In his introduction to this extraordinarily important and useful volume, Herman Geertman (G.) points out that the editions of the Liber Pontificalis produced around a century ago by Theodor Mommsen and Louis Duchesne made the Liber more an instrument, than an object, of research. For some years an international group of scholars under the leadership of Girolamo Arnaldi, François Bougard, Paolo Delogu, and G. himself, have been conducting a collaborative project on “The Liber Pontificalis as Source for the History (...) and Material Culture of Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages: A Collective Research Project on the Biographies from 314 to 891.” This book arises out of that project. But the present study, reflecting in particular G.'s interests, does not confine itself to “history” and “material culture.” Although the volume contains many valuable contributions on these important subjects, it also emphasizes the nature of the text of the Liber Pontificalis, the intentions of its redactors, and the accessibility of the text in terms of its language, contents, and conceptual underpinnings. G. notes that the project and the book also attempt a systematic updating of Duchesne's historical and archaeological material. The volume under review contains excellent papers that do indeed update DUCHESNE, but it cannot be said that this volume is “systematic” if by that word one understands comprehensive and exhaustive. I am not, be it emphasized, criticizing G. and his collaborators for failing to accomplish the impossible. It is important to say, however, that G.'s approach makes the Liber Pontificalis once again an object as well as an instrument of research. (shrink)

In the first part of this paper I present a defence of the Austinian semantic approach to incomplete quantifiers and similar phenomena (section 2-4). It is part of my defence of Austinian semantics that it incorporates a cognitive dimension (section 4). This cognitive dimension makes it possible to connect Austinian semantics to various cognitive theories of discourse interpretation. In the second part of the paper (sections 5-7), I establish connections between Austinian semantics and four particular theories: • the theory of (...) reference and modes of presentation in terms of information files (see e.g. Perry 1993), • the theory of discourse interpretation as involving a process of context selection (see Sperber and Wilson 1986), • the theory of informational structure (for a survey, see Lambrecht 1994), • the theory of mental spaces (Fauconnier 1985). (shrink)

Every statement represents a certain state of affairs as holding in a certain situation, which the statement concerns. The situation which a statement concerns is indicated by the context. It must be distinguished from whichever situation may be explicitly mentioned in the statement. In this framework, two cognitive processes are analysed: projection and reflection. Both involve two representations: one which concerns a situation s, and another one which explicitly mentions that situation. Through reflection we go from the representation concerning s (...) to the representation mentioning s. Through projection we go from the representation mentioning s to the representation concerning s. (shrink)

We propose a new approach to the study of introspection. Instead of asking what form introspection actually takes in humans or other animals, we ask what forms it could take, in natural or artificial minds. What are the dimensions along which forms of introspection could vary? This is a relatively unexplored question, but it is one that has the potential to open new avenues of study and reveal new connections between existing ones. It may, for example, focus attention on possible (...) forms of introspection radically different from the human one and help to integrate competing theories of human introspection in a non-adversarial manner. We introduce and motivate the project, provide a preliminary mapping of the space of possible forms of introspection, and sketch a programme for interdisciplinary research on the topic. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that that polysemy is a two-sided phenomenon. It can be reduced neither to pragmatic modulation nor to ambiguity, for it is a mixture of both. The senses of a polysemous expression result from pragmatic modulation but they are stored in memory, as the senses of an ambiguous expression are. The difference with straightforward ambiguity is that the modulation relations between the senses are transparent to the language users: the senses are felt as related – they (...) form a family of senses. In other words, whereas two homonymous expressions are different expressions, with the same phonological realization but distinct meanings, a polyseme is a single expression, i.e. a semantic as well as a phonological unit. It has one meaning, which should not be confused with the separate senses which it contributes in context. Different ways of thinking of that unitary meaning will be discussed, and consequences drawn for the debate between more or less radical versions of Contextualism. (shrink)

This paper — a sequel to my 'Open Quotation' (Mind 2001) — is my reaction to the articles discussing open quotation in the special issue of the Belgian Journal of Linguistics edited by P. De Brabanter in 2005.

In this paper I argue that the self-referential component which Searle rightly detects in the truth-conditions of perceptual judgments comes from the perceptual ‘mode' and is not an aspect of the ‘content' of the judgment, contrary to Searle's claim.

In developmental lexical–gustatory synesthesia, specific words can trigger taste perceptions and these synesthetic associations are generally stable. We describe a case of multilingual lexical–gustatory synesthesia for whom some synesthesias were bidirectional as some tastes also triggered auditory word associations. Evoked concurrents could be gustatory but also tactile sensations. In addition to words and pseudowords, many voices were effective inducers, suggesting increased connections between cortical taste areas and both voice-selective and language-selective areas. Lasting changes in some evoked tastes occurred during childhood (...) suggesting that some plasticity can be present after the initial learning of associations. Inducers were often linked to taste concurrents phonologically or semantically, but also through identifiable childhood episodes . Several inducers were phonologically linked to episodic inducers suggesting a process of secondary acquisition for many inducers. Implications of these observations are discussed. (shrink)

