Mental representations remain the central posits of psychology after many decades of scrutiny. However, there is no consensus about the representational format(s) of biological cognition. This paper provides a survey of evidence from computational cognitive psychology, perceptual psychology, developmental psychology, comparative psychology, and social psychology, and concludes that one type of format that routinely crops up is the language-of-thought (LoT). We outline six core properties of LoTs: (i) discrete constituents; (ii) role-filler independence; (iii) predicate–argument structure; (iv) logical operators; (v) inferential (...) promiscuity; and (vi) abstract content. These properties cluster together throughout cognitive science. Bayesian computational modeling, compositional features of object perception, complex infant and animal reasoning, and automatic, intuitive cognition in adults all implicate LoT-like structures. Instead of regarding LoT as a relic of the previous century, researchers in cognitive science and philosophy-of-mind must take seriously the explanatory breadth of LoT-based architectures. We grant that the mind may harbor many formats and architectures, including iconic and associative structures as well as deep-neural-network-like architectures. However, as computational/representational approaches to the mind continue to advance, classical compositional symbolic structures – that is, LoTs – only prove more flexible and well-supported over time. (shrink)

World society has been emerging on a global scale, but the old world-system of multiple cultures continues to exist at the same time that a global culture is in formation. In this article the author discusses the relations among these forms of integration in the contemporary system, the coming dark age of deglobalization, and the potential for the eventual emergence of a collectively rational and democratic global commonwealth.

Dunn, Geoffrey D As with last year's reflections, it is my intention to give a distinctly patristic flavour to what I write, drawing upon the rich tradition of the church in the youthful flush of its earliest centuries, a time also of great challenge, to see the enduring relevance and beauty of the insights of the earliest Christian preachers, commentators and authors.

Perceptual systems respond to proximal stimuli by forming mental representations of distal stimuli. A central goal for the philosophy of perception is to characterize the representations delivered by perceptual systems. It may be that all perceptual representations are in some way proprietarily perceptual and differ from the representational format of thought (Dretske 1981; Carey 2009; Burge 2010; Block ms.). Or it may instead be that perception and cognition always trade in the same code (Prinz 2002; Pylyshyn 2003). This paper rejects (...) both approaches in favor of perceptual pluralism, the thesis that perception delivers a multiplicity of representational formats, some proprietary and some shared with cognition. The argument for perceptual pluralism marshals a wide array of empirical evidence in favor of iconic (i.e., image-like, analog) representations in perception as well as discursive (i.e., language-like, digital) perceptual object representations. (shrink)

Dispositionalism about belief has had a recent resurgence. In this paper we critically evaluate a popular dispositionalist program pursued by Eric Schwitzgebel. Then we present an alternative: a psychofunctional, representational theory of belief. This theory of belief has two main pillars: that beliefs are relations to structured mental representations, and that the relations are determined by the generalizations under which beliefs are acquired, stored, and changed. We end by describing some of the generalizations regarding belief acquisition, storage, and change.

This discussion begins from the dilemma, posed in some earlier writing by Alasdair MacIntyre, that education is essential but also, in current economic and cultural conditions, impossible. The potential for resolving this dilemma through appeal to ‘practice’, ‘narrative unity’, and ‘tradition’(three core concepts in After Virtue and later writings) is then examined. The discussion also explores the relationship of education to the modern state and the power of a liberal education to create an ‘educated public’ very different in character from (...) the electorates of contemporary democratic regimes. It concludes with some remarks on the role of education in combating prejudice against certain kinds of human difference. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis paper provides a naturalistic account of inference. We posit that the core of inference is constituted by bare inferential transitions, transitions between discursive mental representations guided by rules built into the architecture of cognitive systems. In further developing the concept of BITs, we provide an account of what Boghossian [2014] calls ‘taking’—that is, the appreciation of the rule that guides an inferential transition. We argue that BITs are sufficient for implicit taking, and then, to analyse explicit taking, we posit (...) rich inferential transitions, which are transitions that the subject is disposed to endorse. (shrink)

Stakeholder theory, as a method of management based on morals and behavior, must be grounded by a theory of ethics. However, traditional ethics of justice and rights cannot completely ground the theory. Following and expanding on the work of Wicks, Gilbert, and Freeman (1994), we believe that feminist ethics, invoking principles of caring, provides the missing element that allows moral theory to ground the stakeholder approach to management. Examples are given to support the suggested general principle for making business decisions (...) under feminist moral theory. (shrink)

