Arquivo para a ‘Information Science’ Categoria
Covid 19 rising trend in Brazil
09
May
In numbers Publisher by the Brazilian Ministry of Health itself,
ranging from May 4th to 5th, Saturday and Sunday in general there is underreporting, the epidemiological bulletin has already recorded a high of around 8.9% with 21,682 new infections and 137 deaths from the disease. .
This trend has continued since the beginning of the month and reaching the rate of 15% will be considered a new high and a new wave, although the number of deaths is lower and a moving average remains below 100 daily deaths, being average and having number above 100 could rise again, as the average number of infections is higher and the number of deaths is lower because the strain is less lethal than the previous ones.
The calculation of moving averages is done by experts using the records of the last 14 days and dividing the total by 14, it is possible to have a broader view of the current moment of Covid.
There is no clear analysis of this slight increase, perhaps a seasonal effect of the arrival of the cold that favors respiratory infections, but this would be very premature because it is happening in the southern hemisphere in less than a week, perhaps the greater capacity of infections of the second omicron lineage, BA.2, the worrying thing is that it favors the circulation of the virus and the danger of new variants.
Except for specialized sectors that alert to the issue, little attention is paid to the most accurate information about this future of SARS-Covid, only the situation in China that remains serious and now even with reports of inhumanities due to an excessive and strict #lockdown.
In Brazil it is electoral period and this does not favor correct information about Covid.
Being and listening in hermeneutics
06
May
Anyone who has hearing can hear, but it is less and less
common to listen carefully to the Other, this depends on the conception of Being that we intuitively have, which in more general terms means listening with the soul and the heart to what is being said.
The whole perspective of hermeneutical philosophy goes in this direction and it is not by chance that it has as a reference the work Being and Time by Heidegger, which among other things identifies language as the “house of being”, so to listen is to listen carefully to the Other, or in this case of hermeneutics: the text.
This development when it comes to text interpretation (but it can also be used more broadly for oral communication) is expressed as a hermeneutic circle and was more fully explained by Gadamer in his work “Truth and Method”.
Among the steps of hermeneutic “dialogue” is the recognition of preconceptions, not in the negative sense that is used in everyday life, but in the sense that we have a set of pre-established concepts when we start a reading or a conversation, the reading it is a listening of the author by the reader.
The immediacy and vicious circles of new media impede this circulation and accelerate the process that is called “swarm” by Byung-Chull Han or by “herd effect” in several authors who do not speak specifically of new media, but of dangers arising from processes such as war and denialism in the face of a Pandemic or dangers of various contaminations.
In the biblical perspective this means “my people listen to my voice and follow me” (Jn 10:27), in the current sense it is exactly the reading and interpretation of a text, and the hermeneutic methodology applies to this, it was even used in its beginning by Scheiermacher, even before Husserl.
In the biblical case, it is necessary to pay attention to the final part of the text (Jn, 10, 29) where we read that the Father (God) is the one who will snatch them and “no one will snatch them from the Father’s hand”, in this sense listen to it is also listening to the Holy Spirit through which we better understand decisions and paths adopted.
Being, interpretation and dialogue
05
May
The essential concept of philosophical hermeneutics
developed by Hans-Georg Gadamer criticizes the model of knowledge both of the romantic historical interpretation, which aims only to criticize or adhere to a reconstruction of the author’s intention (it is made mainly relative to the text) and has both a normative function when theological, when one looks at Being as language.
Thus, it corresponds to a requirement of meaning of the text, accepts the link with its content, does not aim to explain the theme or content of a text, accepts the binding character of the content, that is, it has an essential orientation to the human way of inhabiting the world , linked to culture.
To understand is, in this perspective, to apply, not in a mechanical or logical way (in the dual sense), but to translate the text into the very language of its concrete situation, in its entirety.
Understanding is like this, first of all, the act understood, applied to that situation or that something and thus has nothing to do with a doing and a technical knowledge, that is, the latter adds nothing to the way of being and the situation of the interpreter, which is mere automatic ability and cause-effect.
