Petar Bojanić

Bioethics in Serbia: Institutions in Need of Philosophical Debate

This paper is structured in three sections. The first discusses the institutional framework pertaining to bioethics in Serbia. The functioning of this framework is critically assessed and a number of recommendations for its improvement presented. It is also emphasized that philosophers are underrepresented in public debate on bioethics in Serbia. Second, this underrepresentation will be related to two issues that figure prominently in Serbian society but are not accompanied by corresponding bioethical discourses: the first is abortion and the second is the largely unrestricted use of neuropharmacology since the 1990s, both for therapeutic and for cosmetic/recreational purposes. Finally, the perspective of bioethics in Serbia is addressed. It is asserted that this perspective can be based on the enhancement of public philosophical debate on bioethical issues, especially those with notable features in Serbian society (such as abortion and neuropharmacology). Such enhancement would also strengthen the corresponding institutional and legal frameworks

How to Be Together beyond Corporations and Firms? Hegel at the “End of Capitalism”

The text examines different assumptions of Hegel’s understanding of the corporation across various versions of his Lectures of the Philosophy of Right, given recent contemporary reflections on “the end of capitalism.” My intention is to take Hegel’s thematization of the poor and poverty, as well as the significance Hegel ascribes to common work and the constitution of a working group as the foundation of civil society, and formulate these as real conditions of a potential reconstruction of the corporative model and new common action.

Real institution: Document and realism

Regardless of the fact that I am using certain texts by Searle, Ferraris, Smith and De Soto, my intention is not at all to reiterate someone else’s position in my own words, nor is it to question or modify some such position. My intention for now is to, using Ferraris’ theory of the document, affirm the existence of a paradox - one rejected by Searle, but unconvincingly so, I think - regarding the institution (or the institutionalization of the institution). In order to do that, it seems to me that I am forced to slightly disturb both Searle’s and Ferraris’ conception, in attempting to offer my own contribution to a new future theory of the institution. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 43007: Istrаživаnje uticaja klimаtskih promenа nа životnu sredinu: prаcenje uticаjа, аdаptаcijа i ublаžаvаnje]

The institution of group and genocidal acts

This critique is focused on a small theory regarding the constituting of a group through the simultaneous exclusion of some other group. Is it possible, then, to produce social and non-social acts (negative social acts) at the same time? Or is it possible to construct a group which acts ‘genocidally’, meaning that it destroys another group or “the groupness” of a group, and at the same time affirm its own unity and its ontological stability? (I have used the word ‘institution’ in the title, since we are dealing with a group that is lasting, and not temporary.) Finally, does this thematization of the group through inter-group antagonism have anything to do with Lemkin’s word ‘genocide’? [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 43007: Istrаživаnje uticaja klimаtskih promenа nа životnu sredinu: prаcenje uticаjа, аdаptаcijа i ublаžаvаnje i br. 41004: Retke bolesti: molekularna patofiziologija, dijagnosticki i terapijski modaliteti i socijalni, eticki i pravni aspekti]

Sovereignty and the Origins of War Leibniz versus Bodin

IN EXPLAINING SOVEREIGNTY (SUPREMATU[S]), AND THIS IS SURPRISING, the difficulty is that I am entering an entirely neglected field. The reason for this is that those who write about it most often write gazing into the past, toward the stunted remains of sovereignty that are barely even there, while completely disregarding what is happening now. I am least astonished by the common lawyers, for whom no wisdom can be found outside of the tomes of Roman Law; I am confused precisely by our illustrious dignitaries, who, when they encounter a difficulty in writing, reach for authority and erudition rather than experience and ability to think for themselves . . . (Leibniz 1984a, 51). A century after Jean Bodin’s renowned work, Les Six Livres de la République (1576), in which the old word “sovereignty” (souveraineté) is used for the first time to refer to a completely new “figure,” Leibniz attempts to reorder and rethink a word, because it is no longer clear what it indicates, or hides, or

Kants Theorie der Erde

Unsere Absicht ist mittels der Betrachtung der Kantischen Theorie der Erde zu untersuchen in welchem Mas man in seiner Philosophie auch einen Ansatzen der heutigen Ekopotik, die eng verbunden mit der Auslegung Kants uber das Verhaltnis zwischen der Geographie, des Korpers und der Grenzen unserer Erkenntnis ist, findet. In der Kantischen Philosophie finden wir eine Geoethik, die sich mit dem Problem der menschlichen Seshaftigkeit auf die Erde und mit seiner raumlich-moralischen Orientierung in der Welt beschaftigt. Kant kritisiert die ubliche Erdeauffassung als den Besitz der menschlichen Gattung (species) und fordert durch das praktischen Postulat der Vernunft an, dass es notwendig ist, dass man das menschliche Verhaltnis zur Erde wesentlich im Rucksicht auf die korperlich-geographischen Grenzen der unseren Erkenntnis uberpruft.