This study provides a comprehensive reinterpretation of the meaning of Locke's political thought. John Dunn restores Locke's ideas to their exact context, and so stresses the historical question of what Locke in the Two Treatises of Government was intending to claim. By adopting this approach, he reveals the predominantly theological character of all Locke's thinking about politics and provides a convincing analysis of the development of Locke's thought. In a polemical concluding section, John Dunn argues that liberal and Marxist interpretations (...) of Locke's politics have failed to grasp his meaning. Locke emerges as not merely a contributor to the development of English constitutional thought, or as a reflector of socio-economic change in seventeenth-century England, but as essentially a Calvinist natural theologian. (shrink)

As with the last two years' reflections, it is my intention to give a distinctly patristic flavour to what I write, drawing upon the rich tradition of the church in the youthful flush of its earliest centuries, a time also of great challenge, to see the enduring relevance and beauty of the insights of the earliest Christian preachers, commentators, and authors.

Perceptual representations pick out individuals and attribute properties to them. This paper considers the role of perceptual attribution in determining or guiding perceptual reference to objects. We consider three extant models of the relation between perceptual attribution and perceptual reference–all attribution guides reference, no attribution guides reference, or a privileged subset of attributions guides reference–and argue that empirical evidence undermines all three. We then defend a flexible-attributives model, on which the range of perceptual attributives used to guide reference shifts adaptively (...) with context. This model underscores the remarkable and dynamic intelligence of our perceptual capacities. We elucidate implications of the model for the boundary between perception and propositional thought. (shrink)

According to one important proposal, the difference between perception and cognition consists in the representational formats used in the two systems (Carey, 2009; Burge, 2010; Block, 2014). In particular, it is claimed that perceptual representations are iconic, or image-like, while cognitive representations are discursive, or language-like. Taking object perception as a test case, this paper argues on empirical grounds that it requires discursive label-like representations. These representations segment the perceptual field, continuously pick out objects despite changes in their features, and (...) abstractly represent high-level features, none of which appears possible for purely iconic representations. (shrink)

Short‐term memory in vision is typically thought to divide into at least two memory stores: a short, fragile, high‐capacity store known as iconic memory, and a longer, durable, capacity‐limited store known as visual working memory (VWM). This paper argues that iconic memory stores icons, i.e., image‐like perceptual representations. The iconicity of iconic memory has significant consequences for understanding consciousness, nonconceptual content, and the perception–cognition border. Steven Gross and Jonathan Flombaum have recently challenged the division between iconic memory and VWM by (...) arguing against the idea of capacity limits in favor of a flexible resource‐based model of short‐term memory. I argue that, while VWM capacity is probably governed by flexible resources rather than a sharp limit, the two memory stores should still be distinguished by their representational formats. Iconic memory stores icons, while VWM stores discursive (i.e., language‐like) representations. I conclude by arguing that this format‐based distinction between memory stores entails that prominent views about consciousness and the perception–cognition border will likely have to be revised. (shrink)

The question of whether perception is encapsulated from cognition has been a major topic in the study of perception in the past decade. One locus of debate concerns the role of attention. Some theorists argue that attention is a vehicle for widespread violations of encapsulation; others argue that certain forms of cognitively driven attention are compatible with encapsulation, especially if attention only modulates inputs. This paper argues for an extreme thesis: no effect of attention, whether on the inputs to perception (...) or on perceptual processing itself, constitutes a violation of the encapsulation of perception. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to explore an approach to ‘mindfulness’ that lies outside of the usual Buddhist mainstream. This approach adopts a ‘non-dual’ stance to meditation practice, and based on my limited experience and training in Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction, this non-dual notion of ‘mindfulness’ seems an especially appropriate point of comparison between Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction and Buddhism. That comparison itself will not be the focus here—given my own inexpertise and lack of clinical experience, it would be (...) best to leave the comparison to others! Instead, the aim here will be to explore some features of ‘mindfulness’ in the context of non-dual styles of Buddhist practice. To begin, we will assess some difficulties that emerge when one attempts to speak of ‘mindfulness’ in Buddhism. Next, we will turn to the somewhat radical notion of ‘non-dual’ practice in relation to the more mainstream descriptions found in the Buddhist Abhidharma literature. We will then examine some crucial features of Buddhist non-dualism, including attitudes and theories about thoughts and judgments. A brief foray into specific practice instructions will help us to understand the role of ‘mindfulness’ in a specific non-dual tradition called, ‘Mahāmudrā’ (the ‘Great Seal’). Finally, after some reflection on ‘mindfulness’ in the non-dual practice of Mahāmudrā, I will conclude by considering a crucial issue: the context of practice. (shrink)

