Previous research has shown that the perception that one’s partner is investing effort in a joint action can generate a sense of commitment, leading participants to persist longer despite increasing boredom. The current research extends this finding to human-robot interaction. We implemented a 2-player version of the classic snake game which became increasingly boring over the course of each round, and operationalized commitment in terms of how long participants persisted before pressing a ‘finish’ button to conclude each round. Participants were (...) informed that they would be linked via internet with their partner, a humanoid robot. Our results reveal that participants persisted longer when they perceived what they believed to be cues of their robot partner’s effortful contribution to the joint action. This provides evidence that the perception of a robot partner’s effort can elicit a sense of commitment to human-robot interaction. (shrink)

We administered suggestions to see a gray-scale pattern as colored and a colored pattern in shades of gray to 30 high suggestible and eight low suggestible students. The suggestions were administered twice, once following the induction of hypnosis and once without an induction. Besides rating the degree of color they saw in the stimuli differently, participants also rated their states of consciousness as normal, relaxed, hypnotized, or deeply hypnotized. Reports of being hypnotized were limited to highly suggestible participants and only (...) after the hypnotic induction had been administered. Reports of altered color perception were also limited to high suggestibles, but were roughly comparable regardless of whether hypnosis had been induced. These data indicate that suggestible individuals do not slip into a hypnotic state when given imaginative suggestions without the induction of hypnosis, but nevertheless report experiencing difficult suggestions for profound perceptual alterations that are pheonomenologically similar to what they report in hypnosis. (shrink)

A movement asking to take race out of medicine is growing in the US. While we agree with the necessity to get rid of flawed assumptions about biological race that pervade automatic race correction in medical algorithms, we urge caution about insisting on a blanket eliminativism about race in medicine. If we look at racism as a fundamental cause, in the sense that this notion has been introduced in epidemiological studies by Bruce Link and Jo Phelan, we must conclude that (...) race is indispensable to consider, investigate, and denounce the health effects of multilevel racism, and cannot be eliminated by addressing more specific risk factors in socially responsible epidemiology and clinical medicine. This does not mean that realism about human races is vindicated. While maintaining that there are no human races, we show how it is that a non-referring concept can nonetheless turn out indispensable for explaining real phenomena. (shrink)

The paper considers sentences in which “now” occurs in initial position and shows that the meaning they convey differs from the meaning of sentences that are otherwise identical except for “now” occurring in final position. We argue that the occurrence of “now” in initial position triggers a particular kind of modal reading for the sentence to which the adverb is prefixed. A general notion of modal forcing is proposed to provide a uniform account of this kind of reading. Armed with (...) this account, we offer a solution to two tense-modal puzzles, which have to do with fatalism and the possibility of a changing past. (shrink)

SAGGI DI VITTORIO MARCHIS, UMBERTO BOTTAZZINI, FABIO TOSCANO, MASSIMO NEGROTTI, GIUSEPPE O. LONGO, STEFANO A. E. LEONI, ALBERTO CASADEI, SILVANO TAGLIAGAMBE.

A fenomenologia tem como objetivo analisar os momentos constitutivos de diferentes experiências, fazendo justiça às suas formas específicas de aparecimento. Ao fazer isso, ela pode tornar visíveis (e, portanto, corrigir) as suposições problemáticas consideradas válidas desde o início. Estas suposições distorcem e manipulam coerentemente os fenômenos de tal forma que os fenômenos são transformados em algo radicalmente diferente. O fenômeno do déjà vu é muito interessante, nesse sentido, por duas diferentes razões. O déjà vu é transformado em um fenômeno diferente (...) no campo da ciência cognitiva: o déjà vu é comumente entendido como um simples erro de memória. Em segundo lugar, o déjà vu implica a repetição de uma experiência única e contingente. Essa lógica de repetição não é facilmente compatível com o logos das ciências empíricas, que se concentra na identificação de relações invariantes entre termos gerais por meio de pesquisa experimental e, portanto, exige uma abordagem diferente. (shrink)

This book explores the various connections between Law and Opera, providing a comprehensive, multinational, and multidisciplinary resource on the subject. Further, it makes a valuable contribution to studies on law and the humanities. While, for example, the relationship between law and literature has been extensively researched, the relationship between Law and Opera remains largely overlooked. The book approaches the topic from three perspectives in three main sections: Law in Opera, Law on Opera, and Law around Opera.

