LA ONTOLOGÍA SOCIAL DE JOHN R. SEARLE Y DE MAURIZIO FERRARIS. NOTAS CRÍTICAS.

En este trabajo presentamos una versión detallada de las teorías de John Searle y Maurizio Ferraris sobre la ontología social como ontología regional. En primer lugar, ofrecemos una crítica de la teoría intencional y representacional de Searle, mostrando sus aciertos y elementos problemáticos. A continuación, analizamos la teoría de la documentalidad de Ferraris, en especial, las nociones de huella y registro, cuya genealogía arranca de las distinciones conceptuales de Jacques Derrida en De la grammatalogie. En la conclusión, esperamos mostrar que ninguna de las teorías analizadas constituye una explicación suficiente de los problemas ontológicos, semánticos y epistemológicos que plantea la ontología social.

Reclassification for the Chinese Theological Collection

John Searle Library has undertaken a reclassification of the Chinese Theological Collection belonging to Melbourne School of Theology. It was found that Pettee Classification did not support cataloging sufficiently due to not being updated in decades. Reclassification of the collection was necessary. This paper discusses the decision-making process and how the new classification scheme for the collection was chosen. It describes the implementation of the reclassification project and reviews the outcomes. It was decided to reclassify the collection to Library of Congress Classification. This resulted in improving information retrieval, increasing collection discoverability and visibility, and reducing staff time devoted to cataloguing and reference service. An interactive online LCC training module was developed to educate users. As a result, users were engaged and empowered to discover the collection effectively. In conclusion, classification is not merely for shelving and retrieving items. It is the foundation of knowledge organization and also a core business to support many aspects of library service. Information professionals should rethink and reposition classification and transform it into a value-added service for the library.

Chomsky Agonistes

This chapter provides an overview of Noam Chomsky’s current linguistic framework, the Minimalist Program, and the evolutionary milieu in which it is now mostly plied, including the linguistic implications of FOXP2, often called “the language gene” in popular media. The chapter also tackles the most touchy and slippery psychobiographical issue in the field of linguistics over the course of Chomsky’s lengthy and influential career: his rhetorical tactics, especially in connection with the truth. Chomsky has been widely accused of dishonesty, misrepresentation, and, in George Lakoff’s terms “fighting dirty,” as well as being venerated and defended just as widely. I examine that claim with respect to yet another Chomskyan tempest, the dispute over Daniel Everett’s claim that the language Pirahã does not exhibit recursion, a property that seems to be required by Chomsky's Universal Grammar, and through a close reading of an exchange over the existence of grammatical rules with philosopher and early Chomsky supporter, John Searle. Finally, it sifts through Chomsky’s record and the current state of the field to speculate about Chomsky’s legacy.

On collectively assigning features to artifacts

The common notion of artifacts characterizes them as the products of successful activities of their makers, guided by intentions that such objects would instantiate certain features, such as their specific functions. Many counterexamples, however, reveal the unsuitability of the common notion. In the face of this acknowledgment, the paper explores the possibility that features of artifacts, and more specifically, the possession of their functions, may arise, at least partially, from collective assignments. In order to achieve the mentioned goal, the paper critically examines some notions and theses put forward by John Searle (1996; 2010) and others. Its main result, however, consists in offering and elucidating an original thesis, namely, that the functions of many artifacts would be maintained, partially, by forms of continuous collective intentionality, which can involve conscious or unconscious, active or inactive collective intentional states. Keywords: Artifacts, assignment of function, collective intentionality, maintenance of function.

La manipulación del lenguaje literario: un análisis pragmático de La caverna de José Saramago

Este trabajo pretende analizar doce fragmentos de la obra La caverna de José Saramago, a través de los principios pragmáticos de John Austin, de John Searle y especialmente de los principios de Paul Grice. Esto, para evidenciar las múltiples violaciones abiertas del principio de cooperación y de las máximas conversacionales, actos insinceros, silencios y reducciones en los actos comunicativos de los personajes, que son provocados por la influencia del Centro Comercial. Lo anterior permitirá concluir, desde los aspec- tos literarios y pragmáticos, que el escritor utiliza el lenguaje a través de la figura del Centro Comercial, para manipular los actos comunicativos de los personajes de la obra. Esto para demostrar que propuestas como la de Mary Louise Pratt, que plantea utilizar la pragmática para analizar una obra literaria, son po- sibles.

