This chapter contains sections titled: What Does Philosophy Have to Do with Science? Philosophical Issues in Scientific Practice Philosophical Issues in Scientific Foundations Conclusion References.

The practice of economic science is dominated by model building. To evaluate economic policy, models are built and used to produce numbers to inform us about economic phenomena. Although phenomena are detected through the use of observed data, they are in general not directly observable. To 'see' them we need instruments. More particularly, to obtain numerical facts of the phenomena we need measuring instruments. This paper will argue that in economics models function as such instruments of (...) observation, more specific as measuring instruments. In measurement theory, measurement is a mapping of some class of aspects of characteristics of the empirical world into a set of numbers. The paper's view is that economic modelling is a specific kind of mapping to which the standard account on how models are obtained and assessed does not apply. Models are not easily or simply derived from theories and subsequently tested against empirical data. Instruments are constructed by integrating several theoretical and empirical ideas and requirements in such a way that their performance meets a beforehand chosen standard. The empirical requirement is that the model should take account of the phenomenological facts, so that the reliability of the model is not assessed by post-model testing but obtained by calibration. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the rationality of law and legal decision making would be enhanced by a systematic attempt to recognize and respond to the implications of empirical uncertainty for policy making and decision making. Admission of uncertainty about the accuracy of facts and the validity of assumptions relied on to make inferences of fact is commonly avoided in law because it raises the spectre of paralysis of the capacity to decide issues authoritatively. The roots of this short-sighted (...) view are found in primitive mechanical models of relationships in the empirical and social world – those of objective causality and determinism. Insofar as it is believed that if we had sufficient data a clear and unequivocal answer would be available to each question, admission of uncertainty is seen as a sign of insufficiency, incompetence, impotence, and is avoided whenever a decision that must be seen to be based on valid reasons, cannot be avoided. Avoidance of some decisions, duplicity in others, is the result. -/- Decision-making must be restructured to recognize the provisional and context-bound validity and relevance of the models we use to conceptualize and order our understanding of phenomena, and to utilize this awareness as an instrument in the production of legal policies and decisions that will be authoritative precisely because they are honestly accurate and socially responsible. The paper makes a start on such a re-structuring of the legal process by exploring the implications of the observation that if law is to be “just”: 1) legal policy must be based on accurate information and rationally related to social goals; and 2) decisions applying policy to individual fact situations must be based on assumptions that are both relevant and accurate. -/- Reasons for determinations of fact must be given, otherwise the presumption that the trier of fact is “reasonable” is an unconditional licence to use private modes of logic and theories of social and natural science. What is not disclosed cannot be challenged on grounds of invalidity or irrelevance. -/- Use of “objective validity” as a standard to evaluate conclusions made by the trier of fact in contentious cases would only serve to beg all important questions by concealing: 1) fundamental normative conflict, and 2) the limited nature and applicability of many validity claims. -/- Our use of the phrases “undue risk,” “public interest,” “reasonable,” and “necessary,” reflects the weight we choose to give conflicting social values and goals when we must make decisions in relative ignorance of all the consequences. “Objective criteria” are of limited utility in legal decision-making because their social meaning is derivative. Policy generation in the absence of any coherent conceptual-normative framework, use of vague terminology in legislation stating policy, and the absence of rational means to distinguish between individual cases to which decision-makers are required by law to apply policy, make it inevitable that many legal “decisions” made in the guise of determinations of objective fact, are charades, an arbitrary, capricious, intuitive, subjective (and thus private) use of public decision-making power. -/- Law must alter its aspirations and recognize that rational decision-making is a process that can occur only within parameters set by present knowledge and societal preference structures. Only by working with the constraints imposed by these parameters is it possible to achieve “just” decisions. Where no rational basis for differentiating cases exists, “individualized justice” must be avoided and public policy articulated in law applied uniformly to all cases in a class. The terms “reasonable” and “necessary,” used to describe policy and its consequences for specific cases, must be understood to represent provisional societal assessments, attempts to implement societal preference structures in the face of limited knowledge. Heightened awareness of the limited nature of our knowledge can only result in legal policies that have a more explicit normative basis. -/- The volume is is published with an introduction by Michael D. Bayles. It is available in hardback, paperback, and as an ebook. (shrink)

Both in the Introduction to the Treatise of Human Nature and in the, Hume expressly declared that his goal was to contribute to the development of a “science of man” methodologically akin to the natural sciences, and capable of emulating their “accuracy” and explanatory success. He regarded these sciences as starting from careful observation of phenomena, and proceeding to the establish-ment of “principles” of increasing generality. Although rejecting as vain any hope of discovering “the ultimate principles” of (...) any science, he did not make clear what exactly he thought the principles actually involved in natural philosophy are. This article aims to shed some light on this issue through a survey and examination of the principles of Hume’s “science of man”, and of the most representative examples of principles of natural philosophy considered by Hume. (shrink)

The cover page of John Gribbin's The Birth of Time, listing more than thirty books he has written on astronomy, physics, and general science, shows the success this author has had in making these subjects interesting to and understandable by the general public. The eight chapters of The Birth of Time, ending with a useful list of books for further reading and a well‐compiled index, do indeed present a readable account of a difficult subject: man's attempts, from the time (...) of the ancient Greeks onward, to understand what is out in the sky and our place in that world. The book contains no mathematics and can be enjoyed by general readers, high school students, and teachers.The first chapter is historical: an account of the progression from Arabic science at the end of the first millennium, including the discovery and recognition of fossils as indicators of a geological history of the earth, through the seventeenth century's beginnings of an attempt to understand this history. The second chapter provides an account of the twentieth century's growing knowledge of the physics of stars, with nuclear energy as the source of their outpouring radiation. The fundamental work of Sir Arthur Eddington at the University of Cambridge is described here, and a simple account is given of the evolution of stars, from their formation from clouds of gas and dust to their eventual death as spectacular explosions or as cold, inert lumps of mass.Only in Chapter 3 does the author get to the real basic techniques of distance measurement, starting with triangulation by surveyors on the earth's surface and proceeding with ever‐increasing baselines, as Copernicus, Tycho Brahe, and Galileo made their impact on our understanding of the solar system and measurement of the earth's distance from the sun made this baseline the tool for distance measurements of stars.The concept of “standard candles”—stars whose intrinsic luminosities could be determined and whose apparent brightness could be measured, thus yielding their distances—is described next. A fair description is given of the epochal discovery in 1912 by Henrietta Leavitt, working at the Harvard College Observatory on routine measurement of variable stars on photographic plates, of our nearest neighbor galaxy, the Small Magellanic Cloud. She discovered a tight relationship between the periods of variation of a certain class of variable stars, the Cepheids, with their overall brightness, thus giving posterity the most important starting tool for distance measurements of galaxies outside the Milky Way.As Gribbin takes readers through the history of the gradual understanding of the place of our home galaxy, the Milky Way, in the universe at large, the work of various heroes of these progressive discoveries and the pitfalls encountered by others are described, somewhat unevenly. The astronomer Vesto Slipher, observing the spectra of galaxies with the twenty‐four‐inch telescope at Lowell Observatory in northern Arizona, receives due credit for the first measurement of line‐of‐sight recession velocities of galaxies, from the Doppler shift of atomic lines in their spectra toward the red end of the spectrum. The role of Milton Humason, former mule driver, janitor, and eventually the famous associate of Edwin Hubble, in the discovery from these redshifts of the expansion of spacetime is well described. Allan Sandage, a former Hubble pupil who is clearly Gribbin's hero, might himself demur at the enthusiasm with which his work is described; while Gerard de Vaucouleurs, were he still with us, would not be pleased with the account of his work that led to a value for the Hubble Constant—the quantity that converts measured recession velocities of galaxies to their distances from us—twice that determined by Sandage.The description of Gribbin's own recent research , which he describes as “just one minor brick in the scientific edifice” , based as it was on his belief that our sun and solar system exist in a very ordinary average‐sized spiral galaxy, is quite interesting. It follows a chapter giving an account of recent additions to the arsenal of astronomers' tools for distance measurement in the universe—and also the nasty systematic biases that can slant the result away from what one hopes is correct.The book is illustrated by eight nicely printed pages of images obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope. It is easy to read and tells its story in a friendly, chatty style. Though it concludes by suggesting a value of some 13 billion years ago as the epoch of “the birth of time,” the discerning reader will realize that the story is still evolving and that surprises can be expected. (shrink)

