Journal of Philosophy of the University of Costa Rica
The Journal of Philosophy of the University of Costa Rica is the publication of the Costa Rican philosophical community and is produced under the auspices of the School of Philosophy and the Institute of Philosophical Research of the University of Costa Rica. It was founded in 1957, making it one of the oldest periodicals devoted to philosophy in the Americas. Since its founding, it has published philosophical contributions from all philosophical traditions without interruption, and its pages have featured articles and studies by thinkers of the stature of Roderick Chisholm, George Santayana, Gerhard Funke, Ernest Lepore, Anna Teresa Tymieniecka, Dieter Wyss, Bob Hale, Peter Asquith, Herbert Csef, Bernhard Waldenfels, Rodolfo Mondolfo, and Angel Cappelletti, among many others. In addition, it has published previously unpublished translations of important documents such as Richard Wisser's interview with Heidegger and part of the correspondence between Dilthey and Husserl. The philosophical breadth of the journal reflects a tradition of the Costa Rican philosophical community, which has historically cultivated a wide range of philosophical perspectives, including European, Anglo-Saxon, and Latin American. In general terms, the journal publishes high-quality articles and book reviews from any area of philosophy that contribute to contemporary philosophical debates, and therefore targets the national and international philosophical community. Its language of publication is Spanish, although it also accepts articles in English and has published (by invitation) contributions in French and German. It publishes three issues annually (January-April, May-August, September-December) and accepts unpublished manuscripts throughout the year. All manuscripts submitted for consideration will undergo a double-blind peer review process. The editorial team guarantees absolute confidentiality for both authors and reviewers throughout the review process. The journal practices an editorial policy known as open access and, therefore, makes the specialized content published in the journal available to the general public free of charge. Starting with issue 150, the journal will follow the CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 CR license for the distribution of published material. Due to its long life and uninterrupted consistency for more than six decades, the Journal of Philosophy of the University of Costa Rica is one of the most solid and stable periodicals on the American continent. Its breadth of subject matter and its commitment to philosophical thought in all its manifestations also make it one of the most important philosophical journals in the Spanish language. We therefore encourage those engaged in philosophical research and practitioners of philosophy in general to send us their strictly unpublished manuscripts so that they can join our publishing project and become part of one of the few journals of its kind with more than 100 issues behind it. We would also like to inform you that we offer a range of services, including online shipping management and the complete, updated collection of our magazine from the first issue in downloadable PDF format, among others.
This article provides an introductory exploration of the interdisciplinary field of Blue Humanities. It seeks to bridge historical materialism and new materialisms to address the ecological crisis through a conceptual framework grounded in aquatic mediums. The study further unpacks the notion of corrosive materialities as both metaphor and practice, aimed at dismantling anthropocentric thought and fostering situated knowledge rooted in specific material and ecological contexts. Rather than proposing a fixed theory, the article offers a flexible framework for situated theorizing, culminating in a reflection on hydro-realism as a lens to understand planetary transformations beyond the confines of the climate paradigm.
Copyright (c) 2025 Revista de Filosofía de la Universidad de Costa Rica https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/cr/
Speech at the University Merit Recognition Ceremony
This address was delivered at the Ceremony of Recognition for University Merit awarded to Bolívar Echeverría at the UNAM. This version of the text was dated by the author on June 15, 2009, and appeared on the website Bolívar Echeverría: Discurso Crítico y Filosofía de la Cultura (www.bolivare.unam.mx) under a Creative Commons 2.5 license. We reproduce this address with permission from Archivo Bolívar Echeverría.
Bolívar Echeverría: Philosophy and Utopia
On July 23, 2025, in the Joaquín Gutiérrez Hall of the School of Letters at the UCR, a lecture was delivered by Dr. Javier Sigüenza. The lecturer, in addition to having been a research assistant to the renowned Ecuadorian-Mexican philosopher, is a specialist in his work and is in charge of the Bolívar Echeverría Archive. We offer the reader a slightly expanded version based on the discussion following the lecture, including the corresponding citations to the written text. Subsequently, we present Bolívar Echeverría’s address on the occasion of his appointment as Professor Emeritus at the UNAM in 2009. Although more than fifteen years have passed since the author delivered these words, his diagnosis of the Latin American university and the role of the Humanities in this century remains strikingly relevant. We reproduce this address, with permission from the Bolívar Echeverría Archive, as part of the tribute to this important critical theorist of our region carried out in the session with Dr. Sigüenza.
