Festschrift for prof. Helge Malmgren. -/- Contents: • Kristoffer Ahlström: Two Levels of Epistemic Inquiry; • Jan Almäng: Till frågan om trancendentala argument; • Kent Gustavsson: Perceptionens gåta; • Björn Haglund: Some Notes on Induction; • Ingvar Johansson: Money and Fictions; • Frank Lorentzon: Intuition och kunskap; • Ingmar Persson: Double Effect Troubles; • Filip Radovic: Wittgenstein om tautologier och andra logiska satser; • Claes Strannegård: Anthropomorphic Artificial Intelligence; • Bolof Stridbeck: Den motbjudande slutsatsen & den plågade filosofen; • (...) class='Hi'>Christer Svennerlind: Armstrong on Instantiation as Partial Identity; • Anders Tolland: Mr Darcys berättigade stolthet; • Björn Vickhoff: H-speech: the Musical Self - A Phenomenological Approach to Music & Emotion; • Dag Westerståhl: On the Aristotelian Square of Opposition; • Carl-Gustaf Wikstrand: On Pain States & Mental Causation;. (shrink)

The subject matter of this thesis is analytic ontology. Chapters II and III deal with two versions of trope theory, or moderate nominalism; these are defined as ontologies which recognise properties and relations but no (real) universals. The key notion of both theories, trope, is characterised as an abstract particular. What the abstractness amounts to differs between the two. Yet another difference is that simplicity is an essential trait of a trope according to one theory, but not according to the (...) other. Though exact similarity is said to play an important role in both theories, as it turns out, this does not seem to be the case. The ontology dealt with in chapter IV is a mixture of moderate nominalism concerning qualities and realism concerning relations. In it, quality instances (moments) and universal relations are the ultimate constituents of the universe. While relations and moments are considered to be constituents of states of affairs, which are characterised as objects of higher orders, complexes that are objects of the first order are made up of moments on their own. Among these complexes one finds the ordinary objects. Paradoxically, although relations are necessary for the existence of complex first order objects, relations are not thought to be among the contents of these objects. The main subject of chapter V is a particular version of moderate realism; it is an ontology which is realistic in its recognition of universals and moderate in its recognition of instances of these universals. Instances combine to form complex networks. A theoretically motivated claim is that although each instance has a predicational aspect as well as a universal one, it is simple in the sense of lacking internal predicative structure; though, this claim can be called into question. Keywords: analytic ontology, moderate nominalism, moderate realism, particular, universal, abstract, concrete, abstract particular, abstract universal, concrete particular, concrete universal, trope, moment, complex unity, collection, instance, unit attribute, intensional aspect, predicational aspect, continuous composite, articulated composite. (shrink)

During the last decades, Ingvar Johansson has made a formidable contribution to the development of philosophy in general and perhaps especially to the development of metaphysics. This volume consists of original papers written by 50 philosophers from all over the world in honour of Ingvar Johansson to celebrate his 70th birthday. The papers cover traditional issues in metaphysics and the philosophy of mind, applied ethics and applied metaphysics, the nature of human rights, the philosophy of economics and sports. Some of (...) the papers study the philosophy of Ingvar Johansson.All of them studies subjects which he has shown an interest in. The variety of subjects covered, testifies to the extraordinary wide range of issues his thought has had a bearing on. (shrink)

In this article I look at two works by Swedish video artist Lina Selander and explore how underlying visual patterns unfold in these works that are connected to certain worldly phenomena. Borrowing from Jacques Derrida, I describe the tendency of being en mal d'archive as an obsession to structure the world into particular recognizable patterns. I argue that Selander's works can be understood as the unfolding of such structures, the result being that the very impulse itself, the obsession Derrida speaks (...) of, comes to the forefront. In several of Selander's works, light is explored both as a basis and prerequisite for photography and as a metaphor for this potentially destructive desire for all-encompassing knowledge and structure. As such, I argue, the unfolding that takes place in her works can be understood as paradoxically increasing the shadows ‐ as a way of undoing the totalizing effect of light and articulating modes of not knowing or mystery in relation to the phenomena explored. (shrink)

