Discussion of J. Kevin O’Regan’s “Why Red Doesn’t Sound Like a Bell: Understanding the Feel of Consciousness” Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-20 DOI 10.1007/s13164-012-0090-7 Authors J. Kevin O’Regan, Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception, CNRS - Université Paris Descartes, Centre Biomédical des Saints Pères, 45 rue des Sts Pères, 75270 Paris cedex 06, France Ned Block, Departments of Philosophy, Psychology and Center for Neural Science, New York University, 5 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003, USA Journal Review of Philosophy and (...) Psychology Online ISSN 1878-5166 Print ISSN 1878-5158. (shrink)

Increasing ethical attention and debate is focusing on whether individuals who take part in clinical trials should be given access to post-trial care. However, the main focus of this debate has been upon drug trials undertaken in low-income settings. To broaden this debate, we report findings from interviews with individuals (n = 24) who participated in a clinical trial of a closed-loop system, which is a medical device under development for people with type 1 diabetes that automatically adjusts blood glucose (...) to help keep it within clinically recommended ranges. Individuals were recruited from UK sites and interviewed following trial close-out, at which point the closed-loop had been withdrawn. While individuals were stoical and accepting of the requirement to return the closed-loop, they also conveyed varying degrees of distress. Many described having relaxed diabetes management practices while using the closed-loop and having become deskilled as a consequence, which made reverting back to pre-trial regimens challenging. Participants also described unanticipated consequences arising from using a closed-loop. As well as deskilling, these included experiencing psychological and emotional benefits that could not be sustained after the closed-loop had been withdrawn and participants reevaluating their pre- and post-trial life in light of having used a closed-loop and now perceiving this life much more negatively. Participants also voiced frustrations about experiencing better blood glucose control using a closed-loop and then having to revert to using what they now saw as antiquated and imprecise self-management tools. We use these findings to argue that ethical debates about post-trial provisioning need to be broadened to consider potential psychological and emotional harms, and not just clinical harms, that may result from withdrawal of investigated treatments. We also suggest that individuals may benefit from information about potential nonclinical harms to help make informed decisions about trial participation. (shrink)

In his concept of an anthropological physiology, F.J.J. Buytendijk has tried to lay down the theoretical and scientific foundations for an anthropologically-oriented medicine. The aim of anthropological physiology is to demonstrate, empirically, what being specifically human is in the most elementary physiological functions. This article contains a sketch of Buytendijk''s life and work, an overview of his philosophical-anthropological presuppositions, an outline of his idea of an anthropological physiology and medicine, and a discussion of some episternological and methodological problems. It is (...) demonstrated that Buytendijk''s design of an anthropological physiology is fragmentary and programmatic and that his methodology offers few points of contact for specific anthropological experimental research.Notwithstanding, it is argued that Buytendijk''s description of the subjective, animated body forms a pre-eminent point of reference for all research in physiology and psychology in which the specific human aspect is not ignored beforehand. (shrink)

This paper explores the practical consequences that Enlightenment ideals had on morality as it applies to clinical practice, using Alisdair MacIntyre's conceptualization and critique of the Enlightenment as its reference point. Taking the perspective of a practicing clinician, I critically examine the historical origins of ideas that made shared decision making (SDM) a necessary and ideal model of clinician-patient relationship. I then build on MacIntyre's critique of Enlightenment thought and examine its implications for conceptions of shared decision-making that use an (...) Enlightenment justification, as well as examining contemporary threats to SDM that the Enlightenment made possible. I conclude by offering an alternative framing of SDM that fits with the clinician's duty to act on behalf of and along with patients but that avoids the tenuous Enlightenment assumptions that MacIntyre's work so vocally critiques. (shrink)

The explicit goal of most major AI labs is to create artificial general intelligence (AGI): machines that can assist us across a wide range of tasks. Additionally, they all want to build systems that are safe, fair and beneficial to their users – machines that are good. But, building machines that are both generally intelligent and good requires building machines that can “think” about what’s good, that make their own moral judgments. And this raises both philosophical and technical questions that (...) we have barely started to address. (shrink)

Written over the last 18 months of his life and inspired by his interest in G. E. Moore's defence of common sense, this much discussed volume collects Wittgenstein's reflections on knowledge and certainty, on what it is to know a proposition for sure.

J. C. Dybikowski; VII*—Lord Devlin's Morality and its Enforcement, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 75, Issue 1, 1 June 1975, Pages 89–110, https.

J. C. Dybikowski; VII*—Lord Devlin's Morality and its Enforcement, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 75, Issue 1, 1 June 1975, Pages 89–110, https.

Anglophone philosophers have shown a surprising interest in Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten’s aesthetics in recent years. At the same time, new approaches to aesthetics have been proposed that come very close to the original conception of aesthetics that Baumgarten introduced in the middle of the eighteenth century. In light of these developments, this article undertakes a critical examination of a central concept in Baumgarten’s poetics and aesthetics—extensive clarity. It argues that historians of philosophy and contemporary aestheticians should be wary of this (...) concept for two reasons. First, in Baumgarten’s poetics, the extensive clarity of sensible representations constitutes a dubious standard with which to determine whether those representations are “poetic.” Second, in aesthetics, using extensive clarity as an alternative standard with which to determine the perfection of sensible cognition undermines the “marriage of reason and experience” that characterized the Leibnizian-Wolffian philosophy and raises the specter of dualism that Kant tried, with questionable success, to address in the ‘Schematism’ chapter of the Critique of Pure Reason. The article concludes that historians of philosophy should acknowledge the philosophical shortcomings of Baumgarten’s conception of extensive clarity and contemporary aesthetics should not reproduce them. (shrink)

