We expound an alternative to the Copenhagen interpretation of the formalism of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics. The basic difference is that the new interpretation is formulated in the language of epistemological realism. It involves a change in some basic physical concepts. The ψ function is no longer interpreted as a probability amplitude of the observed behaviour of elementary particles but as an objective physical field representing the particles themselves. The particles are thus extended objects whose extension varies in time according to (...) the variation of ψ. They are considered as fundamental regions of space with some kind of nonlocality. Special consideration is given to the Heisenberg relations, the Einstein-Podolsky- Rosen correlations, the reduction process, the problem of measurement, and the quantum-statistical distributions. (shrink)

We present an alternative to the Copenhagen interpretation of the formalism of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics. The basic difference is that the new inter- pretation is formulated in the language of epistemological realism. It involves a change in some basic physical concepts. Elementary particles are considered as extended objects and nonlocal effects are included. The role of the new concepts in the problems of measurement and of the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen correlations is described. Experiments to distinguish the proposed interpretation from the Copenhagen one (...) are pointed out. (shrink)

There is no paradox with Schrödinger’s cat in a realist interpretation. In particular, a closer look at the temporal aspect shows that the two macroscopic wave functions (alive and dead) of Schrödinger’s cat are not to be compared with two superposed parts of a microscopic quantum wave function.

Determinism is established in quantum mechanics by tracing the probabilities in the Born rules back to the absolute (overall) phase constants of the wave functions and recognizing these phase constants as pseudorandom numbers. The reduction process (collapse) is independent of measurement. It occurs when two wavepackets overlap in ordinary space and satisfy a certain criterion, which depends on the phase constants of both wavepackets. Reduction means contraction of the wavepackets to the place of overlap. The measurement apparatus fans out the (...) incoming wavepacket into spatially separated eigenpackets of the chosen observable. When one of these eigenpackets together with a wavepacket located in the apparatus satisfy the criterion, the reduction associates the place of contraction with an eigenvalue of the observable. The theory is nonlocal and contextual. Keywords:. (shrink)

The spin-statistics connection is derived in a simple manner under the postulates that the original and the exchange wave functions are simply added, and that the azimuthal phase angle, which defines the orientation of the spin part of each single-particle spin-component eigenfunction in the plane normal to the spin-quantization axis, is exchanged along with the other parameters. The spin factor 2s belongs to the exchange wave function when this function is constructed so as to get the spinor ambiguity under control. (...) This is achieved by effecting the exchange of the azimuthal angle by means of rotations and admitting only rotations in one sense. The procedure works in Galilean as well as in Lorentz-invariant quantum mechanics. Relativistic quantum field theory is not required. (shrink)

Why microscopic objects exhibit wave properties (are delocalized), but macroscopic do not (are localized)? Traditional quantum mechanics attributes wave properties to all objects. When complemented with a deterministic collapse model (Quantum Stud.: Math. Found. 3, 279 (2016)) quantum mechanics can dissolve the discrepancy. Collapse in this model means contraction and occurs when the object gets in touch with other objects and satisfies a certain criterion. One single collapse usually does not suffice for localization. But the object rapidly gets in touch (...) with other objects in a short time, leading to rapid localization. Decoherence is not involved. (shrink)

This essay challenges the widely accepted principle that a person is morally responsible for what he has done only if he could have done otherwise. The author considers situations in which there are sufficient conditions for a certain choice or action to be performed by someone, So that it is impossible for the person to choose or to do otherwise, But in which these conditions do not in any way bring it about that the person chooses or acts as he (...) does. In such situations the person may well be morally responsible for what he chooses or does despite his inability to choose or to do otherwise. Finally the author considers certain suggestions for revising the principle he rejects or for replacing it with a principle of an altogether different kind. (shrink)

One of the most influential of contemporary philosophers, Harry Frankfurt has made major contributions to the philosophy of action, moral psychology, and the study of Descartes. This collection of essays complements an earlier collection published by Cambridge, The Importance of What We Care About. Some of the essays develop lines of thought found in the earlier volume. They deal in general with foundational metaphysical and epistemological issues concerning Descartes, moral philosophy, and philosophical anthropology. Some bear upon topics in political (...) philosophy and religion. (shrink)

