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This paper analyzes the relation between the singular and the universal in mythical thinking. The initial problem holds that, conventionally, due to its fantastic expressions, mythical thought is non-objective knowledge of the world; however, I will argue the opposite. Based on Cassirer's Philosophie der symbolischen Formen, I will present two results: firstly, an evaluation of how myth relates singular events with universal concepts, which allows the reassessment of myth as a valid epistemological form. Secondly, the main epistemological resource of myth is the idea of mutation, unlike science, which uses concepts to relate the singular with the universal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This short communication explores the collection and collecting activity of the Hawke’s Bay Philosophical Institute and its precursor in Napier, New Zealand, during the late nineteenth century. Affiliated to the New Zealand Institute (NZI), two well-known figures of New Zealand science, museums and collecting were influential: William Colenso, FLS, FRS, who placed an emphasis on natural history collecting by members; and Augustus Hamilton, who sought to professionalise the museum and its objectives. Collection items were an essential source of scientific knowledge used for research, illustrating papers and as a prompt for learned discussion. Many New Zealand collections owe their origins to similar collecting by NZI members during this period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The changes that occurred on digitization have produced profound variations in the world of work in general, and academic one in particular. Considering the transformations in terms of production, use and appropriation of knowledge, mainly taking this situation as a kind of social relationship described as "cognitive exploitation of scientific knowledge". From this characterization, I shall discuss in this paper the impact over the work of the social scientist. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since its inception in the early 1990s, evidence-based medicine (EBM) has become the dominant epistemic framework for Western medical practice. However, in light of powerful criticisms against EBM, alternatives such as casuistic medicine have been gaining support in both the medical and philosophical community. In the absence of empirical evidence in support of the claim that EBM improves patient outcomes, and in light of considerations that it is unlikely that such evidence will be forthcoming, another standard is needed to assess EBM against its alternatives. In this paper, I propose a set of criteria for this purpose based on Helen Longino's criteria for assessing the objectivity of a knowledge productive community. I then apply these criteria to assess EBM against a casuistic framework for medical knowledge. I argue that EBM's strict adherence to a hierarchical organization of knowledge can reasonably be expected to block it from fulfilling a high level of objectivity. A casuistic framework, on the other hand, because it emphasizes critical evaluation in conjunction with the flexibility of a case-based approach, could be expected to better facilitate a more optimal epistemic community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Islamization of Knowledge process is considered as one of the most important and intellectual movements of the 20ih century. It is also one of the most credible and longstanding contemporary Muslim intellectual responses towards modernism. The undefined structure and framework of the Islamization process makes it a challenging task and recognized more as a theory rather than effective methodology plan. This paper focuses on the Islamization of Knowledge in general, comprising with its history, definition and pioneers. Moreover, Islamization of science subjects in specific with the objective of introducing a framework for this phenomenon, based on Al-Farouqi's 12-step work-plan and Berghout's framework using a descriptive theoretical theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we highlight the need to attend to the structuring power of knowledge production in geoengineering research, because of the way that problem definitions are shaped by disciplinary ways of thinking and describing the world. We also draw attention to a number of problematic assumptions about how interdisciplinary research should be approached and organised in this area. We first look at the logic of 'subordination', in which certain disciplines are given the task of problem definition and others--typically the social sciences--are allocated the task of filling in gaps within that given frame. We then examine the more fundamental 'integrative imaginary' which, we argue, mistakenly assumes that disciplines can be combined in a straightforward way to reveal different aspects of the same underlying world. We conclude by proposing a more reflexive imaginary for interdisciplinarity, one that challenges the idea of integration and subordination, that promotes and benefits from the multiplicity and heterogeneity of ways of seeing that different disciplines offer, and that can thereby contribute to greater 'epistemological responsibility' in geoengineering research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the appearance, in recent decades, of so-called knowledge-based economies, there have been various explanatory proposals or theoretical frameworks for understanding them. In this paper we aim to ponder, within a humanistic outlook, various concepts introduced by thinkers like Dominique Foray, from economic theory, Javier Echeverría, from philosophy of science, Manuel Castells, from sociology, and Edgar Morin, from the perspective of complex thinking. Situating human at the center of the equation, we want to approach the problem of knowledge and their meanings. To that end, this essay begins with a consideration on different conceptions of knowledge and the role that it has taken in the new society, continues with an analysis of the relations between the new economy and the idea of integral human development, and ends by outlining the application of the principles of Morin's complex thought as a proposal to articulate different perspectives on knowledge and the global society to which we belong. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines Robert Kilwardby's (ca. 1215-1279) treatment of causal necessity and contingency. In his Commentary on Aristotle's Posterior Analytics and in his De ortu scientiarum, Kilwardby seems to be particularly concerned with the precarious epistemological status of ethics and physics insofar as these disciplines deal with contingent events. In order to reconcile strictly scientific knowledge with conjectural forms of knowledge, Kilwardby sets the problem of contingency in a genuinely gnoseological rather than metaphysical context, arriving at a highly original account of contingency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I will try to offer a synthesis between two conflicting epistemological positions on the recent philosophical scene: positivism, whose heritage survives as the belief that science is the most genuine form of knowledge, and the defenders of incommensurability. Overcoming the controversy implies rejecting both the classical conception of knowledge (knowledge as theoria) --which, in fact, both positions presuppose-- and the hierarchical view of knowing in favour of a systemic view permitting epistemological pluralism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]