Chapter 1 First Person Access to Mental States. Mind Science and Subjective Qualities -/- Abstract. The philosophy of mind as we know it today starts with Ryle. What defines and at the same time differentiates it from the previous tradition of study on mind is the persuasion that any rigorous approach to mental phenomena must conform to the criteria of scientificity applied by the natural sciences, i.e. its investigations and results must be intersubjectively and publicly controllable. In Ryle’s (...) view, philosophy of mind needs to adopt an antimentalist stance to achieve this aim. Antimentalism not only definitively rejects the idea that mind is a substance separated from the body, it also denies that mental phenomena radically differ from physical phenomena by virtue of several unique features. Most problematically, mental phenomena have a conscious character (mental states are related to specific qualitative feelings) and are accessible only to the first-person (only the subject knows directly what s/he is experiencing inside his/her mind). Ryle takes a strong stance on antimentalism going so far as to maintain that an approach to mind which aims to meet the criteria of scientificity set by the natural sciences must avoid any reference to internal, unobservable mental states. In his view (which is considered a specifically philosophical version of psychological behaviorism and also addresses questions put forward in psychological research), mental states can be redescribed in terms of behavioral dispositions. In this chapter, we address the historical roots of the antimentalist view and analyze its relation to the later tradition of research on mind. We show that, compared to the antimentalist stance, functionalism and cognitivism take a step back when they maintain that direct reference to mental states is necessary since mental states cause and therefore explain human behavior. This step backwards is often interpreted as a return to mentalism. However, this is only partially true. Indeed, we suggest that these later traditions retain one important element of Ryle’s antimentalism, i.e. the idea that mental states must be uniquely identified using external and publicly observable criteria, while excluding any reference to introspection and those qualitative dimensions of a mental state, which are accessible only to the first-person. According to the perspective we put forward, this epistemological stance has continued to influence contemporary research on mind and current philosophical and psychological theories which both tend to exclude the subjective qualities of human experience from their accounts of how the mind works. The issue we raise here is whether this is legitimate or whether subjective qualities do play a role with respect to the way our mind works. The conclusion of this chapter anticipates the argument the book makes in in favor of this latter position, starting from a particular angle, i.e. the problem of how we categorize concepts related to our internal states. -/- Chapter 2 The Misleading Aspects of the Mind/Computer Analogy. The Grounding Problem and the Thorny Issue of Propriosensitive Information -/- Abstract. After the crisis of behaviorism, cognitivism and functionalism became the predominant models in the field of psychology and of philosophy, respectively. Their success is mainly due to the new key they use for interpreting mental processes: the mind/computer analogy. On the basis of this analogy, mental operations are seen as cognitive processes based on computations, i.e. on manipulations of abstract symbols which are in turn understood as informational unities (representations). This chapter identifies two main problems with this model. The first is how these symbols can relate to and communicate with perception and thus allow us to identify and classify what we perceive through the senses. Here we limit ourselves to presenting this issue in relation to the classical symbol grounding problem originally put forward by Harnad on the basis of Searle’s Chinese room argument. An attempt to address the problem raised here will be made in chap. 3. The second point we discuss in relation to the mind/computer analogy concerns the idea of information it fosters. Indeed, following this analogy, information is something available in the external world which can be captured by the senses and transmitted to the central system without being influenced or modified by the procedures of transmission. This perspective does not take into account that – unlike computers – in living beings information is acquired by means of the body. As Ulric Neisser has already pointed out, the body is itself an informational source that provides us with additional sensory experience that influences (modifies or complements) the information extracted from the external world by the senses. To develop this line of analysis and to determine exactly what information is provided by the body and how this might influence cognition, we examine Sherrington’s and Gibson’s positions. Moving on from their views, we qualify bodily information in terms of ‘proprioception’. We use ‘proprioception’ in a broad sense to describe any kind of experience we have of our internal states (including postural information as well as sensations related to the general state of the body and its parts). Following Damasio’s and Craig’s studies, we further elaborate this position, arguing that living beings are equipped with an internal propriosensitive monitoring system which maps all the changes that constantly occur in our body and that give us perceptual (‘proprioceptive’ or propriosensitive) information about what happens inside us. Moreover, relying on Goldie’s and Ratcliffe’s view, we show that emotional information can also be considered as a form of ‘proprioception’ which contributes to determining everything we perceive. This analysis leads us to the second main thesis of this book: ‘proprioception’ is a form of internal perception and it is an essential component of the sensory information we can access and use for all cognitive purposes. -/- Chapter 3 Semantic Competence from the Inside: Conceptual Architecture and Composition -/- Abstract. Concepts are essential constituents of thought: they are the instruments we use to categorize our experience, i.e. to classify things and group them together in homogeneous sets. Here we define concepts as the internal mental information (representations) that allows us, among other things, to master words in natural language. By analyzing the way in which individuals master word meanings we explore a number of hypotheses regarding the nature of concepts. Following Diego Marconi’s research, we differentiate between two kind of abilities that underpin lexical competence – so-called ‘referential’ and ‘inferential competence’ – and we suggest that, in order to support these abilities, concepts must also include two corresponding kinds of information, i.e. inferential and referential information. We point out that the most widely used and acknowledged theories of concepts do not make this distinction, instead broadly characterizing the information used for categorization in terms of propositionally described feature lists. However, we show that while feature lists can explain inferential competence, they do not account for referential competence. To address the issue of referential competence we examine Ray Jackendoff’s hypothesis that to account for the possibility of linking perceptual and conceptual information we need to assume the existence of a (visual) representation that encodes the geometric and topological properties of objects and bridges the gap between the percept and the concept. Furthermore, we analyze the extension of this work by Jesse Prinz who introduced the notion of a proxytype, a perceptual representation of a class of objects that incorporates structural and parametric information related to their appearance. However, as we point out, proxytypes can only explain the relationship between perception and concepts with respect to instances that can be perceived through the senses and that belong to the same class by virtue of their physical similarity. We suggest that this notion be extended to include larger conceptual classes. To accomplish this, we further develop Mark Johnson, George Lakoff and Jean Mandler’s idea of a schematic image and argue that conceptual representations include a perceptual schema. Perceptual schemata are non-linguistic, structured experiential gestalts (patterns or maps) that make use of information taken from all sensory modalities, including body perception. They accomplish a quasi-conceptual function: they allow us to recognize and to classify different instances. In this work, we hypothesize that perceptual schemata are an essential component of concepts, but not identical to them. Instead, we suggest that concepts include both perceptual and propositional information with perceptual schemata providing the ‘perceptual core concept’ that grounds related propositional information. -/- Chapter 4 In the Beginning There Were Categories. The Bodily Origin of Prelinguistic Categorical Organization: The Example of Folkbiological Taxonomies -/- Abstract. Studies of categorization in psychology and the cognitive sciences have made use of the notions of ‘category’ and ‘concept’ without precisely defining what is meant by either; in fact, often these terms have been used as synonyms, making it difficult to address specific issues related to conceptual development. This chapter begins by discussing the definitions of, as well as the distinctions between, ‘categories’ and ‘concepts’ in the classical philosophical tradition (Aristotle, Kant and Husserl). We introduce our view of categories with reference to Husserl. Categorization is defined as the way in which our experience is originally (pre-linguistically) organized in a passive and fully unconscious manner on the basis of universal structuring principles. Conceptualization is explained as a later process in which the earlier categorical macro-classes are further subdivided into more specific and detailed sets; this later process also relies on linguistic learning and exposure to culture. On the basis of Ray Jackendoff, Jean Mandler, George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s work, we hypothesize that categorization is a two-step process that begins with the formation of homogeneous sets of entities partitioned into regions that describe the ontological boundaries of the objects that humans perceive (categories) and continues at a later stage with the development of more specific classifications (concepts). In this chapter, we mainly address three related issues: Why should we assume that there is categorical organization which precedes the development of a conceptual system? How do categories and concepts relate to each other? Shall we hypothesize that categories are innate or that they are formed before concepts on the basis of information and organizational structure available at a very early developmental stage? We show that categorical partitions are necessary for categorization and, following Mandler, that the general categories we form at an early age do not match our adult superordinate concepts. As for the third issue, we argue that there might be no need to assume that categories are innately present in the human mind, since their formation can be explained – at least in certain cases – by basic mechanisms that work on body (propriosensitive) information. This hypothesis will not be discussed in general, but in relation to a particularly relevant example of categorical partition, i.e. the folk-biological dichotomy between ANIMATE/INANIMATE. This is compared with other dichotomies that derive from it, but are not directly categorical such as LIVING/NON-LIVING and BIOLOGICAL/NON-BIOLOGICAL. -/- Chapter 5 Internal States: From Headache to Anger. Conceptualization and Semantic Mastery -/- Abstract. Here we ask if we can also apply the distinction between referential and inferential competence we introduced in Chapter 3 to words that do not refer to things that are perceived using the external senses, especially to words/concepts that denote bodily experiences (such as pain, thirst, hunger, etc.) or emotions. We introduce and discuss the hypothesis that – even though such words/concepts do not refer to intersubjectively identifiable entities in the external world – they do have a kind of referent that can be accessed via direct perception, more specifically ‘proprioception’, as we have defined it in terms of all propriosensitive information we can consciously access. In the first part of the chapter, we specifically consider terms denoting bodily experiences such as ‘pain’ or ‘hunger’ and argue that their referents are identified and classified from a first-personal point of view on the basis of four main characteristics: their specific intensity, their localization in the body, their co-occurrence with other signals and above all their specific qualitative sensations. Emotions are addressed in the second part of the chapter. We suggest that there is a continuity between bodily experiences and emotions. In particular, we argue for a perceptual theory of emotions in line with that proposed by James and Lange at the end of the 19th century and developed more recently by authors such as Damasio (see also chap. 2§5, §6). The hypothesis we put forward is that the referential information that supports the categorization of emotions and therefore also our mastery of terms referring to emotions consists in the perception (i.e. the ‘proprioception’) of those bodily states and changes in bodily states which constitute our emotional experience. In the context of this discussion we examine some objections to this line of reasoning that arise from a cognitivist perspective and following authors such as Oatley, Johnson-Laird and Frijda, we distinguish between basic emotions that can be identified and classified solely on the basis on how they feel and complex emotions whose identification and classification additionally depends on cognitive factors. To describe how emotions are identified and classified on the basis of how they feel, we rely on Marcel and Lambie’s distinction between an ‘emotion state’ and an ‘emotion experience’. Both notions indicate kinds of feelings that we consciously experience. However, they describe first-order and second order emotion awareness respectively. The emotion state is the feeling we have of the bodily states and changes that occur when we are experiencing an emotion, while the emotion experience is the fully developed and integrated emotion we both experience and are, with reflection, aware of experiencing. On the basis of this differentiation, we also show that the same characteristics that aid in the identification and classification of bodily experiences (specific qualitative sensations; somatic localization; specific intensity; presence/absence of specific concomitant sensations) can also be used for the identification and classification of emotions – at least basic emotions. In the last two sections of the chapter we present some clinical evidence on the semantic competence of people who suffer from Alexithymia and Autism Spectrum Disorder which supports the conclusions of our preceding analyses. -/- Chapter 6 The ‘Proprioceptive’ Component of Abstract Concepts -/- Abstract. In this chapter, we address the issue of whether the mastery of abstract words requires only inferential knowledge and thus, if the concepts that support the mastery of abstract words include only linguistic information. We start by differentiating the notions of ‘abstract’ and ‘general’ which are often erroneously confused. We then identify a strict definition of abstract, as contrasted with ‘concrete’, that applies to words or concepts whose referent cannot be experienced by the senses. We argue that abstract words/concepts would be better described as theoretical, because they are usually conceived as structured sets of inferential knowledge expressed linguistically; that is, as small theories. Pointing out parallels with Carnap’s analysis of this issue in philosophy of science, we hypothesize that words/concepts denoting non-observable entities are not all ‘equally theoretical’, because their link to sensory experience can be stronger or weaker. We revive the distinction, inspired by Quine, between theoretical and intertheoretical concepts/words. This distinction relies on the fact that the former – unlike the latter – retains a strong, although indirect, connection with perception. In Quine’s discussion, perception is understood uniquely in terms of observability, i.e. of external sensory experience. Here we argue, however, that bodily, ‘proprioceptive’ (i.e. propriosensitive) experience can also serve to referentially ground theoretical (i.e. abstract) concepts/words. We frame this issue using the example of the theoretical concept ‘freedom’ and Lakoff’s hypothesis that this concept is developed on the basis of bodily information. We contrast this with the example of ‘democracy’ which more closely resembles an intertheoretical concept/word. Furthermore, we show that one of the classical views put forward in psycholinguistic research to explain how abstract concepts are mentally represented – i.e. Paivio’s Dual Coding Theory – points in the same direction as our analysis. The same is true of Barsalou’s work suggesting that we use internal information to understand at least some abstract words. To sustain this position, we put forward two lines of evidence: the first comes from psycholinguistic studies while the second examines deficits of semantic competence exhibited by people with Autism Spectrum Disorder. On the basis of our analysis, we put forward a classification that distinguishes between different kinds of concreteness and different degrees of abstraction: concepts/words referring to body experiences and basic emotions are described as analogous to concrete concepts/words because they are grounded in perceptual (i.e. propriosensitive) experience, while abstract concepts/words are considered more or less abstract depending on whether they are intratheoretical (and rely entirely on inferential information) or theoretical (and are partially grounded in perceptual – or more often in propriosensitive perceptual – information). In the last section of the chapter we consider two scales that have been used in psycholinguistic research to measure the degree of concreteness vs. abstractness of words and we show that – used conjointly – they can provide a measure of the internal vs. external grounding of specific words. (shrink)

At first glance singularity would seem to be necessarily opposed to the physical sciences, indeed to any kind of science. As the hallowed saying goes: “Science deals only in universals.” According to this view, the aim of any true scientific endeavor must be the discovery of universals or, in other words, the value of such an endeavor is based on its ability to explain phenomena in terms of universals. The status of singularity in science is a (...) direct result of this approach. Singularity is associated with the presence, either in a person or an object, of an unusual or exceptional quality, or of an individual trait. Singularity so conceived must therefore be seen as inherently compromising the aims of any scientific endeavor, since the purpose of that endeavor is universality as defined above. In this sense, the basis of scientific explication is the ability to determine a feature common to a collection of objects, thus allowing them to be explained by deductive reasoning. This common feature can therefore not be individual, if individual is understood as unusual or exceptional. (shrink)

In spite of these efforts in the 1920s and 1930s to initiate ongoing research on contraception, the subject of birth control remained a problem of concern primarily to the social activist rather than to the research scientist or practicing physician.80 In the 1930s, as has been shown, American scientists turned to the study of other aspects of reproductive physiology, while American physicians, anxious to eliminate the moral and medical dangers of contraception, only reluctantly accepted birth control as falling within their (...) professional domain.As a result, the problem of cheap, effective, and safe contraception was not solved by these earliest attempts. Consideration of the subject was initiated afresh by private philanthropy after World War II, sparked by a new wave of interest in population studies.81 Summarizing such efforts to support research in the reproductive sciences, a recent Ford Foundation study has noted: “To initiate and sustain serious research in the reproductive sciences has required for more than half a century concerted effort by interested individuals and private organizations, mainly from outside the mainstreams of the biomedical research community.”82The early laboratory research on chemical contraception described in this paper was but one important outcome of the concerted effort made by reformers in the 1920s to eliminate a variety of social problems thought to derive from excessive fertility. Scientific arguments and expertise were employed to advocate reform as well as to define the appropriate solution to such social problems. Scientists were recruited as advocates for the movement, but they were also employed as researchers in laboratory investigations sponsored by these same reformers.Sponsors of these early laboratory studies noted the difficulty of obtaining first-class investigators.83 The routine analyses necessary for such research, as well as the traditional scientific aversion to applied problems, provide only a partial explanation for this response. The real difficulty lay in recruiting investigators to a field that had previously been taboo. Once opened up — first as socially relevant, and finally as scientifically sound — there was much interest in this area, and the appeal to researchers of the scientific issues surrounding fertility and reproduction soon surpassed that of the reforming value of birth control.A survey of the kinds of experimental investigations sponsored by birth control advocates indicates the range of physiological problems explored by contraceptive research. The most definitive work was done on the efficacy and safety of spermicides, but the potential of other contraceptive methods was also examined. Investigators attempted to develop spermatoxins that would effectively immunize women against sperm, and they also tried to elucidate the mechanism of hormonal control of reproduction. In fact, speculations about the possible hormonal manipulation of fertility were expressed at the Seventh International Birth Control Conference held in Zurich in 1930.84In the 1920s, clinical studies were undertaken to assess the effectiveness of the various birth control methods. Laboratory investigators complemented this work by screening spermicides for safety and testing for their ability to kill sperm. There were a variety of birth control preparations on the market, but no one really knew whether these were effective or even safe.85 Although the physiology of other major organ systems was well advanced, the scientific study of reproductive physiology and contraceptive technology was clearly in its infancy in this period. Routine analyses simply could not be conducted, because the fundamental research establishing baselines had not yet been done. Scientists used this fact to redirect attention to basic research on reproduction.Laboratory research on contraception indicated important unexplored areas for physiological investigation. Social activists, who had encouraged prominent scientists to become interested in both the social value and the genetic implications of birth control, found these investigators revising the goals of their research. The biologists had formed their own network and had begun to seek out funding, reformulating the justification for sponsorship of further investigations. The eugenic motivations underlying these studies, which had initially made them theoretically attractive to biologists, were gradually eroded. Concern with “human evolution” ceded its place to interest in physiological mechanisms. Crew and others began to note that the use of biological theory to justify essentially political decisions had serious limitations. Biologists had become uncomfortable with those very arguments which had originally captured their interest. Recognition of the potential political abuse wrought by applying scientific principles to society was expressed by Crew just one year after the Zurich meeting. Referring to previous assessments of the role of sex in reproduction, he generalized: “In the past the biologist has justified feudalism, Manchester Liberalism, socialism and every other type of social organization and political programme by reference to selected biological phenomena.”86 By 1932 Crew had also begun to question the biological logic of regulated breeding, and had made it clear to his American sponsor that there was no simple correspondence between the practice of birth control and the genetic improvement of the human race.87Biologists further began to recognize, however, that although the hopeful genetic solution to human problems was probably an illusion, contraception still remained one tangible means to alleviate, human misery. Some laboratory scientists, like Crew, acknowledged the applicability of their own particular skills to this problem. For a few brief years, social needs and scientific goals were mutually supportive and closely intertwined. But as laboratory researchers gained interest in the study of reproduction and established their own priorities in this field, they temporarily withdrew from the arena of debate over birth control as an important mechanism for social reform.With the rise of Hitler, the genetic arguments for birth control rapidly lost their appeal. But by that time the scientific problem of how to achieve effective contraception had entered the professional consciousness. Both physicians and scientists began to be aware of birth control as a subject within their domain of expertise, although outside the principal focus of their research. Scientific discussion of birth control permanently altered from a question of justification to a problem of method: How could one achieve reliable and safe contraception? This had been Sanger's and Dickinson's goal from the beginning. Laboratory scientists had indeed been persuaded to undertake this work; this research had in turn affected biologists' perceptions of the whole field of reproductive physiology, encouraging further study of reproductive mechanisms. The promise of new knowledge provided for continued funding of this research, despite the caution by scientists that the social benefits would not be as immediate or as far-reaching as advocates and they themselves had first argued.The activities of birth control activists and their supporting agencies, and the financial backing of private contributors and foundations, notably the Rockefeller philanthropies, provided an important new stimulus to the development of research on the biology of reproduction in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Biologists were able to claim an enlarged realm of issues for scientific study through their activities as advocates and as investigators for the birth control movement. At the same time, they promised as-yet-undiscovered possibilities for regulating human reproduction once its physiology was understood. The knowledge and control that they promised lay in understanding the whole reproductive cycle — not merely in evaluating the toxic effects of presumptive spermicides.Chemical spermicides never summoned the interest of scientists as the contraceptive pill was to do, yet that research did reinforce the widespread perceptions of scientific research as essential to social reform. Spermicide investigations focused research efforts in reproductive biology by challenging traditional taboos, defining problems for further study, and providing laboratory investigators the opportunity to assert the social and scientific value of their own skills. Crew echoed this attitude as he observed in 1934:Man has turned from the adventurous conquest of his environment to the conquest of himself. To-day is the day of biological invention, eagerly used for the control of the undesirable and the unwanted. Sex and reproduction are no longer hedged around by myth and taboo; they are no longer accepted as mysteries that defy understanding. They are matters inviting examination and explanation; they are regarded as expressions of physico-chemical forces, the nature of which is to be displayed. It is accepted that when knowledge is sufficient, control will be absolute, and, though knowledge is not yet sufficient, readers... must be persuaded to the view that this will not always be so.88The synergism between reproductive biology and social needs has been temporary and sporadic, but recurring, since the 1920s. Scientific research programs have clearly been influenced by issues raised by public debate. Nevertheless, reproductive biologists have continued to assert their own professional goals. For the most part, they have rejected problems without inherent scientific interest and have spurned applied research except as it has had a direct bearing on current research themes. This attitude, apparent among American and British investigators in the 1930s, created the intellectual context for the invention and acceptance of the technically sophisticated oral contraceptive pill. It did not foster the production and improvement of the simple, safe, effective, and cheap vaginal contraceptive desired by early birth control advocates. (shrink)

