The article suggests an ethical-anthropological reading of Thoughts, magna opera of the French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal, which was published after his death by his relatives and friends. Such a reading is presented in three moments: Firstly, an anthropological description aimed at answering the question ‘who is man?’; secondly, an analysis of Pascal’s erotic condition; and, finally, an ethical proposal as cura amoris. The main argument of the article is that every human being has a motivation in acting, that (...) of love and being loved. Thus, having a happy or unhappy life depends on the care for this erotic condition, and the latter is achieved through thought. (shrink)

Gracias a su escritura concisa, sin rodeos y amena, el filósofo surcoreano Byung-Chul Han expone una reflexión en torno al concepto de dolor en la actualidad. Esta obra asume un rasgo interesante en su composición y es el hecho de haber sido acabada y publicada en el transcurso de la pandemia de la covid-19 en su versión original en alemán. Aunque a través de los once breves apartados que componen la obra, Han entra en diálogo con pensadores contemporáneos como Adorno, (...) Heidegger, Nietzsche, Freud, Benjamin, Hegel y Levinas, entre otros, aparece un interlocutor, de principio a fin: se trata del filósofo alemán del siglo XX Ernst Jünger con su ensayo Sobre el dolor escrito en 1934. (shrink)

We reconsider the Myerson value and the position value for communication situations. In case the underlying game is a unanimity game, we show that each of these values can be computed using the inclusion--exclusion principle. Linearity of both values permits us to calculate them without needing the dividends of the induced games (graph-restricted game and link game). The expression of these dividends is only derived in the existing literature for special communication situations. Moreover, the associated inclusion--exclusion decomposability property depends on (...) what we have called the graph allocation rule. This rule is the relative degree (relative indicator) for the position value (Myerson value). (shrink)

Adaptive optics are techniques used for processing the spatial resolution of astronomical images taken from large ground-based telescopes. In this work, computational results are presented for a modified curvature sensor, the tomographic pupil image wavefront sensor, which measures the turbulence of the atmosphere, expressed in terms of an expansion over Zernike polynomials. Convolutional neural networks are presented as an alternative to the TPI-WFS reconstruction. This technique is a machine learning model of the family of artificial neural networks, which are widely (...) known for its performance as modeling and prediction technique in complex systems. Results obtained from the reconstruction of the networks are compared with the TPI-WFS reconstruction by estimating errors and optical measurements. The reconstructed wavefronts from both techniques are compared for wavefronts of 153 Zernike modes. For this case, a detailed comparison and grid search to find the most suitable neural network is performed, searching between multi-layer perceptron, CNN and recurrent networks topologies. In general, the best network was a CNN trained for TPI-WFS reconstruction, achieving better performance than the reconstruction software from TPI-WFS in most of the turbulent profiles, but the most significant improvements were found for higher turbulent profiles that have the lowest r0 values. (shrink)

Aim: The present work proposes the study of the neuromotor activity of the masseter-jaw-tongue articulation during diadochokinetic exercising to establish functional statistical relationships between surface Electromyography, 3D Accelerometry, and acoustic features extracted from the speech signal, with the aim of characterizing Hypokinetic Dysarthria. A database of multi-trait signals of recordings from an age-matched control and PD participants are used in the experimental study. Hypothesis: The main assumption is that information between sEMG and 3D acceleration, and acoustic features may be quantified (...) using linear regression methods. Methods: Recordings from a cohort of eight age-matched control participants and eight PD participants were collected during the utterance of a diadochokinetic exercise. The dynamic and acoustic absolute kinematic velocities produced during the exercises were estimated by acoustic filter inversion and numerical integration and differentiation of the speech signal. The amplitude distributions of the absolute kinematic and acoustic velocities are estimated to allow comparisons in terms of Mutual Information. Results: The regression results show the relationships between sEMG and dynamic and acoustic estimates. The projection methodology may help in understanding the basic neuromotor muscle activity regarding neurodegenerative speech in remote monitoring neuromotor and neurocognitive diseases using speech as the vehicular tool, and in the study of other speech-related disorders. The study also showed strong and significant cross-correlations between articulation kinematics, both for the control and the PD cohorts. The absolute kinematic variables presents an observable difference for the PD participants compared to the control group. Conclusion: Kinematic distributions derived from acoustic analysis may be useful biomarkers toward characterizing HD in neuromotor disorders providing new insights into PD. (shrink)

