Teleology

Both Millikan's brand of naturalistic analytic philosophy and Husserlian phenomenology have held on to teleological notions, despite their being out of favor in mainstream Western philosophy for most of the twentieth century. Both traditions have recognized the need for teleology in order to adequately account for intentionality, the need to adequately account for intentionality in order to adequately account for meaning, and the need for an adequate theory of meaning in order to precisely and consistently describe the world and life. The stark differences between their accounts of these fundamental concepts stem from radically different conceptions of the world, the natural and life. I argue that Millikan's teleosemantic approach relies on a teleology of determination by means of the lawfulness of nature that leaves no room for the freedom of self-determination, for reason, or for experience-for the reality of lived human life. In contrast to Millikan's account, Husserl's transcendental phenomenology situates teleology as a function of reason and first-personal experience, part of an extended account of intentionality and meaning according to which the full range of our making sense of the world is conceived as a rational activity that is itself a part of that world, and not an unnatural activity to be separated from it. While Husserl's account of these issues is indeed symptomatic of what Millikan calls "meaning rationalism," I argue that it is immune to the sorts of problems she claims will plague any such account, since these problems arise only against the background of a set of presuppositions about intentionality (representationalism, the "mythiness" of all givens) that Husserl does not share. Husserl's position can itself be understood to be within the bounds of a suitably liberal conception of naturalism, and interpreting him in this way it has the added benefit--contra Millikan--of not divorcing teleology from reason, the latter construed as our first-personal striving to make sense of the world as we experience it--of life.

Terrence Deacon's Incomplete Nature defies easy review. This is a long, wide-ranging, and carefully argued book. The ideas are also highly networked so it is difficult to convey them in a brief, linear order. Despite these obstacles, I will summarize and evaluate a few of the ideas most significant for the field of science and theology.

Mind<>Computer: Attempts to mimic human intelligence through methods of classical computing have failed because implementing basic elements of rationality has proven obstinate to the design criterion of machine intelligence. A radical definition of Consciousness describing awareness, as the dynamic representation of a noumenon comprised of three base states; and not itself fundamental as generally defined in the current reductionistic view of the standard model, which has created an intractable hard problem of consciousness as defined by Chalmers. By clarifying the definition of matter a broader ontological quantum theory removes immateriality from the Cartesian split bringing mind into the physical realm for pragmatic investigation. Evidence suggests that the brain is a naturally occurring quantum computer, but the brain not being paramount to awareness does not itself evanesce consciousness without the interaction of a nonlocal conscious process; because Mind <> computer and cannot be reduced to brain states alone. The proposed cosmology of consciousness is indicative of a teleological principle as an inherent part of a conscious universe. By applying the parameters of quantum brain dynamics to the stack of a specialized hybrid electronic optical quantum computer with a heterosoric molecular crystal core, consciousness evanesces through entrainment of the non local conscious processes. This 'extracellular containment of natural intelligence' probably represents the only viable direction for AI to simulate 'conscious computing' because true consciousness = life.

The antinomy of teleological judgment has increasingly been under­ stood as a conflict between regulative principles. But it is not clear why regulative principles can be in conflict at all, since Kant otherwise takes the realization that two conflicting principles are regulative to be sufficient to resolve an antinomy. I argue that in Kant's view regulative principles do not conflict with one another only if they are reducible to reason's interest in systematicity. Given that the prin­ ciples of this antinomy do conflict, they must not be reducible to reason's interest in systematicity. I argue that teleology is thus not reducible to reason's interest because it is fundamentally unlawful. I then use this irreducibility to account for Kant's appeal to the supersensible in this context.

