Much research in the field of emotions has shown that people differ in the cues that they use to perceive their own emotions. People who are more responsive to personal cues (personal cuers) make use of cues arising from their own bodies and behavior; people who are less responsive to personal cues (situational cuers) make use of cues arising from the world around them. An evolutionary explanation of this well-documented phenomenon is that it occurs because of the operation of a (...) cognitive module designed to enable the organism to predict its own impending behavior. This theory suggests that situational cuers would be people for whom external factors are the best source of information about their own future behavior, whereas personal cuers are people for whom cues about themselves are the best source of information about their own future behavior. Such a view is founded in the New Realist philosophy of the early twentieth century, a philosophy that affected psychology through the work of E. C. Tolman and J. J. Gibson. (shrink)

This study investigates specific behavioral perceptual differences of ethics between practitioners and students enrolled in sales classes. Respondents were asked to indicate their beliefs to issues related to ethics in sales. A highly significant difference was found between mean responses of students and sales personnel. Managers indicated a greater concern for ethical behavior and less attention to sales than did the students. Students indicated a strong desire for success regardless of ethical constraints violated.

In orthodox quantum mechanics, it has virtually become the custom to identify properties of a physical system with operationally testable propositions about the system. The causes and consequences of this practice are explored mathematically in this paper. Among other things, it is found that such an identification imposes severe constraints on the admissible states of the physical system.

The notion of a Sasaki projectionon an orthomodular lattice is generalized to a mapping Φ: E × E → E, where E is an effect algebra. If E is lattice ordered and Φ is symmetric, then E is called a Φ-symmetric effect algebra.This paper launches a study of such effect algebras. In particular, it is shown that every interval effect algebra with a lattice-ordered ambient group is Φ-symmetric, and its group is the one constructed by Ravindran in his proof that (...) every effect algebra that has the Riesz decomposition property is an interval algebra. It is shown that the doubling construction introduced in the paper is connected to the conditional event algebrasof Goodman, Nguyen, and Walker. (shrink)

Using the mathematical notion of an entity to represent states in quantum and classical mechanics, we show that, in a strict sense, proper superpositions are possible in classical mechanics.

Under the influence of recurrent deleterious mutation and selection, asexual and sexual populations reach a deterministic equilibrium with individuals carrying 0,1,2,. . . harmful mutations. When a favourable mutation (aA) occurs in an asexual population it will usually occur in an individual who has one or more (k) deleterious mutations. Muller's ratchet then applies as A will thereafter never occur in an individual with less than k mutations. If the selective advantage of A is less than the selective disadvantage of (...) k harmful mutations then A will not spread. If it is greater it may spread carrying k deleterious mutations to fixation. Sexual populations are not affected in this way. A will spread through the population experiencing genomes with 0,1,2,. . . deleterious mutations in accordance with the deterministic equilibrium. (shrink)

A combination of social forces has thrown marriage into question in westernised societies at the end of the millennium. This uncertainty creates space for new ways of thinking about marriage. In this context, we examine the idea of marriage as friendship. We trace its genealogy in the work of Mary Wollstonecraft, John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor and then subject it to critical scrutiny using some of Michel de Montaigne’s ideas. We ask how applicable the ideal of higher friendship is (...) to marriage and what might be gained and lost by a synthesis of marriage and friendship. Grounding the discussion in historical sources is valuable because the topic is so little explored in the contemporary philosophical literature. This approach also allows any enduring value in these historical texts to be elicited. (shrink)

Pleidooi voor een metafysische visie op hedendaagse sociale en economische problemen.