Though some influentially critical objections have been raised during the ‘classical’ pre-computational simulation philosophy of science tradition, suggesting a more nuanced methodological category for experiments, it safe to say such critical objections have greatly proliferated in philosophical studies dedicated to the role played by computational simulations in science. For instance, Eric Winsberg suggests that computer simulations are methodologically unique in the development of a theory’s models suggesting new epistemic notions of application. This is also echoed in Jeffrey (...) Ramsey’s notions of “transformation reduction,”—i.e., a notion of reduction of a more highly constructive variety. Computer simulations create a broadly continuous arena spanned by normative and descriptive aspects of theory-articulation, as entailed by the notion of transformation reductions occupying a continuous region demarcated by Ernest Nagel’s logical-explanatory “domain-combining reduction” on the one hand, and Thomas Nickels’ heuristic “domain-preserving reduction,” on the other. I extend Winsberg’s and Ramsey’s points here, by arguing that in the field of computational fluid dynamics as well as in other branches of applied physics, the computer plays a constitutively experimental role—supplanting in many cases the more traditional experimental methods such as flow-visualization, etc. In this case, however CFD algorithms act as substitutes, not supplements when it comes to experimental practices. I bring up the constructive example involving the Clifford-Algebraic algorithms for modeling singular phenomena in CFD by Gerik Scheuermann and Steven Mann & Alyn Rockwood who demonstrate that their algorithms offer greater descriptive and explanatory scope than the standard Navier-Stokes approaches. The mathematical distinction between Navier-Stokes-based and Clifford-Algebraic based CFD has essentially to do with the regularization features exhibited to a far greater extent by the latter, than the former. Hence, CACFD indicate that the utilization of computational techniques can be based on principled reasons, as opposed to merely practical. CACFD hence exhibit a new generative role in the field of fluid mechanics, by offering categories of experimental evidence that are optimally descriptive and explanatory—i.e., pace Batterman can be both ontologically and epistemically fundamental. (shrink)

Architecture and Deconstruction Case of Peter Eisenman and Bernard Tschumi -/- Introduction Towards deconstruction in architecture Intensive relations between philosophical deconstruction and architecture, which were present in the late 1980s and early 1990s, belong to the past and therefore may be described from a greater than before distance. Within these relations three basic variations can be distinguished: the first one, in which philosophy of deconstruction deals with architectural terms but does not interfere with real architecture, the second one, in which (...) a collaboration between Jacques Derrida and a group of architects interested in his concepts is commenced, and the third one, in which completed or only designed objects or new concepts of deconstruction created by architects gain their supremacy over philosophy. The following book analyses these three possible ways, first of all with the reference to Peter Eisenman and Bernard Tschumi. -/- Peter Eisenman -/- Misreading… and Other Errors -/- The issue of relations between Peter Eisenman’s work and philosophy of deconstruction may be referred to his activity more than ten years preceding his direct collaboration with Jacques Derrida (in 1985) and organisation of the exhibition Deconstructivist Architecture at Museum of Modern Art in New York (in 1988). As soon as at the stage of designing the first houses (House I-III, 1967-1970), which almost entirely inscribed in formalistic aesthetics of Modernism, the architect analysed the problem of architecture dependence on its assumptions. All his later designs may be treated as consequence of this initial interest in relations between practice and theory, and at the same time as an introduction to manipulations later on led at the level of metaphysics of architecture. Beginning with the issue of presence, considered in comments to House VI (1972), the number of ideas having their analogies in philosophy of deconstruction increased. The text entitled The End of the Classical: The End of the Beginning, The End of the End (1984), in which Eisenman criticised questions of representation in architecture, its delusive strive for truth and comparably unattainable attempts at ultimate definition of elementary rules, should be acclaimed the breaking point. This attitude was extended by numerous strategies disturbing architecture rules defined at metaphysical level in an essay Moving Arrows, Eros, and Other Errors: an Architecture of Absence (1986). The issue of Eisenman’s passage from formalism to deconstruction has already been much discussed in the literature (Rosalind Krauss, Thomas Patin among others), still it should be mentioned that the threads similar to Derrida’s concept included in Eisenman’s writing reveal untranslatability of architecture and philosophy. -/- Choral Works or Separate tricks -/- In 1985-1986 a series of seven disputes between Jacques Derrida and Peter Eisenman took place. The pretext for them were designs concerning Parc de la Villette in Paris. The situation of many months of collaboration between a notable philosopher of the second half of the 20th c. and an architect that already had a huge theoretical oeuvre, ended up with a publication of a large volume entitled Chora L Works and it became at the same time a vast study area for historians of contemporary architecture and philosophers. Derrida’s contribution to concept works were his considerations over the idea of chôra, the properties related to this concept were about to be reflected in shapes of the park. Therefore, Chora L Works became an example of the abilities of contemporary art, both in its capability of translation from philosophical ideas to artistic forms and its resistance to tradition of representing in architecture some phenomena and values originating outside this discipline. In the final period of their collaboration both interlocutors started to polemicise with each other more decidedly, what became a separate part of their thought exchange. The exchange of letters between Derrida and Eisenman at the turn of 1989 ended up the period of their direct contacts, nevertheless, at this time precisely a large group of experts in issues of deconstruction joined the discussion and extended the revealed in the former dispute problems into more than ten years of further considerations and publications. Except for a long text by Jeffrey Kipnis, who had participated in the meetings of the philosopher and the architect, there appeared also comments of researchers of artistic theories (K. Michael Hays, Thomas Patin), philosophers (Andrew Benjamin), and even experts in Greek literature (Maria Theodorou or Ann Bergren). Following these debates a contemporary reflection on architecture has saturated with indeed numerous concepts originating in philosophy of deconstruction. -/- Architecture which imitates mute philosophy -/- The series of Jacques Derrida and Peter Eisenman meetings, which took place in the period of 1985-1987, induced many authors to make comments. Some of them (Jeffrey Kipnis, Ann Bergren, Maria Theodorou) developed the subject of chôra which was introduced to the discussion by Derrida. The problem that was about to be solved was the question of tying up the concept of chôra with architecture, including Eisenman’s architecture and the series of meetings within frames of Chora L Works project. Kipnis on this occasion paid attention to chôra and its character of anachronia which infects any being created within chôra. In other words any event has its counterpart (analogon) in another, earlier event. He demonstrated the similarity of structure of many events and statements from the times of Derrida and Eisenman’s meetings to the almost identical behaviour of figures in Plato’s dialogue Timaeus. The loss of beginning present in this phenomenon was appropriate to both features of chôra and the effects of typical analyses of philosophy of deconstruction. Bergren’s analyses focused on accentuating gender of chôra, which, according to this author, had been neglected hitherto in discussions. She collated chôra descriptions with characteristics of women in myths, early Greek epic and philosophy and she arrived at a conclusion that chôra has features of a single woman and a married one at the same time. And yet Theodorou’s studies showed that in the Homeric epics chôra is not treated as an idea but is related with single things and events. The other part of the comments (represented by Andrew Benjamin and K. Michael Hays’ utterances) concerns Eisenman’s attitude to tradition which was treated as a variety of iteration understood philosophically. Benjamin commenced his considerations at the point of closeness between a definition of tradition and a concept of chôra understood as perpetuation (placement). A problematic issue was for him Eisenman’s complex relation to tradition based on its contest and affirmation at the same time. Overcoming the simple subordination to tradition – according to Benjamin – was based on awareness of the role of repetition in culture not known before. Hays made an attempt to explain the pleasure and torment of repetition with the support of Sigmund Freud and Roland Barthes’ concepts. According to Hays repetitions are attempts of a single being to a certain primal state perceived as free of any tension. In a similar way Rosalind Krauss explained a motif of a grate present in Modernistic art and also exceptionally frequent in Eisenman’s work. -/- Annex Architecture is still writing Balzac novels. Peter Eisenman and literature -/- Architecture’s approach to writing, script or literature, present within Peter Eisenman’s work, is an exceptional phenomenon, furthermore a complex one. The article considers four possible relations. The first one relates to Eisenman’s characteristics as a person extremely gifted with the ability to wordplay, which very ‘play’ reveals skills to create architectural images. In the second approach the attention has been paid to Eisenman’s interests – in the first period of his oeuvre – in linguistic works by Noam Chomsky and his transformational-generative grammar. The third kind of relations applied to overcoming the need for autonomy of architecture (and of modernist aesthetics at the same time) and renew interests in questions of meaning in architecture. The fourth sort of relations occurred when Eisenman started to create reflections of historic or literary narrations in architecture – ‘stone stories’ and architectural fictions of their kind. -/- Bernard Tschumi -/- From perversion to deconstruction In Bernard Tschumi’s writings from the 1970s and 1980s we can find a transposition of important threads of post-structuralist ideas deriving from Georges Bataille, Roland Barthes and Jacques Derrida’s works. The analysis of the architect’s writings also shows roots in Phillippe Sollers, Michel Foucault and Denis Hollier’s works. The analysis of borrowed elements from the beginnings of Tschumi’s theoretical activity may be helpful in explaining the contents of his later writings motre inspired by philosophy of deconstruction. The set of his earliest views was inspired by Marxism, Neo Marxism and French Structuralism, mainly by the writings of Henri Levebre and Guy Debord. From the thought of Levebre Tschumi took interest for city as not only a question of urbanistics but also a political issue. From Debord’s concepts he borrowed a conviction about the role of situational violation for changes in the society structure. Some of these beliefs were preserved in his own concepts of architecture as an event. From this period derived also his will to change conservative elements of social structure not by means of political revolution but of theoretical and creative activity. Tschumi acknowledged that the effective way of the proceedings towards achieving his aims would be accepting the role of both a critical intellectualist and architecture expert who would not hide away his left-wing orientation. The speculations defined by the architect as ‘revolting analyses’ were about to characterise contradictions which tear the society apart, penetrate architecture and constitute the basis of culture. Spreading away of the conscience of false assumptions hidden away in various disciplines could have weakened cohesion of a conservative society and influence the will to change among the elites. This way the beginnings of political revolution were rooted in philosophy of architecture. In 1977 Tschumi published his text entitled The Pleasure of Architecture inspired by Roland Barthes’s The Pleasure of the Text, it also included some concepts derived from Georges Bataille and Jacques Derrida. First of all the author used Barthes’s concept which made an assumption that literary activity is pervaded by the spirit of resistance towards social rules, and Tschudi transferred this remark onto architecture. From the ideas of Bataille, acquainted via Holier’s work, he derived his belief that two concepts of space, a conceptual one (defined as Pyramid) and a sensual one (defined as Labirynth), not losing their distinct features, they join in the concept of experienced space which exceeds contradictions. The exceeding itself was defined as the basic rule of architecture and it was referred to situations in which architecture not only negates social needs, but also disavows its own tradition. Crossing the borders applies not only to political issues or permanent rules of the very discipline but also interfering with other fields (especially literature and film). The fact that architecture is associated with organising events turned Tschumi’s attention to questions of violence that result from upsetting architectural order of a given building by its users and the one hand, and on the other from forcing the users to specific acts imposed by this very order. The analysis of the concepts used by Tschumi in his early writings indicates that they are close to definitions that would occur in his reflection in the following years influenced by philosophy of deconstruction. -/- Approaching deconstruction Tschumi in his theories developed in the 1980s presumed that the current social world had undergone a deep process of decay, and the reaction against which ought to be based on ordering-up actions, and also preserving the main outline of disintegration of the whole and its elements in the state of conflict. The statements concerning the nature of the contemporary to Tschumi social relations were applied by him to the world of architecture, this led him to coming up with designing strategies that took into consideration the destabilised character of conditions in which works of architecture were created. New ways of conduct invented by Tschumi drew their inspiration from literature and research on literature, psychoanalysis, structural linguistics, structuralism and post structuralism, and eventually also deconstruction philosophy. The proposed methods were opposed by their author both to functionalism continuity trends and postmodern architecture. Tschumi’s proposals contradicted any forms of conservatism or traditionalism in political sphere as well as in reference to tendencies in architecture. They were not simple contradictions of social or architectural rules, they intrude them from the inside, weaken or escalate the already existing incongruities, they move the boundaries between the areas. Revolutionary illusions about the possibility of radical changes were replaced with strategies which completed, tainted or test former rules in the series of formal games of permutation and combination. Quite different from avant-garde formalism Tschumi’s games were not about maintaining the autonomy of a given area, but on the contrary – polluting it with other areas’ influences. Tschumi enjoyed demonstrating illusions of architecture concerning simple relations between form and function, or between form and meaning. Making use of Freud, Lacan and Foucault’s research he introduced a category of “madness” into architecture allowing an observation that the recognised norms are nothing but merely ones of many possible principles of behaviour, and their recognised status resulted from unjustified hindering innovativeness which is crucial for architecture. To reborn architecture’s capability of changing Tschumi also made use of Barthes’s discoveries concerning rules of narration and works by writers who applied in their writing knowledge on linguistics. Making a work’s author unclear by various mechanical transformations of its elements was however apparent only, and formal rigours imposed on the process of designing liberated possibilities difficult to obtain in more traditional creative action. Another mode of acting introduced by Tschumi was combining his work of elements deriving from outside architecture; joining space records with notation of motion and events accompanying architectural objects among others. These architectural and extra-architectural elements were not unified, on the contrary their heterogenous and conflictual character was stressed. This is how shock, anxiety and instability, typical for live in great metropolises, infiltrated architecture. Taking some ideas of deconstruction philosophy as a pattern Tschumi also took into critical consideration in his essays traditional in architecture oppositions between form and figuration, or theory and practice. By combining various inspirations he eventually worked out an idea of architectural event, which he understood as a series of actions contesting its own field, redefining its sources, principles and elements. An event, understood in this way, was not so much producing works as rather creating conditions of their production and at the same time designing the society different from a hierarchic one. -/- Park of deconstruction Among numerous philosophical strategies of deconstruction most frequently used was questioning the practice of strong opposition of two reasons. In many cases Bernard Tschumi’s writings just consider functioning of the conflict juxtaposition of the ideas of structure and ornament or theory and practice in history of architecture. Violation of traditional relations between terms of this kind, both old and modern, raised Jacques Derrida’s objections, when he was induced for the first time to co-operate with architects’ milieu. During this long lasting thought exchange the philosopher eventually acknowledged Bernard Tschumi’s arguments for reasoning the encroachment of architecture’s fundamental rules. Deconstruction applied in architecture was not a simple transposition or analogy of practices that had been applied by philosophy of deconstruction. We may even say that considering architectural terms became an important formula of deconstruction. Architecture understood in philosophical way became something beyond the practice and theory of its own discipline, a sort of metaphysics of both philosophy and architecture. The deliberate encroachment of simplicity of dividing architecture into theory and practice, for the first time became a clear aim for Tschumi in his drawings and texts entitled The Manhattan Transcripts. The contents of this series of works was a record of characteristic features of this New York district in such a way that not only objects were the subject of the record but also relations between objects, people and events. The record was about to take into consideration a conflict character of elements of this representation and at the same time to avoid applying to them the rule of mimetism. The record became a form of reflection over the very record by an increased control over the ways of representation. Architecture which was considered in the The Manhattan Transcripts was not directed to fulfill the needs of inhabitation or production, it was rather related with hitherto usually marginalised liminal situations: building ostentatiously big monuments, religious cult, war etc. Architecture operating in these relations focused also the attention on the included in it continuous tendency to overpass its own restrictions, the role of violence as its not recognised factor, or the meaning of excess and shock in its operation. Architecture moving from reason towards madness became even more visible in the design of Parisian Parc de la Villette, whose pavilions were defined as folies (in French it means both small park buildings and follies). The park was supposed to be on the one hand a reflection of traditional society disintegration while on the other it questioned basic rules of producing a work of architecture. The traditional rules of designing, based on ordering up, were replaced with the strategies of dysfunction and dissociation. In Tschumi’s opinion methods of this kind may be equivalent of what Derrida named différance. Instead of aiming at mergence, any diversity, plays or variations were strengthen. Tschumi’s texts, in which he explained his attitude, were completed by Derrida’s extent statement entitled Point de folie – Maintenant l’architecture. Derrida’s article is the most significant of all his statements on architecture as a form of thinking and activity. According to the philosopher, architecture should divide space (in French defined as espacement), what enables both thinking and action – it arranges the space of an event. Tschumi’s buildings, defined as folies, in an essential way destabilise any created order, and at the same time they refresh it. Derrida’s statement suggests that architecture may become both metaphor of an order merging a language or a society but also of inner forces which deconstruct and reconstruct it. Therefore architecture is at the same time a construction, a deconstruction and a reconstruction. Parc de la Villette stands out in this system with its attempt to step beyond the scheme of an easy repetition and its heading for chances of achieving more radical otherness. -/- Conclusion Destruction as construction. Paradoxes of deconstruction in architecture -/- Scepticism about persistence and common importance of fundamental values of human culture evinced in philosophers and writers’ works as early as in Greek antiquity, nevertheless it was not expressed so strongly as in the second half of the 20th century. Especially in Heidegger’s work Being and Time (although originated in 1927, still influential in all later philosophy) the following states were characterised: the state of losing the ground (Abgrund), of being out of sight (Unheimlichkeit) and of being out of dwelling (Un-zuhause-sein) – as the basis of self-confidence of conscious being there (Dasein). The entire criticism of philosophy of home and dwelling draws the inspiration from this early writing of the German philosopher, it combines crisis of basic terms of metaphysics with social conditions which are dictated by living in large metropolis. The crisis of both metaphysical foundation and home appears to be similar to the situation of weakening the relations between a man and his dwelling in extensively expanding cities. Whereas philosophy, as well as many disciplines of social sciences, have diagnosed for a long time the destabilisation of fundamental ideas of Western culture and crucial changes in the ways of dwelling, architecture itself occurred to be “the last fortress of metaphysics” (J. Derrida). Among contemporary architects, Peter Eisenman and Bernard Tschumi were the ones who engaged most decidedly in the issues of critical analysis of architecture foundation and its social role. Both the architects noticed new formulas of contemporary social and individual existence, tremendously different from the entire history, and at the same time they affirmed lack of adequacy of architecture concepts to new situations. Both Eisenman and Tschumi used to describe the existing architecture as a tool for consolidation of highly integrated and hierarchised societies, and also as a discipline extremely uncoincidental with the current character of social life based on ideas of freedom and diversity. The means to transform architecture and make a factor of further social changes out of it, was a concept that accentuated revealing the inner contradictions of this discipline, and considering them in designing strategies. Eisenman’s activity, in regard of what has just been noticed, was focused on questioning the basic rules of traditionally comprehended architecture, especially the rule of purpose. The American architect noticed that the concept of architecture as fulfilment the need of location, hides away the fact that the location has to be constantly reconsidered, and hence it is overtaken by change (dislocation). Therefore new concept of architecture propounded architectural activity to translocate the concept of location – more than before – but also to change its status perpetually. Such comprehended architecture should claim, as its main purpose, the constant revision of this purpose and create itself anew permanently. Even Eisenman’s earliest designs of houses nos. I-IV broke with such values as the sense of safety, closeness and familiarity, and just on the contrary they accentuated senses of strangeness, homelessness and loss of confidence. The contradictions within architecture noticed by Tschumi referred to combination of intellectual and sensual values in architecture, when their non-appropriation was defeated by an additional condition, namely the way of experience based on pleasure of excess, marked by insanity. The features of folly were especially visible in his designs of gardens, where the order of planning was mixed with sensual experience introduced by particular elements (both the ones created by nature, and the buildings defined as folies). Parc de la Villette designed by the French architect in Paris put in question not only the common understanding of purpose in architecture but also the ideas of order and integrity, as its plan was based on the combination of independent layers with records of grids of points, various lines and planes. The architecture that collides inadequate elements with each other was supposed to be a kind of an event with no beginning and no end. The architecture treated as an event became a form of a space weakened articulation that maintains its diversity and lack of accordance of the elements building it up. The analyses of Eisenman and Tschumi’s theoretical writings indicate how much the aims of architecture have actually changed; instead of supporting social persistence, the architecture is rather intensifying contradictions, and instead of providing people with the sense of safety, it sublimes danger. From simple acts of defamiliarisation, increasing the distance to itself and enhancing the role of theory, through discomfort, anxiety, not feeling someone at home, weirdness, excess, shock and violence, architecture reached the edge of stability and uncertainty, only to make an attempt at penetrating what is impossible and unutterable, and recording what cannot become the subject of any records. -/- . (shrink)