The concept of magic is frequently used to discuss technology, a practice considered useful by some with others arguing that viewing technology as magic precludes a proper understanding of technology. The concept of magic is especially prominent in discussions of artificial intelligence and machine learning. Based on an anthropological perspective, this paper juxtaposes ML technology with magic, using descriptions drawn from a project on an ML-powered system for propulsion control of cargo ships. The paper concludes that prior scholarly work on (...) technology has failed to both define magic adequately and use research into magic. It also argues that although the distinction between ML technology and magic is important, recognition of the similarities is useful for understanding ML technology. (shrink)

In Ostia, Rome's harbour-town, several parts of an inscription which reveals that the Emperor Vespasian promoted the town's water supply were found in 1983. Eventually references to the text began to circulate, then one more fragment turned up and in 2006 the formal and official publication of the text took place, for which the scholarly world is grateful to Alfredo Marinucci.

This book compares and contrasts publicly espoused security concepts in the Nordic region, and explores the notion of societal security. Outside observers often assume that Nordic countries take similar approaches to the security and safety of their citizens. This book challenges that assumption and traces the evolution of 'societal security', and its broadly equivalent concepts, in Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland. The notion of societal security is deconstructed and analysed in terms of its different meanings and implications for each country, (...) through both country- and issue-focused studies. Each chapter traces the evolution of key security concepts and related practices, allowing for a comparison of similarities and differences between these four countries. Using discourses and practices as evidence, this is the first book to explore how different Nordic nations have conceptualised domestic security over time. The findings will be valuable to scholars from across the geographical and theoretical spectrum, while highlighting how Nordic security discourses and practices may deviate from traditional assumptions about Nordic values. This book will be of much interest to students of security studies, Nordic politics and International Relations. (shrink)

Tbe role of Swedish royal family has been reduced to an almost exclusively ceremonial one during the 20th century, and this reduction of functions has possibly been carried out further in Sweden than in any other monarchy - with the exception of Japan. The Swedish King is for example no longer responsible even pro forma for the formation of the Government, but it took a long time before he was thus stripped of all his power.By the mid-1800s his influence on (...) the economy had been greatly diminished, and by 1905 bis influence on foreign policy had also vanished. Tbe last time a Swedish King ex erts any real power is in 1914, when he insisted on choosing bis own advisors. In reality he only managed to substitute a government he disliked for one which he liked better. But after 1917, when the King is forced to accept a government which included Social Democrats, his influence is reduced to virtually nothing. Officially, however, the King is not reduced to figure-head until 1974, when the new Swedish constitution was passed. Tbe new constitution stated, after a great deal of negociating between the Social Democrats and the nonsocialist parties, that Sweden should remain a monarchy hut the Head of State should only have a ceremonial role. Apparently no one in the royal f amily had any serious objections to this new order and they didn 't try to stop it. Power and influence is not, however, only related to the laws of a country. The King and the whole royal family still exert a good deal of influence over the Swedish people by setting an example. The image the royal family wants to project is that of traditional conservative values ; they are all in f a vor of a strong defence, church going and f amily life. The present King has given bis opinion on a few occasions on rather controversial issues - whether this has been part of a strategy or simply a mistake is impossible to say. All in all the present royal family seems to be quite satisfied with their position as figure-head on the Swedish barge, which, according to the public opinion polls, the Swedish people consider to be a very fitting role for a modern monarch. (shrink)

To a large extent liability for ICT perils is still a grey area, even though an increasing number of information security researchers adopt economic approaches to highlight market mechanisms and externalities. That is why this article focuses on the need for increased awareness of externalities and liability among ICT professionals and their customers. This is critical to achieve in order to promote appropriate ICT technologies and services with comprehensible privacy and security protection. What is needed is a better understanding of (...) the consequences of externalities from ICT perils. This would benefit customers and increase trust in ICT products and services which in turn may even increase suppliers' profit margin; customers would be prepared to buy more services and products if contracts and service level agreements would accept more liability. Moreover, suppliers could sell guaranties and insurances on top of their products and services. The result would be a win-win situation and would benefit society at large. (shrink)