Collating, for the first time, the key writings of Leonard Harris, this volume introduces readers to a leading figure in African-American and liberatory thought. -/- Harris' writings on honor, insurrectionist ethics, tradition, and his work on Alain Locke have established him as a leading figure in critical philosophy. His timely and urgent responses to structural racism and structural violence mark him out as a bold cultural commentator and a deft theoretician. -/- The wealth and depth of Harris' writings are brought (...) to the fore in this collection and the incisive introduction by Lee McBride serves to orient, contextualize, and frame an oeuvre that spans four decades. In his prolegomenon, Harris eschews the classical meaning of “philosophy,” supplanting it with an idiosyncratic conception of philosophy--philosophia nata ex conatu--that features an avowedly value-laden dimension. As well as serving as an introduction to Harris' philosophy, A Philosophy of Struggle provides new insights into how we ought conceptualize philosophy, race, tradition, and insurrection in the 21st century. (shrink)

This 1988 volume is a collection of thirteen seminal essays on ethics, free will, and the philosophy of mind. The essays deal with such central topics as freedom of the will, moral responsibility, the concept of a person, the structure of the will, the nature of action, the constitution of the self, and the theory of personal ideals. By focusing on the distinctive nature of human freedom, Professor Frankfurt is able to explore fundamental problems of what it is to be (...) a person and of what one should care about in life. (shrink)

I found that some statements in Sect. 7 of my paper are restricted to special configurations. Here I present the general case.

The family is hotly contested ideological terrain. Some defend the traditional two-parent heterosexual family while others welcome its demise. Opinions vary about how much control parents should have over their children's upbringing. Family Values provides a major new theoretical account of the morality and politics of the family, telling us why the family is valuable, who has the right to parent, and what rights parents should—and should not—have over their children. Harry Brighouse and Adam Swift argue that parent-child relationships (...) produce the "familial relationship goods" that people need to flourish. Children's healthy development depends on intimate relationships with authoritative adults, while the distinctive joys and challenges of parenting are part of a fulfilling life for adults. Yet the relationships that make these goods possible have little to do with biology, and do not require the extensive rights that parents currently enjoy. Challenging some of our most commonly held beliefs about the family, Brighouse and Swift explain why a child's interest in autonomy severely limits parents' right to shape their children's values, and why parents have no fundamental right to confer wealth or advantage on their children. Family Values reaffirms the vital importance of the family as a social institution while challenging its role in the reproduction of social inequality and carefully balancing the interests of parents and children. (shrink)

A retired manager and university teacher reflects on global ethics, on the purpose of life, and on the challenges facing global ethics in a contemporary world where there is no certainty about shared belief or shared values. The future lies, he concludes, with process and with a deeper understanding of one another.

Presents a theory of bullshit, how it differs from lying, how those who engage in it change the rules of conversation, and how indulgence in bullshit can alter a person's ability to tell the truth.

The author argues that the key to a fulfilled life is to pursue what one cares about, that love is the most authoritative form of caring, and that the purest form of love is, in a complicated way, self-love.

Saethre‐Chotzen syndrome (SCS), a human autosomal dominant condition with limb defects and craniosynostosis, is caused by haploinsufficiency of TWIST1, a basic helix–loop–helix (bHLH) transcription factor. Until recently, the molecular pathogenesis of the limb defects in SCS has not been well understood. Now, Firulli et al.1 show in mouse and chick that ectopic expression of a related bHLH protein, Hand2, results in phenocopies of the limb defects caused by Twist1 loss‐of‐function mutations. These two proteins interact in a dosage‐dependent antagonistic manner, and (...) both can be regulated through phosphorylation at conserved helix I amino acid residues. These findings provide an important link between the misregulation of Twist1 dimerization and the limb phenotypes observed in SCS. BioEssays 27:1102–1106, 2005. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Georges Florovsky’s essay ‘On the Grounding of Logical Relativism’ has attracted attention from various theologians and students of Russian thought but has until now avoided a serious philosophical analysis and critique. The complex but thought-provoking essay presents Florovsky’s so-called logical relativism, a position which he seemed to maintain for the rest of his career. This paper will show that by conflating ‘scientific’ with ‘alethic’ relativism, Florovsky exposed himself to detrimental philosophical and theological critique. After some methodological remarks, the first part (...) of the paper will introduce Florovsky’s article, and present its central argument as a scientific relativism which is then conflated with a truly logical or alethic relativism. The second and third parts will highlight the philosophical and theological problems with Florovsky’s position. (shrink)