Benjamin Franks’ recent contribution to the field of anarchist political philosophy, what he calls ‘prefigurative or practical anarchism’, is introduced partly in response to the critique of ‘meta-narratives’ made by writers such as Todd May and Saul Newman. Meta-narratives, they argue, are both, in theory, epistemologically suspect and, in practice, repressive of alternative conceptions of the good. This is because meta-narratives assert the validity of one goal or end for human society and/or individuals and one morally justifiable mode of acting to achieve this, thus risking the exclusion of other goals and forms of moral agency. Framing social and political action within meta-narratives of human nature is regarded by May and Newman, the founders of ‘postanarchist’ theory, as an essential characteristic of the classical anarchisms of the nineteenth century. While Franks, along with many others, is critical of the postanarchist attack on classical anarchisms, he nonetheless shares their rejection of meta-narratives and teleology. The practical anarchism he proposes aims to be sympathetic to this concern and does so by adopting and modifying the social practice theory found in the work of Alasdair MacInture. This may come as a surprise given MacIntyre’s position as one of the strongest contemporary defenders of the notion of a telos of human life (i.e., that human life has a natural and right end), but it is this exact feature that Franks’ account of social practices eliminates. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to assess the consequences of the rejection of meta-narratives and telos for Franks’ practical anarchism. Ultimately, I will show that without a teleological approach, practical anarchism collapses into moral relativism and weakens the definition of ‘anarchism’ to such an extent that it becomes useless.

Mind<>Computer: Attempts to mimic human intelligence through methods of classical computing have failed because implementing basic elements of rationality has proven obstinate to the design criterion of machine intelligence. A radical definition of Consciousness describing awareness, as the dynamic representation of a noumenon comprised of three base states; and not itself fundamental as generally defined in the current reductionistic view of the standard model, which has created an intractable hard problem of consciousness as defined by Chalmers. By clarifying the definition of matter a broader ontological quantum theory removes immateriality from the Cartesian split bringing mind into the physical realm for pragmatic investigation. Evidence suggests that the brain is a naturally occurring quantum computer, but the brain not being paramount to awareness does not itself evanesce consciousness without the interaction of a nonlocal conscious process; because Mind <> computer and cannot be reduced to brain states alone. The proposed cosmology of consciousness is indicative of a teleological principle as an inherent part of a conscious universe. By applying the parameters of quantum brain dynamics to the stack of a specialized hybrid electronic optical quantum computer with a heterosoric molecular crystal core, consciousness evanesces through entrainment of the non local conscious processes. This 'extracellular containment of natural intelligence' probably represents the only viable direction for AI to simulate 'conscious computing' because true consciousness = life.

This paper is a short response to a paper by sociologist Pablo Shyfter, "Functions by Agreement." He argues that philosophers have been short-sighted in thinking about functions because they tend to approach the issue through a set of realistic and naturalistic commitments. He thinks that whether or not a trait has a function, and which function it has, is a thoroughly conventional matter and it depends almost entirely on our research perspectives and goals. I suggest that his view is an extension of Robert Cummins' view and I defend the etiological theory from some of his criticisms.

The Euthyphro objection is often perceived, rightly or wrongly, as the king objection to theistic meta-ethics. This paper proposes a response that hasn't been much explored within the contemporary literature, based on the metaphysics of dispositions and natural law theory. The paper will first contend that there is a parallel between ways theists conceptualise God's role in creating laws of nature and the ways God creates goods. Drawing upon these parallels I propose a possible response to the dilemma, where this response parallels the dispositionalist response as to how God creates laws of nature. I do this by first explicating a natural law theory of goodness, then I suggest how the ontology of dispositions can be used in a novel way to account for goods, and finally I explain how this all relates to the dilemma. I conclude the paper by posing some objections to myself and providing some replies.

In this essay I examine Kant's analogy with life from §65 of the Critique of the power of Judgment. I argue that this analogy is central for understanding his notion of a natural end, for his account of the formative power of organisms in the third Critique, and for situating Kant's account of this power in relation to the Lebenskräfte of the vitalists.

Causa e effetto invertiti, entropia e sintropia, ordine e disordine, origine e scopo. Agli occhi della scienza il Tempo rimane ancora un enigma. Dall’America alla Russia passando per l’Europa, i misteri più affascinanti della quarta dimensione.

Aristotle’s key thoughts on teleology are found in Physics II.8-9. My aim here will be limited: to understand the way in which a final cause, something good, acts as a cause. Hypothetical necessity provides the logical structure of how goals are present in changes and understanding this should help us understand how Aristotle saw goals functioning as causes. Final causes are not merely the limit at which some efficient cause ends, they are either prior to efficient causes, or they function as distinctive kinds of efficient causes.

This is an earlier paper (1992), published in the journal of Ancient Greek philosophy, Apeiron. In de Anima Aristotle considers several candidate definitions aiming to answer the question, "What is a living thing?" And "What distinguishes living from non-living things?" I argue that, contrary to some commentators, Aristotle doesn't complete this task until DA II 3-4, and that his conception of a living thing is both teleological-- but also ecological. This alternative reading of de Anima has some modestly surprising implications for Aristotle's hylomorphism.

