Philosophical Alternatives 3/2026

Nina Dimitrova (Professor, DSc at Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences)
Eros and Thanatos: Bulgarian Interpretations (First Half of the 20th Century)
https://doi.org/10.58945/NBCK8878
Abstract: The article is an attempt to highlight the philosophical-anthropological approach to the themes of love and death in Bulgarian humanities from the first half of the 20th century by examining texts of diverse nature (from the fields of natural philosophy, sociology, psychology, psychoanalysis, cultural studies, theology), close to a broadly understood philosophy of man. The variety of interpretations is a necessary complement to philosophical developments on both topics.
Keywords: philosophical anthropology; folk psychology; philosophy of love, philosophy of death; natural philosophy

Stanul Grozev (Senior Assistant Professor at Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences)
Ivan Sarailiev on Truth
https://doi.org/10.58945/LQJK3367
Abstract: This article focuses on one key concept in Ivan Sarailiev's (1887–1969) work – the question of truth – and briefly outlines the results of an initial research upon his outlook on the subject. Truth is one of the most difficult questions in philosophy, and in order to solve the problem, philosophers must first acknowledge the existence of different types of truths requiring different explanations. While Sarailiev sympathized with human truths and criticized philosophers who denied the possibility of achieving absolute truth in 1938, in his later texts from 1955, he acknowledges the need for a little skepticism. Distinguishing philosophical truth from truths in science and everyday life, he sides categorically with human truths. Those are truths that are limited and incomplete, but sufficient for the needs of life here and now.
Keywords: Ivan Sarailiev; truth; pragmatism; types of truth

Georgi Belogashev (Associate Professor at Veliko Tarnovo University “St. St. Cyril and Methodius”)
Masses in History Through Asen Ignatov's Theoretical Discourse
https://doi.org/10.58945/QGLK3206
Abstract: The article explores Ignatov's scientific interest in the place of the broad human masses in the structure of socio-historical reality. Ignatov's analyses of the positions of classical Marxism are examined from the perspective of their dispute with representatives of the Russian Narodniks, as well as the positions of leading Bulgarian thinkers – Pasmanik, Mikhalchev, on this issue. Ignatov's own position on the role of the broad human masses in the construction of history is presented.
Keywords: Ignatov; broad human masses; socio-historical reality; classical Marxism; Marx; Engels; Plekhanov; Blagoev; Pavlov; Russian Narodniks; Herzen; Chernyshevsky; Tkachev; Pasmanik; Mihalchev

Ivana Baltova (Supporter of Remkeanism, active contributor to the Philosophical Review journal)
Philosophy in Bulgaria in the 20th Century
https://doi.org/10.58945/ENBO7685
Abstract: This text provides a brief overview of the history of philosophy in Bulgaria and is one of the few works on this subject from the interwar period. Information about the author is scarce. She belongs to the Rehmkean school, which was founded by Dimitar Mikhalchev in Bulgaria. The article emphasises both Mikhalchev's contribution and the inclusion of women in philosophical thought.
Keywords: history of philosophical thought; Bulgaria; interwar period; Bulgarian Rehmkean school

Tsvetanka Goranova (Senior Assistant Professor at Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences)
The Relationship between Ethnography and National Economic Knowledge according to the Understandings of Todor Vladigerov
https://doi.org/10.58945/KGIP1658
Abstract: The study examines the views of economist Todor Vladigerov, from the early 1940s, on the relationship between ethnographic science and farm managing/economic knowledge, through a scientific analysis of two of his studies: the article Ethnography as a source of farm managing/economic knowledge and the study Agrarian relations in Bulgaria. Ethnographic research. It is shown that the Bulgarian scientist develops a special national or ethnographic approach in the work of the farm manager/economist and the economic historian.
Keywords: Bulgarian Nation Studies; Narodouka; ethnological knowledge; ethnography; political economy; national economic; knowledge national economist; managed economy; identity of the people; national essences; historical-economic categories; economic laws; abstract method; induction and deduction

Oreoluwa Idris Adesanya, Solomon Kolawole Awe (Lecturer at the Department of Philosophy, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, with Adjunct positions at Kola Daisi University and Major Seminary of Saints Peter and Paul, Bodija, Ibadan, Nigeria; Lecturer at the Department of Philosophy, Osun State University, Osogbo, Ikire Campus, Osun State, Nigeria)
Ngugi Wa Thiong’o and the Challenge of Linguistic Extroversion in African Philosophy: Some Critical Comments
https://doi.org/10.58945/SKNT8636
Abstract: The crisis of knowledge production in Africa is attributed to the challenge of linguistic extroversion, which is connected to the gradual marginalisation of endogenous belief systems and practices that animated life before the advent of colonialism. Language serves as the carrier of the burdens of a culture; as such, the marginalisation of a particular language ultimately results in the eventual oblivion of the epistemic frameworks it captures. Paulin Hountondji associates scientific extroversion with the embrace of foreign or European languages in facilitating research in Africa. At the same time, Ngugi wa Thiong’o advocates the use of African languages in generating and expressing philosophical ideas in Africa. Kwasi Wiredu, in his project on conceptual decolonisation in African philosophy, also maintains that philosophically pregnant words in African indigenous languages should be studied within the conceptual frameworks of such languages, without the imposition of foreign lenses or concepts. For Moses Makinde and A.G.A. Bello, overemphasising the authenticity and genuineness of using indigenous languages to analyse and capture Africans’ realities and experiences will restrain the bridge of intellectual communication, not only among African scholars but also with the world at large. As such, African indigenous languages cannot wholly capture the gamut and totality of African realities and philosophical contexts. Kazeem Fayemi categorises these two camps as Conservatives and Progressives. Therefore, this paper argues that to challenge the dominance of expressing African ideas, thoughts, and narratives solely through foreign languages and conceptual frameworks, it is essential to prioritise and emphasise the development of philosophical glossaries and vocabularies in African languages. This will allow for a clear and explicit expression of African thoughts within the conceptual frameworks created by Africans.
Keywords: Linguistic extroversion; Africa; knowledge; language; traditionalism; modernism

