir palaikyti prasmes, kurios antraip išnyktų laiko tėkmėje.Pagrindiniai žodžiai: kraštovaizdžio suvokimas, erdvinės struktūros, fenomenologinis metodas, suvokimo prasmė, kultūrinė forma.Human Spatiality: A Cultural Phenomenology of Landscapes and PlacesTõnu Viik SummaryThe paper applies phenomenological method to the analysis of perception of landscapes and other spatialformations. A spatial formation is seen as a region of space, or a territory, with its specific meaning that is experienced by the subject who views it. Husserl’s theory of meaning-formation is used to clarify how spatial formations obtain meanings that define them as landscape, home, or country. It is suggestedthat besides the subject’s position and the series of perceptions of objects, the decisive element that determines the meaning of the specific spatial formation is what Husserl calls a “grasping sense” (Auffassungssinn).It defines the gaze specific to a particular spatiality. When the “grasping sense” becomes intersubjectively valid and institutionalized, it obtains the status of a cultural form which functions as a meaning-bestowing automaton for interpreting the world for entire societies. Finally it is argued that the spatiality specific to human Umwelten serves the purpose of creating and maintaining meanings that would otherwise disappear in the flux of time.Keywords: perception of landscapes, spatial formations, phenomenological method, grasping sense, cultural form.

scholarly journals The Mind of the Political and Social Animal

2019 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nerijus Stasiulis
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
The Political ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Mind

In this article I present the outline of Filosofija. Sociogija 30(3) the articles of which I see as mainly centering around the issue of Man as placed and interacting within social, cultural and political contexts. However, the discussion of the social or political is generally nourished by metaphysical or epistemological issues or insights. The human mind deals with the fundamental questions concerning human nature, the existence or the metaphysical structure of the world, the status of cognition in general and science/ technology in particular. The articles merge into a choir signalling the inescapably social and political mode of our consciousness.

scholarly journals PHENOMENOLOGY OF CULTURE BY E. HUSSERL: COMMUNICATIVE AND COMPREGENSIVE EXPERIENCES

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (45) ◽  
pp. 118
Author(s):  
O. Yatsenko
Keyword(s):  
Phenomenological Method ◽  
Mechanism Of Formation ◽  
Surrounding World ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The World ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Intentional Acts

The article states the effectiveness of the phenomenological method in solving a wide range of current problems of modern socioculture, both applied and theoretical. It is substantiated that in intentional acts of consciousness the surrounding world acts as a boundary of subjectivity, as a correlate of intentional transformations of interaction of consciousness with the world. Differentiation of communicative and compregensive experience produces the necessary grounds for the interpretation of culture as a mechanism of formation in the mind of the spatial and semantic perspective of perception and understanding of the world. Based on this disposition, we have the opportunity to distinguish between the universality of ways of "capturing" the world, or the metaphysical plan of culture, and its paradigm, or historical and social conditionality. In the dialectic of these dimensions there is a dynamic of the existence of a universal horizon of subjectivity.Key words: culture, subjectivity, intentionality, communicative experience, compregensive experience, reflection.

scholarly journals Chagas Disease: seroprevalence and effectiveness of antiparasitic treatment

2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (17) ◽  
pp. 60-68
Author(s):  
Jorge Alberto Monroy-Vargas ◽  
Eduardo Bustos-Vázquez ◽  
Gisela Galindo-Juárez
Keyword(s):  
Chagas Disease ◽  
Health Programs ◽  
The World ◽  
Prolonged Duration ◽  
The Status ◽  
Treatment Objective ◽  
Maximum Expression ◽  
Antiparasitic Treatment