This paper introduces a formal view of the semantics and pragmatics of corrective feedback in dialogues between adults and children. The goal of this research is to give a formal account of language coordination in dialogue, and semantic coordination in particular. Accounting for semantic coordination requires (1) a semantics, i.e. an architecture allowing for dynamic meanings and meaning updates as results of dialogue moves, and (2) a pragmatics, describing the dialogue moves involved in semantic coordination. We illustrate the general approach (...) by applying it to some examples from the literature on corrective feedback, and provide a fairly detailed discussion of one example using TTR (Type Theory with Records) to formalize concepts. TTR provides an analysis of linguistic content which is structured in order to allow modification and similarity metrics, and a framework for describing dialogue moves and resulting updates to linguistic resources. (shrink)

Humanitarian aid professionals frequently encounter situations in which one is conscious of the morally appropriate action but cannot take it because of institutional obstacles. Dilemmas like this are likely to result in a specific kind of stress reaction at the individual level, labeled as moral stress. In our study, 16 individuals working with international humanitarian aid and rescue operations participated in semistructured interviews, analyzed in accordance with a grounded theory approach. A theoretical model of ethical decision making from a moral (...) stress perspective was developed. The practical implications of the study are discussed. (shrink)

Platelet‐derived growth factor (PDGF) was originally identified in platelets and in serum as a mitogen for fibroblasts, smooth muscle cells (SMC) and glia cells in culture. PDGF has since expanded to a family of dimers of at least four gene products, whose biological actions are mediated through two receptor tyrosine kinases, PDGFRs. The present review summarizes and discusses the biological functions of PDGFs and PDGFRs in developmental processes, mainly as revealed through genetic analysis in mice. Such studies have demonstrated multiple (...) critical roles of PDGFs and PDGFRs in embryonic and postnatal development. PDGFs seem to act upon specific populations of progenitor cells that give rise to several different cell types with distinct functions in a variety of developmental processes. Analogies are seen between the cell functions and the developmental processes controlled by PDGFs. This suggests that ancestral PDGF and PDGFR expression patterns and functions may have been iterated in related sets of morphogenetic processes in the course of evolution. BioEssays 23:494–507, 2001. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

This study investigates the relationship between moral stress reactions and resulting coping efforts in severely morally challenging situations. Long-term positive reactions and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) indicators following morally challenging situations are also studied. The sample consisted of cadets and officers (n = 332) from Norway and Sweden. Long-term positive reactions were found to be associated with limited moral stress reactions during the challenging episode and frequent use of acceptance and positive reappraisal coping strategies. Long-term high scores on a PTSD (...) indicator scale covaried with high scores on Openness, a strong moral stress reaction, and frequent use of instrumental coping strategies. The main conclusion is that the immediate moral stress reaction and coping strategies following morally challenging situations appear to be related to both positive long-term reactions and to indicators of PTSD. (shrink)

Background: The midwifery profession in Sweden has a history since the early 1700s when government training for midwives began. Midwifery is historically well described, but the idea of caring within midwifery is not described. Aim: The aim was to describe the patterns of ideas of caring as they appeared in midwifery during the first half of the 20th century. Research design: This study has a hermeneutic approach and the method is history of ideas. Sources of material are taken from the (...) journal Jordemodern (Midwifery), textbooks for midwives, and midwifery regulations. The study has a caring science perspective according to Eriksson. Ethical considerations: This study is conducted in accordance with the ethical guidelines for good scientific practice issued by The Finnish Advisory Board on Research Integrity. The special demands on approach to the analyzed text in history of ideas have been met. Findings: Three themes were identified: Serving as a way of life, Acting in a redemptive spirit, and Having independence with heavy responsibility. The various themes are not refined, but current ideas are woven into the weave that were characteristic of midwifery during the first half of the 20th century. Conclusion: History of ideas is a fruitful method for understanding and re-finding valuable cultural goods. We can once more stress the manner of being within the midwife’s profession where inner values, ethos, shape the manner of conduct in the care of women in childbirth. (shrink)

Utilitarianism tells us to maximize the total amount of well-being in the world. I discuss whether there is a total amount of well-being in the world, given hedonist and preferentialist notions of well-being, respectively. My conclusion is that the prospects for preferentialism, in particular, are quite bleak.