Marxian Totality: Inverting Hegel to Expound Worldly Matters. Kaveh Boveiri (Brill, Leiden, 2024. 204 páginas.)
Bibliographic catalog:Constantino Láscaris-Comneno Micolaw (Zaragoza, 1923-San José, 1979)
The purpose of this article is to approach the album book Artesano de palabras (2021) by applying the notion of semiotic device, considering how its application could enhance the processes of signification in the readers of the book. The starting point for this dissertation is the semiotics of culture and the concept of text by Yuri Lotman. An approach that allows us to think that the semiotic device in the space of the text fulfills a complex communicative function in which the relationships between the author and the reader come into play; the reader and his culture; the reader with himself; the reader with the text and the text in relation to the cultural context in which it appears.
This research explores the concepts of causality, necessary connection, and probability in Hume’s philosophy, with the aim of showing how, from a naturalistic perspective and the regularity in impressions (custom), the Scottish philosopher cannot be considered a radical skeptic, as has often been interpreted. His skepticism only challenges reason as the foundation of causality and necessary connection, but he does not doubt the truth of these relations or their epistemological significance in the construction of positive knowledge of reality.
History, Memory, and Messianic Politics in Walter Benjamin
The German Jewish literary critic Walter Benjamin outlined in his last text “On the Concept of History”, a heterodox conceptual relationship between history and memory. To this end, from the beginning of his career, he engaged in a dialogue between intellectual traditions that seemed contradictory to some of his contemporaries. The aim is to understand how he articulated elements of these perspectives to propose that way of understanding and experiencing the past between history and memory through messianic politics.
This paper presents a preliminary outline concerning the possible homological relationship between Althusser and Lacan. First, it examines the affinities between both thinkers: their returns to Freud and Marx, as well as their critique of psychologism and humanism. After considering their evident discrepancies, a homological theoretical reasoning is identified at the level of enunciation of both theorists: the logic of structural causality. The article concludes with a reassessment of the event as a condition of the structure, and with the proposal of a logical articulation between Althusser and Lacan for a critique of capitalist structure.
Nihilism and absolute tragedy in the post-secular age
The advances of neoconservative sectors in the West show that we are in a postsecular era. The utopian right achieved its political rise thanks to its ability to mobilize some of the oldest myths. Therefore, it is of utmost importance to consider the links between tragedy and the philosophical systems that give it meaning. By relating nihilism, tragedy and utopia in the Western tradition, this article proposes to value the «potential for reason» that the theory of tragedy has in the West. We are interested in the perspective of Latin American liberation theology.
(registro de foto-performance en plantación de piña, fotografía impresa en papel fotográfico, 12mils - 230 g/m2, sin montura, 20 × 30 pulgadas. 2024.)
Pantheism in the Studies on Nature of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
This article studies the philosophical thought of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, inside his ontological conception from his pantheism and his studies of nature, identifying the elements where both are related.
The idea of ​​justice from the recognition of the other
The idea of justice from the recognition of the other in Luis Villoro’s communitarianism and contemporary Marxism’s sustain the possibility of collective projects, however, both proposals also preserve differences. On the other hand, in the face of the individualistic selfishness promoted by neoliberalism, it is prudent to analyze other alternatives to it.