The rules of one’s own prejudices must then be put into play, opening the dialogue that they provide, thus a fusion of horizons occurs, then a new step of listening to the text, and only then is it possible to apply a meaning to the text and question up.
In this context, dialogue is possible, otherwise there is a dogmatic closure without the ability to listen to the Other beyond the preconceptions and intentions of readers and/or authors.
It is necessary to emphasize the need for mediation that is done through common ideas that are transmitted by the historical or literary tradition, for Gadamer, such mediation is what makes thinking and transmitting practices of relationship and communication, and without them there is difficulty in dialogue.
Phenomenology as a method for dialogue
04
May
Phenomenology is essential for a true dialogue because it
presupposes a “starting point” philosophically said, it presupposes an epoché (a suspension of judgment in the Greek sense) but the phenomenological epoché is a putting in parentheses, that is, it admits the dialogue with tradition or with the reader or interpreter of the text.
It emerged as a method in opposition to positivist thinking, through the studies of Edmund Husserl (1859-1938), and as a method of philosophical investigation it will capture the essence and meaning of a certain thing, said by Husserl: “there is no consciousness, only consciousness. of something”, and this comes from a subcategory that is intentionality, Franz Brentano and Tomás de Aquino had worked this but only with a psychological or mental sense.
Said by Husserl it is: “the description of what appears or science that has as objective or project this description”, thus part of the idea that we project our intentionality when describing.
Heidegger will place it, retaking ontology now on a different plane from the psychological and placing it as a method: “the expression ‘phenomenology’ means, above all, a concept of method”, in this sense it will also be a break with idealism and traditional rationalism.
“One of the contributions of phenomenology to philosophy is in the way it treats judgments and meanings. Martín Heidegger does not separate reason from emotion, nor the subject from the object”.
The question of the existence of Being turns to the concern with the way of human experience, or our preconceptions or even our rationalizations, it cannot be isolated from the relationship with the world and with the Others, all contemporary philosophy seeks a a way of being objectified, isolated, whether objective or subjective, because this deviation is also observed in the field of poetics, subjectivity and religion.
The Being must represent a presence, a manifesto, or a relationship with the Other, and a requirement is the symmetry of this relationship, where each one is able to make a “void” to contain the Other, an epoché of their preconceptions, without which there is no dialogue.
A first look at this dialogue is the hermeneutic circle proposed in the figure above.
The peace of the pacific
29
Apr
There are several misconceptions about peace, some were
pointed out by Kant such as pacts that hide future conflicts, the just revolt against totalitarian regimes, but there is no way to build peace without peaceful ones, the idea that you want peace, prepare for peace. war is a mistake, or with the violent, act as violent, etc. hide small and large wars.
Every exercise of power is asymmetrical, points out Byung-Chull Han (The Swarm), in the book that makes an essay exactly on the new media, and that says that there is only symmetry if there is respect.
So, respect for cultures, the diversity of opinions and ideas, of religious freedom, of different types of personal choices, of course that do not imply disrespect for the Other, is a starting point for peace, so there must be peaceful ones to build peace.
The idea of more weapons, of more aggression that can intimidate opponents hides that there is no peaceful principle in these attitudes, that there is no respect as Chul Han asks, and for those peoples, countries and nations that have peaceful principles, such as Finland and India for example. , it is worrying to see warmongering attitudes.
On the other hand, Makron’s victory in France is an encouragement mainly due to the defeat of totalitarian thinking in the country that is the source of modern republican democracy.
Peace must also be the basis of any religious thought, admitting that there is something or someone superior should strip us of the pride of judging oneself superior to someone, some people, race or gender, but history shows that it was not always like that, I remember. here the Peace of Westphalia, which was a pact so that religions would not encourage hatred between states, with this the idea of a secular state.
In several biblical passages Jesus makes the first greeting to his disciples: “Peace be with you”, of course he speaks of the peace of the peaceable, and in the verse of the beatitudes he says that they will be called “sons of God” (Mt 5,9) , that is, they are not Christians if they do not desire peace.