In 1948 the pharmaceutical company Leo launched a placental hormonal preparation, called Gonadex, in Sweden. During a press conference, and in commercials and newspapers, it was said that Gonadex could cure sterility as well as many other problems related to the endocrine system. The remedy was described as effective and pure, with no side effects whatsoever. For several reasons, Gonadex was looked upon as a ‘Swedish triumph’. Inspired by research on ‘mediation’, conducted within the field of social studies of pharmaceutical (...) drugs, the present essay explores the political and scientific visions and values behind Gonadex; the propaganda for and marketing of Gonadex; the mediated image of Gonadex in the press; the reception by the medical profession, and finally the hopes and fears of the women who tried Gonadex. The essay argues that the public image of Gonadex was ‘oversell’ of hormone therapy, and that it was shaped by the way endocrinologists at Karolinska Hospital, notably Professor Axel Westman, mediated between Leo, the mass media, and the consumers when, and even before, Gonadex was introduced to the market. (shrink)

The aim of the article is to analyse the relationship between Quaternary geology, the idea of land elevation, nationalism and regionalism in Scandinavia, with special regard to the contribution of Swedish geologists at the end of the nineteenth century. From a scientific point of view, the idea of land elevation was connected to the acceptance of the glaciation theory and the elevation theory of Thomas F. Jamieson, but analysed in a wider cultural context it is possible to understand both the (...) professionalization of Quaternary geology and the new theory of shore-line displacement as expressions of Swedish cultural nationalism. As a complement to the specific cultural history, the Quaternary geology enterprise was a way of constituting a unique natural history of the nation. One of the new theories that developed in this process was that of the Highest Marine Border, a complex concept established by the distinguished geologist Gerard De Geer at the end of the 1880s in order to defend the theory of land elevation, which was threatened by the work of Eduard Suess. The line was considered to be a geographical border that both expressed the elevation pattern and sharply divided Sweden into one part that had been covered by water during the post-glacial period and another part that had not. The study continues by looking more closely at the construction of the border in the north of Sweden. Through an account of a subsequent scientific dispute between De Geer and the geologist Arvid Gustaf Hogbom it is clear that the concept of the Highest Marine Border was shaped not only by nationalism but also by regionalism. (shrink)

The paper describes a methodology to be used for analysis and design of human activity systems. The methodology is based on an analysis of the decision settings whereas most other decision analysis methodologies are analysing the process. The decision concept is analysed and discussed. A distinction between programmed and programmable as well as non-programmed and non-programmable decisions is proposed. A classification of different information types for decision making is presented. A methodology based on a systemic and systematic analysis of the (...) information requirements of an organization is proposed. This methodology also indicates organizational discrepancies and information imbalances. The methodology focuses the settings of the decisions on all levels of organizations. The methodology can be regarded as a dynamic, learning system. The author proposes further research on the individuals decision making abilities. (shrink)

Large, black, flightless birds with unpredictable tempers and colourful heads and necks, cassowaries have enthralled European audiences for centuries, but perhaps no one more so than private collector and zoologist Lionel Walter Rothschild (1868-1937). Throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Rothschild acquired hundreds of living cassowaries which were kept in his private zoological collection. This paper explores the nature of Rothschild's private zoo and how the collection of living cassowaries was used to support his zoological activities. Spread across (...) three sites-the family estate at Tring Park, the zoological gardens in Regent's Park, and the business premises of Cambridge-based taxidermist Frederick Doggett-it will examine how Rothschild used the living birds kept in his private zoo to devise and inform a process for the preparation and display of cassowary specimens in museum galleries. It will show how he recruited specialist artists and taxidermists to perfect the art, and the significant financial investment this entailed. This is followed by exploration of how Rothschild's access to and observations of living birds informed his taxonomic work and, in particular, the identification of species and subspecies. The argument is made that Rothschild's private zoo and access to living cassowaries enabled his dedication to the study of the genus and ultimately underpinned his reputation as a world authority on cassowaries in the early 20th century. (shrink)

