Heidegger is perhaps best known for stressing the function of time as temporality on the phenomena of life. There is a sense, however, in which the full significance of these insights can be best understood only through an exploration of the function of space as spatiality in the phenomena of life. At their juxtaposition, there is a privileged perspective on the meaning of life, and most importantly on what is the most meaningful life on the Heideggerian account, thephilosophical life. The following short exploration uncovers this standpoint through an analysis of the word “clearing” as temporally expansive space. Through this device, there is a clear view of the role of philosophy, of truth, and of the meaning of life in Heidegger’s Being and Time.

In any given historical period, the fate of human beings is determined directly by their modes of existence and their ways of understanding to the future. In our time, the process of modernization leaves us uncertain about the future. This situation of uncertainty gives a new way of philosophizing and understandingphilosophy that must be appropriate to our new way of experiencing the future. We must recognize that the future has its own reality: that it transcends us and is also impact within us, and that it is inherently unpredictable. Therefore, the mission of philosophy in our time is to embody this new way of experiencing the future and help people to see the future from the future. This way of living does not rest on the assumption that history has a given aim, but instead seeks to buildthe future that focuses on dialogue among people with different viewpoints.

In this paper, I discuss the pros and cons of the movement and philosophy of Transhumanism, with a focus on the concept of nothingness. I argue that all hitherto concepts of nothingness, both Western and Eastern, are inadequate for an understanding of the present technological position humans now find themselves in.

Until now post-structuralism is widely regarded as an opposite to phenomenology. This is also true for the relation of Butler’s post-structuralism and Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology. The aim of this paper is to show how close they are to each other. For this purpose, I will focus on Butler’s poststructuralist theory of performativity to confront it with Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenological theory of expression. While Butler accuses theories of expression of being essentialist, I argue that Merleau-Ponty’s theory of experience resists such a criticism. “Expressivity” and “performativity”, and thus phenomenology and post-structuralism, are not opposites but partners in the search for an anti-essentialist concept.

The study of the Chinese feminism rose in 1980s. Its theoretical premise is that Chinese woman has divided into different groups and has gotten the uneven development, caused by the command economic system into the market economic system. By this premise, the given questions of Chinese feminism only accordwith the given woman groups, namely, each woman group has its own problems. All of the problems have shown that the key question in the study of the Chinese feminism is why the unequal between sexes occurs in such a society of the equal between sexes in law as China. This paper will analyze this question through three aspects: (1) study the present condition of the Chinese woman groups and the cause for the occurrence; (2) analyze the causes that the unequal between sexes occur in china; (3) rethink the practice and theory of the Chinese woman movement.

It is a welcoming feature that today women are improving in grounds of health and education. But they are still lagging behind in political and economic spheres and hence they continue to be the victims of high level of violence and abuse. These disadvantages are not due to sex differences but are the result of gender discrimination.

Coming from Germany in Europe I am starting with Feminism from a Western point of view but with a perspective of dialogue with Feminisms in other parts of the World. My inquiry deals with problems of the present time, especially how to make Feminism interesting not only to a philosophical or academic public, but to people from all professional fields and disciplines. The political perspective of feminist philosophy can be underlined with the central definition the Austrian philosopher Herta Nagl Docekal gives. According to this definition freedom of women is the main issue of each feminist interrogation. With regard to the development of women’s liberation in Europe and the USA three different movements of feminism can be distinguished: the main issue of the first is the notion of equality, it is also called humanist feminism according to Iris Marion Young; secondly we have the feminism of difference or gynocentrism; the third wave can not so easily be defined, a wide range of variety exists, which may lead to the impression that no more general aim is left. Sometimes it is also called postmodern feminism. But what does this mean: postmodern feminism? Far from an arbitrary attitude, which does not accept any order, postmodern feminism – as postmodern and poststructural philosophy – may be understood as a lesson on how to be different and not to loose the aims women share all over the world. The most important challenge is to find a new balance between the different aims and groups of feminism as well as between feminism in different societies and cultures. Feminisms from the beginnings wanted to overcome step by step the prejudices about men and women, about sex and gender, one of the heritages of our Western tradition. My interpretation of Third Wave may be seen as another step on this way.

