The fallacy that the many worlds interpretation (MWI) of quantum mechanics implies certain survival in quantum-Russian-roulette-like situations (the ‘Quantum Suicide’ (QS) thought experiment) has become common enough that it is now necessary to publicly debunk this belief despite the risk of further publicizing it. ‘Quantum Immortality’ (QI) is an extension of the QS Fallacy (QSF) with some additional unlikely assumptions. The QS/QI ideas are examined here and shown to be false.

Computationalism provides a framework for understanding how a mathematically describable physical world could give rise to conscious observations without the need for dualism. A criterion is proposed for the implementation of computations by physical systems, which has been a problem for computationalism. Together with an independence criterion for implementations this would allow, in principle, prediction of probabilities for various observations based on counting implementations. Applied to quantum mechanics, this results in a Many Computations Interpretation (MCI), which is an explicit form (...) of the Everett style Many Worlds Interpretation (MWI). Derivation of the Born Rule emerges as the central problem for most realist interpretations of quantum mechanics. If the Born Rule is derived based on computationalism and the wavefunction it would provide strong support for the MWI; but if the Born Rule is shown not to follow from these to an experimentally falsified extent, it would indicate the necessity for either new physics or (more radically) new philosophy of mind. (shrink)

Without a proper restriction on mappings, virtually any system could be seen as implementing any computation. That would not allow characterization of systems in terms of implemented computations and is not compatible with a computationalist philosophy of mind. Information-based criteria for independence of substates within structured states are proposed as a solution. Objections to the use of requirements for transitions in counterfactual states are addressed, in part using the partial-brain argument as a general counterargument to neural replacement arguments.

