With the help of syncretiсs as a new philosophical logic, the philosophy of carriers, the theory of similarity and the theory of Infinite Hierarchical Nesting of Matter, the problems of modern physics are analyzed. We consider the classical and relativistic mechanics, the special and general theories of relativity, the theory of electromagnetic and gravitational fields, of weak and strong interactions. The goal is axiomatization of these theories, building models of elementary particles and of their interactions with (...) each other. The main obtained results are: description of the electrokinetic theory of the origin of magnetic fields in cosmic bodies; calculation of metric in the uniformly accelerated reference frame; the axiomatic construction of electrodynamics, Lorentz invariant (LITG) and covariant theories of gravitation (CTG); comparing CTG with the general theory of relativity and with the results of gravitational experiments. Among other results – the analysis of the properties of ether as the medium responsible for transfer of electromagnetic and gravitational waves, and derivation of the formula for entropy in a tensor form. For students and researchers, as well as for those interested in physical and philosophical problems. (shrink)

For principled and substantially philosophical reasons, based largely on his reform of natural history by inverting the Paleyan notion of overarching and purposeful beneficence in the construction of organisms, Darwin built his theory of selection at the single causal level of individual bodies engaged in unconscious struggle for their own reproductive success. But the central logic of the theory allows selection to work effectively on entities at several levels of a genealogical hierarchy, provided that they embody a set (...) of requisite features for defining evolutionary individuality. Genes, cell lineages, demes, species, and clades-as well as Darwin’s favoured organisms-embody these requisite features in enough cases to form important levels of selection in the history of life. R. A. Fisher explicitly recognized the unassailable logic of species selection, but denied that thsi real process could be important in evolution because, compared with the production of new organisms within a species, the origin of new species is so rare, and the number of species within most clades so low. I review this and other classical arguments against higher-level selection, and conclude that they are invalid in practice for interdemic selection, and false in principle for species selection. Punctuated equilibrium defines the individuality of species and refutes Fisher’s classical argument based on cycle time. In the second part of the paper, I argue that we have failed to appreciate the range and power of selection at levels above and below the organismic because we falsely extrapolate the defining properties of organisms to these other levels, and then regard the other levels as impotent because their effective individuals differ so much from organisms. We would better appreciate the power and generality of hierarchical models of selection if we grasped two key principles: first, that levels can interact in all modes, and not only in the negative style that, for heuristic and operational reasons, has received almost exclusive attention in the existing literature; and second, that each hierarchical level differs from all others in substantial and interesting ways, both in the style and frequency of patterns in change and causal modes. (shrink)

The existential insecurity of human beings has induced them to create protective spheres of symbols: myths, religions, values, belief systems, theories, etc. Rationality is one of the key factors contributing to the construction of civilisation in technical and symbolic terms. As Hankiss (2001) has emphasised, protective spheres of symbols may collapse – thus causing a profound social crisis. Social and political transformations had a tremendous impact at the end of the 20th century. As a result, management theories have been revised (...) in order to deal with transition and uncertainty. Francis Fukuyama's (2000) approach is supportive of hierarchical organisation as the best solution when facing a 'disruption'. The notion of Homo Hierarchicus has been based on, allegedly, rational presumptions. This paper contributes to the discussion on hierarchy within contemporary organisations. It criticises so-called 'natural' and 'rational' necessities justifying hierarchy. A key issue identified by the paper is the formalisation of language in claiming value-free knowledge and 'detached' observation as the basis for neutral rationality and aspired efficiency. This should be seriously reconsidered as hindering rather than aiding understanding of social complexity. All in all, Homo Hierarchicus appears to be misleading rather than helping symbolic sphere or construct. (shrink)

One of the most important methods in dealing with the optimization of large, complex systems is that of hierarchical decomposition. The idea is to reduce the overall complex problem into manageable approximate problems or subproblems, to solve these problems, and to construct a solution of the original problem from the solutions of these simpler prob lems. Development of such approaches for large complex systems has been identified as a particularly fruitful area by the Committee on the Next Decade (...) in Operations Research (1988) [42] as well as by the Panel on Future Directions in Control Theory (1988) [65]. Most manufacturing firms are complex systems characterized by sev eral decision subsystems, such as finance, personnel, marketing, and op erations. They may have several plants and warehouses and a wide variety of machines and equipment devoted to producing a large number of different products. Moreover, they are subject to deterministic as well as stochastic discrete events, such as purchasing new equipment, hiring and layoff of personnel, and machine setups, failures, and repairs. (shrink)

Despite hundreds of definitions, no consensus exists on a definition of life or on the closely related and problematic definitions of the organism and death. These problems retard practical and theoretical development in, for example, exobiology, artificial life, biology and evolution. This paper suggests improving this situation by basing definitions on a theory of a generalized particle hierarchy. This theory uses the common denominator of the “operator” for a unified ranking of both particles and organisms, from elementary particles (...) to animals with brains. Accordingly, this ranking is called “the operator hierarchy”. This hierarchy allows life to be defined as: matter with the configuration of an operator, and that possesses a complexity equal to, or even higher than the cellular operator. Living is then synonymous with the dynamics of such operators and the word organism refers to a select group of operators that fit the definition of life. The minimum condition defining an organism is its existence as an operator, construction thus being more essential than metabolism, growth or reproduction. In the operator hierarchy, every organism is associated with a specific closure, for example, the nucleus in eukaryotes. This allows death to be defined as: the state in which an organism has lost its closure following irreversible deterioration of its organization. The generality of the operator hierarchy also offers a context to discuss “life as we do not know it”. The paper ends with testing the definition’s practical value with a range of examples. (shrink)

Guanxi (literally interpersonal connections) is in essence a network of resource coalition-based stakeholders sharing resources for survival, and it plays a key role in achieving business success in China. However, the salience of guanxi stakeholders varies: not all guanxi relationships are necessary, and among the necessary guanxi participants, not all are equally important. A hierarchical stakeholder model of guanxi is developed drawing upon Mitchell et al.’s (1997) stakeholder salience theory and Anderson’s (1982) constituency theory. As an application (...) of instrumental stakeholder theory, the model dimensionalizes the notion of stakeholder salience, and distinguishes between and among internal and external guanxi, core, major, and peripheral guanxi, and primary and secondary guanxi stakeholders. Guanxi management principles are developed based on a hierarchy of guanxi priorities and management specializations. The goal of this application of instrumental stakeholder theory is to construct, for Western business firms in China, a means to reliably identify guanxi partners by employing the principles of effective guanxi. These principles are described in the form of testable propositions that advance social scientific research in this area of international business ethics. (shrink)