The American environmental philosopher J. Baird Callicott argues that we human beings are ethically obliged to promote and protect the environment as an intrinsic value. To do so, we should adopt a scientifically and philosophically informed postmodern land ethic which protects and nurtures the great chain of being (pyramids of energy) from soil to civilization. The practice of this Leopoldian land ethic requires that we transform our modernist utilitarian and Cartesian ethics which instrumentalize and alienate nature. Two key works by Callicott outline his position as a mainstream academic deep ecologist: Earth’s Insights (1994) and Beyond the Land Ethic (1999). The French cultural and political philosopher, Luc Ferry, argues that deep ecological ideologies, such as Callicott’s, threatenthe historical enterprise of modernist humanism. The appeal of deep ecologists lies in their romantic and anti-Cartesian ideologies. In his book, The New Ecological Order (1995; Le nouvel ordre écologique, 1992), Ferry criticizes the deep ecologists (and he includes Callicott in this group) for their unjustified attacks on the traditions of humanism. In the conclusion to his book, deep ecological radicalism is equated with an anti-cosmopolitan “barbarism”. Ferry feels that the ideals of the European enlightenment and its modernist anthropocentrism which privileges human autonomy, freedom, and democratic ideals, have been undermined by the forces of the political left.

The paper will revolve around Shulamith Firestone’s claims that women’s biology is the root cause of prejudices against women and at the same time the basis for solutions that seek to end such prejudices. In the rational attack to these claims, it is argued that Firestone does not really debunk the patriarchal view but actually agrees with it. The attack focused on her avowed solution to the women problem that turns out to be defeatist in nature. In the attempt to prevent, if not end discrimination against women, the paper carefully offers possible solutions to consider.

My starting point in the exploration of the two subjects’ dialectics would be something what is perceived by Luce Irigaray, namely, that the humane nature is two, but the two is not represented in the philosophical discourse and the woman has always been symbolised as the other or lack. In Irigaray philosophy the crucial otherness is the other belonging to the other gender. The dialectical process now is in the service of intersubjectivity. Luce Irigaray argues that the recognition of the other as sexuate other offers the possibility to overcome the master – slave dialectics, because between woman and man, man and woman, recognitionrequires the labour of the negative. Irigaray sees in the recognition process the moment of acceptance of one’s own limits and of the limits of the other. Renouncement of the opposition activity / passivity is crucial for Luce Irigaray concept of the two subject’s dialectics. Luce Irigaray’s contribution to the contemporary discussions of the role of passivity and activity in subject’s relationship to the other (Paul Ricoeur, Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Levinas) is crucial.

In this paper, I provide a critique of Rawls’ non-ideal theory by arguing that in as much as background assumptions about what non-ideal conditions mean are derived from his idealized theory, not from existing actual conditions, his non-ideal theory is also idealized and flawed, similarly to his ideal theory. Thus, first, I argue that idealized assumptions which are used in the justification of justice principles are not neutral to members in non-ideal conditions; and second, such accounts systematically exclude some sort of actual injustice claims, in particular, justice claims from neo-liberal globalization.

Feminist and post-colonial epistemologists, philosophers of science, and thinkers more generally may find themselves in a distinct form of difficult situation regarding their access to and authority over knowledge within the academic world. Because feminist and post-colonial approaches to knowledge require an acute awareness of relations of domination and the ways in which these pervade the social and epistemic world, it is often difficult to know how to proceed in making theory. These theorists are in particularly ripe positions to benefit from what philosopher-physicist Karen Barad offers us. In this paper, I engage with parts of Karen Barad’s theory of agential realism, both critically and self-reflexively. I assert that allowing Barad’s theory to inform and structure our thinking and language makes knowers better able to meet certain requirements of epistemological responsibility, particularly with regard to the ways we make theory. Moreover, I attempt to assert this in a way that is mindful of how her theory speaks to and accounts for my doing so.

How to read the canonical texts of the male philosophical tradition has been an ongoing question for feminist philosophers. This paper wants to investigate Luce Irigaray’s notion of mimesis so as to offer an alternative reading practice for traditional philosophical texts. The paper will consist of two parts: in a firstsection, Irigaray’s concept of mimesis will be discussed in its affirmative as well as its transformative version; the second part attempts to apply the concept of mimesis to contemporary feminist readings of the philosophical canon. It will be shown that most existing feminist scholarship in philosophy follows the pattern of an affirmative mimetic approach while Irigaray’s own readings of male philosophers offers a stylistic example for the use of a transformative version of mimesis. It will be claimed that both approaches are necessary since they complement each other in significant ways, one interpreting traditional texts, the other re-writing them.

The concept ‘personhood’ lies at the center of contemporary disputes concerning whether certain biological interventions are ethical. Thus, if ‘personhood’ could be located or its existence evidenced by observations available to biologists, then each of these controversies could be resolved in biology’s own terms. I argue that this is a fruitless task. The attempt to track down a material object, ‘personhood,’ reveals ignorance of an important metaphysical presupposition underlying contemporary culture’s Cartesian/Kantian concept of ‘personhood.’