A Priori Problems with the Metaphysical and Causal Reduction of Consciousness

Consciousness exists, or so it seems to us most of the time. However, consciousness is unlike your car-keys or your cell-phone in that it is not located at a specific point in space and time. The applicability of physical laws like gravity seem moot at best when it comes to consciousness. What is desirable is an explanation of consciousness that allows it to exist and be part of the very same reality as the car-key or the cell-phone, a ‘philosophy of immanence’ as Gilles Deleuze would put it. I prefer a view that construes consciousness as causally-efficacious (having material effects upon one’s body in real time) and metaphysically separate from the brain. In essence, to say that the mind is metaphysically separate from the brain is to deny the proposition that there is nothing more to our subjective experience of mind than the mere activity of the physical brain. This paper looks at a view proposed by John Searle and tries to show that there are empirical problems with a consciousness that is causally inefficacious (unable to cause material changes) and metaphysically identical (not separate from the brain).

Comparing the Meaning Potential in Shakespeare and Manto through Speech Acts: A Discourse Pragmatic Study

This paper attempts to explain the application of speech act theory (John Searle, 1976) on the soliloquies expressed by Hamlet and Keshulal Singh. The descriptive focus of this study is to draw attention to the felicity conditions whether they are being fulfilled by the speakers while making an utterance or not. Content analysis based on speech act theory is used for this paper. It has been pointed out that declaratives are less while directives are more applicable on these soliloquies, with the help of analysis. Hamlet and Keshulal’s inner self is being depicted through their speeches and it is analyzed that they are so much upset and are in the situation of to be or not to be that they do not know what should be their strategies, in taking their revenge. In actuality, they are trying to extinguish the storm which is bursting inside them through their soliloquies but by comparing the inner devastation of both characters. It is highlighted that Hamlet’s soliloquies are more self-explanatory than that of Keshulal because Hamlet makes vows, questions, deplores, and challenges the circumstances more than the Keshulal.

Constitutive Theory in International Relations

Constitutive theory is a philosophical analysis of the logical interconnections between actors, their actions, and the social practices within which they perform these. It draws on insights from the later work of Ludwig Wittgenstein, as developed and extended by Peter Winch and John Searle. It highlights that actors and their actions can only be understood from within the practices in which they are constituted as actors of a certain kind, who have available to them a specific repertoire of meaningful action. It stresses that the interpretation of their actions involves: understanding the language internal to the practices in which they take place; understanding the rule-boundness of that language; the meaning of its terms; a holist perspective on the practice; and, crucially, an understanding of the ethics embedded in it. It briefly explores the implications of such a philosophical analysis for those seeking to understand the actors and their interactions in global practices. It highlights how international actors (both states and individuals) are constituted as international actors in two major international practices, the practice of sovereign states and the global rights practice. It indicates the guidance constitutive theory might provide for all who would better understand international affairs.

APROXIMACIÓN CRÍTICA AL CONSTRUCTIVISMO DE BRUNO LATOUR

El presente artículo constituye una aproximación crítica de la filosofía de las ciencias sociales propuesta por Bruno Latour. Más concretamente, examina a modo de clarificación conceptual los ejes fundamentales de su sustrato antirrealista. De este modo, se expone en primer lugar el punto de partida desde el cual se va a proponer la crítica, basado en las formulaciones de John Searle y, en menor medida, Rusell Keat y John Urry. En segundo lugar, se examina de qué modo Latour responde a dos interrogantes esenciales: 1) ¿de qué modo se niega la existencia tanto de una realidad externa como de un sujeto cognoscente de la misma? 2) ¿en qué medida el acto de conocimiento supone al mismo tiempo un acto de modificación de las entidades y fenómenos estudiados?. Como conclusión, se adelantan los elementos principales que habrán de ser detallados para una ulterior crítica detallada y sistemática.

Human Mind and Its Carriers: Is It Possible to Transform Ourselves into Robots?

In this paper I discuss some aspects of the problem of carriers of human mind and person. The main emphasis is placed on the origin of our idea of the identi­cal self in the stream of perceptions, the need for a physical carrier of our self and person, and on possibility of replacing the biological carriers of self and per­son with artificial analogues. I argue that the idea of identical self is constructed by reflection on memories, that its truth is guaranteed by continuous stream of perceptions kept in memories, and that the stream of perceptions presupposes the presence of a normally functioning brain, which can be considered as a car­rier of our mind and person. Therefore, personal identity turns out to be depen­dent on the identity of the brain in time. An attempt to copy the structures of mind and person onto other possible carriers can thus only lead to creation of duplicates of the original person, but not to the continuation of its existence on another carrier. I argue that the gradual replacement of their components with artificial analogues is a more promising way of transforming the biological carri­ers of human person. To access the possible consequences of such a replacement I analyze arguments of John Searle and David Chalmers, designed to show, re­spectively, the disappearance of consciousness and person with such a replace­ment and, on the contrary, their preservation in a previous state. I explain why Searle’s arguments are unconvincing, and demonstrate that Chalmers’ arguments are based on a hidden premise, the confirmation of which is possible in the con­text of dubious theories of mind-body identity, epiphenomenalism or panpsy­chism only. I conclude that in the current situation it is impossible to predict which consequences for our person would follow such a replacement.