In relation to semantics, “grounding” has two relevant meanings. “Symbol grounding” is the process of connecting symbols to perception and the world. “Communicative grounding” is the process of interactively adding to common ground in dialog. Strategies for grounding in human communication include, crucially, strategies for resolving troubles caused by various kinds of miscommunication. As it happens, these two processes of grounding are closely related. As a side-effect of grounding an utterance, dialog participants may adjust the meanings they assign to linguistic (...) expressions, in a process of semantic coordination. Meanings of at least some expressions include perceptual aspects which enable DPs to classify entities as falling under the expression or not based on their perception of those entities. We show how perceptual grounding of symbols can be achieved in a process of interactively adding to common ground. This requires that perceptual aspects of meaning can be updated as a result of participating in linguistic interaction, thereby enabling fine-grained semantic coordination of perceptually grounded linguistic meanings. A formal semantics for low-level perceptual aspects of meaning is presented, tying these together with the logical-inferential aspects of meaning traditionally studied in formal semantics. The key idea is to model perceptual meanings as classifiers of perceptual input. This requires a framework where intensions are represented independently of extensions, and structured objects which can be modified as a result of learning. We use Type Theory with Records, a formal semantics framework which starts from the idea that information and meaning are founded on our ability to perceive and classify the world, that is, to perceive objects and situations as being of types. As an example of our approach, we show how a simple classifier of spatial information based on the Perceptron can be cast in TTR. (shrink)

Ever since its formative years in the USA a century ago, the discipline of education has taken an uneasy stand on its own ‘scientific’ status, not least with regard to the basic issue of the relationships between theory and practice. When a science of education was introduced as a panacea for rational planning in the fields of schooling and teacher training, general solutions on a scientific basis were to underpin efficient steering at all levels. Presently, there are signs of similar (...) approaches to science in federal policies concerned with evidence‐based educational practice in the USA. At the same time a new conception of educational science has been launched in Sweden as a means to promote more fruitful research. With the background of some striking similarities as well as differences among dominant conceptions of educational science in these varying contexts, this article aims to reconsider some basic aspects of the persistent issue of the relationships between pedagogic theory and practice. (shrink)

ABSTRACTColin Hay's constructivist institutionalism and Vivien A. Schmidt's discursive institutionalism are two recent attempts to theorize ideas as potential explanations of institutional change. This new attention to the causal role of ideas is welcome, but Hay and Schmidt do not take into consideration the constitutive and structural aspects of ideas. Instead they reduce ideas to properties of individual conscious minds, scanting the respects in which ideas are intersubjectively baked into the practices shared by individuals. This aspect of ideas—arguably, the institutional (...) side of ideas—is developed in post-structuralist thought, which therefore demands a place in ideational research. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The technocratic dimension of government—its reliance upon knowledge claims, usually in scientific guise—is of great importance if we wish to understand modern power and governance. In Power Without Knowledge: A Critique of Technocracy, Jeffrey Friedman investigates the often-overlooked question of the relationship between technocratic knowledge/power and ideas. Friedman’s contribution to our understanding of technocracy can therefore be read as a contribution to governmentality studies, one that introduces the possibility of adding normative solutions to this critical tradition.

The vocabulary for describing odors in English natural language is not well understood, as prior studies of odor descriptions have often relied on preselected descriptors and odor ratings. Here, we present a data-driven approach that automatically identifies English odor descriptors based on their degree of olfactory association, and derive their semantic organization from their distributions in natural texts, using a distributional-semantic language model. We identify 243 descriptors that are much more strongly associated with olfaction than English words in general. We (...) then derive the semantic organization of these olfactory descriptors, and find that it is captured by four clusters that we name Offensive, Malodorous, Fragrant, and Edible. The semantic space derived from our model primarily differentiates descriptors in terms of pleasantness and edibility along which our four clusters are positioned, and is similar to a space derived from perceptual data. The semantic organization of odor vocabulary can thus be mapped using natural language data (e.g., online text), without the limitations of odor-perceptual data and preselected descriptors. Our method may thus facilitate research on olfaction, a sensory system known to often elude verbal description. (shrink)