The ‘Fading Qualia’ thought experiment of Chalmers purports to show that computationalism is very probably true even if dualism is true by considering a series of brains, with biological parts increasingly substituted for by artificial but functionally analagous parts in small steps, and arguing that consciousness would not plausibly vanish in either a gradual or sudden way. This defense of computationalism inspired an attack on computationalism by Bishop, who argued that a similar series of substitutions by parts that have the (...) correct physical activity but not the correct causal relationships must likewise preserve consciousness, purportedly showing that ‘Counterfactuals Cannot Count’ and if so ruining a necessary condition for computation to meaningfully distinguish between physical systems. In this paper, the case in which a series of parts are simply removed and substituted for only by imposing the correct boundary conditions to exactly preserve the functioning of the remaining partial brain is described. It is argued that consciousness must gradually vanish in this case, not by fading but by becoming more and more partial. This supports the non-centralized nature of consciousness, tends to support the plausibility of physicalism against dualism, and provides the proper counterargument to Bishop’s contention. It also provides an avenue of attack against the “Fading Qualia” argument for those who remain dualists. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Dr. Jacques L. and Martin Hide-a-Guerre: The Subject of New HistoricismStephen Bretzius (bio)Joel Fineman. The Subjectivity Effect in Western Literary Tradition: Essays Toward the Release of Shakespeare’s Will. Cambridge: MIT P, 1991. [SW]Stephen Greenblatt. Learning to Curse: Essays in Early Modern Culture. New York: Routledge, 1990.Stephen Greenblatt. Shakespearean Negotiations: The Circulation of Social Energy in Renaissance England. Berkeley: U of California P, 1988.The word ‘theory’ stems from the (...) Greek verb theorein. The noun belonging to it is theoria. Peculiar to these words is a lofty and mysterious meaning. The verb theorein grew out of the coalescing of two root words, thea and horao. Thea (cf. theater) is the outward look, the aspect, in which something shows itself.... The second root word in theorein, horao, means: to look at something attentively, to look it over, to view it closely. Thus it follows that theorein is thean horan, to look attentively on the outward appearance wherein what presences becomes visible and, through such sight—seeing—to linger with it.—Martin Heidegger, “Science and Reflection”Hamlet: ‘Sblood, there is something in this more than natural, if philosophy could find it out. A flourish.Guildenstern: There are the players.—Hamlet 2.2.366–681In setting forth Shakespeare’s unique role within an important institutional appropriation of the early modern theater by the postmodern university, together with a corresponding postmodern theory already shaping the early modern theater, a highly stylized early play like Romeo and Juliet is a good place to begin. For here, and from the beginning, the play unfolds outside (and therefore inside) the “deconstructed” binarisms characteristic of a certain poststructural literary theory generally—womb-tomb, light-dark, female-male, Capulet-Montague, waking-sleeping, all-nothing, lark-nightingale, love-hate, late-early, vice-virtue, poison-remedy, mercy-murder, wedding-funeral, dove-raven, fiend-angel, wolf-lamb, miss-mend, stand-stir, haste-destiny, and so on. 1 Here the nonbinary language [End Page 73] of the theater anticipates the “unlimited semiosis” of postmodern literary and cultural theory precisely by extending that nonbinary language to the opposition theater-theory, which the play also undermines. To cite only one particularly central example, literary criticism’s ongoing concerns with the cultural and ritualistic origins of tragedy are not just explored but explained—theorized—by the play’s self-conscious identification of Juliet as both “dove” (“So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows” [1.5.48]) and “lamb” (“Juliet! Fast, I warrant her, she. / Why, lamb! Why, lady!” [4.5.1–2]). The theatrical experience of the play’s “poor sacrifices” [5.3.318] is further related to the Catholic mass, out of which Shakespeare’s own tragic theater significantly evolves, by “Come Lammas Eve at night shall she be fourteen” [1.3.17] (Lammas [hlammas] hlaf ‘loaf, bread,’ maesse ‘mass’) and “God’s bread, it makes me mad!” [3.5.176]. 2 Redoubling this Christian context for sacrifice, a seasonal parallel in the myth of Persephone stolen away by Pluto shows through “Death lies on her like an untimely frost / Upon the sweetest flower of all the field” [4.5.28–29] and “O son, the night before thy wedding-day / Hath Death lain with thy wife” [35–36]. Within the same ongoing theorization of the play’s own theater, the “pomegranate tree” in Juliet’s “It was the nightingale, and not the lark... / Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree” [3.5.2–4] further joins Juliet to Persephone, Lady Capulet to Ceres, and “love-devouring death” [2.6.7] to Hades.From the play to the theory, then, influential critiques of performative discourse and its ritualistic origins in postsubjective (post-Lacanian) sacrifice are generated not only by the postmodern university, but also, in Romeo and Juliet, by the early modern theater. For the play, and not simply the theory, is already about the play—and autobiographical, from Montague’s “Away from light steals home my heavy son, / And private in his chamber pens himself” [1.1.137–38] through Juliet’s “Was ever book containing such vile matter / So fairly bound” [3.2.83–84] to Romeo’s frantic “get me ink and paper... (shrink)

In _Jacques Derrida: Opening Lines_, Marian Hobson gives us a thorough and elegant analysis of this controversial and seminal contemporary thinker. Looking closely at the language and the construction of some of Derrida's philosophy, Hobson suggests the way he writes, indeed the fact he writes in another language, affects how he can be understood by English speakers. This superb study on the question of language will make illuminating reading for anyone studying or engaged with Derrida's philosophy.

"Starting with the pre-Socratics, and proceeding through antiquity, the Christian fathers, the Middle Ages, and on to the existentialism and the anxious world of the present, Jacques Choron shows how fear of death, hope of death—or disregard of death—have influenced man's thought. In his unique study, the first of its kind ever published in any language, Dr. Choron succeeds not only in clarifying and synthesizing the great Western philosophers' reflections on death, but also provides a provocative portrait of each (...) man in relation to his ideas. In addition to the philosophical, he explores the psychological and sociological problems that arise from the phenomenon of death, and finds impressive support for Schopenhauer's opinion that death is the "muse of philosophy." A significant contribution to the history of ideas, the book offers fresh, and sometimes startling, perspectives on the experience that has been a source of awe and mystification to man throughout the ages."-Publisher. (shrink)