Archaeologists have proposed that behavioral knowledge of a tool can be conceptualized as a “recipe”—a unit of cultural transmission that combines the preparation of raw materials, construction, and use of the tool, and contingency plans for repair and maintenance. This parallels theories in cognitive psychology that behavioral knowledge is hierarchically structured—sequences of actions are divided into higher level, partially independent subunits. Here we use an agent-based simulation model to explore the costs and benefits of hierarchical learning relative to holistic (...) learning, where entire behavioral sequences are learned in an all-or-nothing fashion, and diffusionist learning, where actions are completely independent. Hierarchical learning is favored under the reasonable assumptions that learning is associated with some degree of both error and cost, and that behavior can be grouped into subunits that repeat in one or more tool recipes. These general predictions can be tested in the archaeological and ethnographic record. Recent advances in evolutionary developmental biology have revealed a number of parallels between the hierarchically structured, recipe-like organization of behavioral knowledge that we examine here and the manner in which biological organisms develop. (shrink)

The central thesis of this article is that measurement units are theoretical concepts because measurement presumes theoretical definition. New theoretical constructs can be defined in terms of algebraic combinations of previously defined measurement units. Physics has developed an impressive hierarchical knowledge structure on this basis. The unitless measures favored by psychology preclude the generation of such a knowledge hierarchy. It also leads to definitions of reliability and validity in correlational terms which can result in inaccurate measurement. Psychology has long (...) used time as a fundamental unit. Adoption of a second measurement unit would enable construction of a psychological knowledge hierarchy to begin. (shrink)

We investigated the hypothesis that theory of mind (ToM) and epistemological understanding promote the aspect of science learning that concerns the ability to understand that there can be more than one representation of the same phenomenon in the physical world. Sixty-three students ranging in age from 10 to 12 years were administered two false-belief ToM tasks, an epistemological understanding task that investigated beliefs about the nature of science and a science learning task. The science learning task required distinguishing and (...) reflecting upon phenomenal and scientific depictions of phenomena in observational astronomy. A three-stage hierarchical multiple regression showed that ToM was a significant predictor of performance in the astronomy task, supporting the hypothesis of a common underlying conceptual component. The results also showed that performance in the personal epistemology–nature of science task was a significant predictor of performance in the astronomy task, even when ToM and age were taken into consideration. The results indicate that both ToM and epistemological understanding promote the ability to construct and reflect on phenomenal and scientific representations of the same situation in the physical world and have important implications for science education. (shrink)

The significance of the study is contingent upon two criteria. All objects in the actual world that can capture a researcher’s attention are inherently complicated. Furthermore, every commodity that an individual manufactures and every work of art that an individual develops are intricate in nature. The entirety of the processes that an individual perceives and instigates are intricate. Although many professions have established techniques for constructing intricate entities, there currently exists no universally applicable concepts or methodologies for comprehensively studying, designing, (...) producing, or generating complicated items.The objective of this work is two-fold: firstly, to develop a comprehensive methodology for analysing complex synthetic processes, and secondly, to propose universal models or synthesis mechanisms that can be used to systematically derive specific process synthesis algorithms for various practical applications. The ability to utilize generalized models and synthesis techniques is highly advantageous when designing realistic computer programming.The authors introduced a comprehensive process model and enumerated its characteristics. Using this concept, techniques for creating and suggesting processes have been formulated and put forward. The concept of a decomposition diagram enables the systematic design of intricate multi-level hierarchical processes. The multitude of processes and the intricacy of their combination give rise to the notion of formulating a synthesis theory. The acquired results can be regarded as the initial stage in the construction of such a theory. The authors’ proposed methods of process synthesis enable the deductive derivation of useful algorithms for application software. Although the concept of the breakdown scheme and synthesis procedures is relatively straightforward, this advancement has been suggested for the first time.In order to further this project, it is necessary to augment the generalized process model with supplementary traits and properties, as well as to further refine the synthesis procedures. A proposal is being made to initiate the development of a theory for synthesizing a comprehensive plan using the decomposition scheme and methods of synthesis and decomposition. (shrink)

In spite of feminist recognition that hierarchical organizations are an important location of male dominance, most feminists writing about organizations assume that organizational structure is gender neutral. This article argues that organizational structure is not gender neutral; on the contrary, assumptions about gender underlie the documents and contracts used to construct organizations and to provide the commonsense ground for theorizing about them. Their gendered nature is partly masked through obscuring the embodied nature of work.jobs and hierarchies, common concepts (...) in organizational thinking, assume a disembodies and universal worker. This worker is actually a man; men's bodies, sexuality, and relationships to procreation and paid work are subsumed in the image of the worker. Images of men's bodies and masculinity pervade organizational processes, marginalizing women and contributing to the maintenance of gender segregation in organizations. The positing of gender-neutral and disembodied organizational structures and work relations is part of the larger strategy of control in industrial capitalist societies, which, at least partly, are built upon a deeply embedded substructure of gender difference. (shrink)

Kelsen's monistic theory of international law was shaped during his exile in Geneva, but its deep roots are to be found in his Pure Theory of Law, centred on the neo-Kantian notion of “system.” According to this conception, a legal system can only descend from a single principle. Consequently, Kelsen constructed a monistic theory of law, i.e., a legal system incorporating all norms into a pyramidal structure culminating in a single principle: the fundamental norm. This Kelsenian pyramid (...) must also include international law, considering that if international law were a legal system different from national law, the theoretical construction would need two fundamental norms. This dualism is as incompatible with Kelsen's monistic vision as Schmitt's theory of “Great Spaces,” creating a hierarchical system of international relations. In the Kelsenian pyramid, international law occupies a position superior to national law: The consequences of this assumption are discussed in some documents recently published in German and French. (shrink)

