Estudios de Filosofía

The Role of Socrates as gatekeeper: Migratory and temporal controls in Plato’s Philebus

Lucas-Manuel Álvarez — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

Toward the end of the Philebus, while discussing the value of different kinds of knowledge, Socrates compares himself to a gatekeeper who, overwhelmed by a crowd of “impure forms of knowledge,” decides to open the gates and let them in. This paper situates Socrates’ image within a literary tradition that uses the figure of the gatekeeper to explore the control of thresholds and the questions of who should cross them, when, and how. By examining the meanings and functions of Socrates’ simile, the analysis reveals the decisive role it plays in advancing the dialogue’s ethical aim: the shaping of the good life.

Equality in Hobbes and its dual nature: factually grounded, relatively fictional

Jenny-Carolina Burgos-Casas — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

This paper presents a discussion between two interpretations of Hobbes' postulate of natural equality: the classical position, according to which equality is based on a factual statement, namely the equal capacity for mutual violent destruction among human beings, and the normative-fictionalist position, which indicates that natural equality does not point to a factual description of how men are, but rather is a fictional assumption that we must assume if we want to survive and live in peace. I will argue in favor of the classical position by evaluating some of the objections raised against it from the normative-fictionalist side, but I will also defend the idea that certain concessions must be made to the latter interpretation.

Can the Sovereign be Touched (by Himself)? Power and the Haptic in Jacques Derrida

Diego-A Soto-Morera — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

This paper examines the relationship between power (sovereignty) and the haptic in the work of Jacques Derrida. It argues that Derrida’s critique of the continuist postulate within the phenomenological tradition reveals a double bind between touch and power, which structures the essay in two movements. First, the analysis locates power within the phenomenal field of the haptic, underscoring its dependence on a constitutive passivity tied to the advent or mediation of the Other. Second, it deconstructs the classical concept of sovereignty—predicated on indivisible and autonomous ipseity—to demonstrate its reliance on a generic hapticity that feminizes all it touches to consolidate its dominion and territorialize the other. The conclusion asserts that rethinking the distribution of the sensible and reconfiguring passivity are necessary conditions for enabling new experiences of an alternative form of power.

The existent versus the person: Luigi Pareyson’s critical appropriation of Karl Jaspers’ existentialism

Constanza Giménez — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

Pareyson raises a particular criticism of Jaspers' concept of existential shipwreck, understood as the annihilation of the existing due to its finitude, preceded by a supreme moment of self-awareness and revelation. In contrast to the negativity and guilt that Jaspers assumes as inherent to finitude and, paradoxically, as determinants of freedom, Pareyson interprets existence as a point of revelation of being in history. He does so by replacing the concept of implication between finite and infinite with that of incommensurability. Between an eternal non-relative absolute and a temporal relative finite. On this basis, he builds his concept of person as an “initiated initiative,” that is, a freely chosen and operative agency, preceded by the establishment of an original relationship with the absolute.

Playful time: Sketches for a phenomenological anthropology on play

Marcela Venebra-Muñoz — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

This paper offers a phenomenological description of playful time as the genesis of human play. Husserl’s phenomenology of temporality provides a comprehensive and defining framework for understanding playful time through four essential dimensions, which are presented in the order followed in this text. The first part addresses the extraordinary condition of playful time; the second explores its ritual and festive qualities; and the third and fourth sections examine its free and imaginary nature. Playful time exhibits the anthropological unity of existential spheres such as work, and value, often excluded from play in anthropological accounts, while also highlighting the boundary between animal and human play as a site of intersection.

Hans-Georg Gadamer and Phenomenology: Affiliation and Critical Distance

Erika Whitney — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

This paper examines the affiliation and position of Hans-Georg Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics within the phenomenological tradition. The first part analyzes Gadamer’s objections to the founder of phenomenology, Edmund Husserl. Particular attention is given to Gadamer’s critique of the claim to ultimate grounding (Letztbegründung) and its relation to the concept of the Lebenswelt. The second part reconstructs Gadamer’s phenomenological appropriation of the concept of play, understood as an attitude of openness free from foundationalist commitments. Drawing on Heidegger’s reinterpretation of the phenomenological project, Gadamer conceives philosophical hermeneutics as a non-dogmatic reformulation of phenomenology’s program and its original philosophical impulse. His relation to phenomenology may thus be described as one of critical affiliation.

Time and Eternity in Thomas Aquinas: Reconstruction and Critical Approach

Jorge-Enrique Pulido-Blanco — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

This article reconstructs Thomistic ontology centered on the actus essendi and asks whether Thomas Aquinas applied this approach in his philosophy of time. Our hypothesis is that, when he understands time from the perspective of eternity in the Summa Theologiae, he employs an ousiology of lesser explanatory capacity in relation to the existential ontology of De ente et essentia, thus leaving the most promising elements of his philosophy of time in a state of mere potentiality. Following, though with certain reservations, Heidegger’s critique of Aquinas’s account of time, we seek to understand the reasons for this imbalance or disjunction between two such relevant themes. Finally, we propose three approaches by which it is possible to reconsider time from a Thomistic perspective more closely aligned with his existential ontology.