Also to his disciples, Jesus, who appears resurrected in his third appearance and asks Peter insistently (Jn 21:15-17): “After they had eaten, Jesus asked Simon Peter: “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” Peter replied, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.” And he said again to Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter said, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.” The third time he asked Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” and Pedro gets sad and says “you know everything”.
Yes Jesus knew that even among religious it would be difficult to understand peace and unity.
Perpetual Peace concept
28
Apr
Perpetual Peace was Kant’s political proposal, in a way it is expressed in the liberal view of thought about peace, with some nuances in countries from the Soviet period, but as a rule, the normal there is the Roman vision of the pax romana that was the submission of enemies.
As we saw in the previous post, for Kant, smart as snakes and false as doves, Machiavelli, in a very different way in his “Prince”, also spoke of dividing and ruling, a principle that is analyzed by Kant ( Divide et impera, p. 39), in this case it stops as a false freedom of opposing ideas when the supreme chief “disunites them and isolates them from the people”.
The work To perpetual peace was written by the German philosopher Immanuel Kant, in 1795. The uniqueness of Kant’s contribution lies in his faith in a perpetual peace that is built because reason has more strength than power, “… reason, from the seat of the highest moral legislative power, condemns war as a juridical way and, on the other hand, makes the state of peace an immediate duty, which, however, cannot be established or guaranteed without a pact between peoples: – there must therefore be a federation of a special type, which can be called the federation of peace (foedus pacificum), which would be distinguished from the peace pact (pactum pacis), since the latter would try to end a war …” (KANT, 2008, p. 17-18).
But when would it then be fair to make war? What would be the limit of reason? Kant speaks first of revolt within a nation subjected to a tyrant: “Is revolt the legitimate means for a people to reject the oppressive power of the so-called tyrant [non titulo, sed exercitio talis (‘tyrant in the exercise of power, not in your denomination’)]? The rights of the people are forfeited and no injustice is done to them (the tyrant) through dethronement; in this respect there is no doubt. However, it is most unjust on the part of subjects to claim their right in this way, and they cannot complain of injustice if they are defeated in this struggle and then have to endure the most severe punishments” (Kant, 2008, p. 47).
As we saw in the previous post, for Kant, smart as snakes and false as doves, Machiavelli, in a very different way in his “Prince”, also spoke of dividing and ruling, a principle that is analyzed by Kant (. Divide et impera, p. 39, in this case it stops as a false freedom of opposing ideas when the supreme chief “disunites them and isolates them from the people”.
There are interesting points in his proposal divided into articles: a republican civil constitution (today there are peoples with other forms of government and which are not always tyrannies), a “federation of free nations” as the principle of hospitality (the problem of migrants today) and then he makes a series of “supplements” to perpetual peace, but basically it’s a defense of reason.
It also touches on the interesting point, as we have already said with regard to world wars, that peace must not be based on possibilities that can open new future wars.
Today, it is necessary to analyze the light of the original culture of the peoples, not only indigenous and various pre or post-enlightenment nations (where a certain form of reason prevails, remember the Greek State and Roman law), and also the economic, war and now also cyber.
Perpetual peace isn´t or any other form of lasting peace must look to a more humane and fraternal civilization, without which any argument for war is possible.
KANT, I. A paz perpétua. Trad. Artur Mourão. Portugal: Universidade da Beira Interior Covilhã, 2008
Twitter, Cyberculture and Perpetual Peace
27
Apr
The purchase of Twitter by Elon Musk for $ 44 billion,
the Space X and Tesla billionaire, makes social media increasingly tied to the political field and shakes the empire of traditional media.
One of Musk’s basic ideas is to make the network less controlled (the moderator function) and with more text possibility, at launch in 2006 it was 140, in 2017 it was expanded to 280 and will probably add larger texts, Musk is the owner of the tool Revue.
NetFlix lost 200,000 subscribers (a little for 100 million subscribers, but a trend), CNN faces serious problems with an editorial discourse (7 out of 10 viewers) tries to change the focus, it is the mainstream media suffering from the advancement of new media , and everything indicates that the war in the military and ideological field will move to the cybernetic field, the drones practically retire the idea of using tanks and drones airplanes and flight autonomy, making war unequal in strength and war material more equal .
