Volum 15 Nr. 2 (2020): Romanian Journal of Analytic Philosophy / Revista Română de Filosofie Analitică
Revista publică articole din domeniul filosofiei analitice în sens larg. Tematica variază de la logică, filosofia matematicii și epistemologie la metafizică, filosofia biologiei, filosofia minții, filosofia științelor cogniției și filosofia limbajului, dar nu se rezumă la acestea.
Număr complet
Articles
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COGNITION AND CONSCIOUSNESS IN THE YOGA-SAMKHYA PHILOSOPHY – INTERSECTIONS WITH CURRENT DEBATES IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF MIND
Rezumat
This paper explores the intersection of Yoga-Samkhya philosophy with contemporary debates in the philosophy of mind. While mainstream philosophy of mind has primarily embraced physicalism, asserting that everything has an underlying physical basis, it still fails to account satisfactorily for why or how exactly consciousness, and in particular its phenomenal aspect, would arise from neural structures and mechanisms. The paper argues for the relevance of ancient Eastern philosophies, specifically Samkhya-Yoga, in addressing persisting dilemmas regarding the relationship between the body, mind, and consciousness.
The Samkhya philosophy, rooted in metaphysical dualism between material (prakrti) and spirit (purusa), introduces a perspective different from Western Cartesian dualism. The mind, in Samkhya, is considered part of nature or matter, distinct from consciousness or spirit. The article explores how Samkhya's ideas on the mind-body relationship, the role of intellect (buddhi), and the concepts of gunas (qualities of matter) and koshas (sheaths or aspects of human being) could enrich modern discussions.
Samkhya proposes a form of panpsychism, suggesting that consciousness is inherent in everything, while differentiating between an immaterial, immutable and unchanging witnessing consciousness (purusa), free from the constraints of physicality, time and space, and unaffected by the continuous fluctuations of the material mind.
The article concludes by asserting that considering Samkhya-Yoga's perspectives could reframe current debates, providing a constructive alternative to both Cartesian dualism and prevalent physicalism in understanding consciousness. The ancient philosophical insights from Samkhya-Yoga might offer valuable contributions to the ongoing discourse in the philosophy of mind. -
VAGUENESS AND FREGE
Rezumat
A constant of Frege’s writing is his rejection of indeterminate predicates as found in natural language. This paper follows Frege’s remarks on vagueness from the early "Begriffsschrift” to his mature works, drawing brief parallels with the main contemporary theories of vagueness. I critically examine Frege’s arguments for the inconsistency of natural language and argue that the inability to accommodate vagueness in his mature ontology is mainly due to heuristic rules of thumb which Frege took as essential, not to a deep problem in his fundamental apparatus.
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DOES THE MEANING OF LYING POSE A PROBLEM TO PINOCCHIO’S PARADOX?
Rezumat
In this paper I sketch two solutions to Pinocchio’s Paradox, mainly by resorting to the concept of lying, as it is conceived by Augustine in his “De mendacio”. I will argue that the paradox is based on a slightly narrow conception of what it means to lie, as it confuses the meaning of lying with the meaning of falsity from the correspondence theory of truth. Furthermore, I will claim that the problems that I have highlighted are sufficient conditions to block the entire paradox and, therefore, to show that the argument that supposedly leads to a contradiction is actually fallacious.