The topic of sex change in our bisexual society touches upon not only main basis of human existence but also questions of evolution as a whole, of humankind persistence. Is sex change a humane act or do we herewith sacrifice the culture and health of human population for the sake of individual principles? Today, theproblem of sex change has turned from purely medical to a sociocultural one. It brings up a number of important and complex issues for physicians, and for society as a whole. It is necessary to undertake the efforts upon their solution on miscellaneous levels ‐ from practical to general philosophic one. What is the principal difference in surgical sex change and other body changes, such as plastic operations etc? Is a person free to make decisions about changing his or her body like he or she is when changing hairstyle, clothes etc? Who is responsible for answering these questions? We offer another, in comparison with traditional, approach to determination of the indication to change sex in case of various dissociations of sexual identity (for instance, transsexualism). The presented strategy is designed with some elements of synergetic modeling. A different cultural and ideological approach to the problem of sex change lies in the foundations of this strategy. Since we are referring not just to sexual, but also sexual.

Kant has often been criticized for holding a very negative vision of women, according to which they are less rational and less morally valuable than men. In this paper, I shall argue quite the opposite. I will show that, in spite of some minor pejorative comments, Kant held that women fit better the ideal of a moral person than men. This is due to some qualities of the female sex, mainly the women capacity for self-control and the capacity for having moral feelings like sympathy and compassion. Moreover, women show their master of emotions and passions when they are able to use their emotional sensitivity and self-control to master thefeelings and passions of men.

This paper concerns broadly with the works of such ethical postmodern theorists as Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Levinas, Giles Deleuze, focusing on how we can contribute to the development of their ideas by discussing Laozi and Zhuanzi’s Taoism, Buddhism, and modern Korean Neo-Confucianism of Toe-gae Lee. I claim that for criticism and art, literature, film and culture as well as philosophy itself, we are now facing this new need of another notion of subjectivity that not only accepts difference but takes the position of whole positivity toward the Other. This different view of subjectivity that can be called "the sublime subjectivity" or the sublime totality of a human being or a society is essentially an aesthetic one, rather than one that depends upon logic, and it is vital to take advantage of Oriental ideas. From the perspective of the ethics of Levinas, I first place the sublime, jouissance, or pure enjoyment, at the heart of literary criticism. The pure sensibility of the sublime, or jouissance, unlike the raw feelings of pleasure, is an aesthetic sensibility beyond the ontological unity of feelings of pleasures and pains. Then with the Oriental thought, I make an attempt to contribute to the development of the ideas on the ethics of the relation of the reader and the literary text’s language. Laozi’s Taote Ching, Chuanzi, Diamond Sutra, and Toe-gae Lee’s notion of Taeguk are briefly explored in view of the aesthetic transphenomenal dimension and the sublime totality.

The discovery of the oriental poetry, specially Japanese and Chinese, had a deep impact in the poetic writing and personal evolution of the mexican poet Octavio Paz. The initial approach to the taoist aesthetic and philosophical universe was made trough the synthetic, sensorial and deeply suggestive strength of oriental poetry, and Paz found immediately an essential resemblance between the universe just discovered and the prehispanic cosmovision. As a result of that experience, in 1955 he published “Piedras sueltas”, a brief poem collection, in which he combines the evocative power of the poetic image typical of the japanese haiku with several indigenous topics. The influence and the attraction to Oriental thought, particularly Taoism, is also present in El arco y la lira (1956),book that represents the pinacle of Octavio Paz’s ultimate poetic thought.

The relations of philosophy and poetry include but are not exhausted by Plato’s hostility to mimetic poetry in the Republic and Aristotle’s defence of it in the Poetics. For poetry has often carried a philosophical message itself, from the work of Chaucer and Milton to that of T.S. Eliot. In yet earlier generations, poetry was chosen as the medium for conveying a philosophical message by (among Greek philosophers) Xenophanes, Parmenides and Empedocles, and (at Rome) by Lucretius, who struggled both with the Latin language and with the standard metre of didactic poetry, hexameters, to spread what he considered enlightenment and to reach for his Epicureanism an audience that might otherwise have remained unreached. To the extent that poets such as Lucretius succeeded, the philosophical critics of poetry in the tradition of Plato would have to recognise merit in some mimetic poetry. (Thus Lucretius compares clouds of atoms to flocks of sheep, which he graphically depicts.) Yet a defence of poetry other than Aristotelian katharsis would be needed for works such as those of Empedocles and Lucretius. Perhaps Enlightenment can be conveyed equally well in verse as in prose, mimetic components notwithstanding; for some purposes perhaps itcan be conveyed uniquely well. De nihilo nil fit, to quote Lucretius, comprises an example.