It is an orthodoxy in cognitive science that perception can occur unconsciously. Recently, Hakwan Lau, Megan Peters and Ian Phillips have argued that this orthodoxy may be mistaken. They argue that many purported cases of unconscious perception fail to rule out low degrees of conscious awareness while others fail to establish genuine perception. This paper presents a case of unconscious perception that avoids these problems. It also advances a general principle of ‘phenomenal coherence’ that can insulate some forms of evidence (...) for unconscious perception from the methodological critiques of Lau, Peters and Phillips. (shrink)

According to a classic but nowadays discarded philosophical theory, perceptual experience is a complex of nonconceptual sensory states and full-blown propositional beliefs. This classical dual-component theory of experience is often taken to be obsolete. In particular, there seem to be cases in which perceptual experience and belief conflict: cases of known illusions, wherein subjects have beliefs contrary to the contents of their experiences. Modern dual-component theories reject the belief requirement and instead hold that perceptual experience is a complex of nonconceptual (...) sensory states and some other sort of conceptual state. The most popular modern dual-component theory appeals to sui generis propositional attitudes called ‘perceptual seemings’. This article argues that the classical dual-component theory has the resources to explain known illusions without giving up the claim that the conceptual components of experience are beliefs. The classical dual-component view, though often viewed as outdated and implausible, should be regarded as a serious contender in contemporary debates about the nature of perceptual experience. (shrink)

Two types of criticism are frequently levelled at the history of ideas in general and the history of political theory in particular. The first is very much that of historians practising in other fields; that it is written as a saga in which all the great deeds are done by entities which could not, in principle, do anything. In it, Science is always wrestling with Theology, Empiricism with Rationalism, monism with dualism, evolution with the Great Chain of Being, artifice with (...) nature, Politik with political moralism. Its protagonists are never humans, but only reified abstractions—or, if humans by inadvertence, humans only as the loci of these abstractions. The other charge, one more frequently levelled by philosophers, is that it is insensitive to the distinctive features of ideas, unconcerned with, or more often ineffectual in its concern with, truth and falsehood, its products more like intellectual seed-catalogues than adequate studies of thought In short it is characterised by a persistent tension between the threats of falsity in its history and incompetence in its philosophy. (shrink)

The use of technology and teaching techniques derived from technology is currently a bourgeoning topic in higher education. Teachers at all levels and types of institutions want to know how these new technologies will affect what happens in and outside of the classroom. Many teachers have already embraced some of these technologies but remain uncertain about their educational efficacy. Other teachers have waited because they are reluctant to try tools or techniques that remain unproven or, as is often the case, (...) lack institutional support. This book is designed to help both groups, so that those with technological expertise can extend their knowledge, while technological novices can "ramp up" at their own pace and for their own purposes. Best Practices for Technology-Enhanced Teaching and Learning brings together expert teacher-scholars who apply and assess technology's impact on traditional, hybrid or blended, or completely on-line courses, relying on technology as a teaching tool for classroom management and interaction, as well as student-based uses of technology largely independent of instructors. Each chapter will address how technological improvements can be connected to assessment initiatives, as is now routinely advocated in psychology and social science education. The book features current scholarship and pedagogy involving innovative technology that impacts on student learning in psychology and related disciplines, focusing also on student reactions to these novel technologies, and proper assessments of how well they promote learning. This text will serve as the standard reference on emerging technologies for undergraduate instructors. (shrink)

We often evaluate belief-forming processes, agents, or entire belief states for reliability. This is normally done with the assumption that beliefs are all-or-nothing. How does such evaluation go when we’re considering beliefs that come in degrees? I consider a natural answer to this question that focuses on the degree of truth-possession had by a set of beliefs. I argue that this natural proposal is inadequate, but for an interesting reason. When we are dealing with all-or-nothing belief, high reliability leads to (...) high levels of truth-possession. However, when it comes to degrees of belief, reliability and truth-possession part ways. The natural answer thus fails to be a good way to evaluate degrees of belief for reliability. I propose and develop an alternative method based on the notion of calibration, suggested by Frank Ramsey, which does not have this problem and consider why we should care about such assessments of reliability even if they are not tied directly to truth-possession. (shrink)

In this paper we introduce canonical extensions of partially ordered sets and monotone maps and a corresponding discrete duality. We then use these to give a uniform treatment of completeness of relational semantics for various substructural logics with implication as the residual(s) of fusion.

