Dimitrios Dacrotsis

This essay explores the intricate interplay between fear, consciousness, and human evolution, positing fear as a critical catalyst for the emergence of self‐awareness. Beginning with the role of fear as a reflexive survival mechanism, the discussion extends to its evolutionary transformation into a driver of complex cognitive traits. By examining the gradual emergence of inner experience, the essay highlights how early humans transitioned from instinct‐driven responses to self‐awareness, enabling them to adapt to hostile environments. Integrating theories of emotional processing and adaptive function, the framework presented emphasizes the iterative nature of consciousness, shaped by environmental pressures and the necessity for survival. The essay further bridges evolutionary biology, neuroscience, and philosophy to provide a comprehensive understanding of consciousness as an adaptive tool. Ultimately, it underscores the pivotal role of emotions, particularly fear, in shaping human cognition and the dynamic trajectory of human evolution.

El éxodo de más de 5.6 millones de venezolanos representa un fenómeno migratorio con múltiples facetas, cada una merecedora de atento análisis y profundización. Ante la dimensión del movimiento de millones de seres humanos, se corre el riesgo de subestimar tragedias que ocurren dentro del drama migratorio. Una de ellas, es el exilio de científicos y académicos. Este libro resume la vision acerca de la inaccion de la sociedad y orden mundial hacia la perdida de talento academico. Es un trabajo continuado de 4 anos que pretende mostrar que esta banalidad no es nueva. A traves de la historia, los ojos inmoviles del mundo han visto repetirse el mismo escenario: Italia, Espana, Siria, Yemen, Afganistan entre otros tantos han sufrido impotentes la desaparicion de sus talentos pensantes en distitnos periodos historicos. Venezuela se ha sumado recientemente a esta lista. En las siguientes paginas intento resumir a la mirada publica la imperiosa necesidad de preservar y proteger el talento academico. Resumidamente, abordo tres ejes temáticos: 1) Causas y consecuencias de la Ciencia en Riesgo, 2) Instrumentalización de la Ciencia en Riesgo y 3) Efectividad de programas dirigidos a científicos en riesgo. El primer eje temático, está fundamentado en analizar las causas y consecuencias de la Diáspora científica venezolana, bajo una reconstrucción histórica del exilio científico de Italia y España, para luego hacer un análisis comparativo. El segundo eje establece, desde el marco filosófico, la conveniente preservación del statu quo de la Ciencia en riesgo, a través de instrumentalización y unidimensionalidad del quehacer científico en países en vías de desarrollo por parte de programas internacionales financiados por organismos privados y gubernamentales. El tercer y último enfoque tiene como punto de partida la situación actual de la diáspora científica y la exposición de soluciones eficaces que rompan la inercia presente, enmarcando las ideas dentro de la actual crisis de la posmodernidad.

A través de una reconstrucción histórica y análisis de conceptos básicos, que da cuenta de la importancia de la historia y filosofía de la física, este libro resume un arduo trabajo de investigación en torno a la significación de la noción de simetría en física abordando tres problemas: 1) la existencia o no del término simetría en la antigüedad, 2) la posición kantiana en referencia a la comprensión del problema inercial y sus repercusiones y 3) la naturaleza de la noción de simetría en la física contemporánea, es decir, si la simetría es un principio o un argumento. Es un libro dirigido tanto a filósofos como a físicos ya que se adapta a la exigencia que demanda el lenguaje científico -filosófico. El resultado de la investigación lleva importante consecuencias, tanto para la física como para la filosofía, brindando nuevos e innovadores desafíos.

The current technoscientific progress has led to a sectorization in the philosophy of science. Today the philosophy of science isn't is informal interested in studying old problems about the general characteristics of scientific practice. The interest of the philosopher of science is the study of concepts, problems and riddles of particular disciplines. Then, within this progress of philosophy of science, neuroscientific research stands out, because it invades issues traditionally addressed by the humanities, such as the nature of consciousness, action, knowledge, normativity, etc. As a result, the new area of interdisciplinary study of neuroscience and philosophy arises: neurophilosophy. This emerging area applies neuroscientific concepts to traditional philosophical questions, limiting their responses to neuroscientific revelations about nervous systems. Neurophilosophy research focuses on problems related to the indirect nature of mind and brain, computational or representative analysis of brain process, relationships between psychological and neuroscientific research, adequate adaptations of physical and philosophical concepts in neuroscience and the place of cognitive functions. Now, the temporal representation of conscious experience and the types of the neural architecture to represent objects in time have aroused scientific interest. Under these interests, we focus on the studies on the temporary triadic structure of phenomenological consciousness in Dan Lloyd and Rick Grush. From Grush’s studies, the importance of Kantian ideas for cognitive neuroscience emerges, due to the active way in which Kant conceived space and time as forms of intuition, within which the mind interprets its experience. Under this perspective, the theoretical arguments of Dennett-Kinsbourne and Eagleman-Sejnowski represent winks in the direction of Kant-Husserl within the neuroscientific goal while considering that the contents provided by the mind included space, objects and perception of causal relationships. Then, theories of cognitive neuroscience are beginning to suggest that these elements are also, as Kant argued, interpretative elaborations provided by mind / brain, and not only content received from outside. In other words, current cognitive neuroscientific theories try to pass from its Humean phase to a Kantian phase. So, the challenge has been to explain that these elements are provided by the mind and the world itself, and how they have the content they have come from. These are lacking in current studies. Filling this gap helps to involve the analysis of the scientist’s experience in his theoretical attitude. In this sense, an investigation under the Kantian-Husserlian approach that involves pure intuitions a priori with the experience of the scientific and neuroscientific concepts represents a ground-breaking. At present, a neurophilosophical study about this does not exist. In this sense, one feasible proposal for research would be based on the application of neuroscientific results of Moser-Britt to philosophical problems of foundational notions in relativistic physics: space, time, space-time, field, etc., under the Kantian-Husserlian approach, which allows to demonstrate the multidisciplinary link between neurophilosophy and physics. This represents a ground-breaking area in current interests in scientific research, with a positive impact in the field of neuroscience, and contributing to the study of abstraction emphasizing the importance of Kant’s Copernican turn and Husserl’s phenomenological ideas in the construction of physical theories.