This research aims to clarify the theory of freedom of John Stuart Mill, British utilitarian philosopher, having as a guiding thread the work On Lyberty dated 1859. First, we will deal with the understanding of the right to freedom, in particular freedom of expression and obstacles that pervades, as it is a right that normally conflicts with other fundamental rights. Furthermore, clarify the relevance of the free expression of ideas and opinions for the evolution of society. Among the impasses suffered, this work will emphasize the Law Project No. 504/20 of the State of São Paulo and how this suggestion of amendment violates the fundamental rights of the individual, in particular the right to freedom of expression and the constitutional guarantees of the community LGBTQIA+. The work was carried out using the deductive method and bibliographical research.
This article links the materialist tradition with contemporary debates about labor, in the area of feminist and gender theories. In particular, it focuses on discussions about the value of labor traditionally performed by women and the difficulties involved in their full recognition. Certain locus - double shift, sociosexual division of labor, invisibility - reappear insistently and cross different periods, allowing a diachronic approach that shows both the lucidity of the arguments of classical feminists such as the validity of these problems and the need for their critique. This implies knotting economic and ethical dimensions - as Fraser says, problems of redistribution, recognition and representation- that ultimately lead to a reflection on social justice.
Intellectual humility as an epistemology of virtue
I reflect on intellectual humility, problematizing it from an epistemological perspective of virtue and its relationship with the production and dissemination of knowledge in academic and scientific life, and some other complications that it faces such as arrogance, vanity and intellectual servility.
From a Foucauldian perspective, discourse analysis implies an archeological and genealogical evaluation; therefore, this article addresses the main aspects that must be assessed to unveil the intentionality, directionality and historical a priori of propositions within the discourse in order to determine how the regime of truth is constructed within a context and to evaluate the power effects that are produced.
Starting from two fundamental concepts in the Hindu tradition (jñāna and vijñāna), our article focuses on the philosophy of Śrī Aurobindo (1872-1950), conceived as Pūrṇādvaita, an integral non-dualism in which jñānayoga, the path of knowledge, of gnosis, acquires a particular form. The supreme knowledge (jñāna), knowledge of the ātman that is Brahman (ātmajñāna, brahmavidyā), is a liberating knowledge, but in this vision it is an integral knowledge that not only accesses the realization of the ultimate Reality, but also to the direct perception of the enormous richness of the structures and dynamics of the multidimensional Cosmos. In this way, jñāna, the white gnosis (the realization of the ultimate Identity, of the brahman saccidānanda) unfolds in rainbow gnosis (vijñāna, in Śrī Aurobindo’s terminology) encompassing the direct, supramental knowledge of the three worlds of the manifestation. This comprehensive knowledge liberates, but not necessarily from the body, but in the body. Not necessarily from saṃsāra, but inside the saṃsāra.
The cultivation of prana in classical sāṃkhya
This essay provides a philosophical reading of the notion of prāṇa by showing its ethical dimension in Sāṃkhya philosophy, especially as it appears in the commentary called Yuktidīpikā (8th C.E.). It concludes with a reflection on the implications this notion has for a post-pandemic ethics.
This article investigates the interrelation of two frames of representation about yoga in the Mahābhārata: as a magic power to control reality and as a technique to die in an attitude of emancipative renunciation. To that end, the article analyzes the story of young Śuka (12.309-320). Based on selected key passages translated for the first time into Spanish, it is shown that the story reconciles different visions about yoga, projecting thus an image of harmonic totality in which narrative plays a crucial role, ignored to date. Hence, conceived as the perfect model, Śuka’s yoga is an ideal point of entry to explore the relations between yoga, philosophy and literature in classical India.
The god Śiva embodies time and immortality, desire and the sublimation of desire, death and the power that the yogi has to conquer it; For this reason, the god of ascetics is at the same time the limit imposed by nature and the hidden power in that same nature, capable of exceeding its own limits. Kāla, the Hindu god of time, makes us mature and then swallows us, devouring himself. But he can also die from a stroke of impatience, when he awakens the fiery fury of the god Śiva, conqueror of death (mṛtyunjāya) and lord of time (mahākāla). When this happens, mortals implore Śiva to bring him back to life, for time is synonymous with vital breath (prāṇabhuta). The purāṇic literature shows, through sympathetic narrative plots, the contrary reactions that the experience of time elicits in us: when Kāla is associated with Māyā, he can make us experience an instant as if it were years. In addition, the cyclical experience of reincarnation reverses the logical order of relationships, since the child may be wiser, and older than her own parents.