The notion of an object file figures prominently in recent work in philosophy and cognitive science. Object files play a role in theories of singular reference, object individuation, perceptual memory, and the development of cognitive capacities. However, the philosophical literature lacks a detailed, empirically informed theory of object files. In this paper, we articulate and defend the multiple-slots view, which specifies both the format and architecture of object files. We argue that object files represent in a non-iconic, propositional format that (...) incorporates discrete symbols for separate features. Moreover, we argue that features of separate categories are stored in separate memory slots within an object file. We supplement this view with a computational framework that characterizes how information about objects is stored and retrieved. (shrink)

Consider the multi-user virtual worlds of online games such as EVE and World of Warcraft, or the multi-user virtual world of Second Life. Suppose a player performs an action in one of these worlds, via his or her virtual character, which would be wrong, if the virtual world were real. What is the moral status of this virtual action? In this paper I consider arguments for and against the Asymmetry Thesis: the thesis that such virtual actions are never wrong. I (...) also explain how the truth of the Asymmetry Thesis is closely aligned with the possibility of what Edward Castronova has called closed synthetic worlds. With some qualifications, the ultimate conclusion is that the Asymmetry Thesis is false and that these closed worlds are impossible. (shrink)

The capacity for feature binding is typically explained in terms of the attribution model: a perceptual state selects an individual and attributes properties to it (Kahneman & Treisman 1984; Clark 2004; Burge 2010). Thus features are bound together in virtue of being attributed to the same individual. While the attribution model successfully explains some cases of binding in perception, not all binding need be understood as property attribution. This chapter argues that some forms of binding—those involving holistic iconic representations, which (...) bind features outside the limits of attention and object files—don’t fit the attribution model. The chapter then sketches an alternative coordination model of binding that construes icons as complex analog representations. (shrink)

This book by leading international scholars in the fields of history, philosophy and politics restores the subject to a place at the very centre of political theory and practice.

Over the past quarter of a century the work of few philosophers has exerted such powerful influence, or been the centre of such vigorous debate, as that of Alasdair MacIntyre. And although MacIntyre has not often formally addressed educational issues, the thrust of his writing has seemed to bear more clearly on education than that of most philosophers. His assault on central tenets of the Enlightenment in After Virtue already contained an implicit critique of public education in the modern era. (...) That critique was extended and made more explicit in later writings such as his Richard Peters Lecture ‘The Idea of an Educated Public’ (1987), the concluding chapters of Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (1988), the final chapter of Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry (1990), and the essay ‘Aquinas’s Critique of Education: Against his Age, Against Ours’ (1998). With less polemical intensity he furnished some further arguments on education and upbringing in his book Dependent Rational Animals (1999a). And his most recent comments on the subject are presented in the dialogue published in the Journal of Philosophy of Education (MacIntyre and Dunne, 2002). Moreover, even in his most critical writing MacIntyre has also developed an affirmative vision that has seemed to offer resources for a fruitful reconceptualisation of education: his steady concern with human flourishing, strongly linked to his own distinctive conceptions of virtue and of practice, as well as to his ideas of the biographical unity of a life and the encompassing power of traditions, flows easily into discourse about the aims of education and the kind of undertaking engaged in by teachers. (shrink)

Consider the Evidence Question: When and under what conditions is proposition P evidence for some agent S? Silins (Philos Perspect 19:375–404, 2005) has recently offered a partial answer to the Evidence Question. In particular, Silins argues for Evidential Internalism (EI), which holds that necessarily, if A and B are internal twins, then A and B have the same evidence. In this paper I consider Silins’s argument, and offer two response on behalf of Evidential Externalism (EE), which is the denial of (...) Evidential Internalism. The first response claims that the allegedly unattractive consequence for EE is not so unattractive. The second response takes the form of a tu quoque, demonstrating that a structurally similar argument can be constructed against EI. The two responses play off one another: objecting to the first puts pressure on one to accept the other. Taken together, the two responses have important ramifications for how we answer the Evidence Question, and how we think about evidence in general. (shrink)