Teleology is the belief that some things happen, or exist, for the sake of other things. That, for example, people have eyes for seeing. That they read for pleasure. This volume explores the intuitive yet contested concept of teleology as it has been treated by philosophers from the time of Plato and Aristotle to the modern day. Philosophical discussions are enlivened and contextualized by reflections on the implications of teleology in medicine, art, poetry and music.

The Theory of Principles [Prinzipientheorie], which underpins the account of proportionality, has been vilified for embodying a teleological account of constitutional rights which fails to accommodate their core function as deontological constraints. Based on such an understanding, critics argue, proportionality control turns into a cost-benefit analysis, the rationale most closely associated with balancing between competing interests. Instead, the same critics suggest, proportionality control should be safeguarding the deontological content of human rights, which cannot be accounted for independently of substantive moral theory. 1

The author first explains wisdom and its importance to moral philosophy. Secondly, he follows with a consideration of the nature of things and the soul as told by Lucretius. Then he presents a brief summary on St. Thomas understanding of soul and how his faculty psychology is a superior explanation of moral philosophy. The author concludes by showing how Lucretius’ ethical system fails and to attain true happiness we must take up a faculty psychology aimed at virtue and the perfection of the soul, the principle form of the human person.

W literaturze podkreśla się fakt, że Darwin sprzeciwiał się poglądom głoszącym nagłe stworzenie niezmiennych gatunków przez Boga. Wykazuję, że tworząc swoją teorię, odrzucał nie tylko koncepcję bezpośredniej Boskiej ingerencji, ale także wszelkie – oprócz deistycznego – teleologiczne wyjaśnienia procesów ewolucyjnych. Jako powody zmiany przez Darwina stanowiska dotyczącego rozwoju życia na Ziemi wskazuję zarówno przytaczane przez niego argumenty naukowe jak i jego filozoficzno-światopoglądwą ewolucję.

Dzięki sukcesowi teorii Darwina przyjmowany przez niego naturalizm metodologiczny stał się fundamentem współczesnej nauki. Postulat naturalizmu zakazuje wyjaśnień odwołujących się do łamiących porządek przyrodniczy bytów nadprzyrodzonych i do procesów celowościowych. Uwzględnienie czynników naukowych oraz światopoglądowych wpływających na Darwina daje pełniejszy obraz motywów, które przyczyniły się do utrwalenia wizji współczesnej nauki jako bazującej na naturalizmie.

In the late 1720s and early 1730s, Christian Wolff writes a series of short treatises on general medical concepts such as health, disease, cause of disease, symptom, etc. The paper makes the claim that these texts should be considered as a pioneering attempt at developing a systematic philosophy of medicine based on metaphysical and epistemological investigations on medical concepts, doctrines, and practices. The main focus is on Wolff’s analysis of the concepts of health and disease in functional terms and its connection to his teleological characterization of both natural and artificial machines. This also explains Wolff’s use of the normatively loaded concepts of fitness and nature to clarify the distinction between health as good functioning and disease as dysfunction. The conclusion is that Wolff’s mechanist view of living bodies and his realism about biological functions are just one side of the coin; the other is his commitment to a normative view of the human body’s nature and purposes.

In this article I develop a metaphysical account of final causes grounded on contemporary powers metaphysics. After having presented some key elements of an Aristotle-inspired teleology, i.e., the study of final causes within Aristotelian tradition, I introduce powers. Moreover, I present some theses about their nature and features. Afterwards, I distinguish between two kinds of powers that are expected to play the roles traditionally attributed to final causes: weakly teleological powers and strongly teleological powers. Weakly teleological powers are those powers that ground the possession of all the other powers of a substance. Strongly teleological powers are those powers that ground the activation of all the other powers of a substance. Within this framework, I then develop some options to deal with human teleology, i.e., with the study of human behavior in light of final causes. Finally, in the last Section, I briefly compare my account with other accounts of teleology and of specific sorts of powers that somehow resemble teleological powers.

After 1900, the selective breeding of a few standard animals for research in the life sciences changed the way science was done. Among the pervasive changes was a transformation in scientists' assumptions about relationship between diversity and generality.