“Fenomenologia dell’istituzionale”. Does “to Institutionalize” something mean, in fact, to document it?

Referring to Ferraris’ “Fenomenologia dell’istituzionale (Phenomenology of the Institutional)” is very appropriate to insist on some difficulties with the notion of “institution”. My intent is twofold: on the one hand, I would like to claim, against Ferraris and with Searle, that a theory (or phenomenology) of the institution is always the most important task in the construction of social ontology. Along the way, I would like to point to the importance of violence (and power) and violent strategies in the creation and maintaining of institutions. By answering the question in the sub-heading of this paper, my intention is to understand Ferraris’ project, firstly, as a necessary addition to the ontology of John Searle. But, also, I would like to argue that this project could “incorporate” this same theoretical attempt that precedes it. The future of Ferraris’ project is in political and legal theory, in the understanding of the great and truly “ultimate institutional structures”. Ferraris, as inheritor of and contributor to the great project of Paul Otlet (Mundaneum), surpasses “the government as ultimate institutional structure”, and puts it in the place of the State-Europe and la Cite mondiale.

Sur la raison de la guerre [Kriegsgrund]

Notre interet se centrera sur quelques textes que Franz Rosenzweig, soldat autrichien combattant dans la defense anti-aerienne, a ecrit au cours des dernieres annees de la Premiere Guerre mondiale sur le front des Balkans. Nous nous proposons deux tâches : examiner dans le contexte des differents penseurs de la (geo)politique de ce siecle la tentative rosenzweigienne de comprendre la guerre, les decoupages territoriaux dans la guerre, l’appropriation de la terre, sa comprehension de la frontiere, de l’espace, du peuple, de la geopolitique, du rapport entre la mer et la terre, du monde et de l’Etat mondial. La seconde direction consiste a tenter de determiner le statut de ces textes politiques de Rosenzweig a l’egard de la totalite de son œuvre, de meme que l’influence implicite et explicite de sa judeite sur sa comprehension de la guerre et du monde.

Heidegger. Cadavera proiecta (embrasser le cadavre)

Hajdegerova tematizacija kritickog odnosa prema ideji utemeljenja«prakticke fi lozofi je» i etike od pocetne elaboracije u djelu «Bitak i vrijeme»skopcana je s dubljim nesporazumom u pogledu pitanja sta zapravo jeste praktickafi lozofi ja. Autor postavlja osnovnu tezu da je Hajdeger svoj kriticki odnos izgradiona slaboj fi lozofskoj legitimnosti pojma «prakticka fi lozofi ja», kojoj je porijeklo ukorumpiranom pojmu «praxis», preuzetom s rubnim podrucja fi lozofske tradicije.Ta se slaba legitimnost u bitnom smislu negativno odrazila na vodecu Hajdegerovufi lozofsku namjeru da u «Bitku i vremenu» provede razgradnju tradicionalne idejesubjektivnosti subjekta i pojma covjeka.As one of the most important principles of forming of social relations,Hesiod emphasizes the principle of justice. He places the idea of justice into the verycore of life, because it is in this idea that he fi nds the root out of which a diff erentworld and a better one is to be born. Hesiod’s idea of justice is manifested as a needfor strengthening the relation of equivalence when it is stable and adequate, andfor its establishing in case it is disbalanced and inadequate. Th e presence of justiceat all levels, from the highest metaphysical one, all the way to the relations withinthe practical sphere, shows that it can be considered as a mighty deity, as a cosmicprinciple, but also as a legitimate basis of comprehensive human praxis. In Hesiod’swritings it is fi nally suggested that there is a diff erence between the order of causalityof irrational nature and the order of duties of morality, actually between biaon one hand and nomos and dike on the other. Believing that living beings can notdisturb the order of bia, while humans can disturb the order of dike, Hesiod postulatesthe diff erence which will be crucial for the later philosophical consideration ofthe fi eld of praxis.De 1919 a 1923, Heidegger a developpe une phenomenologie hermeneutiquede la vie facticielle qui s’ouvrira en 1927 sur l’Analytique existentiale du Dasein. Delaissantles grandes sources d’inspiration « positives » que sont pour le jeune Heidegger lespensees d’Aristote, Husserl et Dilthey, nous rappellerons dans cet article que son projetd’une hermeneutique phenomenologique de la vie est notamment issu d’un debat suiviavec le neo-kantien Heinrich Rickert. Nous montrerons que les principales theses epistemologiquesde ce dernier constituent un repoussoir a partir duquel se sont preciseesterme a terme, comme en creux, les intuitions fondamentales qui president a la mise enplace initiale de la pensee philosophique de Heidegger.Wahrend des Sommersemesters 1934 erkennt Heidegger imSeminar „Logik, Als die Frage nach dem Wesen des Sprache“, dass die groste Bedrohungfur jene, die damals glaubten, die Universitat zu revolutionieren, von jenen jer kam,deren Absicht es war, „in Wahrheit eine Leiche konservieren“. Diese Vision desUniversitatskorpers bzw. der Universitat als einer Leiche und des Gestanks der von derUniversitat ausgeht, hatte vor allem das Ziel, die Studenten zum Widerstand gegen dieKonservatoren und Bewahrer zu mobilisieren, die das, was zerfi el, bewahren wollten.Wenn wir dieses Fragment von Heidegger lesen, ist noch immer unklar, ob wir einTeil von ihnen sind, ob wir selbst ein Teil jener Leiche sind, bzw. was uns von ihnenunterscheidet. Statt zu reformieren, zu uberarbeiten, zu erwecken und in Bewegung zusetzen, verteidigen die Konservatoren – oder wir verteidigen –, was langst tot ist.Th e author discusses the scope and limits of both Plato’s criticism of rhetoricin the Gorgias and of his project of new philosophical rhetoric in the Phaedrus. In thesetwo dialogues Plato does not change his attitude towards rhetoric as it may appear atfi rst glance. In both of them he radically criticizes the rhetorical practices of his time.Th e novelty of the Pheadrus is the introduction of a new rhetoric, based on philosophy,which needs fulfi ll three conditions. Firstly, the rhetorical logoi should be composedin such manner that they represent inseparable parts of the organic whole of anoration. Secondly, rhetorical speeches should be based on the strict dialectical rulesof collection and division. Finally, philosopher rhetorician must “guide the souls” ofhis listeners in such a way that he radically infl uences the forming of their souls byfollowing the philosophically founded educational or legal ideal. Plato’s unfi nishedproject was never fully accomplished nor was it ever again set up with such greatambition.