But the release of arbitrage on Twitter worries, although the open source algorithm proposal is interesting, but the big question is Musk’s ideas about war?
Of course, all this is reprehensible due to the number of civilian victims they cause, the human tragedies that develop there, also among soldiers who are on a battlefield where many would not want to be.
Kant’s Perpetual Peace proposed a precept of reason over power, but a strange saying appears in the middle of its text (we will analyze the text in the next post), which is prudent as serpents and gentle as doves, in the text Biblical (Mt 10:16) it is also possible to translate “simple as doves, but the Kantian interpretation is divergent:
“…Be wise as a serpent”; morality adds (as a limiting condition): “and without falsehood like doves” (Kant, 2008, p.34), and Kant himself points out that “the two things cannot coexist in a precept” an evident contradiction, Perpetual Peace It’s more complex, of course.
This is the problem with the new media, it is necessary to use the resource that is often used in politics of a certain “falsehood”, or dubiousness, whether to mislead opponents or to deceive the people.
There is no way to establish peace if there is no respect for conflicting cultures and values, of course within reasonable humanitarian limits, the first is life itself put in check in war and the second is enabling the survival and self-determination of peoples to decide their destiny.
Kant, I. (2008) A Paz Perpetua (Perpetual Peace). trans. Arthur Mourao. Portugal: University of Beira Interior Covilhã.
Reason, Belief and War 2
22
Apr
The relationship of science and belief in Bourdieu’s lesson: “The paradoxical
enterprise that consists in using a position of authority to speak with authority, to teach a lesson, but a lesson of freedom … would be simply inconsequential, or even self-destructive , if the very ambition to make a science of belief did not presuppose belief in science” (Bourdieu, 1994, p. 62), can be better expressed by the principle of transdisciplinarity.
Establishes the Arrábida Transdisciplinarity Charter in one of its principles: “Considering that the contemporary rupture between an increasingly cumulative knowledge and an increasingly impoverished inner being leads to the rise of a new obscurantism, whose consequences, at the individual and social level, are incalculable”. (Freitas, Morin and Barsarab, 1994)
The idea of science based on calculus (including economics) or the physics that makes it possible to advance in the mystery of the infinite universe, with wormholes, black holes and dark matter, cannot do without the mystery that is beyond what man has already conquered.
On the political side, the belief in the modern state that would replace God and could establish perpetual peace (Kant’s philosophical project) as well as science as the summit of “reason” has already shown its limits, as has the fundamentalist faith, which already was with the Pharisees in the time of life, land of Jesus, has limits of ignoring science, even wanting a science of belief, the paradox presented by Bourdieu.
Neither Kant’s perpetual peace nor advanced scientific studies made it possible to avoid war and the world is once again on the verge of a new humanitarian catastrophe, and it is also worth noting that religious fundamentalism cannot abolish it like the “Decalogue of Assisi for Peace” signed in Assisi on March 4, 2002, although they still defend it today.
The Pharisees wanted Jesus to be involved in the war against Rome, which will take place in the 70s of the Christian d.C., with the destruction of Jerusalem and its Holy Temple as predicted in the prophecies, not because Jesus wanted it, but because of the war that men wished.
After the Jewish Passover, and the Passion and Resurrection of Jesus which was our Passover, Jesus appears to the disciples and the apostle who did not believe Thomas was with them, the first greeting of Jesus is: “Peace be with you” (Mt 20, 21), breathes the Holy Spirit on them and told Thomas that he wanted material proofs of his resurrection: “Put your finger here and look at my hands. Reach out your hand and place it in my side. And do not disbelieve, but be faithful” (Mt 20,27) and happy will say those who believe without having seen.
Kant, I. (2008) Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Project. trans. Arthur Mourao. Ed. University of Beira Interior. Portugal: Covilhã.
Freitas, L., Nicolescu, B. and Morin, E. (1994)Letter of Transdisciplinarity. Convent of Arrábida.