Recently, approach-avoidance tendencies and visual perception biases have been increasingly studied using bistable point-light walkers (PLWs). Prior studies have found a facing-the-viewer bias when one is primed with general threat stimuli (e.g. angry faces), explained by the “error management theory”, as failing to detect a threat as approaching is riskier than the opposite. Importantly, no study has explored how disease threat – linked to the behavioural immune system – might affect this bias. This study aimed to explore whether disease-signalling cues (...) can alter how we perceive the motion direction of ambiguous PLWs. Throughout 3 experiments, participants indicated the motion direction of a bistable PLW previously primed with a control or disease-signalling stimuli – that is, face with a surgical mask (Experiment 1), sickness sound (Experiment 2), or face with a disease cue (Experiment 3). Results showed that sickness cues do not significantly modulate the perception of approach-avoidance behaviours. However, a pattern emerged in Experiments 2 and 3, suggesting that sickness stimuli led to more facing away percepts. Unlike other types of threat, this implies that disease-related threat stimuli might trigger a distinct perceptual bias, indicating a preference to avoid a possible infection source. Nonetheless, this finding warrants future investigations. (shrink)

An open question in the semantics of modality is what relations there are among different modal flavours. In this article, we consider the thorny issue of whether ascribing to an agent the obligation to φ implies that it is possible for the agent to φ. Traditionally, this issue has been interpreted as whether ‘ought’ implies ‘can’. But another linguistic interpretation is available as well, namely, whether ‘must’ implies ‘can’ (MIC). We show that ‘must’ does imply ‘can’ via a convergent argument. (...) The first strand of the argument is theoretical: it consists in proving MIC from a well- established theory of modality in natural language, i.e., that proposed by Kratzer. The second strand is empirical: we present novel acceptability judgment studies showing that MIC predicts and explains the linguistic behaviour of native English speakers. (shrink)

This anthology contains selected papers from the 'Science as Culture' conference held at Lake Como, and Pavia University Italy, 15-19 September 1999. The conference, attended by about 220 individuals from thirty countries, was a joint venture of the International History, Philosophy and Science Teaching Group (its fifth conference) and the History of Physics and Physics Teaching Division of the European Physical Society (its eighth conference). The magnificient Villa Olmo, on the lakeshore, provided a memorable location for the presentors of the (...) 160 papers and the audience that discussed them. The conference was part of local celebrations of the bicentenary of Alessandro Volta's creation of the battery in 1799. Volta was born in Como in 1745, and for forty years from 1778 he was professor of experimental physics at Pavia University. The conference was fortunate to have had the generous financial support of the Italian government's Volta Bicentenary Fund, Lombardy region, Pavia University, Italian Research Council, and Kluwer Academic Publishers. The papers included here, have or will be, published in the journal Science & Education, the inaugural volume (1992) of which was a landmark in the history of science education publication, because it was the first journal in the field devoted to contributions from historical, philosophical and sociological scholarship. Clearly these 'foundational' disciplines inform numerous theoretical, curricular and pedagogical debates in science education. Contemporary Concerns The reseach promoted by the International and European Groups, and by the journal, is central to science education programmes in most areas of the world. (shrink)

The aim of this work is to provide a preliminary analysis of a much more far-reaching investigation into the relationship between technology and philosophy. In the context of the contemporary German thought, the author compares the different positions of Karl Marx, Martin Heidegger, Ernst and Friedrich Jünger, Arnold Gehlen and Gunther Anders. The term “machine” is used precisely to mean that complex material device assembled in the last quarter of the 18th century as a result of the definitive modern refinement (...) of certain fundamental technologies, i.e. metallurgy, precision mechanics and hydraulics. The “machine” discussed here arrived on the scene of man’s history when the processes of spinning and weaving were entrusted to semi-automatic means; when the water wheels used in mills, hitherto always made of wood, were supplanted by the metal levers of the steam engine; and especially when the steam engine was connected to the weaving frames, to the metalworking hammers, and to other machines used to manufacture other machines in an endless reiteration of assemblies and applications, the enormous outcome of which is what subsequently came to be described as “mass production”. The philosophers discussed here were also dealing with the type of machine described above and in their works she we can identify three model images of this idea of machine. These images have been drawn on at various times, also outside the realms of philosophy, and they still provide the backdrop for our knowledge of the machine, which has circulated in a great variety of languages. (shrink)

Many modern digital products use Machine Learning (ML) to emulate human abilities, knowledge, and intellect. In order to achieve this goal, ML systems need the greatest possible quantity of training data to allow the Artificial Intelligence (AI) model to develop an understanding of “what it means to be human”. We propose that the processes by which companies collect this data are problematic, because they entail extractive practices that resemble labour exploitation. The article presents four case studies in which unwitting individuals (...) contribute their humanness to develop AI training sets. By employing a post-Marxian framework, we then analyse the characteristic of these individuals and describe the elements of the capture-machine. Then, by describing and characterising the types of applications that are problematic, we set a foundation for defining and justifying interventions to address this form of labour exploitation. (shrink)

Modes of action readiness Acceptance accepting presence or interaction Non- acceptance not accepting presence or interaction Attending acquiring information Disinterest not acquiring information Affiliate achieving or accepting close ...