In computer networks, vertices represent hosts or servers, and edges represent as the connecting medium between them. In localization, some special vertices are selected to locate the position of all vertices in a computer network. If an arbitrary vertex stopped working and selected vertices still remain the resolving set, then the chosen set is called as the fault-tolerant resolving set. The least number of vertices in such resolving sets is called the fault-tolerant metric dimension of the network. Because of (...) the variety of applications of the metric dimension in different areas of sciences, many generalizations were proposed, and fault tolerant is one of them. In this paper, we computed the fault-tolerant metric dimension of triangular snake, ladder, Mobius ladder, and hexagonal ladder networks. It is important to observe that, in all these classes of networks, the fault-tolerant metric dimension and metric dimension differ by 1. (shrink)

The psychological concept of illusion is defined as a process involving an interaction of logical and empirical considerations. Common usage suggests that an illusion is a discrepancy between one's awareness and some stimulus. Following preliminary definitions of classes of stimuli, five definitions of illusion are considered, based upon the possible discrepancies between awareness and a stimulus. It is found that each of these definitions fails to make important distinctions, even to the point of equating all illusory and perceptual (...) class='Hi'>phenomena. This dilemma is resolved by redefining illusion without reference to truth or falsity, but relative to the functioning of a given perceptual system under different conditions. The definition accepted as best is 'a discrepancy between one's perceptions of an object or event observed under different conditions'. Conditions may differ in terms of stimulus exposure, stimulus context, or experiental context. The philosophical and psychological implications are discussed of accepting a definition of illusion not based on a discrepancy between awareness and a stimulus. (shrink)

Two different aspects of knowledge are frequently distinguished by the logician and philosopher: the non-repetitive and the repetitive. However, this distinction is imperfectly supported by careful observation, since no two objects or events are known to be exactly alike, and no two objects or events are completely different. In spite of this relativisitic state of affairs, there is some value in distinguishing between the thinker or student who is primarily interested in the unique, peculiar and non-repetitive phenomena of (...) experience and the person whose emphasis is on general, repetitive and predictable observations. The approaches and mental operations of these two classes of agents are essentially different, although the world they experience may be the same. The first concentrates on one item at a time, the result being a restriction of his attention away from other objects or events of the same class. The generalizing student usually controls his mental operations fully as much, but in this case attention to the unique is held in abeyance and comparisons are deliberately fostered. The essential difference thus becomes a matter of the rejection of the comparative method of procedure by the first and overwhelming dependence on that method on the part of the generalizer. (shrink)

This paper is intended as an extension to some of the recent discussion in the philosophical literature on the nature of experimental evidence. In particular I examine the role of empirical evidence attained through the use of deductions from phenomena. This approach to theory construction has been widely used throughout the history of science both by Newton and Einstein as well as Clerk Maxwell. I discuss a particular formulation of maxwell's electrodynamics, one he claims was deduced from (...) experimental facts. However, the deduction is problematic in that it is not immediately clear that one of the crucial parameters of the theory, the displacement current, can be given an empirical foundation. In outlining Maxwell's argument and his attempts to arrive on an empirically based account of the electromagnetic field equations I draw attention to the philosophical implications of the constraints on theory that arise in this particular case of deduction from phenomena. (shrink)

