Bartosz Brożek

• Professor of Law, Philosophy and Cognitive Science
• Professor (Full) at Jagiellonian University

There exist potential threats to the relevance of universities in the future. Space and methods for discussing and responding to these threats are needed. We recommend engaging the Una Europa community in creative methods of thought to tackle the threats.

This paper addresses the black-box problem in artificial intelligence (AI), and the related problem of explainability of AI in the legal context. We argue, first, that the black box problem is, in fact, a superficial one as it results from an overlap of four different – albeit interconnected – issues: the opacity problem, the strangeness problem, t...

Cumulative transmission and innovation are the hallmark properties of the cultural achievements of human beings. Cognitive scientists have traditionally explained these properties in terms of social learning and creativity. The non-social cognitive dimension of cumulative culture, the so-called technical reasoning, has also been accounted for recen...

Are the cognitive sciences relevant for law? How do they influence legal theory and practice? Should lawyers become part-time cognitive scientists? The recent advances in the cognitive sciences have reshaped our conceptions of human decision-making and behavior. Many claim, for instance, that we can no longer view ourselves as purely rational agent...

Are the cognitive sciences relevant for law? How do they influence legal theory and practice? Should lawyers become part-time cognitive scientists? The recent advances in the cognitive sciences have reshaped our conceptions of human decision-making and behavior. Many claim, for instance, that we can no longer view ourselves as purely rational agent...

Are the cognitive sciences relevant for law? How do they influence legal theory and practice? Should lawyers become part-time cognitive scientists? The recent advances in the cognitive sciences have reshaped our conceptions of human decision-making and behavior. Many claim, for instance, that we can no longer view ourselves as purely rational agent...

The numerical distance effect (it is easier to compare numbers that are further apart) and size effect (for a constant distance, it is easier to compare smaller numbers) characterize symbolic number processing. However, evidence for a relationship between these two basic phenomena and more complex mathematical skills is mixed. Previously this relat...

The numerical distance effect (it is easier to compare numbers that are further apart) and size effect (for a constant distance, it is easier to compare smaller numbers) characterize the analogue number magnitude representation. However, evidence for a relationship between these two basic phenomena and more complex mathematical skills is mixed. Pre...

The paper addresses the question whether artificial intelligences can be moral agents. We begin by observing that philosophical accounts of moral agency, in particular Kantianism and utilitarianism, are very abstract theoretical constructions: no human being can ever be a Kantian or a utilitarian moral agent. Ironically, it is easier for a machine...

We propose some kind of the theory of the Mathematical Subject.

In this chapter I argue that the relation of supervenience is insufficient to account for the normative dimension of the law. I begin by analyzing in some detail the traditional ways of relating normative (especially legal) and non-normative (natural) facts or properties: separation and reduction. Having identified their flaws, I consider the possi...

The paper concerns the problem of the legal responsibility of autonomous machines. In our opinion it boils down to the question of whether such machines can be seen as real agents through the prism of folk-psychology. We argue that autonomous machines cannot be granted the status of legal agents. Although this is quite possible from purely technica...

In this paper I argue that the concept of person as utilized in legal and ethical discourse has no stable meaning, which often leads to premature conclusions and confusion. I identify three different ways of philosophical understanding of ‘person’ – the classical, the psychological and the ethical. I further observe that in the law the term is used...

The present collection represents an attempt to bring together several contributions to the ongoing debate pertaining to supervenience of the normative in law and morals and strives to be the first work that addresses the topic comprehensively. It addresses the controversies surrounding the idea of normative supervenience and the philosophical conc...

A collection of essays devoted to the problem of explanation in various disciplines of science and humanities: mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, neuroscience, and economics. The issues covered include such topics as the interplay between explanation and understanding, the problem of a priori explanation, the limits of causal explanations in...

While mathematically impaired individuals have been shown to have deficits in all kinds of basic numerical representations, among them spatial-numerical associations, little is known about individuals with exceptionally high math expertise. They might have a more abstract magnitude representation or more flexible spatial associations, so that no au...

The goal of the paper is to reply to David Duarte’s critique of the partial reducibility thesis―a claim I defended in one of my books that analogy is partly reducible to the balancing of legal principles. In the first part of the paper I sketch the framework against which the thesis was formulated, i.e. Robert Alexy’s theory of legal reasoning. In...

In this paper it has been argued that the theory of conceptual maps developed recently by Paul M. Churchland provides support for Wittgenstein’s claim that language is a tool for acting in the world. The role of language is to coordinate and shape the conceptual maps of the members of the given language community, reducing the cross-individual cogn...

The goal of the paper is to reply to David Duarte’s critique of the partial reducibility thesis―a claim I defended in one of my books that analogy is partly reducible to the balancing of legal principles. In the first part of the paper I sketch the framework against which the thesis was formulated, i.e. Robert Alexy’s theory of legal reasoning. In...

This article outlines the contributions of the Kraków School to the field of science and religion. The Kraków School is a group of philosophers, scientists, and theologians who belong to the milieu of the Copernicus Center for Interdisciplinary Studies. The members of the group are engaged in inquiries pertaining to the relationship between theolog...

My goal in this short paper is to argue that so-called intermediary concepts play an essential role in organizing and generating legal knowledge. My point of departure is a reconstruction and a critique of Alf Ross’s analysis of such concepts. His goal was to argue that there exist concept in the law which have no semantic reference, yet it is reas...

In a series of essays published from the late 1920s up to the mid-1960s, Hans Kelsen carries out a radical critique of natural law theory. The present paper purports to provide an analytical reconstruction and a critical assessment of the Kelsenian critique. It contains two parts. Part one surveys the fundamentals of Kelsen’s argumentative strategy...

Miracles: A Logical Perspective * T here is an extensive bibliography devoted to the problem of miracles. 1 It is not our goal to analyze those works, particularly as they offer diverse definitions of miracles depending on the accepted conceptual scheme, such as Aristotelian ontology. Our goal is less ambitious: by adopting two explications of the...

A collection of essays on the current neuroscientific, psychological, and philosophical research on emotions (The Introduction is included in the attached file)

A collection of essays on the current neuroscientific, psychological, and philosophical research on emotions

This essay has three interrelated goals. First, I venture to show that some insights from hermeneutic philosophy pertaining to the process of interpretation may be rendered clearer and more explicit with the use of contemporary logical tools. Second, I attempt to construct an analytic theory of legal interpretation (and interpretation in general) a...

The work concerns the concept of a transcendental subject in Kant's philosophy and is part of a larger project, namely a book about a mathematical subject which has not been realized so far.

The aim of the paper is to evaluate the usefulness of W.V.O. Quine's criterion for establishing the ontological commitments of a theory. At the outset, Quine's conception is reconstructed. It is argued that Quine does not provide a particularly clear exposition of the procedure of establishing ontological commitments. It is further maintained that...

The aim of the paper is to show what the logical structure of reasoning by analogy in legal discourse is. Recently, two attempts - due to Brewer and Weinreb - have been made to explain analogical arguments. I criticize them both. Next, against the background of several examples, I reconstruct the general structure of analogy. The structure is taken...

The book is an attempt to analyze the discursive character of legal reasoning. I provide a broad logical framework for legal thinking, using defeasible logic. Then I consider various normative criteria of legal discourse and propose a general model of legal reasoning, as well as a more specific model of the application of law.

The book attempts to describe and criticize four methods used in legal practice, legal dogmatics and legal theory: logic, analysis, argumentation and hermeneutics. Apart from a presentation of basic ideas connected with the above mentioned methods, the essays contained in this book seek to answer questions concerning the assumptions standing behind...