نشریه متافیزیک
سال دوازدهم شماره 1 (پیاپی 29، بهار و تابستان 1399)

The concept of Bildung is one of the key concepts that has been influential for more than three centuries in the Western intellectual and cultural space, and in particular in Germany. This concept has multiple and varied implications both philologically and in its application in various fields. In this article, to examine the meaning of this term and then its impact on different epistemic and cultural fields, we have to begin with the lexical etymology of this term and its advent in the Middle Ages and its propagation in the eighteenth century. In the third step, a history of its application in the German intellectual and cultural space will be presented so that it can be used to analyze the various functions of the term. In the fourth step, the conceptual network of the implications, symmetries, and contradictions of this term with other related terms (such as Kultur, Zivilisation, Erziehung, Humanität, and even terms such as Geist and Wissenschaft) will be drawn up. It is only on this basis that in the fifth step, a kind of category of different meanings of the term Bildung was obtained; and in the sixth step, in addition to the philosophical and theoretical meanings, functions of this term in the ordinary literature will be analyzed. In the seventh and last step of the article, while referring to the inner conflict and the blockade in the concept of Bildung, some critical points of this concept, especially for us and our world, will be mentioned.

After his so-called period of Kehre, Heidegger sought to pursue his thought of truth of being in a poetic or thinking-led mode of thought. The outcome of this effort was the development of some concepts and terms that are considered illogical in contemporary philosophical discourses and are described as mystical notions. Geviert or Fourfold is one of these terms that has played a key role in the philosophy of Later Heidegger. In 1950 and 1951 Heidegger delivered two lectures entitled "Das Ding" and "Bauen, Wohnen, Denken". In these lectures, he seeks to reflect on Geviert focusing on two notions of Das Ding and Wohnen and casts light on their relationship with the discussion of the Truth of Being. In this paper, we try to provide an analysis of Geviert and its place in Later Hiedegger's being-historical thinking.

For Hutcheson, the pleasure of beauty has a natural source like virtue. An aesthetic experience is a kind of intrinsic experience that has nothing to do with academic education, but reflection is a necessary condition for it. This view provides a way of getting rid of the objective tradition, for a kind of inner sense is responsible for the judgment of beauty which there is no specific organ for it. It is as real as the external senses. This sensation has nothing to do with cognitive and useful indicators. Good ear (or good taste) is necessary, most people have a good sense of hearing whiles they all do not enjoy the symphony. It shows that a healthy ear isn’t sufficient condition but we need a good ear. This research is a philosophical explanation for aesthetic pleasure, of course by explaining and expanding Hutcheson’s comment with considering Cage’s Silence. The purpose of this research is to identify the share of the audience and artwork in aesthetic pleasure through studying the basis of aesthetic pleasure by describing and analyzing the collected data through a library study and internet search.

The present paper analyzes and evaluates Michael J. Zimmermann's view on the relationship between moral luck and moral responsibility. In moral philosophy, this relationship is considered from conceptual and subjective aspects. Conceptually, in moral luck, people’s moral judgments about each other are based on involuntary and chancy actions while the moral responsibility of these judgments are based on free actions. Moral luck, concerning its subject, faces a problem that involves old discussions about the conflict between determinism and free will and moral responsibility that goes beyond that problem. By accepting freedom as having volition and desire in action and initiating a difference between the degree and scope of moral responsibility, Zimmermann, a well-known philosopher, denies moral luck and defends moral responsibility. He also claims to have solved the problems of moral luck and moral responsibility. This paper, after exploring the meaning and relationship between responsibility and moral luck, explains Zimmerman's view on moral responsibility, freedom, and rejection of moral luck. Ultimately, an assessment of this view will show that, despite Zimmerman's innovations, his extremism in defending moral responsibility has made it difficult to accept his view.

The relation of wholes to their parts is one of the fundamental themes of metaphysics of composition. Are wholes nothing over and above their parts? Are wholes and their parts identical? The thesis so-called “composition as identity” is a positive answer to the two last equivalent answers. However, there are two versions of the theses: the weak version and the strong version. According to the weak version, the relation of wholes to their parts is not the identity in a strict and logical sense. But that relation is similar to identity. According to the strong version, the relation of wholes to their parts is identity in a strict and logical sense. In this paper, we first formulate these theses, then we criticize the argument based on ontological parsimony. Both weak and strong versions of the thesis of composition as identity claim that they are more parsimonious than the rival thesis-the thesis that wholes and their parts are not identical. Therefore, if their explanatory power is equal, they are rationally preferred to their rival. We showed that both versions of the thesis of composition as identity suffered from abundant ontological-semantic problems.