Many contemporary epistemologists take rational inference to be a conscious action performed by the thinker (Boghossian 2014; 2018; Valaris 2014; Malmgren 2018). It is tempting to think that rational evaluability requires responsibility, which in turn requires conscious action. In that case, unconscious cognition involves merely associative or otherwise arational processing. This paper argues instead for deep rationalism: unconscious inference often exhibits the same rational status and richly structured logical character as conscious inference. The central case study is rationalization, in which (...) people shift their attitudes in logically structured, reason-responsive ways in response to evidence of their own incompetence or immorality. These attitude shifts are irrational in a way that reflects on the thinker. Thus rationally evaluable inference extends downward into the unconscious. Many take the sole aim of belief to be truth (Velleman 2000) or knowledge (Williamson 2000), but the prevalence of rationalization suggests that belief updating often aims instead at preserving our positive conceptions of ourselves—that is, belief updating is part of a psychological immune system (Gilbert 2006; Mandelbaum 2019). This paper argues that the psychological immune system comprises a suite of distinct cognitive mechanisms, some (ir)rational and some arational, which are united by a common function of avoiding the maladaptive predomination of negative affect and maintaining stable motivation. Other aspects of the psychological immune system include (i) a domain-general positive bias in evaluative attitudes and (ii) “terror management,” i.e., the systematic strengthening of meaning-conferring beliefs to avoid death anxiety. The multiplicity of processes underlying the psychological immune system point toward an irrational but adaptive function of cognition to keep us motivated in a world rife with negativity and death. (shrink)

Through the lens of the Health Belief Model and Protection Motivation Theory, we analyzed interviews of 36 agricultural advisors in Indiana and Nebraska to understand their appraisals of climate change risk, related decision making processes and subsequent risk management advice to producers. Most advisors interviewed accept that weather events are a risk for US Midwestern agriculture; however, they are more concerned about tangible threats such as crop prices. There is not much concern about climate change among agricultural advisors. Management practices (...) that could help producers adapt to climate change were more likely to be recommended by conservation and Extension advisors, while financial and crop advisors focused more upon season-to-season decision making. We contend that the agricultural community should integrate long-term thinking as part of farm decision making processes and that agricultural advisors are in a prime position to influence producers. In the face of increasing extreme weather events, climatologists and advisors should work more closely to reach a shared understanding of the risks posed to agriculture by climate change. (shrink)

Finding disjunctivist versions of direct realism unexplanatory, Mark Johnston [(2004). Philosophical Studies, 120, 113–183] offers a non-disjunctive version of direct realism in its place and gives a defense of this view from the problem of hallucination. I will attempt to clarify the view that he presents and then argue that, once clarified, it either does not escape the problem of hallucination or does not look much like direct realism.

In this collection of recent essays (several appearing in English for the first time), John Dunn brings his characteristically acute and penetrative insight to a wide range of political issues. In the first essay, 'The history of political theory', Professor Dunn argues for the importance of a historical perspective in the study of political thought. Other pieces engage with central concepts of political philosophy such as obligation, trust, freedom of conscience and property. A group of studies tackle specific contemporary problems (...) and future dangers, for example racism and the dilemma of humanitarian intervention. The volume as a whole articulates the many dangers, but also the huge importance of, contemporary politics, and provides a representative collection of work by one of the most astute political commentators writing today. (shrink)

This article focuses on the experiences of becoming and being mothers for lesbian co-parents who have children via donor insemination. Rather than the presence of children incorporating lesbians into the mainstream as “honorary heterosexuals,” the author argues that lesbian parenting represents a radical and radicalizing challenge to heterosexual norms that govern parenting roles and identities. It undermines traditional notions of the family and the heterosexual monopoly of reproduction. The same-sex context together with successful collaboration with donors supports the refashioning of (...) kinship relationships. An attentiveness to the gender dynamics of sexuality illuminates further contestations. The author argues that their structural similarities as women place them in contradiction with dominant gender practices enacted in heterosexual relationships. This facilitates the evaluation and negotiation of more egalitarian approaches to work and parenting, and through their operationalization, much of the logic supporting conventional divisions of labor is undermined. (shrink)

This is part three of a 10-volume set on the great political thinkers. It deals with the work of Augustine. Other thinkers covered are: Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Machiavelli, More, Grotius, Hobbes, Locke and Hume.

We continue where we left off from last Sunday with Jesus establishing the ethical foundations of the new Israel. Hypocrisy is really one of the most distasteful of human characteristics and in today's gospel passage Jesus confronts it head on. Hypocrisy is the real 'fake news', for it is nothing other than a sham and a pretence that we are something that we really are not, a contrivance that we are better than others when we are not, a sanctimonious false (...) virtue that we have the right to point out the faults of others while leaving our own failings untouched. When we are the victim of someone else's hypocrisy we feel the injustice and unfairness, we feel the betrayal and deception, we feel the put-down and rejection. (shrink)