Objective: This study aimed to compare the effects of two intervention programs, high-intensity interval training and moderate-intensity training, on anxiety, depression, stress, and resilience during the confinement caused by the coronavirus disease 2019 in healthy adults.Methods: A total of 67 adults who participated were randomly assigned to two groups: HIIT and MIT groups. The MIT group had to perform a home-based intervention based on aerobic exercises, whereas the HIIT group had to perform a home-based intervention based on HIIT exercises. The (...) two groups had to complete the same physical exercise volume, 40 min per session during the confinement period. Depression, anxiety, stress, and resilience were assessed before and after the intervention.Results: Results showed that HIIT and MIT significantly reduced the stress, anxiety, and depression as well as increase the resilience. Moreover, the improvements obtained in the HIIT group seem to be greater than those of the MIT group in depression.Conclusions: HIIT and MIT decreased anxiety, stress, and depression as well as increased resilience during the COVID-19 confinement. In addition, the HIIT intervention seemed to be more beneficial to reduce depression than the MIT intervention. (shrink)

Over the last few decades, the Internet has brought about a myriad of benefits to almost every aspect of our daily lives. However, malware attacks have also widely proliferated, mainly aiming at legitimate network users, resulting in millions of dollars in damages if proper protection and response measures are not settled and enforced. In this context, the paper at hand proposes MalSEIRS, a novel dynamic model, to predict malware distribution in a network based on the SEIRS epidemiological model. As a (...) result, the time-dependent rates of infection, recovery, and loss of immunity enable us to capture the complex dynamism of malware spreading behavior, which is influenced by a variety of external circumstances. In addition, we describe both offensive and defensive techniques, based on the proposed MalSEIRS model, through extensive experimentation, as well as disclosing real-life malware campaigns that can be better understood by using the suggested model. (shrink)

Chagas disease or American trypanosomiasis is an important health problem in Latin America. Due to the mobility of Latin American population around the world, countries without vector presence started to report disease cases. We developed a deterministic compartmental model in order to gain insights into the disease dynamics in a scenario without vector presence, considering congenital transmission and transmission by blood transfusion. The model was used to evaluate the epidemiological effect of control measures. It was applied to demographic data from (...) Spain and sensitivity analysis was performed on model parameters associated with control strategies. (shrink)

In this article I deal with the topic of perceptual self-awareness, focusing on whether a plausible account of sensory self-perception having exterior sensations as its objects requires sensible species representing these acts. I first introduce Aristotle’s two distinct views from On the Soul and On Sleep and Waking as defining the scholastic status quaestionis, then bring in Francisco Suárez’s, Bartholomeo Mastri’s and Bonaventura Belluto’s, and Hugh McCaghwell’s accounts. I show, first, that Suárez’s view, which cannot be substantiated by Scotus’s littera, (...) is rejected by Mastri/Belluto and by McCaghwell in one of his conclusions. Second, I argue that McCaghwell’s second tenet is to be assessed as Suarezian. This shows that Suárez’s philosophy of perception was positively received also by seventeenth-century Scotists. (shrink)

_Resumen_ En una entrevista de la segunda edición de _Crítica de la razón latinoamericana, _Castro-Gómez plantea un debate entre dos técnicas historiográficas que se disputaban legitimidad: Historia de las ideas y Genealogía de las prácticas. Según él mismo, el primer proyecto _nace muerto_, pues se trata de historiar las creencias de América Latina a través de ideas de una élite académica. En adición, asevera que la Genealogía de las prácticas es la historiografía más adecuada, pues ella revela la cosmovisión (...) contingentemente construida de cada grupo humano a partir de experiencias particulares. No obstante, se argumentará que, lejos de ser antitéticas, ambas formas de historiar pueden complementarse. El presente trabajo es el intento de dicha complementación a través de un caso particular: la incursión del marxismo en el Perú. _Palabras clave: _Marxismo, Genealogía de las prácticas, Historia de las ideas, Foucault, Castro-Gomez. (shrink)