The objective of this article is to explain how the integration of new oderlies in geriatric organizations in Quebec must be considered as a problematic process in terms of occupational safety and health. This article is based on data from a qualitative study conducted in 2012 in two geriatric organizations in Quebec. We show how the new recruits having to respect two organizational standards: one concerning compliance with the prescribed workload; the other relates to the quality of work. We show (...) how prudent strategies hold a major role in the protection of new recruits to the risks in the organization. Finally, we present the causes playing a role in the weakening of the transmission process of these strategies. (shrink)

BackgroundThe ageing of the population and the increased number of chronic diseases are associated with an increased frequency of end of life care in hospital settings. Residents rotating in hospital wards play a major part in their care, regardless of their specialty. General practitioner (GP) residents are confronted to such activities in hospital settings during their training. Our aim was to know how they feel about taking care of dying patients, as end-of-life care are very different from the clinical activity (...) they are trained to.MethodsWe surveyed all GP trainees of “Ile de France”. The survey was made of 41 questions regarding advanced directives divided in 7 sections about patients’ care, communication, mentoring and repercussion on personal life. The survey was done one time, during two pre-specified days.Results525 residents (53.8%) accepted to fulfill the survey. 74.1% of the residents thought that palliative care could have been better. Possible ways of improvements were: a reduction of unreasonable obstinacy (or therapeutic overkill, two terms defined in French law as curative treatment without reasonable hope of efficiency) (59.6%), patient’s (210 answers, 40%) and relative’s communication (information of patients and relatives about the severity of the disease and risk of death) (199 answers 37.9%). Residents also reported a lack of knowledge regarding end-of-life care specific treatments (411 answers, 79.3%) and 298 (47.2%) wished for better mentoring. Those difficulties were associated with repercussion on their private life (353 answers, 67.2%), particularly with their close relatives (55.4%). Finally, 56.2% of trainees thought that a systematic psychologic follow up should be instituted for those working in “at risk” hospital settings.ConclusionSelf-perception management of dying patients by GP resident emphasize their lack of training and supervision. The feeling of suboptimal care is associated with consequences on personal life. (shrink)

Parmi les travaux contemporains en sémantique du langage ordinaire, le "programme de Davidson " se distingue par sa portée philosophique : la théorie de la vérité que propose Davidson à titre de cadre sémantique s'épanouit en effet en une véritable philosophie du langage, connue sous le nom d'interprétation radicale. Cet ouvrage tente une évaluation critique du programme de Davidson, à partir d'une question à la fois historique et conceptuelle : quels ont les rapports entre le projet d'une théorie de la (...) vérité "à la Tarski ", et celui d'une sémantique formelle du langage ordinaire? (shrink)

L'idée de philosophie expérimentale révèle l'originalité de Diderot à partir de sa manière de pratiquer la philosophie. Inscrite dans une division sociale du travail intellectuel pensée à partir de Bacon, elle se tourne résolument vers les sciences expérimentales, notamment la chimie. Devenant un point de vue philosophique, celle-ci éclaire plusieurs traits centraux de la pensée diderotienne, notamment sa critique des sciences physico-mathématiques, son matérialisme et sa philosophie du vivant.

Derrida states at the beginning of Geschlecht III that at stake is the question of sexual difference, one that is referred in Heidegger’s 1953 essay on Trakl to a twofoldness that precedes the opposition of sexual duality, a duality which, according to Derrida, neutralizes sexual difference. I follow the development of what Derrida also called the “dream” of “another sexual difference,” one that would not be ruled by the opposition of the two. Derrida’s guiding interpretation in Geschlecht III is that (...) Heidegger privileges “gathering” and the reference to the “one” in this thinking of difference, and of sexual difference, thereby neutralizing difference. Drawing a contrast between difference as polysemy and difference as dissemination, I attempt in what follows to discuss Derrida’s interpretation, raising questions concerning some of his readings with respect to the motifs of dispersion, dissemination, polysemy, and gathering. (shrink)

A number of distinct (though related) issues are raised in the debate over Contextualism in the philosophy of language. My aim in this chapter for the Cambridge Handbook of Pragmatics is to disentangle them, so as to get a clearer view of the positions available (where a 'position' consists of a particular take on each of the relevant issues simultaneously).

Derrida often insists that ethics must be the experience and encounter of a certain impossible. A proposition all the more troubling, as it is proposed by Derrida in the context of a return precisely to the conditions of possibility of ethics. It will appear that returning to the possibilities of ethics implies a return to its limits, to its aporias, which are both constitutive and incapacitating, possibilizing and impossibilizing. The purpose of this paper is to begin exploring this aporetic structure (...) of ethics and to identify how it is tied to the impossible. I will pursue this inquiry by reconstituting how Derrida appropriates Heidegger's expression of "possibility of the impossible," and by reconstituting the aporias of the law, of moral decision, of responsibility, and of an ethics of hospitality as welcome of the event of otherness. (shrink)