The pandemic, and its first visible consequences, put man at a kind of crossroads that he cannot ignore and that requires reorientation options. The arcane world of Indian literature makes available its symbolic capacity to re-signify itself in the historical course; to this end, we propose to resort to the virtuous knowledge of the oriental tradition to corroborate its passage and its renewal in the author’s headquarters or in the mouth of the anonymous people. We will consider here a reading in relation to the story of Queen Savitrî from the Mahâbhârata and its continuity in two times: in Greek visión, Euripides’ Alcestis and in marvelous visión The Sleeping Beauty of the Forest, according to the text of Perrault and the Brothers Grimm, all through the sieve of the figure of Orpheus.
The motto of the Delphic oracle, γνῶθι σεαυτόν (nosce te ipsum, “know thyself”), has enjoyed an immense fortune in Western philosophical culture; among the early Greek thinkers it became particularly associated with Socrates as we know him through Plato, who mentions the motto in connection with Socrates’ attitude to philosophical enquiry in no less than five dialogues (Philebus, Phædrus, Charmides, Protagoras, Timaeus, Alcibiades I). On the other side, exhortations to know (one’s) self are rife in the Indian Upaniṣads, beginning with Yājñavalkya’s famous admonishment to his beloved “philosophical” wife, Maitreyī, that the ātman alone should be contemplated, listened to, reflected and meditated upon. But what is the “self” which is the object of the quest in both philosophical traditions? On the Indian side, its equation with the spiritual principle is more straightforward, since the term ātman covers at once both the function as the reflexive pronoun and the meaning of “soul”. On the Greek side, on the other hand, the equation of tò autó with psychḗ is not immediately apparent, and must be gained through philosophical investigation. In both traditions, however, access to the real essence of the ātman/psychḗ is difficult to obtain through rational discourse, and extra-rational devices are sometimes resorted to in order to assist and catalyze the theoretical insight. Among them, surprisingly enough, the metaphor of the pupil of the eye, named equivalently kórē and kanīnikā in either language, is applied on very similar terms in the story of Prajāpati’s teaching to Indra and Virocana narrated in the eighth chapter of the Chāndogya Upaniṣad and in Socrates’ instruction to Alcibiades in the dialogue named after the latter.
The origins and consequences of four essentialist aspects of the “Vedic-Hindu” world picture in antiquity are analyzed: 1. Organic and unbroken evolution. 2. Hegemony. 3. An evolution without contact or participation in common components with other religious currents. 4. Isolation from the outside of the Subcontinent.
Usually in the academic world that deals with the tought of India, it is normal affirm that in the four Vedas there is no philosophy. We would have to wait for the emergence of the Upaniṣad for us to be before the philosophical phenomenon, a phenomenon that would later develop the six classical dars̓anas. However, a reading of the Ṛg Veda shows us a series hymns before which we can seriously ask ourselves to what extent what we read there is no genuine philosophy.
Introduction: Perhaps not even the gods know
Leo Löwenthal and Herbert Marcuse: Friendship as a Redemptive Utopia
On October 28, 2021, Professor Jansen gave a lecture based on an English version of this text (authored by himself and Professor Engel) in the Mini Auditorium of the Faculty of Letters at the University of Costa Rica. During the social media broadcast, while the speaker read, the text translated into Spanish was projected on the screen. We present it here, with slight variations, to the reading public.
La filosofía política de Ayn Rand (tesis doctoral). Luca Moratal Roméu (Madrid: E-prints complutense, 2021. 417 páginas)
Hegel y el poder. Ensayo sobre la amabilidad. Byung-Chul Han (Barcelona: Editorial Herder, 2019, 160 páginas
Karl Marx, Historian of Social Times and Spaces. George García-Quesada (Leiden: Brill, colección Historical Materialism, 2021. 190 páginas)