J. Hillis Miller (1928–2021) was one of the most prominent figures in literary criticism and theory. After receiving his Ph.D. from Harvard University, he taught at Johns Hopkins University, Yale University and the University of California at Irvine. He retired as Professor Emeritus in 2002. Miller was president of the Modern Language Association of America in 1986 and contributed significantly to professional academic institutions and organizations throughout his career. As an important representative of the Yale School, he had close relationships (...) with Derrida, Paul de Man, Geoffrey Hartman and Harold Bloom. Dr. Ning Yizhong did postdoctoral research under his supervision at UCI from 1997 to 1998. This is part of his interviews with Professor Miller during that time. In this interview, Miller talks about the Yale School in general, and Jacques Derrida, Paul de Man and Harold Bloom in particular. 1. (shrink)

Speech and phenomena.--Form and meaning.--Differance.

The Seductions of Psychoanalysis reflects on the history of psychoanalysis, its conceptual foundations and its relation to other disciplines. John Forrester probes the origins of psychoanalysis and its most beguiling concept, the transference, which is at once its institutional axis and experimental core. He explores the most seductive of all recent psychoanalytic traditions, that inspired by Jacques Lacan, whose radical questioning of psychoanalytic effects has been continued implicitly by Michel Foucault and explicitly by Jacques Derrida. Other key questions (...) addressed include the significance of speech in the talking cure, and the relationship between the 'real' of psychoanalysis and the fictionality of the 'truth' it offers. Dr Forrester also focuses on the relationship between psychoanalysis and the feminine, on analysis and gossip, on the borderline of seduction and rape, and on the women who have played such a crucial role in the history of psychoanalysis, as patients, analysts or both. (shrink)

A reprint of Maritain's classic reflection on social and political issues.

The paper is a defense of a strict form of anti-realism, competing the "in principle" form defended by Michael Dummett. It proposes to ground anti-realism on the basis of two principles ("immanence" and "implicitness") and to develop the consequences of these principles in the light of sub-structural logics.

Jacques Lesourne uses rigorous modelling to analyse the emergentc, working, and dissolution of institutions in economics.

The expression 'platonism in mathematics' or 'mathematical platonism' is familiar in the philosophy of mathematics at least since the use Paul Bernays made of it in his paper of 1934, 'Sur le Platonisme dans les Mathématiques'. But he was not the first to point out the similarities between the conception of the defenders of mathematical realism and the ideas of Plato. Poincaré had already stressed the 'platonistic' orientation of the mathematicians he called'Cantorian', as opposed to those who (like himself) were (...) 'pragmatist' ones. I examine in this paper some very perplexing aspects of the use which is made at that time of a number of concepts, particularly 'idealism' (which generally designates what we would call 'mathematical realism') and 'empiricism' (which can designate almost any form of antirealism, even if, like for example intuitionism, it is not empiricist at all). There are, of course, historical reasons that may explain why it was for a time so easy and natural to use the words and the concepts in a way that may seem now very strange and to treat as if they were equivalent the two oppositions: realism/antirealism and idealism/empiricism. (shrink)

Many years ago Degas said "Il faut décourager les arts." I am far from agreeing, but I am ready to say that critics of a certain kind are in need of active discouragement. Too much is written about matters that should be taken in by the beholder as he hears or scans the work. It is not desirable that his conscious mind should entertain - or be prepared to entertain - clear statements of what he experiences under the spell of (...) a masterpiece. The very reason why art is finer when it shows rather than tells is that comprehension is then immediate, not discursive. Ideally, the spectator must absorb - in order to be absorbed; and this means that the critic should shut up until he is wanted. We have no need of a study of "Punctuality in Thomas Hardy." I am making up the subject, but everybody can think of dozens of comparable works of pseudo-scholarship and pseudo-criticism. Their only excuse is that the authors wrote them under Ph.Duress and cannot be blamed for being coerced. Jacques Barzun is University Professor at Columbia University. Among his numerous books are Classic, Romantic and Modern, Berlioz and the Romantic Century, The Use and Abuse of Art and, most recently, Clio and the Doctors: Psycho-History, Quanto-History, and History. (shrink)