This paper sets out to accomplish two goals. First, drawing on the Irish perspective, it reconceptualises one of the enduring legacy-based harms of epistemic colonisation, in this case, ‘linguicism’, in terms of ‘hermeneutical injustice’. Second, it argues that otherwise well-meaning attempts to combat epistemic colonisation through the inclusion of marginalised testimony can, in certain circumstances, lead to cases of ‘epistemic exploitation’, which, in turn, can result in ‘ontic burnout’. Both linguicism and epistemic exploitation, this paper theorizes, have the potential to (...) bring about ontic burnout. Here is the plan: to set the scene, section I briefly surveys some key arguments supporting the call for higher education institutions (HEIs) to engage in epistemic decolonising, focusing on the importance of striking a balance between two extremes: (i) abandoning all forms of Eurocentric/colonial knowledge through the elimination of inherited thinking and conceptual schemes which result from colonization, in particular, those which remain in our thinking “owing to inertia rather than to our own reflective choices” (Wiredu 2002, p.56); (ii) the other—pursuing a more positive project where we seek to, “exploit as much as is judicious the resources of indigenous conceptual schemes” (Wiredu 1996: p.136). From here, it moves to consider harms associated with a subset of ‘epistemicide’, that is, ‘linguicism’—a phenomenon where the language and culture of the colonizer become part of the ‘civilising project’ and, in more extreme cases of linguicide, forcibly replaces indigenous languages. Section II then explores the subtleties of harmful by-products deriving from ‘inclusion’, namely that which scholars refer to as ‘epistemic exploitation’. Situations where marginalised scholars are finally ‘at the table but still on the menu’ arise when privileged persons, compel marginalised knowers to educate them [and others] about the nature of their oppression (Berenstain, 2016). Habitual requests to turn themselves inside out for emancipatory principles give rise to a phenomenon known as ontic burnout (Dunne and Kotsonis, 2022, p.9)—“a form of dissociative explanatory fatigue culminating in oppressed persons engaging in a conscious or unconscious decoupling from their socially constructed identity, from the burdens and injustices associated with being a member of a certain social kind”. This harm is, I argue, rarely discussed in the literature and worthy of further analysis. (shrink)

This is a study of the choices faced by socialist movements as they developed within capitalist societies. Professor Przeworski examines the three principal choices confronted by socialism: whether to work through elections; whether to rely exclusively on the working class; and whether to try to reform or abolish capitalism. He brings to his analysis a number of abstract models of political and economic structure, and illustrates the issues in the context of historical events, tracing the development of socialist strategies since (...) the mid-nineteenth century. Several of the conclusions are novel and provocative. Professor Przeworski argues that economic issues cannot justify a socialist programme, and that the workers had good reasons to struggle for the improvement of capitalism. Therefore, the project of a socialist transformation, and the fight for economic advancement, were separate historical phenomena. (shrink)

Consider: -/- The Evidence Question: When, and under what conditions does an agent have proposition E as evidence (at t)? -/- Timothy Williamson's (2000) answer to this question is the well-known E = K thesis: -/- E = K: E is a member of S's evidence set at t iff S knows E at t. -/- I will argue that this answer is inconsistent with the version of Bayesianism that Williamson advocates. This is because E = K allows an agent (...) to garner evidence via inductive inference whereas standard Bayesian views disallow such a thing. Since Williamson's version of Bayesianism shares the key features with the standard Bayesian view, there is an inconsistency. (shrink)

Medical advances in newborn care have raised ethical dilemmas as to the level of care which is appropriate when an infant is severely damaged and incapable of a reasonable quality of life in the future. Some of the considerations, philosophical and practical, are discussed. It is concluded that within the framework of the law and after due consultation, decisions are best reached in privacy by the parents and their medical advisor and should be based on the perceived interests of the (...) child. (shrink)

The relationship between a doctor and a patient is taken to be one of the most ethically significant dimensions of good medical care. After all, it is within the interactions that constitute this relationship that information is shared, that choices get determined, that reassurances are provided, that decisions are made and, ultimately, that care is given. Medical ethicists have devoted considerable effort to identifying different types of relationships, and in specifying their ideal components, most usually in general or abstract terms. (...) Indeed, I would suggest that medical ethicists are most comfortable when we are comparing different models of this relationship (most famously, perhaps, when discussing the well-known typology introduced by Emanuel and Emanuel1), or perhaps when advancing one account of this relationship that can provide the foundations for the most optimal approach to shared decision-making, for example by Sandman and Munthe.2 But, in truth, the doctor–patient relationship is most ethically interesting—and intellectually challenging—when scrutinised in its non-ideal forms. Ethicists who turn their attention to the front line of practice have demonstrated a tendency to see this relationship as one that is creaking at the seams, subject to manipulation or side-tracked entirely. So, is it the case that the doctor–patient relationship is under threat in contemporary medical practice? The answer to this question ought, I think, to be answered in the affirmative, though tentatively so. The role of medical ethicists is to identify precisely how such threats are materialising and to capture these in rich, detailed accounts of everyday medical encounters. Medical ethicists then also have a vital role to play in identifying and responding to these changes in a carefully reasoned way. Sometimes this is likely to involve pushing back and protecting those elements of the doctor–patient relationship that have fundamental value, regardless of context, changing social values, …. (shrink)