How is violence conventionally portrayed and where does violence lie in representation? How does photography mediate the relationships between different forms and ideas, moments and experiences of violence? These were some of the questions addressed in a conversation between artist Harri Pälviranta and philosopher Stefanie Baumann organized by Alexandra Athanasiadou, founder and director of the online platform Philosophy & Photography Lab (PHLSPH), during the international Photography Festival, Imago Lisboa, in Lisbon during October 2022. The discussion presented here is edited from (...) a transcript by Athanasiadou. It took place at Lusófona University in Lisbon on the occasion of Pälviranta’s exhibition at the Museu Nacional de Arte Contemporânea (MNAC) (6 October 2021–8 January 2023) and focuses on two series of works in the exhibition, News Portraits and Choreography of Violence. (shrink)

Introduction -- Aristotle and Locke in the American founding -- Equality, liberty, wisdom, morality, and consent in the idea of political freedom -- Humanizing certitudes and impoverishing doubts : a critique of The closing of the American mind by Allan Bloom -- "The Reichstag is still burning : the failure of higher education and the decline of the West" : a valedictory lecture -- The end of history means the end of freedom -- The American founding as the best regime (...) : the bonding of civil and religious liberty -- The decline and fall of the American idea : reflections on the failure of American conservatism -- Thomas Aquinas meets Thomas Jefferson -- Dred Scott revisited -- Legend of Sleepy Hollow. (shrink)

'Mass terms', words like water, rice and traffic, have proved very difficult to accommodate in any theory of meaning since, unlike count nouns such as house or dog, they cannot be viewed as part of a logical set and differ in their grammatical properties. In this study, motivated by the need to design a computer program for understanding natural language utterances incorporating mass terms, Harry Bunt provides a thorough analysis of the problem and offers an original and detailed solution. (...) An extension of classical set theory, Ensemble Theory, is defined, and this provides the conceptual basis of a framework for the analysis of natural language meaning which Dr Bunt calls Two-level model-theoretic semantics. The validity of the framework is convincingly demonstrated by the formal analysis of a fragment of English including sentences with quantified and modified mass terms. Separate chapters of the book are devoted to an axiomatic definition of Ensemble Theory and a detailed discussion of its status as a mathematical formalism. (shrink)

What is education for? Should it produce workers or educate future citizens? Is there a place for faith schools - and should patriotism be taught? In this compelling and controversial book, Harry Brighouse takes on all these urgent questions and more. He argues that children share four fundamental interests: the ability to make their own judgements about what values to adopt; acquiring the skills that will enable them to become economically self-sufficient as adults; being exposed to a range of (...) activities and experiences that will enable them to flourish in their personal lives; and developing a sense of justice. He criticises sharply those who place the interests of the economy before those of children, and assesses the arguments for and against the controversial issues of faith schools and the teaching of patriotism. Clearly argued but provocative, On Education draws on recent examples from Britain and North America as well as famous thinkers on education such as Aristotle and John Locke. It is essential reading for anyone interested in the present state of education and its future. (shrink)

The role of scientific values has taken on new urgency with recent changes in the politics of Western societies. The threat is the erosion of the distinction between true and false in political circles. This could rapidly lead to democracy sliding into populism thence fascism. In the light of this, philosophy and sociology of science should themselves re-examine their role. The main point of the paper is to argue that science could and should push against the erosion of truth in (...) society. Sociological thinking has sometimes tended to erode the difference between science and ordinary thought but it should no longer ignore the political consequences and should, instead, start to take scientific values as a positive resource in society. The philosophical analysis of scientific values, which I will refer to as ‘scientific value analysis, or ‘SVA’, has championed the impact of societal values on science but should also look at the way scientific values could positively affect societal values. (shrink)