Fábio Alves dos Santos (1954-2013) cursou Pedagogia, Ciências Sociais e Teologia, era Especialista em Filosofia da Religião (PUC Minas), Advogado (PUC Minas) e Mestre em Direito Constitucional (UFMG). Lecionou na PUC Minas como professor de Cultura Religiosa e depois como professor no Curso de Direito, atuando principalmente no Serviço de Assistência Judiciária – SAJ, especialmente cuidado de causas populares como as da ASMARE (Associação dos Catadores de Papel, Papelão e Material Reaproveitável de Belo Horizonte), da Pastoral de Rua, da Pastoral (...) Carcerária, de movimentos de “Sem Casa”, de ocupações e tantos outros grupos. Fábio sofria de grave problema de visão há mais de 15 anos. Quase ficou cego depois de diversas cirurgias de miopia. Isso, porém, não o impedia de seguir seu constante compromisso com as lutas populares. Na última entrevista que concedeu, menos de um mês antes de sua morte (19 de outubro de 2013), depois de duro sofrimento de quase dois anos, no tratamento de um câncer no pâncreas, conta um pouco de sua vida, sua luta e sua percepção de várias realidades, especialmente da Igreja e da pastoral. Militante formado na Teologia da Libertação, de profunda espiritualidade, marcada por traços da religiosidade popular nordestina e comprometida com a libertação, Fábio Alves também buscou em sua vida abrir-se à teologia do pluralismo religioso, especialmente com o Santo Daime, em cuja tradição religiosa chegou a ser “fardado”, mantendo uma profunda atitude espiritual aberta ao diálogo inter-religioso. Sua primeira publicação foi “Começo de mundo novo: sofrimento, luta e vitória dos posseiros de Santana dos Frades”, Sergipe, numa versão popular em 1981 e outra pela Editora Vozes (1990). Fruto de sua dissertação de mestrado, publicou o livro “Direito Agrário: política fundiária no Brasil (1995). Em 2001 saiu seu último livro, uma coletânea de artigos publicados em diversos jornais: “Em defesa da vida”. Num artigo em Horizonte (2004), juntamente com o advogado, amigo e colega Prof. Cristiano de Melo Bastos, discutiu “A prática jurídica na missão da PUC Minas”. Palavras-chave : Teologia da Libertação. Militância. Igreja Católica. Pastoral. Lutas populares. (shrink)

In this essay I will try to demonstrate that the principle of self-determination is based on a formal and individualistic view of liberty rights. I also propose a different perspective that takes into account the relationships rather than the individual. I will show how this result can only be achieved through a different ascription of rights to individuals: in particular, I will try to demonstrate 1) that any social practices express specific values, 2) that these values are the result of (...) historical and cultural circumstances, 3) that they are subject to an ongoing public debate, and finally 4) that only if the individual praxis is consistent with these values can it lead to recognition of rights. (shrink)

Causal modelling provides a powerful set of tools for identifying causal structure from observed correlations. It is well known that such techniques fail for quantum systems, unless one introduces 'spooky' hidden mechanisms. Whether one can produce a genuinely quantum framework in order to discover causal structure remains an open question. Here we introduce a new framework for quantum causal modelling that allows for the discovery of causal structure. We define quantum analogues for core features of classical causal modelling techniques, including (...) the causal Markov condition and faithfulness. Based on the process matrix formalism, this framework naturally extends to generalised structures with indefinite causal order. (shrink)

We present a sound and complete Fitch-style natural deduction system for an S5 modal logic containing an actuality operator, a diagonal necessity operator, and a diagonal possibility operator. The logic is two-dimensional, where we evaluate sentences with respect to both an actual world (first dimension) and a world of evaluation (second dimension). The diagonal necessity operator behaves as a quantifier over every point on the diagonal between actual worlds and worlds of evaluation, while the diagonal possibility quantifies over some point (...) on the diagonal. Thus, they are just like the epistemic operators for apriority and its dual. We take this extension of Fitch’s familiar derivation system to be a very natural one, since the new rules and labeled lines hereby introduced preserve the structure of Fitch’s own rules for the modal case. (shrink)

People argue to reconcile differences of opinion, but reconciliation may fail to happen. In these cases, most theorists assume arguers are left with the same disagreement from which they started. This is too optimistic, since disagreement might instead escalate, and this may happen because of the argumentative practice, not in spite of it. These dangers depend on epistemological, pragmatic, and cultural factors, and show why arguers should be careful in picking their dialogical fights.