Over the last decade, attention has crawled from out of the shadows into the philosophical limelight with several important books and widely read articles. Carolyn Dicey Jennings has been a key player in the attention revolution, actively publishing in the area and promoting awareness. This book was much anticipated by insiders and does not disappoint. It is in no way redundant with respect to other recent monographs, covering both a different range of material and developing novel positions throughout. The book (...) might have been called The Attending Self, since Jennings defines attention as mental prioritization controlled by the self. This invocation of the self is among her central innovations, and may prove to be the main source of controversy. I will highlight points of contention here, but want to emphasize at the outset that the book is essential reading for anyone interested in attention. Jennings also contributes to a range of other debates, which will help a broader audience appreciate the importance this topic.After a brief introduction, Jennings provides “a philosophical landscape” of attention (chap. 2), tracing the concept through history. This is an invaluable achievement that will be welcomed by both newcomers and veterans. Jennings exhibits enormous breadth, covering areas that contemporary philosophers of mind tend to neglect: medieval philosophy, Buddhist thought, and phenomenology, to name a few. We also get perspectives on attention from core figures in the Western canon, such as Descartes, Locke, and Kant, as well as thinkers who gave the topic a more political inflection: Mary Wollstonecraft and W. E. B. DuBois. Jennings surveys contemporary literature as well, locating recent work in these older lineages. Some authors get more treatment later in the book (e.g., William James and Wayne Wu). Overall, Jennings provides the best overview of this history I have seen. She proves that attention is not a new topic, but one with deep roots and one that can inform current debates; Jennings draws on these roots throughout. I would love to see a companion piece surveying scientific theories, including “gain control” and “biased competition,” which get little airtime in the book. Some recent philosophical theories are under-explored as well, including Chris Mole’s concept of cognitive unison (Jennings discusses other aspects of his view), Carlos Montemayor and Harry Haladjian’s exploration of attention’s diversity (we get a touch of this), and my own proposal that attention is a gateway to working memory (not mentioned here). That said, no extant survey is more complete.Chapter 3 begins with the empirical claim that attention is regulated by slow brainwaves, and then takes up two issues. The first is mental causation. Endorsing moderate emergentism, Jennings argues that slow brain waves are causally efficacious even though they are not reducible to lower-level processes. (The metaphysics and neuroscience are presented accessibly, aided by three appendixes.) Second, Jennings argues that these slow brain waves indicate that attention is controlled by the self. As someone who was never moved by the mental causation problem—I don’t think overdetermination threatens efficacy—I would have welcomed more development of this second issue. For one thing, in linking attention to subjective control, Jennings eschews the idea that there can be purely “bottom-up” attention driven by stimulus features alone. This goes against the orthodoxy in attention science, and makes it hard for her to accommodate phenomena such as “pop-out,” or the commonsense idea that attention can be “captured” by a sudden flash or loud sound. For another thing, I wanted to hear more on why Jennings relates slow brain waves to the self. Does this include the slow waves that occur during deep sleep? Is there even such a thing as the self? Is there one self or many? How do slow brain waves reflect our interests, projects, values, self-conceptions, autobiographical narratives, or social identities? Does the social self invoked by Wollstonecraft and DuBois gain a foothold here? The whole chapter campaigns against metaphysical reductionism, but arrives at a perspective on the self that will strike some readers as highly reductive.In the fourth chapter, Jennings sheds further light on her conjecture that attention involves the self by advancing the thesis that attention endows sensory information with meaning. On the face of it, this may sound implausible. Object recognition, reading, and many other meaning-involving processes can take place outside of attention and outside of consciousness. But Jennings has a richer notion of “meaning” in mind. She develops the idea of “subject unity,” which is imposition of structure on perception that reflects the interests of the perceiving subject. This, she claims, is what brings perception into the space of reasons. Along the way, she has interesting observations about binding, feature integration, and demonstrative reference. The material is highly original, and Jennings’s postulation of interest-based perceptual organization is compelling. At the same time, one might wonder whether interests are really relegated to the ambit of attentional control. Consider the cocktail party effect, wherein one’s own name captures attention. This implies a preattentive filter that reflects our interests. Emotionally charged words, facial expressions, and dangerous objects also work this way, and social biases can operate preattentively as well. If these reflect our interests, then meaning may arise outside attention.Jennings’s fifth chapter explores the relationship between attention and consciousness. Some authors have argued that attention is necessary and sufficient for consciousness. Jennings focuses primarily on the necessity claim. She does not systematically review the empirical literature here, but she addresses some of the key findings, and effectively rebuts studies that allege to find consciousness outside attention. She does not rest her case there, however. Instead, she identifies a new class of examples that purport to establish the possibility of consciousness without attention. Her central example she calls “conscious entrainment,” which is what we experience when engaged in habitual or skilled activities. Other possible examples touched on in the chapter include hypervigilance in individuals with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), passive movie watching, dreaming, and “attentional neglect.” These states all involve intense focus, Jennings admits, but not attention. To some readers this may sound contradictory. Isn’t focus a kind of attention? Don’t these states of absorption involve stimulus selection and enhancement of relevant features, suppression of distractors, and other hallmarks of attention? Jennings says none of this is tantamount to attention. Recall that she thinks attention is controlled by the self. In these cases, we are invited to imagine that the self takes a passive role: control is either ceded to the world (movie watching) or to previously mastered routines (skills and habits). Thus, Jennings’s claim that there is no attention in these cases hangs on her contentious thesis that attention requires a controlling self. One might also push back by arguing that, in some of Jennings’s allegedly selfless examples, the self remains involved. Skilled activities and hypervigilance, for example, can reflect personal interests.Skills and hypervigilance get more airtime in chapter 6. There, Jennings turns to questions of responsibility—a neglected topic in attention research. The chapter begins with a manslaughter trial in which the teenage plaintiff was given a light sentence because the judge evidently believed that the teen’s ADHD compromised his ability to control his actions. The example may be a bit triggering for people who have a personal relationship with this diagnosis, but, putting that aside, Jennings uses it to introduce the important concept of attention-based control. With reduced control, Jennings argues, comes reduced responsibility. I am inclined to see ADHD as involving dysregulation of attention (difficulty disengaging and dividing attention, for example) rather than diminished attention, but that can still be characterized as an issue with control of attention; therefore ADHD still illustrates Jennings’s point that there is a link between responsibility and control of attention. This, it turns out, is only half of her story. Having argued for this link, one might expect Jennings to follow Wayne Wu, who contends that attention is necessary for action, and hence for responsibility. She does not. Instead, she says argues that responsibility can also arise in cases of “strategic automaticity.” This brings us back to skills. When skills are deployed, action is governed by learned pairings between stimuli and responses. The choice to exercise a skill requires attention, so attention is needed for being a responsible agent, but once a skill kicks in, attention is no longer required, and one can be held responsible for actions performed skillfully—thus attention is not required for responsibility tout court. Jennings addresses an opposing view (defended by Wu, Ellen Fridland, and Barbara Montero), according to which skills involve “automatic attention” rather than no attention. Jennings worries that this move will collapse the distinction between attention and other kinds of selection and filtering that occur throughout the nervous system, including the retina. She says that the attentional interpretation of skilled action is at odds with the lack of top-down reweighing of sensory inputs, regulated by lateral frontal cortex. These objections to automatic attention warrant response. My own view is that attention involves broadcasting to working memory, so retinal filtering is ruled out. Jennings’s insistence on top-down reweighing will not move those who believe attention can be purely bottom-up. For all that, I side with Jennings in wanting to allow for responsibility without attentional control. I think we can be responsible for implicit biases, for example. I also think attentional control is insufficient for responsibility, as when we act under duress.Jennings offers fresh perspective on the nature of attention, and its role in meaningful perception, consciousness, action, and responsibility. Each chapter can be read separately, but they hang together well, and each reflects her thesis that attention is essentially linked to the self. Though I am skeptical of that strong claim, we would do well to follow Jennings in regarding attention as interest-laden interface between mind and world. I look forward to a sequel in which attention is related to richer conceptions of identity, and where the political consequences of this link are actively explored. Meanwhile, one can hardly fault Jennings for covering too little. She tackles a remarkable range of topics, from metaphysics to ethics. Her arguments throughout demand response, repay careful study, and propel the field forward. (shrink)

This dissertation examines the dynamical dark matter problem in twentieth century astrophysics from the point of view of History and Philosophy of Science. The dynamical dark matter problem describes the situation astronomers find themselves in with regard to the dynamics of large scale astrophysical systems such as galaxies and galaxy clusters: The observed motions are incompatible with the visible distribution matter given the accepted law of gravitation. This discrepancy has two classes of possible solutions: either there exists copious amounts (...) of some kind of matter that neither emits nor absorbs radiation , or the law of gravitation must be revised. ;Chapter 2 describes the physical and philosophical foundations of dynamical inferences---inferences from discrepancies between well-founded theoretical expectations and reliable observations to the characteristics of candidate solutions. Chapter 3 discusses the history of dark matter . Chapter 4 reviews the present evidence bearing on the dark matter problem. Chapter 5 evaluates the important candidate matter solutions in light of the available evidence. Chapter 6 evaluates two candidate gravitational solutions on evidential and methodological grounds, and addresses the problem of theory choice. I do not try to solve the dark matter problem, but to uncover and evaluate patterns of inference involved in evidential arguments for and against candidate solutions. ;I show that Newton's "Reasoning from Phenomena" is a good framework from which to understand what is going on in this field. I argue that "higher order" and especially non-dynamical evidence is the best hope for solving this problem in dynamics. This is so in part because of "the dark matter double bind": the very existence of the dark matter problem means that we cannot be sure of the overall matter distribution in astrophysical systems, and this in turn means that the observed motions by themselves cannot provide relative confirmation of any theory of gravitational interactions taking place at these scales. I use Newton's Rules of Reasoning to argue that we should retain General Relativity as our theory of gravity at galactic and greater scales, despite the lack of positive evidence to confirm it over its rivals at these scales. (shrink)

Any successful interpretation of quantum mechanics must explain how our empirical evidence allows us to come to know about quantum mechanics. In this article, we argue that this vital criterion is not met by the class of ‘orthodox interpretations,’ which includes QBism, neo-Copenhagen interpretations, and some versions of relational quantum mechanics. We demonstrate that intersubjectivity fails in radical ways in these approaches, and we explain why intersubjectivity matters for empirical confirmation. We take a detailed look at the way (...) in which belief-updating might work in the kind of universe postulated by an orthodox interpretation, and argue that observers in such a universe are unable to escape their own perspective in order to learn about the structure of the set of perspectives that is supposed to make up reality according to these interpretations. We also argue that in some versions of these interpretations it is not even possible to use one’s own relative frequencies for empirical confirmation. Ultimately we conclude that it cannot be rational to believe these sorts of interpretations unless they are supplemented with some observer-independent structure which underwrites intersubjective agreement in at least certain sorts of cases. (shrink)

Arguments about the relationship between science and religion often proceed by identifying a set of essential characteristics of scientific and religious worldviews and arguing on the basis of these characteristics for claims about a relationship of conflict or compatibility between them. Such a strategy is doomed to failure because science, to some extent, and religion, to a much larger extent, are cultural phenomena that are too diverse in their expressions to be characterized in terms of a (...) unified worldview. In this paper I follow a different strategy. Having offered a loose characterization of the nature of science, I pose five questions about specific areas where religious and scientific worldviews may conflict - questions about the nature of faith, the belief in a God or Gods, the authority of sacred texts, the relationship between scientific and religious conceptions of the mind/soul, and the relationship between scientific and religious understandings of moral behavior. My review of these questions will show that they cannot be answered unequivocally because there is no agreement amongst religious believers as to the meaning of important religious concepts. Thus, whether scientific and religious worldviews conflict depends essentially upon whose science and whose religion one is considering. In closing, I consider the implications of this conundrum for science education. (shrink)

Following a previous article published in Biological Theory, in this study we present a mathematical theory for a science of qualities as directly perceived by living organisms, and based on morphological patterns. We address a range of qualitative phenomena as observables of a psychological system seen as an impredicative system. The starting point of our study is the notion that perceptual phenomena are projections of underlying invariants, objects that remain unchanged when transformations of a certain class (...) under consideration are applied. The study develops with the observables, the entailed total order and metric, whence the algebra and the geometry of such a science, presenting a formal phenomenological model for phenomena that are not rigidly Euclidean. We show how non-Euclidean perception can have many useful Euclidean formalizations, as well as locally-homeomorphic-to-Euclidean-space models. The mathematical models we provide are tested on the basis of results from experimental psychology, in particular from the field of color, time, and space perception. (shrink)

This research applies the notion of sustainability (Barney, 1991; Braa, Monteiro, & Sahay, 2004) to the mechanisms used by socially responsible investment(SRI) firms with respect to their stakeholders (investors and target firms). A contrast is developed between US and UK SRI firms. It is noted that screens, while maintaining a strong investor base, are less sustainable from the perspective of the firms targeted by SRI funds, whereas advocacy has stronger elements of sustainability with respect to the relations with corporations.