INTRODUCTION: Chagas disease is considered the most serious parasitosis in America, forgotten and neglected in the world, with a characteristic that has its maximum expression in the difficulties and limitations for its diagnosis and treatment. OBJECTIVE: To assess the status of seropositivity of Chagas disease in Mexico, in addition to monitoring the effectiveness of treatment in infected patients. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Systematic reviews were conducted, with searches in Crossref, Google Scholar, Scielo, PubMed and the inclusion of guides and manuals of related health programs was evaluated based on their titles, news and relevance. RESULTS: for seropositivity, the data coincide with 100% in the characterization of the risk factors, as well as in the evaluations in the Blood Transfusion Centers of the country, finding captive cases in each state that explain the persistence of the disease . When monitoring treatments and evidence of effectiveness, the following difficulties arise: prolonged duration and side effects, adding the lack of reliable healing criteria, with an effectiveness of 60-75% in acute cases and in 100% of acute congenital cases, and in chronic cases a variation of between 15 and 30 years was found. CONCLUSIONS: Although the achievements have been commendable in reducing rates, the territory has factors that allow the redistribution of the infection, the evidence on the effectiveness is scarce, there is no evidence of epidemiological follow-up of cases in Mexico with respect to healing indicator.

Spirit and Body in the World of Modern Technology

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 24-35
Author(s):  
Zoran Avramović
Keyword(s):  
Modern Science ◽  
Modern Technology ◽  
The Body ◽  
Self Image ◽  
The World ◽  
Mind And Body ◽  
The One ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract Spirit and body of the man living in the world of modern technology are discussed in the paper. The entire life of modern man is under the pressure of rapid and far‐reaching changes in economy, organisation, education, self‐image. The relations between the spirit and the body on the one side and illness and health, money, media, narcissism, morality and national identity on the other side are studied in the article. Particular attention is paid to the relationship between the world of modern science and technology and the quality of life focusing on the mind and body. The fact emphazised in the conclusion is that the nature of Western ‐ European civilization has been changing with predominant turning to the SELF, to the absolute interest of an invidual in terms of materialism. The result of this civilizational turn is jeopardizing the spirit and the body of modern man.

Humor as Violation and Deprecation: A Cognitive Anthropological Account

2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 217-230 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Grant Purzycki
Keyword(s):  
Individual Group ◽  
The Past ◽  
Target Individual ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
Schematic Knowledge ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Way

AbstractOver the past few centuries, scholars have expressed a number of models of humor which are divergent, but potentially complementary. Specifically, the Incongruity Hypothesis posits that humor is our confrontation with a stimulus that is surprising or inconsistent with the way we normally view the world. The Hermetic Hypothesis maintains that the incongruity of humorous statements or events exploits shared cultural (i.e., schematic) knowledge. The Deprecation Hypothesis suggests that humor involves lowering the status of a target individual, group, or object. This paper tests a number of predictions derived from these approaches using statements that isolate the types of violations in both form (i.e., schematic or ontological template violations) and content (i.e., deprecating or non-deprecating). Using cognitive anthropological approaches to the mind, the present results suggest that the most effective forms of humor are deprecating, schematic violations.

scholarly journals The case against divination: an examination of Cicero's De Divinatione

1985 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas Denyer
Keyword(s):  
Physical System ◽  
Modern Science ◽  
Star Wars ◽  
Public Comment ◽  
Current State ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
Military Campaigns ◽  
Public Responsibility

Ancient divination had something of the status of modern science. Diviners, like scientists, were expected to offer public comment on all manner of subjects, from strange meteorological phenomena to proposals for military campaigns, from shooting stars to Star Wars. In both cases this public responsibility is based upon a supposed expertise in prediction. And the arguments of those ancient philosophers who attempted to justify such a status for divination run in some ways remarkably parallel to those of modern philosophers who have attempted to justify such a status for science. Thus we are told both by Stoics and by modern Scientific Realists that the world forms a single and unitary physical system, with nothing outside it to prevent the course of events from unfolding in accordance with the adamantine regularities which are the laws whereby nature operates. This determinism, and its consequence that the entire future of the world is already prefigured in the current state of things, makes it possible for us now to tell what will happen later. And that possibility is realised. Scientific predictions, we are told, may not be uniformly correct, but they are correct too often for that to be due to chance. The predictions of diviners, one must likewise concede, are not uniformly correct: nonnumquam ea quae praedicta sunt minus eueniunt (Cicero, De Divinatione, 1.24).

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