Help for Typhoon Ondoy Victims in the Philippines

We are posting this on behalf of our hundreds and thousands of Kababayans who were, and still are, displaced by the wrath of Typhoon Ondoy, whose lives literally changed in just a few hours. Please consider sending your donations via the links below.

From http://www.google.com/landing/typhoon-ondoy.html: On September 26, 2009, Typhoon Ondoy brought a month’s worth of rainfall to Metro Manila and nearby areas in just a few hours, causing severe flooding which resulted in the loss of many lives and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people. This site compiles relevant information about the disaster, including a volunteer-maintained map of persons needing rescue and a list of relief organizations accepting donations, so that more help can be provided where it is needed. You can also keep track of the latest news on Google News and YouTube.

If you wish to “flood” in your donations, please visit the following links:

http://inquirer.net/specialreports/ondoyreliefdrive/

http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/nation/09/27/09/tropical-storm-ondoy-how-you-can-help

http://www.gmanews.tv/story/173288/update-list-of-verified-relief-centers-for-ondoy-victims

OUR SINCEREST THANK YOU!!!

CONF: A World Without Politics 2009, KU Leuven, Belgium

*A World Without Politics*
www.worldwithoutpolitics.be<http://www.worldwithoutpolitics.be/>

September 17-20th 2009
Higher Institute for Philosophy, Leuven, Belgium

All events are free. For any questions please contact Dr. Anya Topolski.
Registration (by September 11th) is required by e-mail: anyatopolski@hiw.kuleuven.be<mailto:anyatopolski@hiw.kuleuven.be>

As a result of globalization, international political structures are rapidly changing. The emerging world order is characterized by a growing and complex network of regional and transnational institutions which shape an increasingly interconnected global order in a way that undermines the sovereign independence of increasingly impotent and outdated nation-states. Because of the growing importance of international law and because of the technocratic nature of these new institutions, the emergence of the global governance structure has often been analyzed as a process of depoliticization. Whereas politics is supposed to be about a visible, organized and ongoing struggle for power, the very concept of governance, as a form of “government without opposition”, seems to refer to a bureaucratic and consensualistic way of organizing society. Although some have hailed the increasing reliance on law, expert knowledge and consensus as a reinforcement of democracy, others have argued that the process of depoliticization helps to conceal the true power relations underlying the global structure and contributes to the disempowerment of citizens world wide in their attempts to shape the global order in a democratically legitimized manner.  It is the purpose of this conference to analyze the alleged depoliticization of the global order and to reflect on the ways in which this process affects the prospects of some form of global democracy.

Thursday September 17th

11u00   Opening and welcome by the Dean Prof. Antoon Vandevelde

11u40   1st Lecture – Joshua Cohen (Stanford) and Charles Sabel (Columbia)
“Global public reason: in defense of the banausic conception of politics”

13u00   Lunch

14u00   2nd Lecture – Etienne Balibar (Nanterre/Irvine)
“Strangers or Enemies? On the impolitical dimensions of Global Governance”

15u40   Boaventura de Sousa Santos (Coimbra)

20u00   Chantal Mouffe (Westminster)
“Which democracy for an agonistic multipolar world?”

Friday September 18th

10u00   Jean Cohen (Columbia)
“Legality and/or Legitimacy in global Governance: the Dilemmas of Political Justice”

11u40   Junior Session I
Matthias Lievens (Leuven) – “Carl Schmitt and the Specter of a Deterritorialized Politics”
16u20   Annelies Degryse (Leuven)
“Is a World without  Politics already a Fact? Politics according to Arendt”

13u00   Lunch

14u00   Andreas Kalyvas (New School for Social Research, NY)
“World Empire and Global Anomie in Carl Schmitt’s Political Theory of International Law. ”

16u20   Junior Session II (3 parallel sessions)

18u00   Conference Dinner

Saturday September 19th

10u00   Stefan Rummens (Leuven/Nijmegen)
“From governance to government? Representative institutions and democratic legitimacy in the global society”

11u40   Margaret Moore (Queen’s University)
“Global democracy and collective forms of self-determination”

13u00   Closing Lunch/Reception
–
Dr. Anya Topolski
Center for Ethical, Political and Social Theory
KULeuven – University of Leuven
Parkstraat 45, Box 3602, 3000 Leuven, BELGIUM
tel. +32.16.323262
fax. +32.16.323088

Apologies for the relatively long hiatus . . .