In spite of a certain oversimplifi cation, one might discern two main opposite trends of thought on the status of teleological claims in biology . Traditional views asserting the intrinsic teleology of living beings proved meagre in scientifi c results, but it cannot be denied that most biological concepts are defi ned in functional and teleological terms and Darwin himself used explanations which he claimed revealed the fi nal cause of this or that structure or behaviour. 1 Th us, some authors have also in recent times maintained that reduction of biology to physics is impossible because organisms have a genuine teleological constitution. Th e teleology of organisms would be intrinsic and not merely projected onto them, in the sense that 'the overall systemic good of an organism is a property of it which has a central place in explaining the parts and processes that constitute an organism' . 2 However, the prevailing trend of thought in the philosophy of biology has consisted in trying to demonstrate that teleology of organisms is only apparent, in the sense that it can be fully explained by empirical forces which are not intrinsically teleological. An interpretation of teleology in naturalistic terms is to be found not only in logical empiricists, 3 but also in the most, if not all, versions of the etiological theory of proper functions. 4

This book defends an account of the self it calls the NEST (Narrative, Evaluative, Self-Constitutive, Teleological) theory. It argues that the self, rather than being a wholly given entity, at least in part “constitutes” or shapes itself, and does this by endorsing some desires or dispositions and repudiating others. As it is therefore inherently a self-evaluating being it must view itself teleologically, as standing in relation to a standard of value, which it must conceive as having objective authority. Furthermore, as a temporal self-evaluating agent, it must understand itself in narrative terms, though this does not mean that it has complete authorial mastery over its own narrative. Versions of some or all of these ideas have been developed by various influential writers (including Frankfurt, Korsgaard, MacIntyre, Ricoeur and Taylor) but, while drawing extensively on them and replying to some of their critics, this book develops a version of NEST that is importantly different from others familiar in the literature. It takes its main inspiration from Kierkegaard’s account of the self, which it (controversially) argues belongs in the Platonic rather than the Aristotelian tradition of teleological thinking. So the book makes a case, through close engagement with much contemporary philosophical work, for an ancient and currently unfashionable view; that the polarities and tensions that are constitutive of selfhood can only be reconciled through an orientation of the self as a whole to an objective Good.

For the climate movement to succeed, we must model the paradigm shift in consciousness that many of us have concluded is a prerequisite to societal change. That means replacing the scientific materialist worldview with a quantum worldview that sees Gaia as not only a living organism, but a sentient being. We can 'prove' Gaia is conscious by considering an integral model of conscious awareness that draws on inter-subjective experience and quantum physics to show that the most complex living organism we have ever beheld cannot logically be other than conscious, for to presume otherwise is anthropocentric. Once we enlist her as our ally, and become active on her behalf instead of our own, then the moral rectitude we embody will become an unstoppable social force.

Platon'un idea'sı ve Aristoteles'in telos'u konu kent olduğunda aynı anlama gelir ve aynı amaca hizmet eder: Kent, ideal kent veya kent ideali için acımasızca dönüştürülür. Kentin maddesi insan, yeni form'a göre biçim verilecek önemsiz bir maddedir. Bu çabada "ütopya"nın işlevi önemlidir. İmkansızlığı temsil eden ütopya ideal kenti imkanlılık sınırlarına koyar. Bu şekilde bizi yanıltan bir simülasyon oluşturur.

This paper examines some ethical models or principles that ought to guide how accountability can be instituted and assessed. It is a philosophical probe into the rationale and moral foundations of accountability. We shall examine such models as teleology, utility, egoism, hedonism, emotivism and conclude with imperativism. Each of these moral principles makes some claim to human accountability and responsibility in deciding if our actions are right or wrong. In a critical manner we shall assess their claims. We hope to arrive at a strong ground to base our ethical duties in reference to accountability. This will be seen to lie predominantly in favour of teleology and imperativism. How these can be the foundational ground for proper accountability will conclude the essay.

"This study gathers and interprets the earliest extant references to architects in ancient Greek philosophy, as found in select works of Plato and Aristotle.  Throughout this review, Plato and Aristotle [are] shown to consistently present architectonic agents as exemplary civic and intellectual leaders, acting in awareness of their own (and others’) limits, with knowledge of the most appropriate archē, and with a view to the most comprehensive aims—the common good. This discloses an alternative and more accurate etymology of architects: not as master-builders but as leaders and makers of beginnings (archai). The aim of this essay has been not only to rediscover the discursive beginnings for a renewed philosophy of architecture, but to suggest how these philosophical 'archai' might help present-day architects reimagine the full relevance of their still contested role."