Quassim Cassam has argued that psychological and epistemological analyses of conspiracy theories threaten to overlook the political nature of such theories. According to Cassam, conspiracy theories are a form of political propaganda. I develop a limited critique of Cassam's analysis.This paper advances two core theses. First, acceptance of conspiracy theories requires a rejection of epistemic authority that renders conspiracy theorists susceptible to co-option by certain political programs while insulating such programs from criticism. I argue that the contrarian nature of conspiracy (...) theories partially accounts for the prominence of such theories in populist movements.Second, the contrarian nature of conspiracy theories partially accounts for their attractiveness, especially among those to whom populism already appeals. I argue that for those who resent what appears from their perspective as the shaping of the epistemic landscape by alien perspectives, conspiracy theorizing may facilitate the reassertion of epistemic autonomy. (shrink)

This book documents the impact of Stephen Harris’s works in Aboriginal education, Aboriginal learning styles, domains of language use and bilingual-bicultural education. It provides a summary and critique of Stephen Harris's key ideas, particularly those on bilingual-bicultural education. This book also profiles the man, his background, his beliefs and talents. It showcases contributions and personal reflections from Stephen’s family, wife, close colleagues, and many of those influenced by his work. This festschrift explores the professional life and work of Stephen Harris (...) as an educator and anthropologist who worked in the Northern Territory of Australia. (shrink)

In this book Harry Heft examines the historical and theoretical foundations of James J. Gibson's ecological psychology in 20th century thought, and in turn, integrates ecological psychology and analyses of sociocultural processes. A thesis of the book is that knowing is rooted in the direct experience of meaningful environmental objects and events present in individual-environment processes and at the level of collective, social settings. Ecological Psychology in Context: *traces the primary lineage of Gibson's ecological approach to William James's philosophy (...) of radical empiricism; *illuminates how the work of James's student and Gibson's mentor, E.B. Holt, served as a catalyst for the development of Gibson's framework and as a bridge to James's work; *reveals how ecological psychology reciprocally can advance Jamesian studies by resolving some of the theoretical difficulties that kept James from fully realizing a realist philosophy; *broadens the scope of Gibson's framework by proposing a synthesis between it and the ecological program of Roger Barker, who discovered complex systems operating at the level of collective, social processes; *demonstrates ways in which the psychological domain can be extended to properties of the environment rendering its features meaningful, publicly accessible, and distributed across person-environment processes; and *shows how Gibson's work points the way toward overcoming the gap between experimental psychology and the humanities. Intended for scholars and students in the areas of ecological and environmental psychology, theoretical and historical psychology, cognitive science, developmental psychology, anthropology, and philosophy. (shrink)

An argument that moral functioning is immeasurably complex, mediated by biology but not determined by it. Throughout history, humanity has been seen as being in need of improvement, most pressingly in need of moral improvement. Today, in what has been called the beginnings of “the golden age of neuroscience,” laboratory findings claim to offer insights into how the brain “does” morality, even suggesting that it is possible to make people more moral by manipulating their biology. Can “moral bioenhancement”—using technological or (...) pharmaceutical means to boost the morally desirable and remove the morally problematic—bring about a morally improved humanity? In The Myth of the Moral Brain, Harris Wiseman argues that moral functioning is immeasurably complex, mediated by biology but not determined by it. Morality cannot be engineered; there is no such thing as a “moral brain.” Wiseman takes a distinctively interdisciplinary approach, drawing on insights from philosophy, biology, theology, and clinical psychology. He considers philosophical rationales for moral enhancement, and the practical realities they come up against; recent empirical work, including studies of the cognitive and behavioral effects of oxytocin, serotonin, and dopamine; and traditional moral education, in particular the influence of religious thought, belief, and practice. Arguing that morality involves many interacting elements, Wiseman proposes an integrated bio-psycho-social approach to the consideration of moral enhancement. Such an approach would show that, by virtue of their sheer numbers, social and environmental factors are more important in shaping moral functioning than the neurobiological factors with which they are interwoven. (shrink)