Neurophysiological investigations of the visual system by way of single-cell recordings have revealed a hierarchical architecture in which lower level areas, such as the primary visual cortex, contain cells that respond to simple features, while higher level areas contain cells that respond to higher order features apparently composed of combinations of lower level features. This architecture seems to suggest a feed-forward processing strategy in which visual information progresses from lower to higher visual areas. However there is other evidence, both (...) neurophysiological and phenomenal, that suggests a more parallel processing strategy in biological vision, in which top-down feedback plays a significant role. In fact Gestalt theory suggests that visual perception involves a process of emergence, i.e. a dynamic relaxation of multiple constraints throughout the system simultaneously, so that the final percept represents a stable state, or energy minimum of the dynamic system as a whole. A Multi-Level Reciprocal Feedback (MLRF) model is proposed to resolve the apparently contradictory concepts, by proposing a hierarchical visual architecture whose different levels are connected by bi-directional feed-forward and feedback pathways, where the computational transformation performed by the feedback pathway between levels in the hiararchy is a kind of inverse of the transformation performed by the corresponding feed-forward processing stream. This alternative paradigm of perceptual computation accounts in general terms for a number of visual illusory effects, and offers a computational specification for the generative, or constructive aspect of perceptual processing revealed by Gestalt theory. (shrink)

Emergent phenomena are quite interesting and amazing, but they present two main scientific obstacles: to be rationally understood and to be mathematically modelled. In this paper we propose a powerful mathematical tool for modelling emergent phenomena by applying category theory. Furthermore, since great part of biological phenomena are emergent, we present an essay of how to access an emergence from observational data. In the mathematical perspective, we utilize constructs (categories whose objects are structured sets), their operations and their corresponding (...) generalized underlying functor (which are not necessarily faithful) to define emergence. From this definition, we elaborate several results concerning homomorphism between emergences, representability, pull-back, push-out, equalizer, product and co-product of emergences among other results. After we have presented such mathematical model, we utilize a hierarchical structure as example—from molecules to a flatworm—, in order to understand the relation between biological systems and its underlying emergence in a hierarchical model. (shrink)

At present, with the continuous rise in public consumption level, the pressure on college students’ entrepreneurship or employment is increasingly severe. Under the concept of positive psychological intervention, the present work aims to alleviate the entrepreneurial pressure of college students and improve college students’ entrepreneurial education through the analysis of enterprise management elements. A 3-month intervention experiment, including the pre-test, preventive curriculum intervention, post-test, and delayed test, is conducted on a control group and an experimental group, to investigate entrepreneurial intention, (...) emotional management ability, and ability to deal with entrepreneurial pressure of college students. In addition, based on a complex adaptive system, the enterprise management elements are analyzed, and a three-layer network model is constructed. Meanwhile, new diversified elements of enterprise management are defined to discuss the effectiveness and psychological impact of diversified management, proving that psychological security plays an intermediary role in the cross-layer relationship chain in the three-layer CAS network. The experimental results indicate that on the whole, the positive psychological intervention reduces the pressure of students in the experimental group, significantly ameliorates depression and anxiety, and promotes the positive personality in all directions. Besides, in the delayed test after 3 months, the experimental group can maintain a relatively better state than the control group. By exploring the role effectiveness and characteristics of diversified management, this experiment confirms that the improvement of psychological security under positive psychological intervention has a positive impact on the effectiveness of diversified management. The present work discusses the hierarchical construction in enterprise management and puts forward reasonable suggestions and theoretical development for the influence of the entrepreneurial practice of college students. (shrink)

Contextualization is a widely-discussed topic in the field of linguistics. Although it is generally agreed that contextualization is a dynamic process of interaction among the heterogeneous contextual factors, one still lacks a coherent explanation of how the interactions enable a language user to construct a meaningful text/utterance. From an Activity Theory perspective, language use can be termed as a rule-governed activity. The activity itself is the context of a subject’s decision-making, and contextualization is nothing but the actualization process (...) of a language use activity. During the process, the subject strategizes her/his linguistic choice to build the textual outcome in light of the hierarchical text functions, namely, the conventionalized and situational functions of prospective text, which respectively embody the social-cultural and situational factors constraining her/his actions, and the conventional function of textual tools, a foremost factor conditioning her/his operation. When there are contradictions among these functions, the subject needs to prioritize the one at a higher stratum. This can be exemplified by three typical cases of language use: translation, pseudo-translation and self-translation. (shrink)

The examination of "Taiwanese Philosophy" is intricately influenced by the complex meanings of its terms4, fostering a range of interpretations and understandings that play a crucial role in the methodological discussions on how Taiwanese philosophical ideas are analyzed and developed. I highlight that the conventional approaches to interpreting "Taiwanese Philosophy" are mainly divided into two models: the PIT framework, signifying "Philosophical activities in Taiwan," and the TP framework, indicating "Taiwanese Philosophy noted for its unique subjectivity" (see Hung & Gao 2018)5. (...) In the early twentieth century, Mou Zongsan's emergence of New Confucianism shaped the academic reception towards the PIT model and elicited critiques of the TP perspective. This trend guided scholars in Chinese philosophy towards the CPIT (Chinese Philosophy in Taiwan) approach for deciphering "Taiwanese Philosophy," typically viewing it as a form of "Chinese philosophical endeavors in Taiwan." The prevailing contemporary academic opinion posits that initial supporters of New Confucianism failed to recognize Taiwanese philosophy’s unique characteristics and position following colonialism, reducing it to the CPIT model. This stance places "Taiwanese Philosophy" within the broader realm of Chinese Philosophy, highlighting the hierarchical differences between Chinese and Taiwanese philosophical traditions, which later drew substantial critique from supporters of Western liberalism and decolonization efforts. Recently, the importance of "Taiwanese Philosophy" and "Taiwanese Theory" has been increasingly acknowledged, with a growing agreement that "Taiwanese Philosophy," ideally interpreted through the TP model6, mirrors Taiwan's collective ethos and academic value rather than the more exhaustive PIT classification, which encompasses diverse philosophical lineages. Proponents of TP recognize the historical importance of the PIT model in documenting the evolution of Taiwanese Philosophy but strongly dispute its completeness for grasping the essence of "Taiwanese Philosophy." I intend to argue that, notwithstanding the recent criticisms against the PIT approach, revisiting PIT with the aid of extensive textual collections, cultural archives, and the study of intellectual history might offer a solid basis for a deeper appreciation of TP. It will explore how the PIT model can lead to significant misunderstandings by introducing two main biases: the belief that PIT sufficiently encapsulates "Taiwanese Philosophy," and the limitation of PIT to a mere geographical context. In addressing these biases, I offer a potential amicable reinterpretation and reassess the critical elements for a metaphysical description of the subjectivity emphasized in TP. -/- Keywords: Optimal interpretation of Taiwanese Philosophy, Subjectivity and Agency, Genealogy of Knowledge, Methodology of Constructing Theories, Characteristics of Regional Philosophy. (shrink)

