Journal of Philosophical Investigations in Scopus
Year:2010 | Volume:53 | Issue:216|Papers Count:8

This article deals with Lukasiewicz’s view of Aristotle's syllogistic. His fundamental work on the syllogism is Aristotle's Syllogistic from the Standpoint of Modern Formal Logic. The Lukasiewiczian view takes Aristotle’s logic to be an axiomatized system presupposing the propositional calculus. Lukasiewicz noted that Aristotle generally presents syllogisms in conditional form. For example, Barbara is stated as: “if A is said of every B and B of every C, then it is necessary for A to be predicated of every C.” This suggests that syllogisms aren’t inferences but implications. The strong claim constituting Lukasiewicz’s view is that Aristotle’s theory of syllogism is a system of true propositions. He calls all true propositions (whether axioms or theorems) “theses”. From this point of view, imperfect syllogisms are not axioms and need to be proved, i.e. established as theorems. To do that, Aristotle uses a few methods of proof, namely proofs by conversion, proofs by ecthesis and proofs by reductio ad impossibile.

No single text in philosophy is more widely read than Descartes' Meditations. It is a mainstay of the philosophical curriculum in each department of philosophy and has been studied and taught by philosophers of every stripe.Undoubtedly, in addition to its philosophical richness and its great significance within the framework of Descartes' metaphysics, this work possesses of innovative writing style and unique method of reasoning. From this perspective, the present paper tries to look briefly at the book, and deal with its structure, writing style and genre.

F. Copleston is an outstanding historian of philosophy and his name associates "A History of Philosophy" including 11 volumes. The work is an academic research. At first volume (Greece and Rome), he discusses the theory of Ideas in the 20th chapter. Copleston, after an elementary discussion and a description of the "vulgar" presentation of the Plato's theory of Ideas, and based on some Platonic dialogues and Aristotl's interpretation, tries to ascertain, as far as possible, what Plato's doctrine of Ideas actually is. But it seems that Copleston's good intention is not completely in conformity with what he presents.The present article illustrates Copleston's view and his postulate: Ideas are subsistent Universals. This claim shadows all research of Copleston. Studying this claim, we try to show that Copleston's report is the same as Aristotl's interpretation of Ideas. From my point of view, this interpretation and report in some acpects are doubtable. Moreover, in the text of Copleston and its Persian translation there are some deficiencies that requires corrections.

The concept of “Transcendental” is the most fundamental concept of Kant’s theoretical philosophy. Hence, understanding Kant’s epistemology is based on understanding the meaning, the use, and the function of this concept in his view. Regarding some instances of the concept of “Transcendental” in Kant’s Critique of pure reason, we will try in this paper, by using a descriptive-analytic method, to show that in what sense and how Kant’s theoretical philosophy, unlike all the “Transcendent-centered” rationalistic and empiricist philosophies before him, is a “Transcendental-centred” philosophy. To do this, we will try, by presenting Kant’s analysis of the logical structure and function of the judgments of understanding, to illustrate the presence of the concept of “Transcendental” in Kant’s epistemology in the form of a series of non-empirical elements, especially the element of “the unity of pure self-consciousness”.

Observing the flaws and defects in the world and the pains and sufferings that are drived from them, i.e., the existence of the evil in the world, have engaged the mind of everyone. People wish to know that what the origin of the evil is and how is it possible to reconcile them with a belief in a God, who is All-knowing, All-powerful, and Pure Good and His creation is the best possible creation. According to Hume, Leibniz by posing certain questions that since Epicure’s time have been asked and remained unanswered, tried to give a befitting reply. Accepting three kinds of evils, Leibniz tried to clarify them through different methods. In this paper, his responses have been classified in three parts and, then, have been treated. Though his responses are considered to be based on Saint Augustine’s view, the author, in this paper, proved that one of the responses and perhaps the deepest one is that of Leibniz’s himself and is based on his own metaphysics.

Kant shows a picture of mechanical nature in Newtonian Physics in Critique of Pure Reason and Prolegomena. One of the basic elements of this picture is principle of causality. This principle with other principles of understanding product the empirical knowledge. This principle is necessary and indispensable. However, in Critique of Judgment, he considered organisms and nature as a whole with other causality (final causality) that is conscious. This paper wants to illustrate the contact between these two causalities in Kant's thought.

Deontological theories are better understood in contrast to cosequentialist theories and are commonly used in moral philos­ ophy to refer to non-cosequentialist moral concep­ tions. One of the most important implications of deontologism is that a person's behavior can be wrong even if it results in the best possible consequences. In deontological theories, the obligation derives from the nature of the action itself, but, in consequential theories, this obligation is out of the action and a posterior to that. In action, for the deontologist, the preference is with agent’s intention and will, but, the cosequentialist considers only the results and consequences of action. In this article, we will explain and analyze both of deontological and cosequentialist theories. Then, we will examine the relation between these theories. Recent moral philosophy shows much interest in the problem of how deontological constraints are to be reconciled with Consequentialism.