Now that the collective death of mankind has become a possibility, no other thought can remain unimpaired. Harry Redner traces historically the onset of this acute state of Nihilism from what might be called the Faustian revolution, symbolized by Faust's pronouncement “In the beginning was the Deed.” Redner reflects on the passage of the three main Fausts, from Marlowe’s to Goethe’s to Thomas Mann’s, and this reflection serves as the dramatic metaphor for a review of the relationship of Progress (...) to Nihilism in modern civilization. Starting with an exposition of the key Faustian thinkers—Marx, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, and Heidegger—the book proceeds by examining the dominant modern ideas on Man, Time, and Nihilism with reference to Foucault, Derrida, and Althusser. It focuses on Language, which is a key preoccupation of all these thinkers but has not yet been taken far enough to afford a basis for the explanation of fundamental changes in civilization. Language in its creative and destructive functions, as constituting both the conscious and unconscious of a culture, is reconceived so as to account for the hidden link between Progress and Nihilism. The author then explores sociologically the dominant aspects of Progress in terms of the ideas of Weber, Adorno, and Marcuse on Technology, Subjectivity, and Activism. Finally, an extensive literary study of the three main Fausts concludes with a coda on the future of music. In the Beginning Was the Deed is lucid and direct, tinged with wry humor. Redner represent Man in the nuclear age and reflects on that representation, seeking to comprehend our era, draw ethical and political conclusions, and explore action as a response to the threat of annihilation. (shrink)

This paper describes the ways in which trolls and bots impede the acquisition of knowledge online. I distinguish between three ways in which trolls and bots can impede knowledge acquisition, namely, by deceiving, by encouraging misplaced skepticism, and by interfering with the acquisition of warrant concerning persons and content encountered online. I argue that these threats are difficult to resist simultaneously. I argue, further, that the threat that trolls and bots pose to knowledge acquisition goes beyond the mere threat of (...) online misinformation, or the more familiar threat posed by liars offline. Trolls and bots are, in effect, fake persons. Consequently, trolls and bots can systemically interfere with knowledge acquisition by manipulating the signals whereby individuals acquire knowledge from one another online. I conclude with a brief discussion of some possible remedies for the problem of fake persons. (shrink)

In almost every aspect of life, human being always tries to seek happiness. At the same time, we tend to avoid situations which may lead to unhappiness. In fact, there are two undeniable phenomena that negate this tendency, namely, first, happiness has become a commodity that is packaged, advertised, and marketed. Second, despair and other forms of crisis often understood as the antithesis of happiness are actually the existential experiences of every human being. This obsession towards happiness has also infiltrated (...) into education system so that education is understood as some kind of means providing solutions in order to overcome these forms of unhappiness and despair. In disagreement with it, based on Søren Kierkegaard's ideas, especially in Kierkegaard’s work entitled The Sickness unto Death, Peter Roberts argues that education should embrace despair because apart from being inevitable, despair does not always need to be understood as a problem that requires a solution. Education should not try to overcome it. On the contrary, education should work with it so that humans as despair beings are enabled to understand, identify, acknowledge, and discuss it. This idea is an invitation for every person to critically reflect on despair and to rethink the role of education in such crisis circumstances. For this reason, a revitalization of the pedagogical paradigm is necessary, for example by applying political pedagogy through critical discourse analysis methods that do not tend to remain muted in the face of existential despair, as well as injustice and any other social problems occurred structurally. Abstrak Hampir dalam setiap lini kehidupan, manusia senantiasa mencari kebahagiaan dan di saat yang sama menghindar dari situasi yang mengarah pada ketidakbahagiaan. Padahal, ada dua fenomena yang tak terbantahkan dan menegasi kecenderungan tersebut, yaitu pertama, kebahagiaan telah menjadi layaknya komoditas yang diperjualbelikan, dikemas, dan diiklankan. Kedua, kenestapaan dan bentuk-bentuk krisis lainnya yang sering kali dipahami sebagai antitesis dari kebahagiaan itu sebenarnya merupakan pengalaman eksistensial setiap manusia. Tendensi yang obsesif terhadap kebahagiaan itu juga telah merasuk ke dalam bidang pendidikan sehingga pendidikan dipahami sebagai sarana yang dapat memberi solusi agar dapat mengatasi bentuk-bentuk ketidakbahagiaan dan kenestapaan itu. Terhadap perkara di atas, dengan mendasarkan diri pada gagasan Søren Kierkegaard terutama yang dituangkan dalam The Sickness unto Death, Peter Roberts berargumentasi bahwa pendidikan justru seharusnya memeluk kenestapaan itu karena selain tak terelakkan, kenestapaan tidak perlu selalu dipahami sebagai masalah yang membutuhkan solusi. Pendidikan seharusnya tidak mencoba menghindari realitas kenestapaan, tetapi menanggapinya sehingga manusia sebagai pengada yang nestapa dimungkinkan untuk memahami, mengidentifikasi, mengakui, dan membahasakan keadaan krisis itu. Gagasan tersebut merupakan undangan bagi setiap manusia, bukan hanya bagi pelaku pendidikan, untuk secara kritis berefleksi mengenai kenestapaan dan untuk berpikir ulang mengenai kodrat serta peran pendidikan di tengah situasi krisis. Untuk itu, suatu revitalisasi terhadap paradigma pedagogis menjadi perlu, misalnya dengan menerapkan pedagogi politis melalui metode analisis wacana kritis yang tidak cenderung bungkam di hadapan kenestapaan yang eksistensial, maupun di hadapan ketidakadilan dan ketidakberesan sosial yang sering kali terjadi secara struktural. (shrink)