Hi Folks,

As you all have noticed, Gawaing-Pilosopo has been in a relatively long hiatus for several months. The creator-cum-Webmaster of the bulletin board has been tied to several important commitments and is currently preoccupied with a research project which will probably consume him for an indefinite period of time. For this, he would like to extend his sincere apologies to those whose announcements were not posted and to those whose emails were not answered.

Gawaing-Pilosopo started last year as an experiment and, in its own little way, has proven itself to be of good use to the Filipino philosophical community. This is based on the number of event announcements, emails, and feedback that we have so far received. This in itself is enough reason to continue on with our mission of disseminating useful information to our fellow Filipino philosophers, in view of our vision of expanding our philosophical horizons and to forge, in our very own humble way, a more inclusive and open community.

The creator of Gawaing-Pilosopo has asked some of his friends to take over the management of the bulletin board. We are happy to announce that the communication lines are again open and that you can forward to us announcements for future events, scholarships, conferences, workshops, publications, etc. you wanted posted and disseminated.

Thank you for your attention and we hope that you’ll continue to find the bulletin board useful for your purposes.

The Gawaing-Pilosopo Team

Ranhilio Aquino reports on the UNESCO World Day of Philosophy, 20 Nov. Ateneo de Manila University

A symposium on Power and Rights organized by professor Rainier Ibana of Ateneo de Manila University and professor Sedfrey Candelaria of its human rights center marked Unesco World Day of Philosophy on Nov. 20. I accepted the gracious invitation to be on the panel of discussants that included Dr. Leovino Garcia, Fr. Luis David, SJ and Dr. Florentino Hornedo, among others. Aside from expressing his irritation at having to be asked to speak ahead of me (as my bus from Tuguegarao did not allow me to be at Loyola Heights on time for the affair’s commencement), professor Jose David Lapuz regaled the audience of academics and human rights advocates with not-so-kind remarks over one or the other holding of Justice Learned Hand (Lapuz wondered how learned his hand was!) and rhetorical appeals to eschew philosophy for the more quotidian concerns about the plight of the hungry and the homeless. It took Leo Garcia to remind him that it was philosophy day and we had been invited precisely to philosophize.

Click here to read the rest of the essay.

Annual Philosophy Day at the Ateneo de Manila University

The Annual Philosophy Day will be celebrated this year in the Philippines by the UNESCO National Commission’s Social and Human Sciences Sector on Nov 20, 2008 at the Ateneo de Manila University’s Social Development Complex Auditorium with two round-table discussions on “Power and Rights” along with a special discussion on children and environmental rights from 8:00am-3:00pm. Confirmed panelists include Dr. Leovino Ma. Garcia, Fr. Rannie Aquino, Dr. Fernando Zialcita, Prof. David Lapuz, Dr. Florentino Hornedo, Dr. Lukas Kaelin and several human rights lawyers.

This conference is free but we can only accommodate the first 100 pre-registrants due to the limited capacity of the venue. Please confirm your participation by sending the attached preregistration form to the UNESCO National Commission (02) 8318873. Certificates of appearance and participation will be distributed to interested participants by the Secretariat after the conference.

Rainier A. Ibana
2008 Philosophy Day Conference Director
UNESCO National Commission of the Philippines

Interesting result from Google Trends

What is Google Trends?

“With Google Trends, you can compare the world’s interest in your favorite topics. Enter up to five topics and see how often they’ve been searched on Google over time. Google Trends also shows how frequently your topics have appeared in Google News stories, and in which geographic regions people have searched for them most” (from Google Trends About Page).

When you type the word “philosophy” on the Search Trends box (http://www.google.com/trends) then hit enter, the result shows that most requests for the word “philosophy” come from the Philippines:

http://www.google.com/trends?q=philosophy

Perhaps statistics, indeed, does not really map out with reality, given the so called “eclipse” of philosophy in the Philippines.  It would be interesting to read different opinions on this.  Cheers!

Message from the COMIUCAP 2008 organizing committee

Dear COMIUCAP Conference Participants!