In this paper I argue that the rationality of law and legal decision making would be enhanced by a systematic attempt to recognize and respond to the implications of empirical uncertainty for policy making and decision making. Admission of uncertainty about the accuracy of facts and the validity of assumptions relied on to make inferences of fact is commonly avoided in law because it raises the spectre of paralysis of the capacity to decide issues authoritatively. The roots of this short-sighted (...) view are found in primitive mechanical models of relationships in the empirical and social world – those of objective causality and determinism. Insofar as it is believed that if we had sufficient data a clear and unequivocal answer would be available to each question, admission of uncertainty is seen as a sign of insufficiency, incompetence, impotence, and is avoided whenever a decision that must be seen to be based on valid reasons, cannot be avoided. Avoidance of some decisions, duplicity in others, is the result. -/- Decision-making must be restructured to recognize the provisional and context-bound validity and relevance of the models we use to conceptualize and order our understanding of phenomena, and to utilize this awareness as an instrument in the production of legal policies and decisions that will be authoritative precisely because they are honestly accurate and socially responsible. The paper makes a start on such a re-structuring of the legal process by exploring the implications of the observation that if law is to be “just”: 1) legal policy must be based on accurate information and rationally related to social goals; and 2) decisions applying policy to individual fact situations must be based on assumptions that are both relevant and accurate. -/- Reasons for determinations of fact must be given, otherwise the presumption that the trier of fact is “reasonable” is an unconditional licence to use private modes of logic and theories of social and natural science. What is not disclosed cannot be challenged on grounds of invalidity or irrelevance. Use of “objective validity” as a standard to evaluate conclusions made by the trier of fact in contentious cases would only serve to beg all important questions by concealing: 1) fundamental normative conflict, and 2) the limited nature and applicability of many validity claims. -/- Our use of the phrases “undue risk,” “public interest,” “reasonable,” and “necessary,” reflects the weight we choose to give conflicting social values and goals when we must make decisions in relative ignorance of all the consequences. “Objective criteria” are of limited utility in legal decision-making because their social meaning is derivative. Policy generation in the absence of any coherent conceptual-normative framework, use of vague terminology in legislation stating policy, and the absence of rational means to distinguish between individual cases to which decision-makers are required by law to apply policy, make it inevitable that many legal “decisions” made in the guise of determinations of objective fact, are charades, an arbitrary, capricious, intuitive, subjective (and thus private) use of public decision-making power. -/- Law must alter its aspirations and recognize that rational decision-making is a process that can occur only within parameters set by present knowledge and societal preference structures. Only by working with the constraints imposed by these parameters is it possible to achieve “just” decisions. Where no rational basis for differentiating cases exists, “individualized justice” must be avoided and public policy articulated in law applied uniformly to all cases in a class. The terms “reasonable” and “necessary,” used to describe policy and its consequences for specific cases, must be understood to represent provisional societal assessments, attempts to implement societal preference structures in the face of limited knowledge. Heightened awareness of the limited nature of our knowledge can only result in legal policies that have a more explicit normative basis. (shrink)

This paper surveys a decade of philosophical discussion of laboratory science, and concludes with a bibliography. Among its topics are: (1) The historical emergence of distinct styles of experimental reasoning and practice; the relation of this to constructionalist theses. (2) The extension of Duhem's thesis to instruments and apparatus; not only are theory and observation malleable resources, but also the materiel with which one works. (3) The demarcation of science not by method or content, but by product; the (...) creation of phenomena. (4) The disunity of science; science conceived of as a motley of autonomous activities, not as hierarchy. (5) The need to rethink the idea of experiment as intervention; to replace the model of experimenter as master of nature by that of investigator as collaborator. (shrink)

"This work is designed to be an introduction to abnormal psychology. The problems considered, however, belong equally to normal psychology. The present volume consists of selected lectures (with the exception of four) from courses on abnormal psychology delivered at the Tufts College Medical School (1908-10) and later at the University of California (1910). These again were based on a series of papers on the Unconscious published in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology (1908-9) of which they are elaborations. Since the lectures (...) were delivered a large amount of new material has been incorporated and the subject matter considered in more detail and more exhaustively than was practical before student bodies. The four additional lectures (X, XI, XII and XIII) appeared in abbreviated form in the same Journal (Oct., Nov., 1912) under the title "The Meaning of Ideas as Determined by Unconscious Settings." As the subconscious and its processes are fundamentals both in the structure of personality and in the many mechanisms through which personality, normal and abnormal, finds expression, the first eight lectures are devoted to its exposition. Indeed, the subconscious is not only the most important problem of psychology, it is the problem. The study of its phenomena must be preliminary to that of the functioning mechanisms of both the normal mind and of those special pathological conditions--the psycho-neuroses--which modern investigators are tracing to its perversions. It ought to be possible to construct the theory of the subconscious by inductive methods on the basis of facts of observation just as any theory of the physical sciences is constructed. This task I have set before myself as well as that of giving precision to our conception of the theory and taking it out of the domain of philosophical concepts. With this purpose in view I have endeavored to apply the method of science and construct the theory by induction from the data of observation and experiment. I have divided the subconscious into two classes, namely (1) the unconscious, or neural dispositions and processes, and (2) the coconscious, or actual subconscious ideas which do not enter the content of conscious awareness. In these lectures I have also endeavored (Lectures XIV-XVI) to develop the phenomena of the emotional innate dispositions which I conceive play one of the most fundamental parts in human personality and in determining mental and physiological behavior. Experimental methods and the well-known clinical methods of investigation have been employed by me as far as possible. The data made use of have been derived for the most part from my own observations, though confirmatory observations of others have not been neglected. Although a large number and variety of subjects or cases have been studied, as they have presented themselves in private and hospital practice, the data have been to a large extent sought in intensive studies, on particular subjects, carried on in some cases over a period of many years. These subjects, because of the ease with which subconscious and emotional phenomena were either spontaneously manifested or could be experimentally evoked, were particularly suitable for such studies and fruitful in results. It is by such intensive studies on special subjects, rather than by casual observation of many cases, that I believe the deepest insight into mental processes and mechanisms can be obtained. The favorable reception which was given to the first edition of this work has tempted me in preparing a new edition at the request of the publishers to incorporate four additional chapters dealing with the general principles underlying the structure and dynamic elements of human personality (Lecture XVII) and a study of a special problem in personality in which these principles are involved, namely, the psychogenesis of multiple personality as illustrated by a study of the case known as B.C.A. (Lectures XVIII-XX)." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved). (shrink)

The concept of complexity has become very important in theoretical biology. It is a many faceted concept and too new and ill defined to have a universally accepted meaning. This review examines the development of this concept from the point of view of its usefulness as a criteria for the study of living systems to see what it has to offer as a new approach. In particular, one definition of complexity has been put forth which has the necessary precision and (...) rigor to be considered as a useful categorization of systems, especially as it pertains to those we call living. This definition, due to Robert Rosen, has been developed in a number of works and involves some deep new concepts about the way we view systems. In particular, it focuses on the way we view the world and actually practice science through the use of the modelling relation. This mathematical object models the process by which we assign meaning to the world we perceive. By using the modelling relation, it is possible to identify the subjective nature of our practices and deal with this issue explicitly. By so doing, it becomes clear that our notion of complexity and especially its most popular manifestations, is in large part a product of the historical processes which lead to the present state of scientific epistemology. In particular, it is a reaction to the reductionist/mechanistic view of nature which can be termed the Newtonian Paradigm. This approach to epistemology has dominated for so long that its use as a model has become implicit in most of what we do in and out of science. The alternative to this approach is examined and related to the special definition of complexity given by Rosen. Some historical examples are used to emphasize the dependence of our view of what is complex in a popular sense on the ever changing state of our knowledge. The role of some popular concepts such as chaotic dynamics are examined in this context. The fields of artificial life and related areas are also viewed from the perspective of this rigorous view of complexity and found lacking. The notion that in some way life exists at the edge of chaos is examined from the perspective of the second law of thermodynamics given by Schneider and Kay. Finally, the causal elements in complex systems are explored in relation to complexity. Rosen has shown that a clear difference in causal relations exists between complex and simple systems and that this difference leads to a uniquely useful definition of what we mean by living. Rosen makes it very clear that the class of systems which are complex is a much larger class than those which we call living. For that reason, the focus of this review will be on complexity as a stepping stone towards the deeper question of what makes a system alive. (shrink)

In general introduction few examples of astronomical explanations of well-known and common local physical phenomena are presented. They are meant to show that it is often much easier to explain commonly experienced phenomena by investigating the behavior of something which is very far from the observer. In main chapters of the article the transparency of interstellar and intergalactic medium as well as the mystery of diffuse interstellar bands are presented. These very important fundamental problems are – for (...) class='Hi'>some reasons – overlooked by contemporary researchers. Plausible mechanisms of sociological, psychological and methodological kinds are proposed in last chapter as a potential explanation of fading of the scientific attempts to understand the nature and to create better future for the mankind. These are ethics in science and interdisciplinary way of solving scientific problems. (shrink)

SummaryThe view that observations in science are theory‐laden is critically evaluated in this paper. A number of theses are distinguished concerning the alleged theory‐ladenness of claims of the form ‘P observes X’ and ‘P observes that X is A’ that derive from some remarks of Hanson; each thesis is shown to be untenable. However a modicum of theory‐ladenness is supported in the claim that some observation‐that reports depend for their truth on other claims which in turn depend (...) for their truth on a piece of scientific theory. (shrink)

I have argued that insofar as sociological research seeks to elicit information from individuals directly (rather than by the use of documents, etc.), it necessarily involves the formation of a social relationship between investigator and subject(s) which may in time modify either party. I have concentrated on the effects of the research relationship on the investigator, effects which I claim are denied and systematically eliminated by being processed through a methodology which attempts to create a formal hiatus between the researcher (...) and his facts, and to present the facts in such a way as to be readily communicable and verifiable by the professional community. One important area of investigation is thus that of how the research results are achieved or constructed, and in particular, an investigation of the variety of ways in which research situations can affect investigators. This area is beginning to be explored, but is frequently obscured by the methodological orthodoxy which denies its existence. To see the matter in this way, however, is to continue to be dominated by this orthodoxy even whilst challenging it, for it is to continue seeing the problem in terms of a better understanding of researcher interference. The question I am trying to pose is, what can the researcher learn, not in the sense of what he can extract in his predefined terms from the research situation, but in the sense of what the subjects have to tell him. That this is a highly problematic question is indicated by the history of the methodological tradition which has attempted to answer it - the hermeneutic or verstehen tradition embodied by Dilthey and Collingwood, which influenced Max Weber heavily, and through him most of sociology to a greater or lesser extent. My account of the research methods used in “participant observation” in recent times indicates that usually only lip service is paid to verstehen. Weber's own attitude toward it is also instructive. Whilst regarding the possibility of understanding as well as explanation as an asset unique to social science, he regarded an account based solely on verstehen as only “a peculiarly plausible hypothesis” which required causal verification before it could be accepted. Verstehen, in other words, was a source of insight but such insights had to be checked against the facts. The trouble is, as we have seen, that “facts” represent a particular construction put upon certain features of social relationships. It provides an ethnocentricity based not simply on the researcher's interests, theories and problem definitions (though these are important), but on his methodology, which translates everything into a digestible (and, ideally, quantifiable) and mutually comparable language. As has recently been realised, this poses considerable difficulties when the societies in question are not in important respects amenable to “factualisation” - for example when magic and religion play a large part in them. The recent debate on understanding other societies and the role of rationality in doing so, has exposed just that feature of verstehen that Weber's treatment buried: that is, that in order for societies to be fully understood, an acceptance of their terms is necessary; a translation of these terms into the language of social licence distorts and truncates understanding, more drastically for some social phenomena than others. On the other hand, if this is not done, it is hard to see what systematic basis of comparison there will remain. The situation that I have described is however more complex than this, for the researchers in my illustrations have had experiences and learned things which are not always the result of total conversion, but rather the impact of a new way of thought and life upon their own. On this basis, they have gained insights which they have found it impossible to incorporate into the accepted framework of “research.” The status of these insights and their potential for future inclusion in normal research seems to me to present great difficulties. Basically there are two possibilities: either to make what counts as “research,” “data,” and so on, more flexible, and/or to develop the scrutiny of the experiences and insights in question to such a point as to be able to incorporate them into the public and verifiable research process. The dangers of the first alternative are subjectivism and loss of verifiability, and of the second vulgarisation and distortion. But a few examples will serve to illustrate the difficulty entailed in clearly discerning the way ahead. Evans-Pritchard's attitude towards Zande magic is completely ambiguous. He admits to adopting it for periods to enable communication, but drops it as soon as communication stops. His analysis is an outstanding example of its incorporation into social science with the minimum of distortion and the maximum of sensitivity. On ideals in which he continued to believe outside Zande society - as he evidently did not believe in magic - such as God, good and evil and courage, he is extremely reserved, though he does claim to have learned from the Azande, i.e., either he was able to incorporate without change what they taught him into his own frame of reference, or they stimulated him to broaden it. Castaneda seems to have had even more difficulty. He was certainly stimulated and helped to solve personal problems both within and by expanding his own terms, but he also finally accepted that he could not see the new world Don Juan was showing him without abandoning his own terms. What hope there is in this area would seem to lie in the painstaking reanalysis of their experiences by such workers as Evans-Pritchard and Castaneda. In the meantime, I hope I shall not be taken to be arguing for the inclusion of every passing emotion of the researcher into his report. It is one thing to argue that the use of a methodology which necessarily excludes such experiences as irrelevant is systematically misleading; it is another, having admitted them, to go beyond treating them as a problem and to attempt to capitalise on them. It is notable that within the literary and artistic tradition to which I have alluded we can recognise and sometimes agree upon those writers who have made of their experiences and knowledge of the world something worthwhile, and confer on them the title of “artist;” yet the state of literary criticism is, if anything, even more anarchic than that of sociology, and is very far from providing us with criteria to decide how best to proceed. Indeed, even worse, these are hints that sociology may be expected by some to provide an answer to these questions. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Rebirth of Cool:Toward a Science SublimeE. David Wong (bio)We love and hate "the cool." As educators, few things are more coveted than being recognized as teaching the "coolest" class in the school. We look forward to the rare moment when students gasp in awe or scream in amazement. However, in the quiet that returns after the last student rushes out the classroom door, we may feel (...) an uneasy ambivalence. Perhaps we admonish ourselves that serious science is substantial, enduring, and intellectual. We wonder whether our "cool" class was merely superficial, fleeting, and mindless.In this article I examine the cool—this idea we love and hate—and assert its importance in science education. I acknowledge that some experiences can be engaging but are superficial and unimportant—this is the "merely cool." By contrast, some experiences are deeply moving because we feel a growing capacity to perceive meaning and value in the world—this is the "sublimely cool." I draw from philosophy, literature, psychology, and aesthetics to build connections between cool and sublime experiences. By highlighting the surprisingly substantial connection between the cool and sublime, I hope to bring greater depth to the meaning of "cool," this imprecise, but honest, term. I also take care to define sublimely cool experiences in science as having a direct relationship with subject-matter understanding. It is true that the full meaning of aesthetic experiences extends beyond the grasp of words and conceptualization; however, it is equally true that knowledge and reason are central to all worthwhile experiences. The expansion of meaning and perception, not just intense sensation or emotion, is the heart of the sublimely cool experience. Nobel laureate physicist Richard Feynman provides a personal example of how his knowledge of science enhances his sublimely cool experience of Nature: "Poets say science takes away from the beauty of the stars—mere globs of gas atoms. Nothing is 'mere.' I too can see the stars on a desert night, and feel them. But do I see less or more? The [End Page 67] vastness of the heavens stretches my imagination—stuck on this carousel my little eye can catch one-million-year-old light."1Cool as a Sign of Compelling Experience"Cool" is an intriguing expression for it is at once both crude and incisive. On the one hand, "cool" is a colloquial term used by people of all ages and backgrounds in many contexts to describe many things. So wide and informal is its use that "cool" may seem trite and banal. "Cool" is rarely chosen carefully when used: indeed, it is more often an unintentional, reflexive utterance.Thus, the more one thinks before speaking, the less likely "cool" will be used. Nonetheless, because it is an impulsive expression, "cool" may be all the more honest. Dewey made a similar point in his observation of the word "beauty": "Beauty... is properly an emotional term, though one denoting a characteristic emotion. In the presence of a landscape, a poem or a picture that lays hold of us with immediate poignancy, we are moved to murmur or to exclaim 'How beautiful.' The ejaculation is a just tribute to the capacity of the object to arouse admiration that approaches worship."2 With "just tribute" Dewey emphasizes the honesty of the term. By "admiration that approaches worship," Dewey reminds us that the spontaneous uttering of "beautiful" is a sign that a powerful experience has been had. I will make a similar argument that the term "cool"—although common and ordinary—can signal the having of a compelling experience. As a compelling experience, the cool becomes an important resource for teachers.Dewey goes on to describe how the meaning of "beauty" has, unfortunately, lost its value to aesthetic theoreticians: "Beauty is at the furthest remove from an analytic term, and hence from a conception that can figure in theory as a means of explanation or classification. Unfortunately, it has been hardened into a peculiar object; emotional rapture has been subjected to what philosophy calls hypostatization, and the concept of beauty as an essence of intuition has resulted. For purposes of theory, it then becomes an obstructive term."3Because of the way they are... (shrink)

