Documents found
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211.More information
According to some interpreters of the Philosophical Investigations , Wittgenstein thinks that language-use is a social institution and that rule following is a shared practice. Others hold the opposite view and rightly so. They argue that Wittgenstein thinks there could be a language which is spoken by only one individual (provided it is not private) and unshared rules. In this paper I defend the following interpretation: The important question raised in the Investigations is not whether or not an idiolect is possible (or whether or not there could be unshared rules), it is rather what follows with respect to our concepts of meaning , understanding and rule-following from the fact that verbal communication is indeeed (normaly) a shared practice.
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212.More information
Charles Taylor defines the concept of “social imaginary”, in Modern Social Imaginaries, as “self-understanding” of a society, but also as “repertory” of the practices which can be adopted by society's members. Through this dual definition, the concept conjures at the same time an hermeneutic approach and a wittgensteinian approach focusing on the analysis of constitutive social rules. To highlight this conception of social imaginary, I consider the concept of “background” from Taylor's earlier works. This leads me to contend that Taylor's theory does not make room for the wittgensteinian approach. Social practices do not need to rely on the individuals' common understanding of their whole society to be possible. As a consequence, his concept of social imaginary allows us to understand cultural and political identity but not the historical constitution of social practices.
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213.More information
Robert Brandom has tried to displace the concept of representation from its position as the central explanatory concept in the philosophy of language, and to replace it with a set of explanatory concepts derived from the analysis of social action. He argues that the concept of a social norm can serve as a primitive concept in the development of a general theory of meaning. The central problem with taking representation as primitive, in Brandom's view, is that we have no clear understanding of what the “representation” relation amounts to. This leads one to expect that Brandom's analysis of social action will draw upon explanatory primitives that are somehow less mysterious. In particular, one expects Brandom to show that the concept of a “social norm” can be explained in terms of some simpler set of action-theoretic concepts. Unfortunately, Brandom does not provide such an explanation. In this paper, I begin by providing an analysis of the argument that Brandom does provide, and attempt to explain why it is ultimately inconclusive. I then try to articulate the account of the origins of normativity in social action that I think Brandom should have provided.
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214.More information
AbstractConjugacy between energy-idea, structure and function, and other concept pairs is made the basis for a new ontology which resolves the conflicts between "mental" and "physical" poles of description, between mathematical and empirical truth, and between quantum mechanics and relativity theory as rival forms of scientific explanation. The deductive closure (finiteness) of the universe is argued for, in light of the logical connection between number (mathematics) and the alphabet (language). The reality and the conceptual autonomy of ideas (the referents of symbols) are presented as an alternative to Platonism and other ideologies. Mistaken interpretations, misunderstandings and objections are handled through the medium of dialogue.
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215.More information
Without making an evaluative and comparative analysis of the traditional arguments, we would want to examine the reference of the voluntary servitude when it is used to denounce an illusion of increase of the freedom of the individual, by means of information and communication technology. Basing on the original version (16e s.), is this reference justified ? In this paper, we would like to show that if there is a structure of the voluntary servitude, the debate between the defender of the information and communication technology and their opponents, involves thinking the relation between the humanity with the technology.
Keywords: Philosophie, liberté, servitude volontaire, technologies d'information et de communication, réseaux sociaux, Philosophy, freedom, voluntary servitude, information and communication technologies
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216.More information
How could we consider the digital space and give full account of its structured, moving, and simultaneously collective attributes ? How could we find a device that enables an open dialogue, which allows us to understand the meaning of digital infrastructures without any impoverishing essentialization ? This e-exchange appeared to us the most appropriate way to theorize and create an act of thought that fits in with the digital culture and allows a critical eye on it. For about a year and a half (from September 2015 to March 2017), we shared questions and answers, trying to identify the digital world's characteristics — its spaces, times, political challenges —, in continuity with the philosophical dialogue.
Keywords: espace numérique, éditorialisation, sens, perception, présence, expérience, syntaxique/sémantique, algorithme, digital space, editorialization, meaning, perception, presence, experience, syntactic/semantics, algorithm
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217.More information
SummaryThe reappearance of ethical concerns reflects the profound disquiet in our societies in the wake of the triumph of instrumental rationality, with its tendency of making human beings into maniputatable objects. This perversion of rationality finds its expression particularly in companies, in spite of the fact that they are attempting to integrate a concern for ethics into their functioning at this time. It can be observed that, in doing this, their goal is most frequently to develop a strong consensus around the ideals from which they take their inspiration, both from their members and from the social body as a whole. We must ask what are the real ethical issues that confront modern organizations. To this end, the ethics of conviction, of responsibility and of discussion are reviewed here. A fourth form of ethics, the ethics of finitude are considered. Can organizations make a place for this form of ethics? The question is in any case worth asking.
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219.More information
The article investigates the use of “performance” in contemporary theories and develops a threefold typology of performative action. Ritual performances are primarily concerned with the conformity of their participants (1). Theatrical performances are characterized by fictionality and introduce a distinction between performers and audiences (2). Social performances are also directed at audiences, but have to appear authentic in order to be successful (3). These elementary forms of performative action constitute complex social processes such as fictional stage dramas and non-fictional social dramas. However, stage dramas are often based on historical events and frequently cite social performances, whereas the actors in a social drama draw heavily on fictional performances and established rituals in order to achieve resonance in the cultural background of an audience. In the end, it will become clear that all three forms of performance are empirically intertwined – and they all tap the same cultural reservoir of the social imaginary.
Keywords: théorie sociologique, performance, rituel, théâtre, drame, sociological theory, performance, ritual, theatre, drama, teoría sociológica, actuación, ritual, drama
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220.More information
AbstractUsing a thanatogenetic approach drawing on the unavoidable link between death and (re)birth, this essay compares three texts from the French Renaissance (ca. 1545-1550) narrating the mourning of Venus upon the passing of Adonis. While metaphysics is based on the separation and opposition between myth and logic, thanatogenetics demystifies unifying and reductive thinking to allow for an associative dichotomy between mythos and logos, between the masculine and the feminine. The three poems shine a light on what could be construed as either a would-be Greek myth from a neo-platonic perspective, a fusion of myth and logos from a Christian viewpoint, or a novel take on resolving tragic crises with the means of a rebalancing poetical logos.