Dans les Premiers principes métaphysiques de la science de la nature, le principe d’articulation entre métaphysique et physique apparaît obscurci par le registre amphibolique du texte de la préface. L’étude successive de trois motifs amphiboliques permet d’introduire une nouvelle interprétation de cette articulation chez Kant : le problème de la spécification catégoriale qui anime le système des principes de la première Critique surdéterminerait le rapport entre ce système des principes et les Premiers principes métaphysiques de la science de la nature. (...) Ainsi, ce rapport ne doit s’entendre ni comme une application mécanique des principes et catégories de la philosophie transcendantale, ni comme une tentative arbitraire pour accommoder la physique newtonienne à la table des catégories, mais comme une spécification dont la modalité (modélisante) est héritée des particularités systémiques du registre critique. L’apparente instabilité de cette articulation est enfin référée à la situation inédite de la modélisation (mathématique) qui triomphe définitivement en sciences naturelles avec l’émergence du paradigme newtonien. Les Premiers principes se donnent alors à lire comme l’envers métaphysique de la modélisation mathématique en physique et révèlent la métaphysique implicite corrélative à une telle modélisation physique. (shrink)

THE ANNALES SCHOOL OF HISTORIoGRAPHy was A MAJOR INTELLECTUAL PROJECT WHOSE PHENOMENAL SUCCESS IN FRANCE MAKES ITS TACTICS WELL WORTH STUDY.

This paper is concerned with the modeling of neural systems regarded as information processing entities. I investigate the various dynamic regimes that are accessible in neural networks considered as nonlinear adaptive dynamic systems. The possibilities of obtaining steady, oscillatory or chaotic regimes are illustrated with different neural network models. Some aspects of the dependence of the dynamic regimes upon the synaptic couplings are examined. I emphasize the role that the various regimes may play to support information processing abilities. I present (...) an example where controlled transient evolutions in a neural network, are used to model the regulation of motor activities by the cerebellar cortex. (shrink)

I propose in this paper to explore Heidegger's thought of selfhood in Contributions to Philosophy through a close reading of key paragraphs. It is often assumed that after the "turning" in his thinking, when Heidegger engages in a thought of Ereignis no longer centered on human Dasein as the locus of the meaning of being, the reference to selfhood would fade away. However, a close reading of the Contributions reveals that a renewed thinking of selfhood, of what Heidegger calls "self-being" (...) , is enacted precisely at the same time that the subjectivistic understanding of the self is more radically abandoned. I attempt to delineate how Heidegger undertakes to rethink selfhood no longer from the paradigm of the ego, but from the event of Ereignis , or enowning. (shrink)

Plato’s works have been the object of countless interpretations and recuperations ever since Greek antiquity. In the context of prenazi Germany, the writer Hans F.K. Günther published a work in defence of eugenic theories (aiming to improve man through authoritarian laws), allegedly based on the work of the Athenian philosopher and entitled Platon als Hüter des Lebens (“Plato as Protector of Life”). The present article tries to set forth what is at stake in that propaganda piece, its historical context, as (...) well as the disquieting implications of such an “appropriation” of classical philosophy to purely political ends. (shrink)

A key issue in cognitive sciences is to understand the cognitive bases of human tool use. Answers have been provided by two competing approaches. The manipulation-based approach assumes that humans can use tools because of the ability to store sensorimotor knowledge about how to manipulate tools. By contrast, for the reasoning-based approach, human tool use is based on the ability to reason about physical object properties. Recently, Caruana and Cuccio proposed a kind of reconciliation, based on the distinction between three (...) types of abductive inference, involving a different contribution of motor and cognitive elements: Automatic abduction, abduction by selection and creative abduction. This perspective offers new interesting avenues. Nevertheless, it is also subject to several theoretical and epistemological limitations, which make it in its present form inappropriate for the study of the cognitive bases of human tool use. This article aims to discuss these limitations. (shrink)

La relation à l'ontologie et à la pensée de l'être, qui passe de la revendication au rejet, est au cœur de l'impossible rapport de Lacan à la philosophie. L'être joue un rôle décisif dans l'élaboration des catégories du symbolique, de l'imaginaire et du réel, qu'il concerne toutes les trois à des titres et à des moments divers, de même que pour nombre de signifiants majeurs du chemin de Lacan. Essentiel pour la rectification et l'innovation que comporte le retour à Freud, (...) il intéresse la spécificité de la psychanalyse dans sa pensée, son éthique, son expérience - son discours. C'est un recours précieux sinon indispensable pour la démarcation de ses fins d'avec celles de la psychologie, de la médecine et de toute thérapie sociale. Incontournable tant parce qu'il est dans nos langues que par ses élaborations philosophiques et théologiques, l'être sert à Lacan à cerner des points de l'expérience qui excèdent toute la terminologie psychanalytique ; ainsi l'amour, l'interprétation, la fin de l'analyse - le parlêtre enfin. On suivra ici une partie de ce chemin, dont chaque moment garde sa valeur, hors de tout système - il n'y a pas de système de Lacan -, localement, dans ses avancées, ses constantes et ses ruptures. (shrink)