It is shown that with asymmetric classical vacua the quantum mechanical instanton approach to the energy splitting of degenerate states applies even though the degenerate state in one well is not the quantum mechanical ground state of that well. The instanton approach leads to the correct leading exponential behavior of the energy splitting ΔE, but the prefactor is much more difficult to compute due to the asymmetric nature of the fluctuation potential V″(φc(t)), which is in turn a direct consequence of (...) the asymmetry of the two classical minima between which the instanton interpolates. (shrink)

Following the revival of virtue theory, some moral theorists have argued that virtue ethics can provide the basis for a radical politics. Such a politics essentially departs from the liberal model of the moral agent as an autonomous reason-giver. It instead privileges an understanding of the agent as conditioned by her community, and in the case of social oppression and marginalization, communal virtues may become a vehicle for social change. This essay compares political appropriations of virtue theory by Christian theologian (...) Stanley Hauerwas and secular feminist thinkers Lisa Tessman and Margaret Urban Walker. Hauerwas and feminist theorists both embrace a kind of embodied vulnerability as a political virtue, arguing that it enables more genuine social recognition. The virtue feminist critique is more robust than Hauerwas's, however, insofar as it understands mutual recognition to involve acknowledgment of social difference and the concomitant pursuit of justice. (shrink)

In this timely and important work, eminent political theorist John Dunn argues that democracy is not synonymous with good government. The author explores the labyrinthine reality behind the basic concept of democracy, demonstrating how the political system that people in the West generally view as straightforward and obvious is, in fact, deeply unclear and, in many cases, dysfunctional. Consisting of four thought-provoking lectures, Dunn’s book sketches the path by which democracy became the only form of government with moral legitimacy, analyzes (...) the contradictions and pitfalls of modern American democracy, and challenges the academic world to take responsibility for giving the world a more coherent understanding of this widely misrepresented political institution. Suggesting that the supposedly ideal marriage of liberal economics with liberal democracy can neither ensure its continuance nor even address the problems of contemporary life, this courageous analysis attempts to show how we came to be so gripped by democracy’s spell and why we must now learn to break it. (shrink)

Research exists on how a corporation communicates during a crisis, the impact on its reputation, and how well it weathers that crisis. However, crisis communication research tends to view a company’s communication efforts from the standpoint of success or failure; looking at the communication critically to determine if the company’s power influences or silences potentially alternative voices and viewpoints is not currently part of the discussion. This article argues that critical discourse analysis techniques be added to the framework of crisis (...) communication theory in an effort to ensure that the corporation’s message or position of power does not unfairly marginalize or altogether silence alternative discourses. (shrink)

Bastin et al. propose a dual-process model to understand memory deficits. However, results from state-trace analysis have suggested a single underlying variable in behavioral and neural data. We advocate the usage of unidimensional models that are supported by data and have been successful in understanding memory deficits and in linking to neural data.

Dunn, Geoffrey D One of my philosophy professors told me there were two sets of alternatives at the heart of philosophy, which is another way of saying that there are two fundamental choices between two different ways at the heart of understanding life. The years have proven, at least as far as I am concerned, just how insightful this observation was. The two sets of alternatives are one and many, and being and flux. The solemn feast of Pentecost, the last (...) day of our Easter season, gives us the opportunity to reflect on the first set: one and many. When we look out at the world, are we the kind of persons who see what we have in common with others and see what unites us, or are we the kind of persons who first notice the differences between us and other people: either our gender, or our skin colour, or our language, or our religion, or our social status, or our nationality, or our education, or our occupation? There are so many things that make us different from one another that it is a rare person who is able to focus on what makes us one. (shrink)