We undeniably live in an information age—as, indeed, did those who lived before us. After all, as the cultural historian Robert Darnton pointed out: ‘every age was an age of information, each in its own way’ (Darnton 2000: 1). Darnton was referring to the news media, but his insight surely also applies to the sciences. The practices of acquiring, storing, labeling, organizing, retrieving, mobilizing, and integrating data about the natural world has always been an enabling aspect of scientific work. Natural (...) history and its descendant discipline of biological taxonomy are prime examples of sciences dedicated to creating and managing systems of ordering data. In some sense, the idea of biological taxonomy as an information science is commonplace. Perhaps it is because of its self-evidence that the information science perspective on taxonomy has not been a major theme in the history and philosophy of science. The botanist Vernon Heywood once pointed out that historians of biology, in their ‘preoccupation with the development of the sciences of botany and zoology… [have] diverted attention from the role of taxonomy as an information science’ (Heywood 1985: 11). More specifically, he argued that historians had failed to appreciate how principles and practices that can be traced to Linnaeus constituted ‘a change in the nature of taxonomy from a local or limited folk communication system and later a codified folk taxonomy to a formal system of information science [that] marked a watershed in the history of biology’ (ibid.). A similar observation could be made about twentieth-century philosophy of biology, which mostly skipped over practical and epistemic questions about information management in taxonomy. The taxonomic themes that featured in the emerging philosophy of biology literature in the second half of the twentieth century were predominantly metaphysical in orientation. This is illustrated by what has become known as the ‘essentialism story’: an account about the essentialist nature of pre- Darwinian taxonomy that used to be accepted by many historians and philosophers, and which stimulated efforts to document and interpret shifts in the metaphysical understanding of species and (natural) classification (Richards 2010; Winsor 2003; Wilkins 2009). Although contemporary debates in the philosophy of taxonomy have moved on, much discussion continues to focus on conceptual and metaphysical issues surrounding the nature of species and the principles of classification. Discussions centring on whether species are individuals, classes, or kinds have sprung up as predictably as perennials. Raucous debates have arisen even with the aim of accommodating the diversity of views: is monism, pluralism, or eliminativism about the species category the best position to take? In addition to these, our disciplines continue to interrogate what is the nature of these different approaches to classification: are they representational or inferential roles of different approaches to classification (evolutionary taxonomy, phenetics, phylogenetic systematics)? While there is still much to learn from these discussions—in which we both actively participate—our aim with this topical collection has been to seek different entrypoints and address underexposed themes in the history and philosophy of taxonomy. We believe that approaching taxonomy as an information science prompts new questions and can open up new philosophical vistas worth exploring. A twenty-first century information science turn in the history and philosophy of taxonomy is already underway. In scientific practice and in daily life it is hard to escape the imaginaries of Big Data and the constant threats of being ‘flooded with data’. In the life sciences, these developments are often associated with the socalled bioinformatics crisis that can hopefully be contained by a new, interdisciplinary breed of bioinformaticians. These new concepts, narratives, and developments surrounding the centrality of data and information systems in the biological and biomedical sciences have raised important philosophical questions about their challenges and implications. But historical perspectives are just as necessary to judge what makes our information age different from those that preceded us. Indeed, as the British zoologist Charles Godfray has often pointed out, the piles of data that are being generated in contemporary systematic biology have led to a second bioinformatics crisis, the first being the one that confronted Linnaeus in the mid-18th century (Godfray 2007). Although our aim is to clear a path for new discussions of taxonomy from an information science-informed point of view, we continue where others in the history, philosophy, and sociology of science have already trod. We believe that an appreciation of biological taxonomy as an information science raises many questions about the philosophical, theoretical, material, and practical aspects of the use and revision of biological nomenclatures in different local and global communities of scientists and citizen scientists. In particular, conceiving of taxonomy as an information science directs attention to the temporalities of managing an accumulating data about classified entities that are themselves subject to revision, to the means by which revision is accomplished, and to the semantic, material, and collaborative contexts that mediate the execution of revisions. (shrink)

Recently some results have been presented which show that certain kinds of deterministic descriptions and indeterministic descriptions are observationally equivalent (Werndl 2009a, 2010). This paper focuses on some philosophical questions prompted by these results. More specifically, first, I will discuss the philosophical comments made by mathematicians about observational equivalence, in particular Ornstein and Weiss (1991). Their comments are vague, and I will argue that, according to a reasonable interpretation, they are misguided. Second, the results on observational equivalence raise (...) the question of whether the deterministic or indeterministic description is preferable relative to all evidence. If none of them is preferable, there is underdetermination. I will criticize Winnie's (1998) argument that, by appealing to different observations, one finds that the deterministic description is preferable. In particular, I will clarify a confusion in this argument. Furthermore, I will argue that if the concern is a strong kind of underdetermination, the argument delivers the desired conclusion but this conclusion is trivial; and for other kinds of underdetermination of interest the argument fails. (shrink)

Modern knowledge of servo systems and computing machines makes it possible to specify a circuit that can and will induce the rules and winning moves in a game like chess when they are given only ostensibly, that is, by playing against opponents who quit when illegal or losing moves are made. Such circuits enjoy a value social in the sense that it is shared by the players.La connaissance moderne des servomécanismes et des machines à calculer permet de concevoir un circuit (...) qui pourra suivre des règles et décider les coups décisifs dans un jeu comme le jeu d'échecs tout au moins quand les coups sont joués de faÇon apparente, c'est-à-dire contre des adversaires qui abandonneront dans le cas de coups irréguliers ou de coups absurdes.De tels circuits possèdent une „valeur” sociale dans la mesure où elle est partagée par les autres joueurs.Moderne Kenntnissen im Gebiete von Folgegeraeten und Rechenmaschinen ermoeglichen es einen elektrischen Kreis aufzuwerfen, der die Regeln und gewinnbringende Zuege eines Spieles wie Schach induktiv erfassen kann und wird, wenn diese Regeln und Zuege nur ostensiv gegeben sind; d.h. indem mit Gegnern gespielt wird, die das Spiel einstellen sobald regelwidrige oder verlustbringende Zuege gemacht werden. Solche Kreise schaffen demnach einen Wert, der gesellschaftlich in dem Sinn ist, dass er auch von den Mitspielern geteilt wird. (shrink)

By 1933, the class of generally accepted elementary particles comprised the electron, the photon, the proton as well as newcomers in the shape of the neutron, the positron, and the neutrino. During the following decade, a new and poorly understood particle, the mesotron or meson, was added to the list. By paying close attention to the names of these and other particles and to the sometimes controversial proposals of names, a novel perspective on this well-researched line of development is (...) offered. Part of the study investigates the circumstances around the coining of “positron” as an alternative to “positive electron.” Another and central part is concerned with the many names associated with the discovery of what in the late 1930s was generally called the “mesotron” but eventually became known as the “meson” and later again the muon and pion. The naming of particles in the period up to the early 1950s was more than just a matter of agreeing on convenient terms, it also reflected different conceptions of the particles and in some cases the uncertainty regarding their nature and relations to existing theories. Was the particle discovered in the cosmic rays the same as the one responsible for the nuclear forces? While two different names might just be synonymous referents, they might also refer to widely different conceptual images. (shrink)

In this paper, we focus on contexts where the primary activity is to expound knowledge about general classes of phenomena, either by categorizing and characterizing them or by explaining them based on some theory, ranging from a commonsense folk theory to an uncommonsense scientific theory. Texts produced in such contexts include science lectures, research articles, and entries in encyclopedias. We focus on explanations, considering them across strata in terms of context, semantics, and lexicogrammar, and summarizing contributions from (...) different research strands. Against this background, we report on a study of the registers used in secondary school chemistry textbooks in Hong Kong. We begin by summarizing a framework for classifying the contexts in which texts operate – a framework designed to allow us to differentiate different kinds of text according to the contexts they operate in. Then, we focus on one type of context – that of expounding knowledge about general classes of phenomena. Next, we identify different strategies of expounding knowledge, contrasting explanations and categorizations, and then discuss explanations in more detail. Finally, we move to the question of how these contextual types are realized semantically as texts organized as rhetorical complexes, drawing on secondary school textbooks in chemistry in particular. (shrink)

Given the wide range of mythical/occult lore, stage legerdemain, and popular fantasy-based fictional stereotypes that have long been associated with the term magic in human culture, it is quite possible that some academically-minded readers may initially be put off by the title of this book. But these are not the kinds of magic that Dean Radin is talking about. Rather, he is subtly alluding to a certain class of seemingly extraordinary human experiences and abilities for which the exact (...) underlying physical and biological mechanisms are not too well understood as of yet – namely, the experiences and abilities that may be classed as psychic (or psi). He focuses on examining three general sub-classes which, in keeping with the theme of this book, are labeled in the parlance of magic: force of will (referring to psychokinesis, aka. mind-matter interaction), divination (referring to extrasensory perception), and theurgy (referring to experiences related to survival after death). Yet even with such clarification being made from the outset, there might still be readers who would wonder whether it is even a good idea to discuss psi phenomena in conjunction with magic, as some parapsychologists may be reminded of the effort once made by psychologist (and noted skeptic) James Alcock (1981) to portray an association between the two as being something fanciful and not fitting with the pursuit of science in his book Parapsychology: Science or Magic? Arguing on the basis of its seeming incompatibility with mainstream science, Alcock implied that psi is something that could be seen as being akin to occult conjuring, where one is able to spontaneously gain certain knowledge or mentally bring about certain event outcomes at will, without any apparent logic or reason. And as psychologist and psi researcher John Palmer (1983) had pointed out in his critical review of the book, Alcock even went on to imply that parapsychologists tend to act more like occult magicians than scientists, claiming that they are motivated by a predisposed belief in psi rather than an objective search for facts and data-driven theory. In light of such blatant accusations being made in the past, one might figure that parapsychologists would be wary of their subject matter being discussed or referred to in relation to magic again, in any shape or form. (shrink)

We study abductive, causal, and non-causal conditionals in indicative and counterfactual formulations using probabilistic truth table tasks under incomplete probabilistic knowledge (N = 80). We frame the task as a probability-logical inference problem. The most frequently observed response type across all conditions was a class of conditional event interpretations of conditionals; it was followed by conjunction interpretations. An interesting minority of participants neglected some of the relevant imprecision involved in the premises when inferring lower or upper probability bounds (...) on the target conditional/counterfactual ("halfway responses"). We discuss the results in the light of coherence-based probability logic and the new paradigm psychology of reasoning. (shrink)

Summary The mesotrons, or mesons, were the first elementary particles observed to be inherently unstable. This essay offers a reconstruction of the stream of researches related to mesotron decay, and examines how these researches shaped some of the basic concepts and practices of the emerging field of particle physics. Mass measurements could not settle the question of whether the mesons were a homogeneous kind of particles or an assortment of particles with different masses. The assumption of a single mass (...) prevailed not on experimental grounds but because the mesons were identified tentatively with the carriers of the nuclear force according to a theory formulated by Hideki Yukawa. The identification gained currency because it entailed the prediction of meson decay, and thereby upheld the promise of a unified explanation of nuclear and cosmic-ray phenomena. In turn, the observation of decay and the measurement of the mean lifetime created the conditions for investigating the nuclear interactions of mesons at rest. Interest in these interactions was heightened, immediately after WWII, by the prospect of building and using accelerators to acquire knowledge about fundamental nuclear processes. Using decay to study nuclear capture, however, led to the realization that there exist not only different kinds of mesons but also two nuclear forces. (shrink)

This research applies the notion of sustainability (Barney, 1991; Braa, Monteiro, & Sahay, 2004) to the mechanisms used by socially responsible investment(SRI) firms with respect to their stakeholders (investors and target firms). A contrast is developed between US and UK SRI firms. It is noted that screens, while maintaining a strong investor base, are less sustainable from the perspective of the firms targeted by SRI funds, whereas advocacy has stronger elements of sustainability with respect to the relations with corporations.