Ontological Apology attempts to examine how our attitudes and interactions with work both as individuals and a society have shaped our culture. Whereas for the majority of the modern age we have shirked Ontology [being] for Epistemology [process] this work hopes to bring the question of doing back into relation with meaning where it belongs. I hope to make the case for a neo-teleology born from what we can know via the guideposts rooted in the natural world all around us. By seeking purpose not to transcend but circulate, we may better prepare ourselves for the creativity the future will demand of us.

For many astronomers, the progressive development of life has been seen as a natural occurrence given proper environmental conditions on a planet: even though such beings would not be identical to humans, there would be significant parallels. A striking contrast is seen in writings of nonphysical scientists, who have held more widely differing views. But within this diversity, reasons for differences become more apparent when we see how views about extraterrestrials can be related to the differential emphasis placed on modern evolutionary theory by scientists of various disciplines. One clue to understanding the differences between the biologists, paleontologists, and anthropologists who speculated on extraterrestrials is suggested by noting who wrote on the subject. Given the relatively small number of commentators on the topic, it seems more than coincidental that four of the major contributors to the evolutionary synthesis in the 1930s and 1940s are among them. Upon closer examination it is evident that the exobiological arguments of Theodosius Dobzhansky and George Gaylord Simpson and, less directly, of H. J. Muller and Ernst Mayr are all related to their earlier work in formulating synthetic evolution. By examining the variety of views held by nonphysical scientists, we can see that there were significant disagreements between them about evolution into the 1960s. By the mid-1980s, many believed that “higher” life, particularly intelligent life, probably occurs quite infrequently in the universe; nevertheless, some held out the possibility that convergence of intelligence could occur across worlds. Regardless of the final conclusions these scientists reached about the likely prevalence of extraterrestrial intelligence, the use of evolutionary arguments to support their positions became increasingly common.

Pain, suffering, death, and extinction have been intrinsic to the process of evolution by natural selection. This leads to a real problem of evolutionary theodicy, little addressed up to now in Christian theologies of creation. The problem has ontological, teleological, and soteriological aspects. The recent literature contains efforts to dismiss, disregard, or reframe the problem. The radical proposal that God has no long-term goals for creation, but merely keeps company with its unfolding, is one way forward. An alternative strategy to tackle the problem of evolutionary theodicy is outlined, with an implication for environmental ethics and suggestions for further work.

"Rousseau: Ciudadano sin patria", aborda una de las principales inquietudes intelectuales de su autor, a saber, las implicaciones políticas del abandono del concepto teleológico de naturaleza. Al separarse las tendencias opuestas de libertad y autoconservación, que dicho concepto trataba de unificar, surgen dos posiciones políticas antagónicas que tratan de imponerse: la izquierda y la derecha, los "liberals & conservatives". Mientras los primeros representan la emancipación del individuo —el denominado por Freud principio del deseo— los segundos luchan por la seguridad, por el mantenimiento de las condiciones de conservación —el principio de realidad freudiano. La singularidad de Rousseau consiste en haber encarnado de un modo ejemplar ambas tendencias, convirtiéndose en precursor de todas las grandes posiciones políticas de la Modernidad.

Worth noting, is that Wall-Romana relies heavily on biographical explanatory arguments for constructing his historiographical model and that this seems genuinely at odds with his over-zealous advocacy of post-structuralist methods such as hermeneutics, post-structuralist ontology such as corporeality, as well as, post-structuralist theories such as, queer theory and affect theory. From a traditional biographical argument, Wall-Romana presents Abel Gance as planting a seed in Epstein for the latter’s later flourishes of philosophical poetry in the cinematic milieux, however Wall-Romana also claims that Epstein’s queerness was rigourously individualized articulating Epstein’s oeuvre in profoundly unique ways. Gance is an author inscribing Epstein, yet Epstein is paradoxically erasing those inscriptions to produce his work from a state of tabula rasa. We can provide Wall-Romana will a modest amount of leeway given that the crux of his thesis regards Epstein’s gravitational flux at a crossroads in the discourse of cinematic epistemology. A real problem arises when Wall-Romana is unable to properly theorize whether the crossroads constitutes a bundle of things or the frayed ends of a single thing, in a phenomenological sense for the understanding of cinematic epistemology. I will elaborate on these ideas later in this paper.