Asaju Olusola Ayomide (Assistant Professor, PhD at Оbafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria)
Therapeutic Cloning and the Moral Justification of Human Cloning
https://doi.org/10.58945/HFXR5135
Abstract: The debate about the ethics of Human Cloning (HC) is common among bioethicists, religious scholars, physicians inter alia. One of the major problems has been how to justify HC by including considerations about human dignity and society values. The ethical and metaphysical issues also applied. This is because HC has the potential to reinforce and violate human dignity and societal equality. In this paper, we aim to argue that HC can be morally justified without the violation of human dignity and societal equality as a whole. In doing this, the societal value and utilitarian argument will be deployed to demonstrate the moral justification of HC for the societal good. The paper will conclude that HC can be successfully justified through the societal value and utilitarian principal arguments without violating human dignity and societal good.
Keywords: Human Cloning; Genetics; Ethics; Societal good; Utilitarian Principle

Plamen Antov (Professor, DSc at Institute for Literature, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences)
Proto-Ecological Ideas About Nature From a Poetic-Philosophical Perspective (Thoreau⸺Baudelaire)
https://doi.org/10.58945/UQNV5647
Abstract: The article starts from a comparative plot: the understanding of nature (in the image of the forest) in the French post-romantic-symbolist poet Ch. Baudelaire and the American transcendentalist philosopher H. D. Thoreau. Direct reading subjects are the sonnet “Correspondence” from The Flowers of Evil (1857) and Walden, or Life in the Woods (1854). Their contemporaneity is only a starting point to search for other, deeper and more essential, philosophical closenesses, but also distances-in-closeness in view of the extremely different contexts – of Thoreau’s “Americanness” (in the immediate context of the so-called American Renaissance around the middle of the 19th century, of American philosophical transcendentalism and American literary romanticism) and Baudelaire’s symbolism. The emphasis in the comparison is on Thoreau – his intermediate/mixing position in thinking about nature: between transcendence (“correspondences”) and sensory reality. Auxiliary – contextualizing and medial – figures in the comparison are: Swedenborg, Emerson, A. von Humboldt, and in a different, including methodological, sense – Heidegger.
Keywords: Thoreau; Baudelaire; Emerson; Swedenborg; American transcendentalism; American Renaissance; “correspondences”; symbol; philosophy of nature; ecology; Deep Ecology; Heidegger

Juliana Hicheva (PhD student at Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences)
Art Between Techne and “Aura”
https://doi.org/10.58945/AUKW5916
Abstract: This article examines the evolving relationship between technology and art through a dialogue between philosophical reflection and artistic practice. Beginning with Heidegger’s interpretation of the ancient notion of techne—as a mode of revealing rather than mere craftsmanship—it follows the conceptual trajectory through Lyotard’s notion of the technologos and his tripartite model of memory, to Benjamin’s concept of the “aura” and his critique of technical reproducibility. Across these perspectives, technology emerges not simply as a tool, but as a condition that transforms both perception and creation in art. The reflection culminates in an analysis of the work of Nam June Paik, the pioneer of video art, whose integration of technological media into poetic form reveals how the mechanical can become a site of aesthetic and spiritual resonance.
Keywords: τεχνη; logos; technologos; memory; aura; art; video art

Tatyana Batuleva (Professor, DSc at Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences)
Information Technology: Between Utopia and Reality
https://doi.org/10.58945/TGQI1560
Abstract: This essay reflects on the ambivalent nature of information technology and its conflicting optimistic and pessimistic interpretations. Emphasis is placed on the new forms of control and manipulation of information described by Christopher Pollmann in his book “Le Totalitarisme informatique” (2024) as “decentralized surveillance” and “generalized self-surveillance.” Attention is drawn to the possibility of erasing various aspects of the human; General Artificial Intelligence as a potential ally of neoliberalism (E. Morozov); as well as the role of transforming science into a business and the loss of its public component (I. Shnurenko) through the lens of scientometrics.
Keywords: information technology; digital totalitarianism; General Artificial Intelligence