The study of consciousness in modern science is hampered by deeply ingrained, dualist presuppositions about the nature of consciousness. In particular, conscious experiences are thought to be private and subjective, contrasting with physical phenomena which are public and objective. In the present article, I argue that all observed phenomena are, in a sense, private to a given observer, although there are some events to which there is public access. Phenomena can be objective in the sense (...) of intersubjective, investigators can be objective in the sense of truthful or dispassionate, and procedures can be objective in being well-specified, but observed phenomena cannot be objective in the sense of being observer-free. Phenomena are only repeatable in the sense that they are judged by a community of observers to be tokens of the same type. Stripped of its dualist trappings the empirical method becomes if you carry out these procedures you will observe or experience these results -- which applies as much to a science of consciousness as it does to physics. (shrink)

Some issues raised by parapsychological phenomena (psi) are examined in the light of their implications for a philosophy of science. It is shown that the kinds of problems psi poses for science vary with the way one conceives of science as well as one's conception of psi. It is suggested that psi may be a product of the fact that all of our scientific concepts are abstractions and therefore oversimplifications. This raises the possibility that our (...) best conceptual technique for dealing with psi is a non-discursive symbolism, since this would not demand "classes" (oversimplification). Implications of this approach are considered. (shrink)

The debate on “Loss and Damage” (L&D) has gained traction over the last few years. Supported by growing scientific evidence of anthropogenic climate change amplifying frequency, intensity and duration of climate-related hazards as well as observed increases in climate-related impacts and risks in many regions, the “Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage” was established in 2013 and further supported through the Paris Agreement in 2015. Despite advances, the debate currently is broad, diffuse and somewhat confusing, while concepts, methods and (...) tools, as well as directions for policy remain vague and often contested. This book, a joint effort of the Loss and Damage Network—a partnership effort by scientists and practitioners from around the globe—provides evidence-based insight into the L&D discourse by highlighting state-of-the-art research conducted across multiple disciplines, by showcasing applications in practice and by providing insight into policy contexts and salient policy options. This introductory chapter summarises key findings of the twenty-two book chapters in terms of five propositions. These propositions, each building on relevant findings linked to forward-looking suggestions for research, policy and practice, reflect the architecture of the book, whose sections proceed from setting the stage to critical issues, followed by a section on methods and tools, to chapters that provide geographic perspectives, and finally to a section that identifies potential policy options. The propositions comprise (1) Risk management can be an effective entry point for aligning perspectives and debates, if framed comprehensively, coupled with climate justice considerations and linked to established risk management and adaptation practice; (2) Attribution science is advancing rapidly and fundamental to informing actions to minimise, avert, and address losses and damages; (3) Climate change research, in addition to identifying physical/hard limits to adaptation, needs to more systematically examine soft limits to adaptation, for which we find some evidence across several geographies globally; (4) Climate risk insurance mechanisms can serve the prevention and cure aspects emphasised in the L&D debate but solidarity and accountability aspects need further attention, for which we find tentative indication in applications around the world; (5) Policy deliberations may need to overcome the perception that L&D constitutes a win-lose negotiation “game” by developing a more inclusive narrative that highlights collective ambition for tackling risks, mutual benefits and the role of transformation. (shrink)

In this account of the philosophical and scientific pursuits of Pierre Gassendi , I challenge a traditional view which says that the inspiration, motivation, and demonstrative grounds for his physical atomism consist not in his empiricism but in his historicist commitments. Indeed, Gassendi suggests that it's a consequence of our best theory of knowledge and sound scientific method that we get evidence which warrants his microphysical theory. ;The primary novelty of his theory of empirical knowledge is his proposal, against the (...) Stoics and Descartes, that it is not a necessary condition of our knowing some claim that we are certain of it. This move immediately broadens the scope of what we can know through the senses, as does his suggestion that we include among such knowledge claims those assertions about what is hidden to the senses which we legitimately infer from the evidence of the perceptually given. ;On the basis of these epistemological positions, Gassendi develops his views on scientific method according to which we attain and justify our best empirical claims by deduction yet, he believes, these claims are at root probabilistic, and we may maintain hypotheses as the basis of our scientific reasoning so long as there is some empirical evidence for them, however broadly construed. ;Hence Gassendi suggests that his atomism constitutes a 'most likely hypothesis' for which we have empirical evidence--which of necessity is found indirectly in 'indicative' signs, those surface level phenomena for which he takes the existence of atoms to be a sine qua non condition. Perhaps the paramount case of such evidence consists in those microscopic observations of crystalline formation and dissolution that he takes to demonstrate the molecular structure of matter--a key and innovative consequence of his atomism. ;The robust character of Gassendi's method emerges in his appeals to indirect evidence for claims about the unobservable and his willingness to count this as adequate empirical grounds for maintaining an atomist hypothesis. Remarkably, he stands at the dawn of the modern era with at least a proposal as to how to resolve one of empiricism's more vexing difficulties, still with us in some form today. (shrink)

In the hyper-mobile world of today, the industry of tourism and cultural entertainment, witnesses the multiplication of opportunities to travel. According to John Urry, we inhabit mobile cultures where being kind to strangers is a positive cultural value. This reality archives the bloody past of hospitality, which from the ideological fields facilitated, for instance, the conquest of the Americas. In the present discussion, I delve into the world of literature and explore Viaje a caballo por las provincias Argentinas [Journey on (...) horseback across the provinces of Argentine] a work originally written by William Mac Cann, a British businessman who visited the country between 1947 and 1948. His observations not only reveal the collective patterns of behaviour that have remained part of daily life up to date. The volume describes the attempts of an elite interested in creating a united, but subordinated, image of society, and illuminates the diverse mechanisms of imperial expansion. Hospitality plays a crucial role in the hierarchy of travellers presented in the book, with some belonging to the higher classes of society and others unnamed. (shrink)

I would like to stress Vadim Mikhailovich's [Mezhuev's] position and clarify our conversation about culturology. It is constantly repeated that culturology is a science. It is my profound conviction that culturology is not a science. Culturology is a distinctive phenomenon of Russian culture and represents a certain intellectual movement. If one briefly surveys the history of its emergence, its philosophical origin becomes obvious. This intellectual movement consists of three levels, if one takes into account the "-logy" ending. First, (...) the philosophical level, from which in the 1970s culture began to be conceived as a special field of knowledge in our country. Then, humanistic knowledge: a great many representatives of the humanities in Russia-historians, art specialists, art critics, essayists-studied culture. Finally, there is the socioscientific tendency, which is just beginning to form in Russia and carries the internationally accepted name of social and cultural anthropology. All of us are synergistically attracted to these three tendencies, which comprise what is called culturology. The question of how these three tendencies of knowledge are correlated in the framework of the given intellectual movement is, in my view, extremely important. For quite some time now, there has been no reflection in Russia on the foundations of scientific and philosophical knowledge, but such reflection is necessary. To advance along the road of rational knowledge it is important to reflect in what cognitive space we find ourselves, what we are doing within its boundaries, and for what reason. From this point of view, neither philosophers nor representatives of the humanities or the social sciences will renounce their positions of observer. Moreover, I agree with Mezhuev that there is no single philosophy, humanistic conception, or theory of culture. Anyone who is engaged professionally in the study of cultural phenomena can choose his initial foundations. As Vadim Mezhuev correctly notes, the significance of philosophy for other types of knowledge lies in the fact that there are borderline areas of man's existence in the world. However, they are identified in different ways by different philosophies: positivism, phenomenology, classical Platonism, Aristotelianism, Kantianism, and so forth. Representatives of humanistic and socioscientific knowledge are free to choose any metaphysics. Philosophers will continue to attend to their business in their subject area, and scientists in theirs. But it is important periodically to determine rationally when there must be close and complementary relations between the three components of this intellectual movement and when they must exist in parallel. Then questions such as who has priority and who is the guardian of truth will not arise. If the tendencies have diverged in parallel, then the representatives of each of them are occupied within their domains with questions which are irrelevant in other fields of knowledge or for other theoretical models. At the end of the twentieth century, to pose the question of scientism or antiscientism is senseless because today we know that there are different forms of rationality and that science is not the only, and is quite a narrow, form of rationality. Myth too is rational. It is expressed in categories and has a particular inner logic. We recognize myth as a rational cultural entity, because it is represented in symbolic form as an ordered sequence of judgments, as an artifact. But it differs from scientific theory. That is why it is fruitful to reflect on what forms of rationality are relevant to what levels of knowledge. I agree with Ogurtsov, who says that these forms penetrate in one way or another into every culturally institutionalized form of knowledge. Indeed, in philosophical knowledge there are elements of everyday, mythological, and scientific knowledge, but this does not negate the distinctive nature of the philosophical form of knowledge. In science there are elements of metaphysics, mythology, and everyday knowledge, but this does not cancel the particularities of the scientific form of knowledge. The same is true of the humanistic form, which is in principle irremovable from the framework of institutionalized knowledge, at least for now. I do not agree with Ogurtsov that I give the humanistic form of knowledge a negative evaluation. Humanistic knowledge begins to be significant in a period of a cognitive paradigm shift. This, we can say, is apparent today, at a time of transition from the grand style of modernism in its postmodern mode to the building of the foundations for a new whole. The point is that the humanistic form of knowledge enables us to isolate at the outset those areas of the unknown at which we arrive because of the limitations inherent in other forms of rationality. It is closest to everyday and empirical categories of knowledge and forms of ideas; hence, particularism, image syncretism, and mobility are its distinctive features. But without this humanistic level no further step is possible in either scientific or philosophical knowledge. The breakdown into these forms of knowledge- philosophical, humanistic, and scientific-may be primitive, but we have to start our reflection on the foundations of our cognitive relationship to our surroundings somewhere. The identification of the forms of knowledge makes it possible to draw the conclusion that, unlike philosophical and humanistic knowledge, socioscientific knowledge is modeled on the natural sciences. From this it becomes obvious that the distinctive features of the object of social sciences determine also the special nature of the categorial apparatus, operationalization, selection method, and information analysis. I do not insist that the model I suggest must be accepted. Other models can be constructed. But let us start with a simpler comparison of types of knowledge and later we shall differentiate them. I started from this level because in our culture such a division is apparent and generally accepted. There are the philosophical, humanistic, and scientific forms of knowledge. They are irreducible to one another, they perform entirely different functions in the knowledge of man's relationship to the environment, and express different views about how man lives in culture. I agree that philosophy is exactly existence in culture with a singling out of the limits of this existence. But representatives of humanistic and socioscientific knowledge also deal with existence in culture. What is important for the philosopher is the direction of knowledge from within to the outside; for the representative of humanistic knowledge it is the description of how he exists among a multitude of seemingly diverse and divergent artifacts and processes; and for the scientist it is the order of the philosophically and humanistically defined reality in order to control it the better. (shrink)

This is the text of the 2022 Boyle Lecture. After some acknowledgements, it introduces the theological problem of the suffering of nonhuman creatures in the natural world as described by evolutionary science. It sets aside the neo-Cartesian objection that this suffering should not be considered real. The lecture then considers, and initially rejects, theodicies based on some form of fall event. An account is offered based on the premise that Darwinian evolution was the only way God could (...) have given rise to a biological world containing the sorts of values we observe. Although this remains the preferred basis for an evolutionary theodicy, consideration is finally given to the extent to which certain phenomena, such as parasitism, cancers, and viral infections, might be thought to exhibit a resistance to the divine will. The tentative suggestion is made that this resistance might derive from temptation by spiritual powers, thus incorporating into an overall only-way account an element of angelic fallenness. (shrink)

Agent-based modelling has become a well-established method in social epistemology and philosophy of science but the question of what kind of explanations these models provide remains largely open. This paper is dedicated to this issue. It starts by distinguishing between real-world phenomena, real-world possibilities, and logical possibilities as different kinds of targets which agent-based models can represent. I argue that models representing the former two kinds provide how-actually explanations or causal how-possibly explanations. In contrast, models that represent logical (...) possibilities provide epistemically opaque how-possibly explanations. While highly idealised ABMs in the form in which they are initially proposed typically fall into the last category, the epistemic opaqueness of explanations they provide can be reduced by validation procedures. To this purpose, an examination of results of simulations in terms of classes of models can be particularly helpful. I illustrate this point by discussing a class of ABMs of scientific interaction and the claim that a high degree of interaction can impede scientific inquiry. (shrink)

In this thesis I investigate causal inquiry in the social sciences, drawing on examples from various disciplines and in particular from conflict studies. In a backlash against the pervasiveness of statistical methods, in the last decade certain social scientists have focused on finding the causal mechanisms behind observed correlations. To provide evidence for such mechanisms, researchers increasingly rely on ‘process tracing’, a method which attempts to give evidence for causal relations by specifying the chain of events connecting a putative cause (...) and effect of interest. I will ask whether the causal claims process tracers make are defensible, and where they are not defensible I will ask how we can improve the method. Throughout these investigations, I show that the conclusions of process tracing are constrained both by the causal structure ofthe social world and by social scientists’ aims and values. My central argument is this: all instances of social phenomena have causally relevant differences, which implies that any research design that requires some comparison between cases is limited by how we systematize these phenomena. Moreover, such research cannot rely on stable regularities. Nevertheless, to forego causal conclusions altogether is not the right response to these limitations; by carefully outlining our epistemic assumptions we can make progress in causal inquiry. While I use philosophical theories of causation to comment on the feasibility of a social scientific method, I also do the reverse: by investigating a popular contemporary method in the social sciences, I show to what extent our philosophical theories of causation are workable in practice. Thus, this thesis is both a methodological and a philosophical work. Every chapter discusses both a fundamental philosophical position on the social sciences and a relevant case study from the social sciences. (shrink)