History is familiar with great scientific traditions which have been substantial, effective, cumulative and progressive.* At the level of great eras of civilization, extensive and not episodic phenomena, very ancient Chinese science, Greek science and Arab science are objects of investigation for historical erudition, but also for the scientific historian and the philosopher of sciences. Many of the elements of these systems were the source of “modern science”, as it is called, or are integral parts ol’ this system of knowledge and practice which has been constructed over a little more than three centuries. Diachronically, the “scientific revolution” of the classical age in Europe does not signify a total break with what preceded it: Chinese astronomy, Arab algebra and the hospital organization of the Islamic world were used, even if the ideology of scientists when they wrote their own history, particularly from the 19th century onward, tends to make of modern science a purely European phenomenon.

Lately, the issues of “transfer of technology” seem to have become fashionable. However, they cannot be considered at length until those of DEVELOPMENT are clarified: transfer of technology is a means, development is an end, and, if we are not careful, we risk—in all good faith—being carried away by the example of the development and techniques of the “Northern countries,” while the needs and possibilities of the “South” may be quite different.

Everybody knows nowadays that the degree of development is measured according to a certain number of criteria, of which the most important one, and initially the only one. was the Gross National Product (or G.N.P.) of each country, related to the number of inhabitants. The arbitrarily-settled line some twenty years ago between the rich and the poor or, as called at that time, the “underdeveloped”, was based at the level of 1000 U. S. dollars per capita. The expression was badly accepted by those it described, because development confers a dignity which cannot be refused to anybody. That is why the following euphemism appeared: “developing countries”, as promising as it is little compromising. Later on, this exclusively economical criterion was moderated by several additives, linked to social structure, to the rate of elimination of illiteracy, and even to cultural factors.

In recent years empiricism has been under persistent attack, and serious questions have been raised about the ability of empiricism to provide the basis for a viable philosophy of science. The attack has been sufficiently vigorous, and in some quarters sufficiently successful, that many now maintain that empiricism is dead. My aim in this paper is to argue that, rather than being ready for embalmment and emplacement in the museum of philosophic oddities, empiricism is very much alive, and the central thesis of empiricism remains the cornerstone for any viable philosophy of science. This is not to say that the recent attacks on empiricism have been without a point, rather, they have put anyone who would defend empiricism in the position of having to rethink many datails of the empiricist viewpoint. But it is the details, the way in which empiricism has been elaborated by its proponents, not the central empiricist insight, that must be reconsidered.

The terms “modem” and “modernity”, like many other terms in common use and of wide extension, are extremely complex. And a theory of modernity should have no other goal initially than to settle this polysemy in the hope of arriving at a sufficiently rigid definition that the “thing” itself can become the object of a clearer consideration. But what is the path toward this greater clarity?

In this age of “free-sex”, gurus, Hare-Krishna chanters and transcendental meditation teachers J. Кrisimamurti stands almost alone as a non-guru of outstanding grandeur. His lecture tours in major centers of the world remind one of the historical Buddha who reversed the Upanishadic tradition of teaching in a forest hermitage to a select few by travelling on foot from village to village in North-Eastern India to carry his message of love, compassion and understanding to the masses regardless of caste, color or sex. But historical comparisons are never complete. Whereas the Buddha used the local dialect, adapted his message to the intellectual level of his audience and made free use of stories and parables, Krishna-multi lectures in the English language in his intense analytic style to rapt audiences without any such aid. No wonder the Buddha's appeal and impact historically has been infinitely wider than that of Krishnamurti. And yet, both eschewed dogma, tradition and metaphysical subtleties, and deliberately refused to offer any sugar-coated pills and panaceas for overcoming the pervasive human condition of suffering. They endeavoured to make people “see” and “understand” the human condition in an act of total awareness so as to take them to the very brink of that “creative emptiness”, ultimate freedom and radical change which alone is conducive to the attainment of transcendent peace. In other words, the doctrine of Krishnamurti as that of the Buddha is not for the weak and effeminate who need “crutches” of all kinds but for those who have the courage to help themselves by an act of understanding the way things are without being entangled in theories and conceptual puzzles. It is the intention of this paper to analyze, understand and critically evaluate Krishamurti's concepts of self, action and freedom.

One of the most intriguing and painful anomalies of the modern world—so diffused that it has almost become a universal culture— is the incredible number of individuals and groups who kill, torture, burn, kidnap, imprison or merely outrage other people with a clear conscience when a political motive may be alleged. Added to them is the much larger number of people and institutions that tolerate, approve, encourage, praise and even bless that type of behavior when it occurs within a political context. Included in this generic political violence is „the kind of behavior that is much more serious and that we may call terrorist, the behavior of those who seek to impose their will through the commission of atrocities that sow a generalized terror or a panic fear, and then to manipulate the reactions these atrocities provoke. Here “private” terrorists, as well as “semi-state” and “state” terrorists commit acts that would not be tolerated in normal, non-political life, and the public that approves this conduct would never accept it if it occurred in everyday life.