Social evolution theory conventionally takes an externalist explanatory stance, treating observed cooperation as explanandum and the positive assortment of cooperative behaviour as explanans. We ask how the circumstances bringing about this positive assortment arose in the first place. Rather than merely push the explanatory problem back a step, we move from an externalist to an interactionist explanatory stance, in the spirit of Lewontin and the Niche Construction theorists. We develop a theory of ‘social niche construction’ in which we (...) consider biological entities to be both the subject and object of their own social evolution. Some important cases of the evolution of cooperation have the side-effect of causing changes in the hierarchical level at which the evolutionary process acts. This is because the traits that act to align the fitness interests of particles in a collective can also act to diminish the extent to which those particles are bearers of heritable fitness variance, while augmenting the extent to which collectives of such particles are bearers of heritable fitness variance. In this way, we can explain upward transitions in the hierarchical level at which the Darwinian machine operates in terms of particle-level selection, even though the outcome of the process is a collective-level selection regime. Our theory avoids the logical and metaphysical paradoxes faced by other attempts to explain evolutionary transitions. (shrink)

In philosophy of science two questions become central in the discussion of the nature of empirical science: 1) What is a theory, i.e. how is it built up, how does it work? And: 2) How does a theory relate to its corresponding experiential basis? To deal with these two questions modern philosophy of science has devised various ‘models’ on the nature and working of scientific theories. Some aspects of these models are widely held within the community of philosophers (...) of science, but others are still being discussed quite controversially. In this paper, we will consider both kinds of aspects. Particularly, we will analyze how the meaning of scientific concepts is determined; the axiomatic construction of a scientific theory; the idea of model building views as a bridge between theory and experience; the holistic semantic thesis of science; the question about the true of scientific theories; and, finally, the hierarchic structure of theories.En filosofía de la ciencia, dos cuestiones resultan centrales en la discusión acerca de la naturalezade la ciencia empírica: 1) ¿qué es una teoría ?, es decir, ¿cómo estáconstituida y cómo funciona? y 2) ¿cómo se relaciona una teoría con su correspondientebase experiencial? Para tratar estas dos cuestiones, la moderna filosofía de la ciencia ha desarrolladovarios “modelos” sobre la naturaleza y el funcionamiento de lasteorías científicas. Algunos aspectos de estos modelos son ampliamente aceptados por lacomunidad de filósofos de la ciencia, mientras que otros son todavía discutidos de manerabastante controvertida. En este trabajo, consideraremos ambos tipos de aspectos. En particular,analizaremos cómo se determina el significado de los conceptos teóricos, la construcción axiomática de una teoría científica, la idea de las concepciones sobre la construcción de modelos como puente entre la teoría y la experiencia, la tesis semántica holista de la ciencia, la cuestión acerca de la verdad de las teorías científicas y, finalmente, la estructura jerárquica de las teorías. (shrink)

This Perspective traces the evolution of certain central notions in the theory of Generative Grammar (GG). The founding documents of the field suggested a relation between the grammar, construed as recursively enumerating an infinite set of sentences, and the idealized native speaker that was essentially equivalent to the relation between a formal language (a set of well-formed formulas) and an automaton that recognizes strings as belonging to the language or not. But this early view was later abandoned, when the (...) focus of the field shifted to the grammar's strong generative capacity as recursive generation of hierarchically structured objects as opposed to strings. The grammar is now no longer seen as specifying a set of well-formed expressions and in fact necessarily constructs expressions of any degree of intuitive “acceptability.” The field of GG, however, has not sufficiently acknowledged the significance of this shift in perspective, as evidenced by the fact that (informal and experimentally-controlled) observations about string acceptability continue to be treated as bona fide data and generalizations for the theory of GG. The focus on strong generative capacity, it is argued, requires a new discussion of what constitutes valid empirical evidence for GG beyond observations pertaining to weak generation. (shrink)

In this deeply probing, intellectually challenging work, Dr. Jaan Valsiner lays the groundwork for a dynamic new cultural-historical approach to developmental psychology. He begins by deconstructing traditional developmental theory, exposing the conceptual confusion and epistemological blind spots that he believes continue to undermine the scientific validity of its methodologies. He describes the ways in which embedded cultural biases shape interventional goals and influence both the direction research takes and the ways in which research data are interpreted. And he suggests (...) ways in which researchers and clinicians can become more aware of and transcend those biases. Dr. Valsiner then develops a hierarchical, systemic model that portrays development as an open-ended, dialectical process. Central to Valsiner's approach is the premise that, since each child is unique--as are his or her life conditions--deviations function or not the rate of development from a prescribed norm are just as likely to be constructive adaptations to changing environmental pressures as symptoms of psychological disorder. Drawing upon sources as varied as linguistic philosophy, structural anthropology, thermodynamics, and systems theory, as well as the work of many of the leading figures in twentieth-century developmental theory, Valsiner argues convincingly for an approach to developmental psychology mature enough to recognize the difference between healthy variability and dysfunction. (shrink)

This study examines the use of an explicit, reflective method for teaching the difference and relationship between scientific theories and laws to ninth-grade students. Students reflected individually and then as a whole class on theories and laws using a Venn diagram, both before and after reading short articles describing features of theories and laws that provided an explicit challenge to their naïve prior conceptions. In small groups, they chose a theory or law, researched it, constructed a poster, and did (...) a gallery walk. Examination of students’ Venn diagrams and answers to a single question from VNOS-C given as both a pre- and post-test showed that prior to the lesson, all students except for one held more naïve views of both the difference between theories and laws and the nature of scientific theories. After the lesson, more than a third of them had improved their conceptions to more informed, and nearly a quarter understood that there is not a hierarchical relationship between scientific theories and laws. (shrink)