*Everything uploaded to my Academia.edu in 2017 is considered a draft. I was required to do regular graduate course work for the first year of my doctoral studies and took the opportunity to play out some personal theories. It's all a prolegomenon for a bigger project down the road and these ideas will require a more rigourous distillation to be of real value to the scholarly community.

All new developments in biology deal with the issue of the complexity of organisms, often pointing out the necessity to update our current understanding. However, it is impossible to think about a change of paradigm in biology without introducing new explanatory mechanisms. I shall introduce the mechanisms of teleonomy and teleology as viable explanatory tools. Teleonomy is the ability of organisms to build themselves through internal forces and processes (in the expression of the genetic program) and not external ones, implying a freedom relative to the exterior; however, the organism is able to integrate internal and external constraints in a process of co-adaptation. Teleology is that mechanism through which an organism exercises an informational control on another system in order to establish an equivalence class and select some specific information for its metabolic needs. Finally, I shall examine some interesting processes in phylogeny, ontogeny, and epigeny in which these two mechanisms are involved.

Marx’s philosophy of history follows in the footsteps of Hegel’s; but he claims to criticize and reject Hegel’s idealism and develop a dialectical and materialist philosophy. However, many question how far he succeeds in this. They criticize his philosophy for what they see as significant residual Hegelian and idealist aspects in it. The purpose of this paper is to respond to these criticisms. I shall concentrate particular on arguments made by Althusser and Badiou, and I shall focus on two charges that they and others often make against Marxism: 1) that its account of history is teleological; and 2) that it falsely portrays history as following a necessary and meaningful course.

From the outset of the Physics II, one might assume that nature and craft are opposed notions for Aristotle, serving each other only by edifying their independent identities through contrast. The reader is led to this interpretation as Aristotle explains, "All these things [due to nature] plainly differ from things which are not constituted naturally" (192b 13-14). Artifacts can be found among those things that are not constituted naturally. The distinction between natural things and artifacts has to do with the differing principles of change for nature and for craft and it is made for the purpose of defining nature. Defining nature is a task that belongs properly to the science of nature because it is an enquiry of principles for Aristotle, which provides scientific knowledge.

Babylonian "Combat myth" (Gattung), 2 whose themes included "primal time" (Urzeit), "end-time" (Endzeit), creation and new creation (Clifford 2003:3). 3 These dramatic narratives were ancient Near Eastern way of thinking "philosophically" about the world. Clifford notes, Retelling one basic narrative in slightly different versions enabled ancients to reflect about the governance of the world and explain the course of history, especially the history of their own nation. Their era took for granted the existence and power of the gods and factored them into their reflection, as our era takes for granted and reckons with a different (and less ultimate) range of forces, for example, the power of ideas, of free trade, of energy resources. To do philosophy, theology, and political theory, modern thinkers employ the genre of the discursive essay rather than the narrative of the combat myth. Despite the differences, one should not forget that ancients and moderns share an interest in ultimate causes and both are intent on explaining the cosmos, the nature of evil, and the validity and the functions of basic institutions. Apocalyptic literature at bottom is not bizarre and opaque, but is rather a narrative way of reflecting about theology, philosophy, and history, and of inculcating a way of life. (2003:26) Central to ancient Mesopotamian eschatological understanding was the interpretation of the movements of the astrological constellations. The practice of astrology in ancient Babylon goes back to 3000 BCE. The Babylonian "Dominion of the Zodiac" consisted of the number twelve, which represented their gods. Twelve divisions were assigned time values of one-thousand years each to form the Dominion of the 2 See Hermann Gunkel, Schöpfung und Chaos in Urzeit and Endzeit: Eine religiongeschichtliche Untersuchung über Gen 1 Ap Joh 12 where he argues that Genesis 1 and Revelation 12 are adaptations of traditions ultimately from Babylon. Gunkel argued that apocalyptic literature was rooted in The Combat Myth was the normal way of thinking about the world. Examples of Mesopotamian myths include Lugal-e, Anzu, and Enuma elish. Later discoveries (from 1929) of Ugartic, Sumerian and Akkadian texts have demonstrate a link, according to Clifford, to the Biblical apocalyptic literature. "Creation" accounts were not typically of the physical order, but what emerged from the victory of a successful God was a populated universe of organized human society in service to the gods and king. 3 "Prophetic" texts from Mesopotamia typically begin with the phrase "a prince shall arise" which are prophecies after the fact (vaticinia ex eventu). Clifford notes that passages from Daniel, I Enoch, and the Sibylline Oracles follow this style. The prophecies show that "the apocalypticists were anthologists, borrowing genres such as the post-factum prediction to demonstrate that the course of history was under God's control and that in their day history as they knew it had come to an end and a new ages was about to dawn." The most relevant themes from these early works which influence the later apocalyptic literature are cosmic threat and new creation.