The main idea embedded in the hypothesis of the extended mind is that the mind is not confined to the body or the nervous system. This hypothesis asserts that contrary to the traditional (physicalist) view, according to which the boundaries of the mind correspond to the boundaries of the brain (or the body), mental and cognitive states can be extended beyond the boundaries of the nervous system (or the body). In this paper, I will try to deal with the hypothesis and the arguments in its favor. Also, I will try to focus on some of its problems and limitations. An objection raised in this paper against this thesis is inspired by a widely-known argument called “epistemic argument”. According to this objection, phenomenal states cannot be attributed to “hybrid systems”, systems constituted by both the nervous system and environmental components. I will argue that the hypothesis of the extended mind, at best, conceptually excludes conscious states. Consequently, it is not obvious at all that, given this substantial conceptual limitation, to what extent the advocates of this hypothesis are entitled to claim that their application of the term “mind” still semantically overlap with the referent of traditional view’s proponents sufficiently. Another objection appeals to the fact that, regarding scientific explanation and prediction, the traditional concept of the mind has shown fruitful whereas the concept of extended mind is unlikely to readily yield numerous law-like regularities.

The aesthetics of Hume and Kant are subjectivist; i.e. beauty is perceived by the faculty of taste, but by exploring their subjectivist approaches it will be showed that there is an antinomy in them. On the one hand, judgments of taste are individual and dependent on one's tact. Thus, it can be said that everyone's sentiment is valid. On the other hand, people have a common understanding of their judgments and, from this, all people have the same opinion about Beauty and deformity. Therefore, judgments of taste are universal. While Hume tries to solution this antinomy based on his empirical method, as well as by appealing to the sentiments of true judges as a standard of taste, Kant appeals to his transcendental idealism as well as the meta- phenomenal basis. This article is aimed to explore this antinomy and its solution from the point of view of both of these philosophers. Also, we try to show that Kant is influenced by Hume in his theory of antinomy of taste.

Heidegger’s critique of Aristoteles’ definition of mankind as ζώον λόγον έχον is a long and still attractive chapter in his philosophy. We see often in Heidegger’s works that he appeals to the Latin translation (or the Latin interpretation, as he says) of animal rationale as a way to criticize western metaphysics. The conception of mankind in western metaphysics, culture, and thought is based on the Aristotelian definition. This paper aims to discuss the role and importance of this definition in Heidegger's thought. Broadly speaking, he has two kinds of discussion about it: there is a question concerning human beings, but in so far as it is the Being-question; and there is a question concerning language. Here we restrict ourselves to the latter. Firstly, in the introduction part, we will justify posing a question about the human being and will show that such a question is a kind of Being-question. After that, in the first part, based on Heidegger’s lecture The Ground Problems of Metaphysics (1929/30) we will explore those language-problems which are arisen from the Aristotelian definition. Heidegger's starting point is λόγος, i.e. speech or language, which is taken from ζώον λόγον έχον. Finally, in the second part, we will explore the same problem in Heidegger’s Being and Time.

De Beauvoir and Butler are the most prominent thinkers who have emphasized the necessity of re-reading the subject and gender identity. Their attempt to find the meaning of subjectivism has been accompanied by the necessity to deconstruct the meanings of sex and gender. Accordingly, by focusing on the concept of becoming (De Beauvoir) and performance (Butler), they have sought to change the gender mentality (De Beauvoir) and the plurality of gender identity (Butler). Although Butler started with De Beauvoir with common points of view and owes some of the most important concepts of her thought, her interpretations and results of her thought are broader and more different than De Beauvoir. Explaining the constructivist nature of gender identity, De Beauvoir proposed a change of mindset to end the binary oppositions man-woman. Recognizing the cultural nature of gender identity, Butler exposes the various forms of power and its binary opposites and proposes the plurality of gender identity with the intent of ending gender ideology. According to Butler, although De Beauvoir’s constructivist views on gender identity and the formation of the female subject have had a significant effect on the formulation of her views

Husserl and Heidegger are often referred to as if they were thinkers with minor differences who dealt with a common theme and taught in one city, and one continued the ideas of the other continuously and according to the opinion of the other. This description, while consistent with what Husserl once dreamed of Heidegger, does not fit the historical facts. In this article, I have tried to explain the differences between Heidegger's and Husserl's phenomenology by referring to Heidegger's early lectures. In short, Heidegger introduces several objections to Husserl's phenomenology: 1) The first objection is that Husserl ignores the lived experience of the environment; 2) Heidegger's other objection to Husserl is that Husserl thinks he can free his philosophy from all relations to tradition; 3) With the conception of "hermeneutics of facticity", Heidegger challenges Husserl's understanding of phenomenology and defines phenomenology as the primordial science prior to theory; Finally, it is necessary to point out the difference between Heidegger's conception of intentionality, which he calls care (Sorge) and what Husserl defines as the perception of things.