SACRIFICE ET SACRIFICE (OPFER ET AUFOPFERUNG) Les sacrifices pour la patrie chez Hegel

Der Text unternimmt den Versuch, Hegels Verwendung und Differenzie- rung der Begriffe „Opfer“ und ,,Aufopferung“ zu rekonstruieren. Im ersten Teil der Untersuchung werden der Ursprung und die Bedeutung dieser Begriffe in den wichtigsten Texten der deutschen Philosophie vor und nach Hegel erforscht. Der zweite Teil ist einer detaillierten Analyse von He- gels Syntagma „Opfer fur die Heimat“ bzw. „Opfer fur das Vaterland“ gewidmet, das sich bei Hegel in unterschiedlichen Texten findet. Im Kontext des Krieges und des Kampfes gegen den Feind, im Kontext von Hegels Patriotismus und im Hinblick auf die Bedeutung des Opfers fur sein philosophisches System und fur die Institutionalisierung des deutschen Staates konnen die Unterschiede zwischen Opfer und Aufopferung verfolgt sowie deren Bedeutung fur Hegels Den- ken nachvollzogen werden.Marksovo misljenje kapitala kao totaliteta i njemu imanentnih protivrecja, po mno- gim autorima, pripada proslosti, te sledstveno tome to misljenje je nedelotvorno. Pitanje glasi: da li je to tako, ili, pak, suprotno, buduci da kapital u liku globalizacije ispoljava i danas svo bogat- stvo protivrecja koje se mogu misliti shodno Marksovom misljenju? Marksovo misljenje proti- vrecja kapitala u delima Osnovi kritike politicke ekonomije i Kritika politicke ekonomije po mom misljenju su itekako sa-vremena te ih treba sagledati kroz dimenziju sveprisutne pohvale globali- zaciji koja navescuje svoje krajnje mogucnosti u svetlu neophodnosti njenog revolucionisanja.Hekelovi stavovi o teoriji razvitka, zatim njegov odnos prema Darvinu, a jos nepo- srednije i sama Darvinova koncepcija evolutivne teorije, bitni je osnov marksisticke interpretaci- je tada moderne biologije i, preko nje, teorije evolucije. To stanoviste proveo je Fridrih Engels s opstih filozofskih pozicija dijalektickog materijalizma u podrucju organske prirode, prevashod- no u fragmentima i clancima rukopisne zaostavstine za nedovrseni projekt Dijalektike prirode, i dakako u spisu Anti-Diring .