The early philosophical standpoint of Professor Bogusław Wolniewicz alluded mainly to the so-called first philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, as expressed in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Professor Wolniewicz’s views have found their expressions, first, in the book (in Polish) Things and Facts. An introduction to the first philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein (1968), and finally in his monograph (in Polish) Ontology of Situations. Foundations and Applications (1985). In both cases, Wolniewicz’ standpoint has been expressed by giving a substantive interpretation to semiotical and logical concepts (i.e. by producing hypostases). This practice looks rather dubious to me, in both cases, although I hope that ontology of situations can be usefully treated as a general formal theory of semantical correlates characteristic for sentential statements.
In the opinion of Bogusław Wolniewicz (1927–2017), Wittgenstein in his Tractatus presented a new metaphysics – a modern ‘metaphysics of facts’, in opposition to the traditional ‘metaphysics of substance’ (Aristotle) or to the ‘metaphysics of things’ (Tadeusz Kotarbiński’s ‘reism’). The new metaphysics describes, just like the old ones did, the structure of the world. First, it refers to the world as a whole, seeing in it an actualization of one of numerous possible worlds. It also refers to the elementary unit of world-structure, which is an ‘atomic fact’ (an independent unit, though at the same time not the simplest one, since it involves further ‘simple objects’). Those concepts of ‘world’, ‘atom’ and ‘possible beings’ make the system of Tractatus ‘metaphysics’, comparable to the Aristotle’s metaphysics of ‘form’ and ‘matter’. In Tractatus, the Aristotelian ‘matter’ turns into ‘simple objects’, while ‘form’ becomes a form of ‘fact’. In this view, the world is conceived as a set of facts and equals a particular choice made from the universe of possible situations. But one element is missing in Wittgenstein’s system, namely, the ‘efficient cause’ responsible for the choice of facts (actualization of possibilities). Leibniz believed there was a ‘sufficient reason’ why a particular choice was made among possible situations and one possible world has become real. This ‘sufficient reason’ finally turned out to be God’s rational will. In Wolniewicz’s late philosophy however, the ‘efficient cause’ is only ‘fate’ or ‘chance’ (τύχη). Fate is therefore the mysterious deus absconditus of Wittgenstein’s metaphysics.
Formalization of a set of beliefs expressed in one language consists in translating them into sentences of another language. The characteristic property of a good formalization is that the target language is correctly chosen and the translations precisely reflect the meaning of the original sentences. In the paper a formalization of ontology of situations (given by Professor Bogusław Wolniewicz) is discussed. I argue that this is an example of a perfect solution of the problem.
Rzeczy Piękne [Beautiful Things] (1918–1932) was a monthly publication of the Adrian Baraniecki Municipal Industrial Museum in Cracow. Among its distinctive features were a sophisticated graphic layout and eye-catching initials. The latter are remarkable for one more reason. While decorative initials are usually associated with of book design, it is rare to find a set of artistic ornaments commissioned specially for a periodical. This study has shown that the initials owe their distinct character not only to the ideas of the arts and crafts association Warsztaty Krakowskie [Cracow Workshops] but also to an original and attractive technique of composition.
The article discusses the category of the option for the poor, by answering four key questions: 1) What is the option for the poor?; 2) Who are the poor?; 3) Why the option for the poor?; 4) How to opt? The category of the option for the poor emerged in Latin America at the turn of the 60s and 70s of the twentieth century, as the fruit of an audit of faith and the personal, communitarian, social and ecclesial life . The author defines the category according to the teaching of the bishops (Medellin and Puebla), to John Paul II and Latin-American theologians . He highlights the need for clarifying the meaning of poverty and the poor, specifically of the current theological understanding of these concepts . He then describes main theological reasons of the option for the poor: God’s plan of salvation; the theology of creation; human dignity; the mystery of sin; the phenomenon of poverty as a place of proving the fundamental statements about God and Jesus Christ; an ecclesiological significance of the option for the poor. In the last part of the paper the author quotes the Polish translation of the so-called The Pact of St. Domitilla Catacombs, which illustrates one of more promising ways of implementing that option in both personal and ecclesial life.