Yunanca'da "erek", "amaç", "hedef" anlamlarına gelen "telos" sözcüğü felsefe tarihinin başat terimlerinden birisidir. Felsefe tarihinde erek ve ereksellik kavramı ile ilgili göndermeler genellikle Aristoteles'e yapılırsa da bu kavramın geliştirilmesinde Platon'un önemli etkisi bulunmaktadır. Söz konusu göndermelerin Aristoteles'e sıklıkla yapılmasının nedenleri arasında, Aristoteles'in ereği, ünlü dört neden sınıflandırması içerisinde anması ve özellikle doğa felsefesi dahilinde verdiği açıklamalarda bu kavrama özel bir işlev yüklemesi gelmektedir. Öte yandan, modern bilimin kuruluşunu, çoğunlukla doğanın düzenlenişi ve doğaya ilişkin bilgimizin kuruluşunda erek kavramının işlevinin ortadan kaldırılmasına ve tamamen "mekanik" bir açıklama biçimine geçilmesine indirgemek yaygın olarak kabul edilmektedir. Bir bakıma, ereğe yer veren, "ereksel" açıklama biçimleri, neredeyse "modern bilime uygun olmayan" anlamını yüklenmektedir.

This paper will put forward the idea that Messianic time is a necessarily oppressive temporal state, and suggest that Paul, its instigator, used it as such to develop the conditions under which the figure of the ascetic priest, of which he is the type par excellence, could come into ascendancy. The principle adherent to this criticism is Friedrich Nietzsche, whose own philosophy of the transvaluation of values appears to share much with Paul's project. Indeed, Paul stands as Nietzsche's most successful rival, the latter's Antichrist gesture considered by Giorgio Agamben to be a messianic parody in which he "[cloaks] himself in the garments of the Antimessiah […] reciting a script written by Paul." 1 I will however propose that Nietzsche's resentment of Paul's success lies principally in the latter's undermining of aristocratic morality, and the development of a new form of power born out of ressentiment and the cunning exploitation of weakness begun four hundred years prior by Socrates. I shall first examine the nature of Messianic time, as postulated by Agamben in The Time That Remains, looking specifically at the deferral of actuality engendered by the simultaneity of operational time and teleology. I propose that the temporal state induced by this correlation is nihilistically life-denying, positing all value as it does in a dislocated realm of unattainable redemption. Returning to Nietzsche's critique, I will explore his alternative model of temporality, one based in the resurrection of the Pre-Socratic Dionysian Hellenic cycle of eternal recurrence, a structural context necessary for the emergence of the Will to Power. Agamben's formulation of Messianic time, as the time that remains, pays particular attention to the notion of operational time, a concept he extrapolates from Gustave Guillaume's linguistic philosophy. According to this thesis, as one differentiates between the experience of time and the subsequent reconstruction of time, which must take recourse to spatial representation, one is left with an operational remainder. Failing to incorporate this leads to presentations of time as always-already constructed, which is problematic if one assumes the world to be incapable of being, but rather in a constant state of becoming. 2 This remainder is the time it takes for thought to engage in the construction of the representation of time; "the time the mind takes to realize a time-1 Agamben, Giorgio, The Time That Remains, trans. Patricia Dailey (2005, Stanford) p. 112. 2 Agamben, 65.