This paper can be read as an attempt at providing philosophical foundations to linear logic. The only plausible form of philosophical antirealism deals with practical feasibility rather than with effectivity in principle. The very notion of recognizability is ambiguous, audit has to be considered from a stricter perspective than currently done. The intuitionistic assertability conditions are to be reinforced. This change requires a move towards a frame in which the circumstances of the application of a logical rule can be specified. (...) Gentzen's sequential calculi provide such a frame, when some structural rules have been removed or limited. (shrink)

The people's theatre : a long drawn-out affair -- The cultural historic compromise -- The philosopher's tale : intellectuals and the trajectory of Gauchisme -- Joan of Arc in the Gulag -- The inconceivable revolution -- Factory nostalgia (notes on an article and various books) -- The ethics of sociology.

Theoretical minimal RNA rings attempt to mimick life’s primitive RNAs. At most 25 22-nucleotide-long RNA rings code once for each biotic amino acid, a start and a stop codon and form a stem-loop hairpin, resembling consensus tRNAs. We calculated, for each RNA ring’s 22 potential splicing positions, similarities of predicted secondary structures with tRNA vs. rRNA secondary structures. Assuming rRNAs partly derived from tRNA accretions, we predict positive associations between relative secondary structure similarities with rRNAs over tRNAs and genetic code (...) integration orders of RNA ring anticodon cognate amino acids. Analyses consider for each secondary structure all nucleotide triplets as potential anticodon. Anticodons for ancient, chemically inert cognate amino acids are most frequent in the 25 RNA rings. For RNA rings with primordial cognate amino acids according to tRNA-homology-derived anticodons, tRNA-homology and coding sequences coincide, these are separate for predicted cognate amino acids that presumably integrated late the genetic code. RNA ring secondary structure similarity with rRNA over tRNA secondary structures associates best with genetic code integration orders of anticodon cognate amino acids when assuming split anticodons (one and two nucleotides at the spliced RNA ring 5′ and 3′ extremities, respectively), and at predicted anticodon location in the spliced RNA ring’s midst. Results confirm RNA ring homologies with tRNAs and CDs, ancestral status of tRNA half genes split at anticodons, the tRNA-rRNA axis of RNA evolution, and that single theoretical minimal RNA rings potentially produce near-complete proto-tRNA sets. Hence genetic code pre-existence determines 25 short circular gene- and tRNA-like RNAs. Accounting for each potential splicing position, each RNA ring potentially translates most amino acids, realistically mimicks evolution of the tRNA-rRNA translation machinery. These RNA rings ‘of creation’ remind the uroboros’ (snake biting its tail) symbolism for creative regeneration. (shrink)

Cet article porte sur des problèmes d’analyse en corpus de structures discursives, en partant de l’exemple de la procéduralité. Quand l’objet d’étude ne porte pas sur une forme particulière, il est difficile de recueillir les données à analyser sans idée préconçue, c’est-à-dire sans biaiser a priori les résultats. L’article propose une méthode permettant de résoudre en partie ces problèmes, en partant d’une annotation à plusieurs mains qui est progressivement unifiée afin d’obtenir un résultat objectif. Nous montrons que cette étape fait (...) pleinement partie de l’étude linguistique elle-même. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and (...) made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

La Voix divine, nous disent les mythes et traditions, a créé le monde. Le chant des voix humaines lui répond. Orphée, l'initié des Mystères grecs, personnifie les pouvoirs de la musique. De nos jours, le matérialisme scientiste qui nie l'harmonie cosmique est démenti par la science ± holistique? qui rejoint la sagesse ancestrale. Au confluent de la physique contemporaine et de la métaphysique traditionnelle, de la cosmologie et de l'anthropologie, de la musicologie et de l'ethnomusicologie, cet ouvrage contribue à ce (...) nouveau paradigme en élucidant les arcanes de l'harmonie musicale. Il lui restitue sa dimension symbolique et spirituelle et éclaire l'évolution confuse de la musique occidentale depuis le début du xxe siècle. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and (...) made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)