La obra de Nicolás Gómez Dávila ha sido leída presuponiendo su desconexión frente a la producción filosófica local del pasado. Esa presuposición ha pasado por alto la existencia de posibles vínculos entre las tesis de la filosofía del derecho en De iure y la reflexión sobre el lenguaje y la tradición presente en el ensayo de Miguel Antonio Caro titulado “Del uso en sus relaciones con el lenguaje”. Este artículo explora los posibles vínculos entre ambos ensayos, a partir de (...) (i) la similitud entre la concepción horaciana del lenguaje presente en la obra de Caro y las tesis de De iure, (ii) las correspondencias entre los esquemas metodológicos y valorativos, derivados de aquella concepción, presentes en ambas obras, y (iii) las similitudes y diferencias de su conservatismo político. (shrink)

Gómez de Lisboa fue uno de los más importantes representantes del escotismo del renacimiento italiano. En su Scriptum super Questiones Metaphisice Antonii Andree, a veces está en desacuerdo con las soluciones de Antoni Andreu y con sus interpretaciones de Escoto. Con este artículo, trato de presentar esos puntos de desacuerdo. Al hacerlo, espero contribuir a la comprensión del escotismo del renacimiento y proporcionar un buen ejemplo de la duradera influencia de Antoni Andreu.

INTENSIONAL LOGIC §1. Natural Language and Intensional Logic When we speak of a theory of meaning for a natural language such as English, we have in mind an ...

The human world is replete with narratives - narratives of our making that are uniquely appreciated by us. Some thinkers have afforded special importance to our capacity to generate such narratives, seeing it as variously enabling us to: exercise our imaginations in unique ways; engender an understanding of actions performed for reasons; and provide a basis for the kind of reflection and evaluation that matters vitally to moral and self development. Perhaps most radically, some hold that narratives are essential for (...) the constitution of human selves. This volume brings together nine original contributions in which the individual authors advance, develop and challenge proposals of these kinds. They critically examine the place and importance of narratives in human lives and consider the underlying capacities that permit us to produce and utilise these special artifacts. All of the papers are written in a non-technical and accessible style. (shrink)

Jeffrey (1983) proposed a generalization of conditioning as a means of updating probability distributions when new evidence drives no event to certainty. His rule requires the stability of certain conditional probabilities through time. We tested this assumption (“invariance”) from the psychological point of view. In Experiment 1 participants offered probability estimates for events in Jeffrey’s candlelight example. Two further scenarios were investigated in Experiment 2, one in which invariance seems justified, the other in which it does not. Results were in (...) rough conformity to Jeffrey (1983)’s principle. (shrink)

"This book is a very impressive achievement. Kennefick skillfully introduces readers to some of the most abstruse yet fascinating concepts in modern physics stemming from Einstein's gravitational theory.

This chapter begins with a putative puzzle between non-reductive physicalism according to which psychological properties are distinct from, yet metaphysically necessitated by, physical properties, and Hume's dictum according to which there are no necessary connections between distinct existences. However, the puzzle dissolves once care is taken to distinguish between distinct kinds of distinction: numerical distinctness, mereological distinctness, and what the chapter calls ‘weak modal distinctness’ and ‘strong modal distinctness’. For each of these notions, it turns out that either it makes (...) no sense according to non-reductive physicalism or else it is unclear whether Hume's dictum is true. The chapter then deploys these distinctions to argue first that unlike the dualist, the non-reductive physicalist can reject the exclusion principle in the causal exclusion argument, and second that emergentism can be distinguished from non-reductive physicalism. (shrink)

The writings of the later Mohists are generally taken to contain several updates to the consequentialist ethical view held by the Mohist school. In this paper, I defend one interpretation of those updates and how they may have served, within the Mohists’ argumentative context, to make their views more defensible. I argue that we should reject A.C. Graham’s prominent interpretation, on which the later Mohists’ argumentative strategy is to develop a conception of the a priori and to ground their ethical (...) view in a form of a priori rationalism. I contend, instead, that the strength of the later Mohists’ ethical view comes largely from their adoption of a subjective criterion for identifying what counts as a benefit within their consequentialist view. I show how the adoption of this subjective criterion fits within a larger trend in later Mohist thought of coming to terms with the diversity of people’s evaluative standpoints, and further show how it equips the later Mohists with worthwhile responses to their philosophical rivals. (shrink)

Anlezark, Daniel Review of: Francis of Assisi: The life and afterlife of a medieval saint, by Andre Vauchez, trans. Michael F. Cusato,, pp. xv + 398, $45.00.

Markets are central institutions in societies such as ours, and it seems appropriate to ask whether markets treat individuals justly or unjustly and whether choices individuals make concerning their market behavior are just or unjust. After all, markets influence most important features of our lives from the environment in which we live to the ways in which we find pleasure and fulfillment. Within market life we collectively determine the shape of human existence.<1>.