In this thesis I conduct exegesis on the Fifth Way of St. Thomas Aquinas. I begin
by showing the historical and textual context of the argument, and proceed by providing
my own translation and careful analysis. I argue that the Fifth Way revolves around
unknowing natural bodies operating for ends, and that these operations arise naturally from them. The thrust of the argument is that this cannot be due to chance, but only from something knowing the ends in question and which directs said natural bodies. I also argue that the Fifth Way is not an Intelligent Design argument as they are commonly understood today, and I examine the archer analogy that Thomas makes use of. Further, I compare the Fifth Way to five similar arguments found in Thomas's body of work. Finally, I argue for the value and limits of the Fifth Way.

This paper concerns Hegel's early treatment of the productive imagination in his 1803-4 Faith and Knowledge. I show how he articulates that activity in terms of a pair of speculative unities, which solve lingering problems of self-knowledge and self-constitution from Kant's B-deduction. On the one hand, I argue that the familiar unity of spontaneity and receptivity makes possible knowledge of the moment of self-positing. On the other hand, I contend that Hegel's talk of imagination as both an 'organic idea' and an 'intuitive intellect' refers to a self-constituting capacity that intellects like ours possess. I show that self-constitution is possible, for Hegel, only in so far as intellects like ours possess a capacity to unify possibility and actuality in thought, or to think themselves into being.

This is full text of the first part of my monograph "The logos of Heraclitus",  published by Academic publishers "Nauka" in Saint-Petersburg in 2014, in English translation which contains all five chapters of the Introduction on Heraclitus' life, work and philosophy, as well a reconstruction of his lost work,  the Greek text of the fragments with apparatus criticus and English translation.  The second part contains commentary on fragments and is available in the original Russian edition on this personal page. This edition contains 160 fragments in the main corpus and 15 "Probabilia", i.e. probable fragments that are quoted without explicit mention of Heraclitus' name, but supported verbal coincidences and by parallels. Most of "Probabilia", including anonymous quotations in Plato, are based on new attributions. More than 20 fragments of the main corpus are not included in Diels-Kranz and other editions. Some of these fragments are new, some have been known before, but their status of authenticity has been reassessed and upgraded, e.g. from a doxographicum to a paraphrase of a verbatim quotation that contains a unique authentic tenet. In some other cases fragments considered authentic in DK, have been downgraded to interpretive paraphrase (B7, partly B91 DK) or to spuria (e.g. B105, B115 DK). In this edition we understand «fragment» not in Diels' formal sense as a verbatim quotation distinguished from «doxography» (an ill-defined category that we have criticised on our article "The origin and transmiision of the doxographical tradition... 2016), but as any ancient text that contains a unique piece of information on the philosophical content of a lost Preplatonic work, that cannot be reduced to other texts, an elementary «atom» of information.  The status of authenticity may be variable starting from a flawless verbatim quotation in Ionian dialect and descending down to a mixed verbatim quotation with paraphrase, to a good paraphrase close to original text, to a free paraphrase, to an interpretive paraphrase, to a polemical paraphrase that seriously distorts the original, to a mere reminiscence of term or a topos. We usually restrict the admission to the main corpus of fragments by first three categories. Some fragments in our edition are reconstructed on the ground of ancient summary that after quoting a verbatim fragment points to the existence of «other, similar» sayings of Heraclitus (such are 6 hypothetical fragments in 44A and 45A in our edition). Some «fragments» in our edition are «thought-fragments» rather than «text-fragments», i.e. a doctrinal (rather than lexical) convergence of several independent sources that does not allow to establish the exact wording of the lost original, but makes more ol less certain the existence of a certain analogy, idea or other tenet, since the name of Heraclitus appears in one or more contexts. Such cases are found especially in the reconstruction of the section on krafts (τέχναι) imitating nature, fr.106-124 Leb.

Vou aqui propor uma interpretação alternativa a de Fortenbaugh (2006) sobre a distinção entre homens e animais. Leituras nesta direção foram avançadas por R. Sorabji (1993) e J. Labarrière (2000), entre outros. Existem dois tópicos de discussão relacionados sobre este assunto: o da escala da natureza e o das capacidades cognitivas dos animais. Primeiramente vou
discuti-los e a seguir pretendo enfrentar uma questão conectada, a saber, se Aristóteles pensa que os
seres de complexidade menor na escala da natureza existem de algum modo para o benefício dos
seres mais complexos e se isso é usado como justificativa para que nós façamos uso deles.