This article’s subject is the theory and practice of ‘regional survey’, the method of social and environmental study associated with Scottish thinker Patrick Geddes (1854–1932). Despite being overlooked or dismissed in most accounts of early 20th-century social science, regional survey had a wide influence on the development of the nascent disciplines of anthropology, sociology, and human geography. Emerging from late 19th-century field biology, the regional survey came to typify a methodological moment in the natural and social sciences that favoured the (...) holistic analysis of geographically delimited areas. By the interwar period, the kinds of projects that went under its name can clearly be seen as forerunners of the post-Second World War tradition of community studies. Additionally, in its self-presentation as a civic, participatory exercise, the regional survey can be read as a form of popular autoethnography that contrasts with other, more familiar social-scientific ventures in the first half of the 20th century, and defies the dichotomy between ‘gentlemanly’ and ‘technical’ modes of social science. As a result, this article argues, the regional survey provides an alternative point of departure for thinking about the origins and development of the modern social sciences in Britain. (shrink)

This paper defends two main theses related to emerging deepfake technology. First, fears that deepfakes will bring about epistemic catastrophe are overblown. Such concerns underappreciate that the evidential power of video derives not solely from its content, but also from its source. An audience may find even the most realistic video evidence unconvincing when it is delivered by a dubious source. At the same time, an audience may find even weak video evidence compelling so long as it is delivered by (...) a trusted source. The growing prominence of deepfake content is unlikely to change this fundamental dynamic. Thus, through appropriate patterns of trust, whatever epistemic threat deepfakes pose can be substantially mitigated. The second main thesis is that focusing on deepfakes that are intended to deceive, as epistemological discussions of the technology tend to do, threatens to overlook a further effect of this technology. Even where deepfake content is not regarded by its audience as veridical, it may cause its viewers to develop psychological associations based on that content. These associations, even without rising to the level of belief, may be harmful to the individuals depicted and more generally. Moreover, these associations may develop in cases in which the video content is realistic, but the audience is dubious of the content in virtue of skepticism toward its source. Thus, even if—as I suggest—epistemological concerns about deepfakes are overblown, deepfakes may nonetheless be psychologically impactful and may do great harm. (shrink)

Some of the barriers to the realisation of equality reflect the value of respecting prerogatives people have to favour themselves. Even G.A. Cohen, whose egalitarianism is especially pervasive and demanding, says that.

From the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller On Bullshit, the case for worrying less about the rich and more about the poor Economic inequality is one of the most divisive issues of our time. Yet few would argue that inequality is a greater evil than poverty. The poor suffer because they don't have enough, not because others have more, and some have far too much. So why do many people appear to be more distressed by the rich (...) than by the poor? In this provocative book, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of On Bullshit presents a compelling and unsettling response to those who believe that the goal of social justice should be economic equality or less inequality. Harry Frankfurt, one of the most influential moral philosophers in the world, argues that we are morally obligated to eliminate poverty—not achieve equality or reduce inequality. Our focus should be on making sure everyone has a sufficient amount to live a decent life. To focus instead on inequality is distracting and alienating. At the same time, Frankfurt argues that the conjunction of vast wealth and poverty is offensive. If we dedicate ourselves to making sure everyone has enough, we may reduce inequality as a side effect. But it’s essential to see that the ultimate goal of justice is to end poverty, not inequality. A serious challenge to cherished beliefs on both the political left and right, On Inequality promises to have a profound impact on one of the great debates of our time. (shrink)