The evolution of the technology standard alliance is examined using complex adaptive system theory. Taking TSA as a dynamic CAS, an echo model is constructed to depict the mechanism of its evolution, and a model is simulated on the NetLogo platform. The echo model includes a basic model, an extended model, and a three-layer echo model. The adhesive aggregation of agents is explained, and the three evolutionary stages of agents’ entry, migration, and exit are analyzed. Moreover, the adaptability of (...) agents in TSA is quantified. The results of simulation show the evolution of the TSA in relation to the two aspects of agent adhesion aggregation and agent resource interaction, and they demonstrate the dynamic and complex hierarchical structure of the TSA system. It is proposed that greater matching ability, moderate behavior income, and lower behavior cost are more conducive to the evolution and development of TSA. Additionally, the echo model is reconstructed to expand the range of application of CAS theory. (shrink)

Philanthropy is typically hierarchically constructed with an imbalance of power between funders and grantees. While this seems inherent in philanthropic relationships where funders inevitably control resources that grantees need, some women’s funds have sought to construct less hierarchical and thus more feminist relationships with the organizations they support. Based on many years of insider access to a local women’s fund, this article describes and explains the organization’s efforts to develop interactive dialogues with its grantees, which led to a (...) change in grants guidelines that were more inclusive of women’s methods of community organizing. A small survey of women’s community groups, done as background to this research, provides data on challenges and obstacles these groups face when seeking monies to support their work. Some attention is given to implications for general theories of organizations, for funder-grantee dialogues leading to increased accountability in philanthropy, and for support of women’s community organizations. (shrink)

In this deeply probing, intellectually challenging work, Dr. JaanValsiner lays the groundwork for a dynamic new cultural-historicalapproach to developmental psychology. He begins by deconstructingtraditional developmental theory, exposing the conceptual confusionand epistemological blind spots that he believes continue toundermine the scientific validity of its methodologies. Hedescribes the ways in which embedded cultural biases shapeinterventional goals and influence both the direction researchtakes and the ways in which research data are interpreted. And hesuggests ways in which researchers and clinicians can become moreaware (...) of and transcend those biases. Dr. Valsiner then develops a hierarchical, systemic model thatportrays development as an open-ended, dialectical process. Centralto Valsiner's approach is the premise that, since each child isunique--as are his or her life conditions--deviations in functionor the rate of development from a prescribed norm are just aslikely to be constructive adaptations to changing environmentalpressures as symptoms of psychological disorder. Drawing uponsources as varied as linguistic philosophy, structuralanthropology, thermodynamics, and systems theory, as well as thework of many of the leading figures in twentieth-centurydevelopmental theory, Valsiner argues convincingly for an approachto developmental psychology mature enough to recognize thedifference between healthy variability and dysfunction. In later chapters the focus shifts from development in the abstractto the everyday challenges encountered by the developing child.Case histories illustrate the subtle interplay of cultural,physiological, and psychological factors in shaping childhoodbehavior. Called an "intellectual tour de force" by the Bulletin of theMenninger Clinic, Culture and the Development of Children's Actionis important reading for developmental psychologists, childpsychologists, and all child clinicians. "Of course, no science progresses in a linear fashion. It movesinterdependently with the society in which it is embedded, makinguse of the narrative forms in describing itself to its insiders andoutsiders. The rhetoric of scientists about their science istherefore necessarily inconsistent. Sciences are both socialinstitutions within a society and social organizations that attemptto build universal knowledge. It is a complicated task forpsychology to be both knowledge-constructing and self-reflexive atthe same time. Nevertheless, it is the latter kind of reflexivitythat guides the actual construction of knowledge." -- JaanValsiner "[This book] is a fascinating and important work that challengesmuch of contemporary developmental psychology. The Second Editionhas changed in a number of respects, and much new material has beenadded, but at root, Valsiner grapples with the question 'how shallwe understand development?' He continues to struggle also with whathe describes rather vividly as the 'epistemological windmills ofpsychology.' His challenge is summed up succinctly in two linesfrom a poem by T. S. Eliot: * Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? * Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?" -- -- fromthe Foreword by Kevin Connolly. (shrink)

My main purpose here is to provide an account of context selection in utterance understanding in terms of the role played by schemata and goals in top-down processing. The general idea is that information is organized hierarchically, with items iteratively organized in chunks—here called “schemata”—at multiple levels, so that the activation of any items spreads to schemata that are the most accessible due to previous experience. The activation of a schema, in turn, activates its other components, so as to predict (...) a likely context for the original item. Since each input activates its own schemata, conflicting schemata compete with (and inhibit) each other, while multiple activations of a schema raise its likelihood to win the competition. There is therefore a double movement—with bottom-up activation of schemata enabling top-down prediction of other contextual components—triggered by multiple sources. Another claim of the paper is that goals are represented by schemata placed at the highest-levels of the executive hierarchy, in accordance with Fuster’s model of the brain as a hierarchically organized perception action cycle. This account can be considered, in part at least, a development of ideas contained in Relevance Theory, though it may imply that some other claims of the theory are in need of revision. Therefore, a secondary purpose of the paper is a contribution to the analysis of that theory. (shrink)

With the assistance of the corpus analysis tool Wmatrix 4.0, this paper analyzes the semantic categories of the top 10 commercial banks of China and the United States to figure out their social-cultural behavior in the Internet business context. It is discovered that both common and distinctive identities were constructed: the common identities include the professional financial service provider, responsible corporation for employees, and relevant communities with environmental and social consciousness, while the distinctive identities are manifested in the communication strategy, (...) style, and persuasion mode: The Chinese Commercial Banks adopted the proactive strategy for corporate identity construction, are prone to take hierarchical and impersonal communication style, and more focused on the “credibility appeal” and “rational appeal” in persuasion mode; the commercial banks of the United States are more reactive in the communication strategy, position themselves in short distance with the putative audience in communication style, and conform to the typical “affective appeal” regarding the persuasion mode. From the intercultural perspective, the distinctions are the representation of the peculiar high-context culture and low-context culture based on Hofstede's cultural dimensions theory. Chinese banks should try to shorten the cultural gap by adopting communication strategy in conformity with the local cultural when going global rather than sticking to the domestic communication strategy. (shrink)