Bayesian Epistemology is a general framework for thinking about agents who have beliefs that come in degrees. Theories in this framework give accounts of rational belief and rational belief change, which share two key features: (i) rational belief states are represented with probability functions, and (ii) rational belief change results from the acquisition of evidence. This dissertation focuses specifically on the second feature. I pose the Evidence Question: What is it to have evidence? Before addressing this question we must have (...) an understanding of Bayesian Epistemology. The first chapter argues that we should understand Bayesian Epistemology as giving us theories that are evaluative and not action-guiding. I reach this verdict after considering the popular ‘ought’-implies-‘can’ objection to Bayesian Epistemology. The second chapter argues that it is important for theories in Bayesian Epistemology to answer the Evidence Question, and distinguishes between internalist and externalist answers. The third and fourth chapters present and defend a specific answer to the Evidence Question. The account is inspired by reliabilist accounts of justification, and attempts to understand what it is to have evidence by appealing solely to considerations of reliability. Chapter 3 explains how to understand reliability, and how the account fits with Bayesian Epistemology, in particular, the requirement that an agent’s evidence receive probability 1. Chapter 4 responds to objections, which maintain that the account gives the wrong verdict in a variety of situations including skeptical scenarios, lottery cases, scientific cases, and cases involving inference. After slight modifications, I argue that my account has the resources to answer the objections. The fifth chapter considers the possibility of losing evidence. I show how my account can model these cases. To do so, however, we require a modification to Conditionalization, the orthodox principle governing belief change. I present such a modification. The sixth and seventh chapters propose a new understanding of Dutch Book Arguments, historically important arguments for Bayesian principles. The proposal shows that the Dutch Book Arguments for implausible principles are defective, while the ones for plausible principles are not. The final chapter is a conclusion. (shrink)

Hobbes held distinctive views about the role of power in organizing and directing human life and posing the central problems of politics. His English vocabulary (unlike his Latin vocabulary) conflates conceptions of force, instrumental capacity, right and entitlement in a single term. It remains controversial how far he changed his conception of human nature over the last four decades of his intellectual life from a more to a less egoistic version, and how far, if he did, any such change modified (...) his recipe for pacifying human collective life. The best way of tracking the development of Hobbes?s political thinking is to trace the ways in which he saw the shifting contributions of power to human life in assisting, enabling or impeding human beings in living and acting as they wish. (shrink)

Reid endorsed a doxastic theory of perception, on which beliefs are constituents of perceptual experiences. This theory faces the problem of known illusions: we can perceive that p while believing that not-p. Some scholars argue that the problem of known illusions and other problems entail that Reid’s view cannot be charitably interpreted as a doxastic theory. This paper explores Reid’s theoretical commitments with respect to belief acquisition and uses textual evidence to show that his theory is genuinely doxastic. It then (...) argues that a Reidian response to the problem of known illusions can be formulated by appeal to the thesis that perceptual beliefs are formed noninferentially. Reid can also resist the intuition that we lack illusory beliefs in known-illusion cases given his independent reasons for doubting our capacity to identify perceptual beliefs by introspection. The paper then surveys other problems raised in the secondary literature and argues that none decisively undermine the doxastic interpretation of Reid. (shrink)

This volume explores the distinctiveness of teaching and learning as a human undertaking and the nature and scope of the philosophy of education. An investigation of the distinctiveness of teaching and learning as a human undertaking. Provides fresh thinking on the nature and scope of the philosophy of education. Draws on the original insights of an international group of experts in philosophy and education. Includes an interview on education with Alasdair MacIntyre, together with searching investigations of his views by other (...) contributors. (shrink)

Objective: We hypothesized that the reasons behind this tension are complex and can be understood better by applying social psychology theory.Design: A qualitative methodology was drawn on for data collection and thematic analysis, with focus group discussions adopted for interviews with patient families and ICU physicians. Additionally, we used a social psychology theory, the reasoned action approach (RAA) framework, to understand these tensions.Setting: Two 15-bedded ICUs of an academic university–affiliated teaching hospital in Singapore.Subjects: A total of 72 physicians and family (...) members of older ICU patients (>70 years old).Measurements and Main Results: The primary analysis revealed five areas of tension around prognostication in the ICU. These dealt with issues of divergent views, different role expectations, conflicting emotional responses, and issues of communication and trust. Further analysis helped to identify underlying factors leading to tensions and behaviors. Differences in prognostication and in expectation of outcomes between clinicians and family members were the main cause of tensions. When the RAA framework was applied, these tensions could be predicted early on and understood more clearly.Conclusions: Tensions revolve around losing control of the patient’s care, differences between hopeful expectations and clinical prognostication, perceived biases of physicians, and underlying mistrust between families and physicians. (shrink)