Reason, Belief and War
21
Apr
The evidence of two world wars, where rationality was challenged by the
barbarities of the concentration camps, the atrocities committed, and the Hiroshima bomb is also included, give evidence that it is necessary to examine in depth what built what was called the reason passing through Kant’s critique of pure reason and the critique of practical reason.
At the opening of the book “Disenchantment of the World”, Pierre Bourdieu introduces his analysis of economic and temporal structures as follows: “Those who pose the ritual question of cultural obstacles to economic development are exclusively (i.e., abstractly) interested in “rationalization”. “of conducts, economics and describe as resistances, attributable only to cultural heritage (or, worse still, to one or another of its aspects, Islam for example), all omissions towards the abstract model of “rationality” such as defines economic theory.” (Bourdieu, 1979, pp. 11).
The recent history of our civilizational process develops the physical (and therefore only material) aspect and mathematical calculation, in particular the rationalizations of economic structures, when quoting Max Weber, the author explains: “the very character of the capitalist epoch [writes Max Weber] and – one at the root of the other – the importance of the theory of marginal utility (as well as of the whole theory of value) for the understanding of this epoch consists in that. just as the economic history of countless epochs in the past) has rightly been called “the history of the non-economic”. In the present conditions of life, the approximation of this theory and life was, is, and asks to judge, it will be bigger and bigger and will have to determine the destiny of more and more ample strata of humanity.” (Bourdieu, 1979, pp. 17).
His analysis is too extensive and almost complete (I will explain later) to be summarized here, but the aspect that interests us of the “non-economic” cultural cosmovision, which is that of belief and can be explained in a sentence of his about how he sees the relationship of science and belief: “The paradoxical enterprise that consists in using a position of authority to speak with authority, to teach a lesson, but a lesson in freedom … would be simply inconsequential, or even self-destructive, if ambition itself of making a science of belief did not presuppose belief in science” (Bourdieu, (1994, p. 62), which means that it is necessary to combine reason and belief.
The current war involves these economic (and ideological beliefs, which include religious beliefs), and it is thus neither a practical nor a theoretical reason, peace is possible if we limit beliefs to the common principle of defending peace for the civilizing process (already that the concept of progress is also a belief in a certain sense of “economic history”).
Bourdieu, P. (1979) O desencantamento do mundo: as estruturas econômicas e estruturas temporais. Trad. Silvia Mazza. Brazil, São Paulo: Editora perspectiva.
Bourdieu, Pierre (1994). Lições de aula. (Lessons from the class). Brazil_ São Paulo: Ática, 1994.
The palliative society or the absence of pain
13
Apr
Palliative society explains Byung Chul Han has nothing to do with palliative medicine, as the Korean-German philosopher explains: “Thus, every critique of society has to carry out a hermeneutic of pain. If pain is left solely to medicine, we miss its character as a sign” (Han, 2021).
It reminds us of a saying by Ernest Jünger: “Tell your relationship with pain, and I will tell you who you are!”, so a critical society is not possible without a hermeneutics of pain, the relationship with each suffering not only that produced by history, but that which is in the particularity of each Other.
“Survival society completely misses the point of the good life. Enjoyment is also sacrificed to high health for an end in itself” (Han, 2021, p. 34).
He recalls and quotes Agamben in his vision of homo sacer and via naked: “Without resistance, we subject ourselves to the state of exception that reduces life to bare life” (Han, 2021, idem).
In the palliative society “The art of suffering pain is entirely lost to us… Pain is now a meaningless evil that must be fought with painkillers. As a mere bodily affliction, it falls entirely outside the symbolic order” (Han, 2021, p. 41), emphasis added by the author.
So today, pain is removed from any possibility of expression, it is condemned to remain silent, and “the palliative society does not allow to enliven, to verbalize pain into a passion” (p. 14), emphasis added by the author.
Vargas, Cecília (2018) Systems of Pain/Networks of Resilience project in one gallery. Curated by Cecilia Vargas, Dickson Center at Waubonsee Community College, June 7-July 10th(foto).
HAN, Byung-Chul. (2021) The palliative society: pain today. trans. Lucas Machado. Brazil, Petrópolis: Vozes.