The idea that natural selection acts on many levels—and not only at the level of organisms or individual genes—is increasingly accepted among biologists. However, it is not easy to reconcile this idea with the strictly “individualistic” conception of the evolutionary process that has always characterized Darwinian thought. Moreover, the individuality of some forms of life is a vague concept and therefore controversial. This is the case of Candidatus Magnetoglobus multicellularis, whose discovery immediately inspired the following question: Does the concept of (...) individuality have degrees? Alternatively, how far is this structure of prokaryotic cells from deserving to be called an organism? In this article, we propose a new conceptual scheme based on an idea of individuality that is not limited to organisms and that makes sense in terms of Darwinian evolution. In this conceptual scheme, selection at levels above that of the individual organism is interpreted as the evolutionary emergence of higher-level individuality. This proposal may serve as a basis on which to construct a promising hierarchical evolutionary theory. (shrink)

The idea that natural selection acts on many levels—and not only at the level of organisms or individual genes—is increasingly accepted among biologists. However, it is not easy to reconcile this idea with the strictly “individualistic” conception of the evolutionary process that has always characterized Darwinian thought. Moreover, the individuality of some forms of life is a vague concept and therefore controversial. This is the case of Candidatus Magnetoglobus multicellularis, whose discovery immediately inspired the following question: Does the concept of (...) individuality have degrees? Alternatively, how far is this structure of prokaryotic cells from deserving to be called an organism? In this article, we propose a new conceptual scheme based on an idea of individuality that is not limited to organisms and that makes sense in terms of Darwinian evolution. In this conceptual scheme, selection at levels above that of the individual organism is interpreted as the evolutionary emergence of higher-level individuality. This proposal may serve as a basis on which to construct a promising hierarchical evolutionary theory. (shrink)

Two controversies exist regarding the appropriate characterization of hierarchical and adaptive evolution in natural populations. In biology, there is the Wright-Fisher controversy over the relative roles of random genetic drift, natural selection, population structure, and interdemic selection in adaptive evolution begun by Sewall Wright and Ronald Aylmer Fisher. There is also the Units of Selection debate, spanning both the biological and the philosophical literature and including the impassioned group-selection debate. Why do these two discourses exist separately, and interact relatively (...) little? We postulate that the reason for this schism can be found in the differing focus of each controversy, a deep difference itself determined by distinct general styles of scientific research guiding each discourse. That is, the Wright-Fisher debate focuses on adaptive process, and tends to be instructed by the mathematical modeling style, while the focus of the Units of Selection controversy is adaptive product, and is typically guided by the function style. The differences between the two discourses can be usefully tracked by examining their interpretations of two contested strategies for theorizing hierarchical selection: horizontal and vertical averaging. (shrink)

If one formulates Helmholtz's ideas about perception in terms of modern-day theories one arrives at a model of perceptual inference and learning that can explain a remarkable range of neurobiological facts. Using constructs from statistical physics it can be shown that the problems of inferring what cause our sensory inputs and learning causal regularities in the sensorium can be resolved using exactly the same principles. Furthermore, inference and learning can proceed in a biologically plausible fashion. The ensuing scheme rests on (...) Empirical Bayes and hierarchical models of how sensory information is generated. The use of hierarchical models enables the brain to construct prior expectations in a dynamic and context-sensitive fashion. This scheme provides a principled way to understand many aspects of the brain's organisation and responses. In this paper, we suggest that these perceptual processes are just one emergent property of systems that conform to a free-energy principle. The free-energy considered here represents a bound on the surprise inherent in any exchange with the environment, under expectations encoded by its state or configuration. A system can minimise free-energy by changing its configuration to change the way it samples the environment, or to change its expectations. These changes correspond to action and perception, respectively, and lead to an adaptive exchange with the environment that is characteristic of biological systems. This treatment implies that the system's state and structure encode an implicit and probabilistic model of the environment. We will look at models entailed by the brain and how minimisation of free-energy can explain its dynamics and structure. (shrink)

This chapter explains the notions of information, communication and learning in the context of the complex adaptive systems theory, under the version proposed by M. Gell‐Mann. Within the class of such systems, it focuses attention on complex and self‐organized natural systems as analyzed by H. Atlan. The chapter describes the epistemological context and the formal definition of self‐organization according to H. Atlan, because this definition results from a re‐interpretation of the Shannonian theorem of the noisy channel by applying it (...) to a system organized into several hierarchical levels. It is gradually restore Atlan's construction of the notion of the meaning of information in a hierarchical system, by contrasting the principles of order from noise and organizational noise and by accordingly distinguishing the concepts of complexity and complication. The principle of complexity from noise, which lies at the heart of the concept of self‐organization proposed by H. Atlan. (shrink)

Implementing the “hierarchical diagnosis and treatment” system highlights the important role of general practitioners as “residents’ health gatekeepers.” Still, the low level of career growth always limits the realization of their service value. Inertial thinking uses a single factor to explain the complexity of career growth in previous studies; in fact, it isn’t easy to assess whether the factor is a sufficient and necessary condition for a high level of career growth. Herein, we have used a set theory (...) perspective to analyze the mechanism of influencing high-level career growth by combining psychological and organizational factors. This research aims to analyze causal complexity relationship between these conditions and results is analyzed in detail. We choose fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis with a sample of 407 GPs to test 5 antecedent conditional variables that can affect their career growth. The variables include professional identity, self-efficacy, achievement motivation, training mechanism, and incentive mechanism. To ensure the universality and diversity of data, the samples were selected from community medical institutions in different regions of China. The results show that three pathways can affect the high career growth of GPs, and the optimal pathway A2 is the linkage matching of high incentive mechanism, high professional identity, high achievement motivation, and high self-efficacy. At the same time, we find that professional identity plays an alternative role in the three pathways. When professional identity is at a high level, as long as achievement motivation and self-efficacy are superior, or achievement motivation, self-efficacy, and achievement motivation are superior, a high level of career growth can be achieved. We broke the shackles of previous studies that only focused on the impact of single factors on the career growth of GPs. From the perspective of set theory, we use configurational thinking to construct Influential pathways of high career growth of GPs by integrating antecedents. The results can provide effective support for improving GPs’ service ability and realizing their service value to protect residents’ health. (shrink)

