Annual Conference of the Philosophical Society of Southern Africa 2008

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    The implications for the principle of bivalence of accepting truth as evidentially constrained
    (Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 2008) Goodwin, Carin; goodwinfam@mweb.co.za
    Paper presented during the Annual Conference of the Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 16 - 18 January 2008. Hosted by the Department of Philosophy, University of Pretoria. ABSTRACT: It is a foundational premise of classical logic that the Principle of Bivalence obtains. This paper will see an exposition of how it can come to be that the truth value of some statements is indeterminate, in other words, that it cannot always be presumed that the truth value of a statement will be either true or false. The paper will investigate two premises for an argument for indeterminacy (counter the Principle of Bivalence): (1) If the metaphysical state of affairs is such that no evidence is available to serve as truth conditions for a claim, that claim is indeterminate and not merely false. (2) If truth is regarded an epistemic notion (evidentially constrained) then many of our statements remain indeterminate in truth value. The conclusion forwarded will be that premise (1) is more problematic than premise (2) but can still serve, if adequately defended, an argument for indeterminacy. If, however, both premises are accepted they would labour interdependently for such a conclusion. Accepting that certain statements remain indeterminate will mean that the unconditional acceptance of the Principle of Bivalence is wrong.
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    More than a stage : the World in Hannah Arendt's Philosophy of Action
    (Philosophical Association of Southern Africa, 2008) elme.vivier@up.ac.za; Vivier, Elme
    Paper presented during the Annual Conference of the Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 16 - 18 January 2008. Hosted by the Department of Philosophy, University of Pretoria. ABSTRACT: This paper explores the centrality of the world in Hannah Arendt’s philosophy of action. Arendt’s notion of performative action politics is often criticized as politically irrelevant and even insignificant. It is difficult to conceptualize and invoke a more meaningful action politics without first considering the conditions, clearly of great importance to Arendt, under which action can unfold in the first place. According to Arendt, natality and plurality constitute the conditions of freedom and action respectively. A permanent, durable world is also necessary to actualize these capacities. This, however, posits an understanding of action as a constant struggle to maintain itself as an exercise of freedom that simultaneously requires its reification into a permanent, worldly object. This is not simply a weakness of action or of Arendt’s philosophy of action, but reveals an underlying tension between the modes and conditions of human being, that is, between political action and private fabrication, and between a fragile freedom and durable world.
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    Fanon and recognition in the colonial context
    (Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 2008) Villet, Charles; charlesv@staugustine.ac.za
    Paper presented during the Annual Conference of the Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 16 - 18 January 2008. Hosted by the Department of Philosophy, University of Pretoria. ABSTRACT: In the Phenomenology of Spirit Hegel provides his main discussion of the theme of recognition as it appears in the relationship between self and other. Recognition within his framework carries a certain amount of ambiguity. Recognition carries a sense of hope but simply if one can live with the domination that accompanies human relations. This means that recognition can be defined in terms that are detrimental to the other as conveyed in the master / slave dialectic that Hegel provides. The dynamic underpinning of this dialectic is taken up by Fanon in his critique of Western colonialism. Fanon’s critique is also a blow for the idea of mutual, reciprocal recognition because the master / slave dialectic was implicit in human relations in the colonies. Fanon provides a picture of this relation in terms of race, and recognition becomes a problematic notion in light of the Western conception of race. I would like to contend that Fanon’s work does not necessarily have to find its conclusion in a suspicious (and violent) notion of recognition. There is the possibility of an optimistic moment in his work where engagement with the other rests on mutual and reciprocal recognition.
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    The necessary (non-arbitrary) conditions making possible the arbitrariness of the lingual sign
    (Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 2008) Strauss, Danie; dfms@cknet.co.za
    Paper presented during the Annual Conference of the Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 16 - 18 January 2008. Hosted by the Department of Philosophy, University of Pretoria. ABSTRACT: Most modern linguists emphasize the fact that the “bond between the signifier and the signified is arbitrary” (De Saussure). Although this may prompt one to fathom that language use as such is completely arbitrary, there are diverse considerations supporting the view that language is also co-determined by an underlying, constant framework. The latter reveals the two basic dimensions of human experience, reflected within language in the presence of verbs, nouns and property terms. Verbs and property terms are made possible by the multiple functional domains of our experience related to the how of things and not to their concrete what. These aspectual (ontic) domains actually serve as points of entry to our experience of and reflection upon things and events within reality expressed in language. As constant cadres (frameworks) these points of entry make possible the rich variability found in different languages. De Saussure already had to concede, in an almost contradictory fashion, that there is both an element of mutability and immutability attached to language. It will be argued that the horizon of the functional conditions of language ultimately underlies meaningful communication and that acknowledging it enables a new approach both to translation and the learning of new languages.
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    New ethics of technology. A discourse in Germany in the 1990s
    (Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 2008) Gruner, Stefan; sg@cs.up.ac.za
    Paper presented during the Annual Conference of the Philosophical Society of Southern Africa, 16 - 18 January 2008. Hosted by the Department of Philosophy, University of Pretoria. ABSTRACT: The mid-1990s in Germany had seen a climax in a long lasting discourse about the so-called New Ethics, especially with regard to the domain of technology. This paper provides an interpretation of some of the German sources to the South African reader of today, such that he may be enabled to compare South-Africa’s present discource with the German discourse of about a decade ago. Such a comparison (which is, however, not attempted in this paper) would not only be of philosophical but also of socio-political interest, given the fact that South-Africa is still a technologically semi-developed society with widespread techno-optimism whereas Germany is a highly developed society with widespread techno-skepticism. The purpose of this paper is thus knowledge-transfer (for the sake of discourse), whereby I do not claim originality as far as my reports and interpretations of the German sources are concerned.