Why are enthymemes so frequent? Are we dumb arguers, smart rhetoricians, or parsimonious reasoners? This paper investigates systematic use of enthymemes, criticizing the application of the principle of charity to their interpretation. In contrast, I propose to analyze enthymematic argumentation in terms of parsimony, i.e. as a manifestation of the rational tendency to economize over scant resources. Consequences of this view on the current debate on enthymemes and on their rational reconstruction are discussed.

It is a widely held principle that no one is able to do something that would require the past to have been different from how it actually is. This principle of the fixity of the past has been presented in numerous ways, playing a crucial role in arguments for logical and theological fatalism, and for the incompatibility of causal determinism and the ability to do otherwise. I will argue that, assuming bivalence, this principle is in conflict with standard views about (...) knowledge and the semantics for ‘actually’. I also consider many possible responses to the argument. (shrink)

A critical review of the main themes arising out of recent literature on the semantics of ordinary event talk. The material is organized in four sections: (i) the nature of events, with emphasis on the opposition between events as particulars and events as universals; (ii) identity and indeterminacy, with emphasis on the unifier/multiplier controversy; (iii) events and logical form, with emphasis on Davidson’s treatment of the form of action sentences; (iv) linguistic applications, with emphasis on issues concerning aspectual phenomena, the (...) telicity/atelicity distinction, the treatment of statives, and temporal quantification. (shrink)

In this paper I argue for a cautious multicultural approach, with specific regard to its implementation as a legal strategy. Such an approach is cautious only because, as I will demonstrate, it stems from an awareness that in some cases, and for different reasons (political, social, as well as legal), other multicultural policies based on minority or group rights do not work. In other words, I will argue for a strategy of recognition that is additional to others, and that can (...) be implemented and juxtaposed with others, in order to offer a better defence of those rights and claims, which other policies do not recognise (or recognise insufficiently). (shrink)

Popular sovereignty requires that citizens perceive themselves as being able to act and implement decisions, and that they are de facto causally connected to mechanisms of decision making. I argue that the two most common understandings of the exercise of popular sovereignty—which center on direct decision making by the people as a whole and the indirect exercise of democratic agency by elected representatives, respectively—are inadequate in this respect, and go on to suggest a complementary account that stresses the central role (...) of internally democratic and participatory political parties in actualising popular sovereignty, drawing on the democratic theory of Hans Kelsen. (shrink)

Populist movements have become key players in European politics. These movements are readily criticized by journalists or political rivals, yet none of the common objections to populism seems to arrest their success. This article turns to normative political theory to cultivate sensitivity to problems arising from some existing arguments against populism, and to explore possible alternatives. It offers a critical reading of prototypical liberal and conservative arguments against populism, and proposes that the principles of solidarity and procedure provide good grounds (...) for a sustainable critique of populism. (shrink)

Nella storia della fortuna di Cicerone, l’età della Controriforma è un periodo non specificamente indagato, benché la presenza dell’oratore sia fondamentale nella formazione di molti protagonisti del rinnovamento cattolico e poi nei nuovi sistemi educativi elaborati per formare un clero più qualificato. L’articolo intende mettere in luce il ruolo centrale assunto da Cicerone in tale delicata fase storica, concentrandosi in particolare sulla figura esemplare di Girolamo Ragazzoni, commentatore delle Epistulae ad Familiares e volgarizzatore delle Filippiche. Ragazzoni, da giovane umanista in (...) stretto contatto con Paolo Manuzio e Carlo Sigonio, parteciperà al Concilio, tenendone l’orazione conclusiva, per poi diventare nel 1577 vescovo di Bergamo: lì, operando in collaborazione con Carlo Borromeo, si rivelerà uno dei più solerti esecutori dell’opera di riforma interna alla Chiesa, in particolare nel settore pedagogico e scolastico. (shrink)