In this paper, we propose a mathematical model of subjective experience in terms of classes of hierarchical geometries of representations (“n-awareness”). We first outline a general framework by recalling concepts from higher category theory, homotopy theory, and the theory of (infinity,1)-topoi. We then state three conjectures that enrich this framework. We first propose that the (infinity,1)-category of a geometric structure known as perfectoid diamond is an (infinity,1)-topos. In order to construct a topology on the (infinity,1)-category (...) of diamonds we then propose that topological localization, in the sense of Grothendieck-Rezk-Lurie (infinity,1)-topoi, extends to the (infinity,1)-category of diamonds. We provide a small-scale model using triangulated categories. Finally, our meta-model takes the form of Efimov K-theory of the (infinity,1)-category of perfectoid diamonds, which illustrates structural equivalences between the category of diamonds and subjective experience (i.e.its privacy, self-containedness, and self-reflexivity). Based on this, we investigate implications of the model. We posit a grammar (“n-declension”) for a novel language to express n-awareness, accompanied by a new temporal scheme (“n-time”). Our framework allows us to revisit old problems in the philosophy of time: how is change possible and what do we mean by simultaneity and coincidence? We also examine the notion of “self” within our framework. A new model of personal identity is introduced which resembles a categorical version of the “bundle theory”: selves are not substances in which properties inhere but (weakly) persistent moduli spaces in the K-theory of perfectoid diamonds. (shrink)

Niche Construction Theory has been gaining acceptance as an explanatory framework for processes in biological and human evolution. Human cultural niche construction, in particular, is suggested as a basis for understanding many phenomena that involve human genetic and cultural evolution. Herein I assess the ability of the cultural niche construction framework to meet this explanatory role by looking into several NCT-inspired accounts that have been offered for two important episodes of human evolution, and by examining the contribution of NCT (...) to the elucidation of two “primary examples” mentioned often in the NCT literature. The result, I claim, is rather disappointing: While NCT may serve as a descriptive framework for these phenomena, it cannot be said to explain them in any substantive sense. Especially disturbing is NCT’s failure to account for differing developments in very similar situations, and to facilitate evaluation and discrimination between divergent and contradictory causal accounts of particular phenomena. I argue that these problems are inherent, and they render NCT unsuitable to serve as an explanatory framework for human phenomena. NCT’s value, at least as related to human phenomena, is therefore descriptive and heuristic rather than explanatory. In conclusion, I discuss and reject comparisons made between NCT and the theory of natural selection, and examine several potential sources of NCT’s explanatory weakness. (shrink)

Despite recognition as an important, potentially unifying construct within the social sciences and humanities, value lacks an overarching theoretical framework. One theory within the social sciences, personal construct theory, is suggested as a theoretical foundation for human values, and an attempt to situate values within this theory is presented. It is argued that human values are core constructs in the language of personal construct theory, while ordinary beliefs are peripheral constructs. Various implications and (...) applications of this formulation are discussed. (shrink)

As biological and moral creatures, humans contain physical and psychological needs that correspond to various development stages. According to Lee, a hierarchy of biological and individual needs provides an objective basis for ethics. The anthropocentric hierarchy of needs provides a model for examining the needs of the environment as well. A sound world order must be based on an ethical theory that integrates the needs of humans and the environment of which they are a part. Political and economic systems (...) must universally address all needs at all levels. (shrink)

Due to their non-hierarchical structure, socio-technical networks are prone to the occurrence of the problem of many hands. In the present paper an approach is introduced in which people’s opinions on responsibility are empirically traced. The approach is based on the Rawlsian concept of Wide Reflective Equilibrium (WRE) in which people’s considered judgments on a case are reflectively weighed against moral principles and background theories, ideally leading to a state of equilibrium. Application of the method to a hypothetical case (...) with an artificially constructed network showed that it is possible to uncover the relevant data to assess a consensus amongst people in terms of their individual WRE. It appeared that the moral background theories people endorse are not predictive for their actual distribution of responsibilities but that they indicate ways of reasoning and justifying outcomes. Two ways of ascribing responsibilities were discerned, corresponding to two requirements of a desirable responsibility distribution: fairness and completeness. Applying the method triggered learning effects, both with regard to conceptual clarification and moral considerations, and in the sense that it led to some convergence of opinions. It is recommended to apply the method to a real engineering case in order to see whether this approach leads to an overlapping consensus on a responsibility distribution which is justifiable to all and in which no responsibilities are left unfulfilled, therewith trying to contribute to the solution of the problem of many hands. (shrink)

Dynamics of complex systems is often hierarchically organized on different time scales. To understand the physics of such hierarchy, here Brownian motion of a particle moving through a fluctuating medium with slowly varying temperature is studied as an analytically tractable example, and a kinetic theory is formulated for describing the states of the particle. What is peculiar here is that the (inverse) temperature is treated as a dynamical variable. Dynamical hierarchy is introduced in conformity with the adiabatic scheme. Then, (...) a new analytical method is developed to show how the Fokker–Planck equation admits as a stationary solution the Maxwellian distribution modulated by the temperature fluctuations, the distribution of which turns out to be determined by the drift term. A careful comment is also made on so-called superstatistics. (shrink)

Purpose: To examine the role of reductionism in the theoretical development of modern physics -- more specifically, in the quest for a complete unification of physical theory -- from the perspective of radical constructivism (RC). Approach: Some central features of the impact of RC on philosophy of physics are pointed out: its position of scientific relativism, with important implications for the validation of scientific propositions; and the notion of sharing constructed knowledge among individual knowers and its consequences for science (...) teaching. The issue of reductionism is then discussed with regard to (a) the hierarchical explanatory ordering of physical phenomena; (b) the idea of a "theory of everything" (TOE); and (c) some of its implications for the methodology and sociology of science. Findings: It is argued that the ontological status of the hierarchical structuring inherent in the sought-after TOE will depend on the individual knower's epistemic position concerning the notion of truth in science. In the relativist epistemology of RC, any true/false dichotomy of theories is without meaning. A hierarchical ordering is just one of many possible strategies that may be chosen for the construction of physical theories; and such a strategy may then be considered successful only to the extent that it yields a theory that is viable. Implications: The paper serves as an illustration of the impact of RC on the ongoing search in physics for a "final theory.". (shrink)