Many of the problems that would be faced in setting up transnational institutions mirror problems that have already been addressed by appropriate institutional mechanisms in the establishment of the modern nation-state.

The authors examined how a perceiver’s identification of a target person’s actions covaries with attributions of mind to the target. The authors found in Study 1 that the attribution of intentionality and cognition to a target was associated with identifying the target’s action in terms of high-level effects rather than low-level details. In Study 2, both action identification and mind attribution were greater for a liked target, and in Study 3, they were reduced for a target suffering misfortune. In Study (...) 4, it was again found that action identification and mind attribution were greater for a liked target, but like that for the self or a liked other, positive actions were identified at higher levels than negative actions, with the reverse being true for disliked others. In Study 5, the authors found that instructing participants to adopt the target’s perspective did not affect mind attribution but did lead to higher level identifications of the.. (shrink)

This article explores two consequences of intentionalism. My first line of argument focuses on the impact of intentionalism on the ‚hard problem’ of phenomenal character. If intentionalism is true, the phenomenal supervenes on the intentional. Furthermore, if physicalism about the intentional is also true, the intentional supervenes on the physical. Therefore, if intentionalism and physicalism are both true, then, by transitivity of supervenience, physicalism about the phenomenal is true. I argue that this transitivity argument is not persuasive, because on any (...) interpretation of its central terms, at least one of its premises is as controversial as its conclusion already is. My second line of argument is about the consequences of intentionalism for the error theory of color perception. I suggest that if intentionalism is true, projectivism must be true also, because under this condition there is no single concept of color that can be used for the qualification of objects as well as for the characterization of experiences. (shrink)

A small but growing body of philosophically informed survey work calls into question whether the value-free ideal is a dominant viewpoint among scientists. However, the survey instruments in used in these studies have important limitations. Previous work has also made little headway in developing hypotheses that might predict or explain differing views about the value-free ideal among scientists. In this article, we review previous survey work on this topic, describe an improved survey instrument, report results from an initial administration of (...) it that strengthen and refine previous results, and develop two hypotheses that may account for gender effects found in the data. (shrink)

A meditation on the lessons to be learned from South Africa's transformation in the wake of apartheid. Justice, truth, and identity; race, society, and law--all come into dramatic play as South Africa makes the tumultuous transition to a post-apartheid democracy. Seeking the timeless through the timely and trying to find the deeper meaning in the sweep of events, Daniel Herwitz brings the vast resources of the philosophical essay to bear on the new realities of post-apartheid South Africa--from racial identity (...) to truth commissions, from architecture to film and television. A public intellectual's reflections on public life, Herwitz's essays question how the new South Africa has constructed its concepts of reconciliation and return and how its historical emergence has meant a rethinking, reimagining, reexperiencing, relabeling, and repoliticizing of race. Herwitz's purpose is to give a philosophical reading of society--a society already relying on implicitly philosophical concepts in its social and political agendas. Working through these concepts, testing their relevance for reading society, his book itself becomes a part of the politics of definition and description in the new South Africa. (shrink)

In this essay, I argue in favor of a novel interpretation of the semantic theory that can be found in the Later Mohist writings. Recent interpretations by Chad Hansen and Chris Fraser cast the Later Mohist theory as a realist theory; this includes attributing to the Later Mohists what we can call “kind-realism,” the idea that there is some correct scheme of kind-terms that carves the world at its joints. While I agree with Hansen and Fraser that the Later Mohist (...) theory is realist in various ways, I offer challenges to their kind-realist interpretations, and argue instead for a kind-conventionalist interpretation on which there is no fixed, correct set of kinds, leaving schemes of kind terms to be determined by conventional decisions that occur during disputation. (shrink)

In order to clarify the Stoics’ reasons for polemicizing against the other philosophical schools, one has to examine the place and function of dialectic in the Stoic system. It emerges that, instead of the heuristic role that it plays in Academic teaching, for the Stoics dialectic has only a defensive function : it is not used to find out the truth through a critical examination of opposing arguments, but to defend against any objection a truth that is known beforehand. This (...) Stoic belief that they were in possession of truth would then be somewhat similar to a religious faith. (shrink)

Philosophy of Jazz discusses the philosophical relevance of jazz, showing that jazz and European art music have more in common than many assume.