It has been nearly a week since the conference ended, and I’m writing you now to share the official results of the feedback you kindly provided through the evaluation forms.

Overall, at least 250 professors and students of philosophy from over 20 countries spanning 5 continents participated in the conference, exceeding the organizers’ target of 150 participants. Of these, 157 delegates (a majority at 63%) gave their feedback.

Based on a rating scale of 1.0 to 5.0, with 1.0 as ‘Poor’ and 5.0 as ‘Excellent’, the 2008 COMIUCAP World Congress achieved an overall average score of 4.0! The breakdown of this score is as follows:

o Communications & Promotions 3.8
o Registration & Fees 4.0
o Program & Logistics 4.1
o Lectures & Workshops 4.1
o Overall Experience 4.2

Most notably, the item on the evaluation sheet that garnered the highest average score at 4.5 was the item “Was the conference worth attending?” Hence, based on the quantitative feedback, we can make the claim that the 2008 COMIUCAP World Congress was truly a success — and it was a success that would NOT have been possible without each and every one of you. Hence, THANK YOU truly for being part of this event.

Having said that, the feedback you provided also indicated several areas that could have been handled better. Hence, to all of you who experienced some dissatisfaction with how the conference was conducted, we do offer our sincerest apologies and we hope you do not take it against our respective host institutions. Any errors we committed belong to us (as the organizers) alone. To those of you who have taken the time and effort to give us your appreciation and acknowledgment, we offer our gratitude.

Just a brief note on the people who worked behind the scenes to make this conference possible — I would like to mention that EVERYTHING was done without professional help in a span of just three months. Every single task – from designing the streamers and developing the website to translating the foreign language papers — was done by the men and women of the Ateneo de Manila University’s philosophy department with the assistance of the philosophy faculty of the University of Santo Tomas. Furthermore, all of these tasks were undertaken without compensation, on top of people’s regular teaching and/or studying loads, and in the weeks leading up to the conference, at the expense of most of the faculty’s and staff’s sleeping hours. So if you should encounter any of these brave souls, I do hope you give them a word of acknowledgment for all the difficulties willingly borne.

And of course, should any of you continue to have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to get in touch with me via this email address. If, for instance, you are interested in viewing the detailed evaluation form results and findings, I can email them to you upon request.

Once again, thank you very much for your unique contribution in making the 2008 COMIUCAP World Congress happen — it was a privilege to be of service to you.

And I continue to remain in your service.
Eileen F. Tupaz
Conference Coordinator
COMIUCAP World Congress 2008 Manila

c/o Department of Philosophy
School of Humanities
2/F De la Costa Hall
Ateneo de Manila University
Loyola Heights, Quezon City
Philippines 1108
Telefax: +63 2 426 5665
Email: comiucap@admu.edu.ph
Website: www.comiucapmanila.tk

Filipinos studying at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven)

Dear colleagues,

We are the current coordinators for FUSE-Leuven, the association of Filipino students studying in the Flemish town of Leuven in Belgium. We organize monthly weekend get-togethers where Filipino, Belgian, and other international students can relax and socialize while enjoying good food and a few drinks.

We have recently created a website where one can find a calendar of FUSE-Leuven and university activities, photos of our gatherings, gospel reflections, some information about Belgium, Leuven, and the university, and some tips that might be helpful to those planning to come to Leuven. You can check the website out by clicking on this link:

http://fuseleuven.multiply.com

We have set this website up for our members but also so as to be of help to Filipinos thinking of studying in Leuven. In connection with this, we would like to ask you to forward this information to anyone you know who may find the website useful. Please note too that if you have questions about living and studying in Leuven, you can email us at fuse_leuven@yahoo.com and we will try our best to answer your questions and/or help you find the information you are looking for.

Thank you very much for your kind attention.

Regards,
Renante Pilapil (PhD in Philosophy)
Maricel Ibita (PhD in Theology)
April Capili (PhD in Philosophy)

(Thank you to April Capili for the permission to repost)

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Shrug, Smirk, or Snarl

Here’s a link to a transcript of GMA’s SONA 2008.

You may choose to read it, then feel free to shrug, smirk, or snarl!

(Don’t hesitate to leave your comments)