Levinas and heideggerian co-being: reflections from the ontological difference

Marjorie Schliebener-Tobar — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

The following article proposes to review one of Levinas's main criticisms of Heidegger, which pertains to a sort of annulment of all alterity based on the understanding of Dasein as the being that is each time mine, interpreted by the French philosopher as an essential egoism, positioning ethics as prior to ontology, as the first philosophy. However, through the discussion of the ontological difference and Heidegger's Mitsein, we will see that, in our view, Levinas's criticism is rather situated in an ontic realm of things, unlike Heidegger, who strives to maintain his philosophical program in the ontological order. Although this work is dedicated to highlighting such differences, it does not aim to take sides with either philosopher but rather to contribute to the clarification of the thematic ground where such criticisms unfold.

Orality, writing, and school: a pedagogical reading of Emmanuel Levinas' unpublished works

Natalia Rodríguez-Martín — Fri, 15 Aug 2025 00:00:00 -0500

This article examines the distinction between orality and writing in the work of Emmanuel Levinas as a key to understanding the genesis of his notion of teaching. The analysis seeks to lay the groundwork for a pedagogical reading of his thought, arguing that this requires reading beyond Totality and Infinity, where teaching is stripped of its pedagogical content. The exploration of unpublished writings and Levinas’ texts devoted to Jewish education enables the reconstruction of his ideas on school and reading, as well as an examination of the influence of the Talmudic tradition upon his conception of scriptural interpretation. From this foundation, it is concluded that reflections on the pedagogical aims of the École Normale Israélite Orientale and on the tradition of Torah reading permeate his unpublished texts, thereby offering a framework that contextualises and justifies the appearance of certain pedagogical terms within them. In this regard, the article opens a new avenue for interpreting Levinas' unpublished works through an educational lens and demonstrates that, whilst it is possible to recover a pedagogical dimension in his work, this dimension was configured prior to the writing of Totality and Infinity.

The social character of truth in Deleuze

Héctor Sevilla-Godínez — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

The present article explores the concept of truth from the philosophical perspective of Gilles Deleuze, emphasizing its intrinsically social nature. It examines how knowledge is invariably mediated by the social, focusing on three fundamental dimensions: interconnection, difference, and the socio-historical conditions underlying scientific progress. The discussion centers on the intersection of science, truth, and nihilism, addressing the challenges that confront the construction of truth in the contemporary context. It also highlights certain epistemological limits, the possibility of engaging with truth, and the paradox of nihilism—understood not as the destruction of meaning, but as the opening of new possibilities for truth and knowledge. Ultimately, the article argues that the advancement of knowledge is inseparably tied to the specific contexts in which it emerges. The methodology employed combines philosophical analysis and hermeneutics, grounded in a close reading of Deleuzian texts. The objective is to interpret their relevance and applicability in contemporary settings, emphasizing the interrelations between the social and the epistemological.

A step toward dynamic externalism

Rodolfo López-García — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

Dynamic externalism offers a promising framework for explaining meaning change. However, despite references to it in foundational works and Cappelen’s incorporation of it into conceptual engineering, its theoretical foundations remain largely unexplored. This paper clarifies the relationship between Cappelen's externalist conceptual engineering and dynamic externalism, distinguishing their operational and meta-level structures. Through a critical analysis of Woodfield and Burge, this paper develops an expert-centric approach to dynamic externalism that integrates the core principles of future externalism while proposing a modified version with an inverted direction of fit. The approach employs this expert-centric framework to provide explanatory resources for semantic change in specialized domains. The resulting account emphasizes the interplay between synchronic and diachronic relations, identifies mechanisms driving semantic evolution, and offers a systematic framework for understanding how technical terminology develops within expert communities.

Information and knowledge in Relational Quantum Mechanics

Juan Vila — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

The relational interpretation of quantum mechanics (RQM) has generated intense philosophical debate, particularly regarding its distinctive conception of knowledge. This paper examines how RQM articulates that conception through the notion of “information.” I begin by analyzing Carlo Rovelli’s view of scientific knowledge, followed by a reconstruction of the main argument supporting RQM. I then critically assess how the theory connects information and knowledge to present a realist, naturalist, and relational account of science. I argue that, in its current form, RQM fails to offer a coherent epistemological framework. Moreover, recent attempts by its advocates to resolve these issues expose deep philosophical tensions at the core of the interpretation, indicating the need for substantial theoretical revisions.

Review: Farisco, M. (2021). Philosophy of Neuroscience: Brain, Mind, Person. Ediciones Universidad Católica De Salta.

Manuel Matías Ambiado Lillo — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

The book Philosophy of Neuroscience: Brain, Mind, Person by Michelle Farisco examines the philosophical and ethical challenges posed by the growing impact of neuroscience on understanding human nature. Farisco critiques neuroscientific reductionism in studying consciousness, highlighting the difficulty of explaining subjective experience from a purely biological approach. He questions neurocentrism, which ties personal identity solely to the brain, advocating for a non-reductionist perspective that includes sociocultural factors. Additionally, Farisco explores "neuroethics," which addresses the ethical boundaries of neurotechnology use and the social implications of conceiving humans solely as neural beings. The work invites reflection on emerging dilemmas at the intersection of neuroscience, philosophy, and society.

Review: Améry, J. (2024). Fragmentos sobre el antisemitismo: una aproximación a las fisuras de la modernidad (L. Sánchez Marín, trad.).

Carlos Vanegas-Zubiría — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500

Book review

Améry, Jean (2024). Fragmentos sobre el antisemitismo. Medellín, Ennegativo Ediciones; Politécnico Colombiano Jaime Isaza Cadavid.