Natural Formalization proposes a concrete way of expanding proof theory from the meta-mathematical investigation of formal theories to an examination of “the concept of the specifically mathematical proof.” Formal proofs play a role for this examination in as much as they reflect the essential structure and systematic construction of mathematical proofs. We emphasize three crucial features of our formal inference mechanism: (1) the underlying logical calculus is built for reasoning with gaps and for providing strategic directions, (2) the mathematical (...) frame is a definitional extension of Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory and has a hierarchically organized structure of concepts and operations, and (3) the construction of formal proofs is deeply connected to the frame through rules for definitions and lemmas. To bring these general ideas to life, we examine, as a case study, proofs of the Cantor–Bernstein Theorem that do not appeal to the principle of choice. A thorough analysis of the multitude of “different” informal proofs seems to reduce them to exactly one. The natural formalization confirms that there is one proof, but that it comes in two variants due to Dedekind and Zermelo, respectively. In this way it enhances the conceptual understanding of the represented informal proofs. The formal, computational work is carried out with the proof search system AProS that serves as a proof assistant and implements the above inference mechanism; it can be fully inspected at (see link below). (shrink)

In modern evolutionary theory, selection acts on particular genes and assemblages of genes that operate through phenotypes expressed in environments. This view, however, overlooks the fact that organisms often alter their environments in pursuit of fitness needs and thus modify some environmental selection pressures. Niche construction theory introduces a reciprocal causal process that modifies natural selection relative to three general kinds of environmental components: abiota, biota (other organisms), and artifacts. The ways in which niche-constructing organisms can construct (...) or modify the components differ. Modification of abiota, for example, may have different consequences from the construction of artifacts. Some changes in abiota may simply be caused by the by-products of metabolisms and activities of organisms. Alternatively, artifacts may be “extended phenotypes” that demonstrate obvious prior “design” and “construction” by organisms in the service of fitness needs. Nevertheless, adaptation should always account for the reciprocity between constructed niches and the living agents that construct them. Looking to well-adapted nature for inspiration for human-built artifacts must account for this reciprocity between phenotype and constructed environment as well as the novel features of human architecture, including frank intentionality of design and novel culturally acquired knowledge. (shrink)

From the foundation of self-determination theory and existing literature on forms of power, we empirically explored relationships between followers’ perceptions of their leader’s use of various forms of power, followers’ self-reported motivational outlooks, and followers’ favorable work intentions. Using survey data collected from two studies of working professionals, we apply path analysis and hierarchical multiple regression to analyze variance among constructs of interest. We found that followers’ perceptions of hard power use by their leaders (i.e., reward, coercive, and (...) legitimate power) was often related to higher levels of sub-optimal motivation in followers (i.e., amotivation, external regulation, and introjected regulation). However, followers who perceived their leaders used soft power (i.e., expert, referent, and informational power) often experienced higher levels of optimal motivation (i.e., identified regulation and intrinsic motivation), but further investigation of soft power use is warranted. The quality of followers’ motivational outlooks was also related to intentions to perform favorably for their organizations. (shrink)

Purpose Previous studies on cyberloafing have so far not focused on the interlinkages among push factors, pull factors, consequences of actions and value orientations of the employees in a comprehensive manner. The purpose of this study is to close that gap by integrating push-pull theory with means-end chain framework. Design/methodology/approach Using a soft-laddering technique, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 21 Indian employees from various organizations with prior written consent. After performing the content analysis and preparation of ladders, an implication (...) matrix and a hierarchical value map were constructed using the LadderUX tool. Findings “Upholding conversational conformity,” “achieving efficiency through noise cancellation,” “addressing occasional requirements,” “social networking as a coping mechanism,” “staying informed and sharing opinions,” “attempting job or profile alteration” and “fulfilling transactional obligations” turned out to be the seven prominent means-end chain patterns, with their respective push-pull factors, consequences and value orientations. This study also suggested the multifaceted character of cyberloafing in a continuum, from “serious-destructive” to “minor-positive” to “facilitative-productive.” Research limitations/implications This study has been conducted by focusing on cyberloafing at physical workplaces and not in the context of distributed work environments. Practical implications The findings of this study will enable organizations to frame an appropriate set of guidelines to control this behavior. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to integrate the push-pull theory and means-end chain framework to explore the nuances of cyberloafing among employees. (shrink)

We introduce a computational theory of situated language understanding in which the meaning of words and utterances depends on the physical environment and the goals and plans of communication partners. According to the theory, concepts that ground linguistic meaning are neither internal nor external to language users, but instead span the objective‐subjective boundary. To model the possible interactions between subject and object, the theory relies on the notion of perceived affordances: structured units of interaction that can be (...) used for prediction at multiple levels of abstraction. Language understanding is treated as a process of filtering perceived affordances. The theory accounts for many aspects of the situated nature of human language use and provides a unified solution to a number of demands on any theory of language understanding including conceptual combination, prototypicality effects, and the generative nature of lexical items.To support the theory, we describe an implemented system that understands verbal commands situated in a virtual gaming environment. The implementation uses probabilistic hierarchical plan recognition to generate perceived affordances. The system has been evaluated on its ability to correctly interpret free‐form spontaneous verbal commands recorded from unrehearsed game play between human players. The system is able to “step into the shoes” of human players and correctly respond to a broad range of verbal commands in which linguistic meaning depends on social and physical context. We quantitatively compare the system's predictions in response to direct player commands with the actions taken by human players and show generalization to unseen data across a range of situations and verbal constructions. (shrink)

Context is an important construct in many domains of cognition, including learning, memory, and emotion. We used dynamical systems methods to demonstrate the episodic nature of experience by showing a natural separation between the scales over which within-context and between-context relationships operate. To do this, we represented an individual's emails extending over about 5 years in a high-dimensional semantic space and computed the dimensionalities of the subspaces occupied by these emails. Personal discourse has a two-scaled geometry with smaller within-context (...) dimensionalities than between-context dimensionalities. Prior studies have shown that reading experience and visual experience have a similar two-scaled structure. Furthermore, the recurrence plot of the emails revealed that experience is predictable and hierarchical, supporting the constructs of some influential theories of memory. The results demonstrate that experience is not scale-free and provide an important target for accounts of how experience shapes cognition. (shrink)

We formulate a predicative, constructive theory of continuous domains whose realizability interpretation gives a practical implementation of continuous ω-chain complete posets and continuous maps between them. We apply the theory to implementation of the interval domain and exact real numbers.