According to the legend, Bishop Wilberforce at a meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in Oxford on Saturday, June 30th, 1860, turned to Thomas Huxley, and asked him ``Is it on your grandfather's or your grandmother's side that you claim descent from a monkey''; whereupon Huxley delivered a devastating rebuke, thereby establishing the primacy of scientific truth over ecclesiastical obscurantism. Although the legend is historically untrue in almost every detail, its persistence suggests that it may nonetheless (...) be true in some deeper, mythical, sense. To explore this possibility the British Academy has invited Dr Janet Browne to be a neo-Huxley confronting Mr J.R. Lucas, as a neo-Wilberforce, with each reconsidering their earlier arguments. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:MACINTYRE'S REPUBLIC J. K. SWINDLER Westminster College Fulton, Missouri CONTRARY TO HIS own evident intentions and perceptions, in After Virtue A'lasdair Macinty!l.·e is much more of a Ptlatonist 1than the A1 ristotelian he aims to be. I hase this judgment both on the positive evidence that Macintyre and Plato (in the Republic) m1gue for and against the same crucial theses and on the negative evidence that Plato has read (...) answers to the very issues which Macintyre finds 1 intractable from an AristoteHan point of viiew. My thesis can be made out in terms of a half dozen issues which Maclntyire takes as crucial to his case: (1) Can there he a science of government? (2) Is there an answer to the sophist's chaillenge to morality? (3) How oan the fragmentation of the modern self he theoretically overcome? (4) What are the hi1stocical and social determinants of morality? (5) Is there a unity of virtue in addition to individual virtues? (6) Can we reconcile ourselves to teleofogy, the absence of the polis, and the tragedy of human 1:ife? I will consider each of these in turn. I. Wisdom Plato defines wisdom as knowledge of how to rule, and Aristotle (in the Nichomachean Ethics) distinguishes between theoretical and practical wisdom, 1suggesting thereby an interesting ambiguity in Plato's view, an ambiguity of which Macintyre makes a great deal. One may rule eithecr hy law or by judgment. In his attack on the Enlightenment, MacIntyre showis quite clearly tha;t the idea of a social science that would p11ovide laws of human behavior, which could in 343 344 J. K. SWINDLER turn be used by il"ulers and managers to predict and therefore manipulate!human action, was an invention of the eighteenth century. He offers an extensive 1oritique o.f this conception of socirul science, grounded primarily in the claim that human.behavior is essentially unlawful, at least if we judge it by the standards of the physical sciences. There is in human affairs a farge 1and uneliminwble element of fortiuna which makes it impossrible rto.formulate laws of human nature or behavior that would he exceptionless and therefore underwrite predictions of behavior. For there is nothing to be done about the unpredictability of innovations or, from one's own point of view, of one's own future actions; nor can the uncertainties of gametheoretie decisions and 1 the general contingency of the outcomes of ruction,be remedied. There is therefore no possibility of a social science in the sense in which Hume tried to imitate Newton. So much for Marx and Weber and the horde of modern.social scientists. This is not to say that life is completely uncertain; on the contrary, there are genuine and general regularities in society, some natural, some social, ·some statistical, some causal, wihich make life bearable. But these provide a,ground for the Aristotelian idea, endorsed by MacIntyre, that the principles of conduct, such as they might be, hold only for the most part and not universa1ly. There is therefore in Maclntyre's view no justification for 1a mora;l oode in the modern sense, nor ev;en of moral principles of the kind we are used to from Kant ·and Mill, Rawls and Nozick, which purport to istand as a sufficient criterion of right in all cases. But, importantly, we do not find any such rules or codes in Pla.to either. For Plato, too, insists on the mixed reign of chaos and logos in the materia;l world and in our Jives and concludes that judgment is essential to· determining right conduct. He tellrs us that wise rule comes only &om good oharructer and good institutions, that legislating in such detaii1 as to eliminate judgment is "cut:ting off the heads of a hy:dra." One cannot help hut think that tMs (essentially Hemclitean) point is something Aristotle ~earned at his MACINTYRE'S REPUBLIC 345 master's knee. And both aspects of Plato's :point ~e ipresent in Aristotle, viz., that s~nce the:ve is chance in nature, there is luck (good 'and had) in life, and since no rule can capture the particularity of conorete situations right... (shrink)

This series will include monographs and collections of studies devoted to the investigation and exploration of knowledge, information and data-processing systems of all kinds, no matter whether human, (other) animal or machine. Its scope is intended to span the full range of interests from classical problems in the philosophy of mind and phi losophical psychology through issues in cognitive psychology and socio biology (concerning the mental capabilities of other species) to ideas related to artificial intelligence and computer science. While primary (...) emphasis will be placed upon theoretical, conceptual and epistemologi cal aspects of these problems and domains, empirical, experimental and methodological studies will also appear from time to time. Among the most challenging and difficult projects within the scope of artificial intelligence is the development and implementation of com puter programs suitable for processing natural language. Our purpose in compiling the present volume has been to contribute to the foundations of this enterprise by bringing together classic papers devoted to crucial problems involved in understanding natural language, which range from issues of formal syntax and logical form to those of possible-worlds and situation semantics. The book begins with a comprehensive introduc tion composed by Jack Kulas, the senior editor of this work, which pro vides a systematic orientation to this complex field, and ends with a selected bibliography intended to promote further research. If our efforts assist others in dealing with these problems, they will have been worthwhile. J. H. F. (shrink)

ABSTRACTGraeme Wood’s The Way of the Strangers suggests that many scholars have denied or downplayed the Islamic State’s own account of its emphatically religious foundation. This tendency is heir to the Enlightenment strategy of defanging illiberal religion by claiming that only religions conforming to liberal principles are genuinely religious—raising anew questions that arose at the dawn of liberalism, in the wake of the Wars of Religion.

With over 150 alphabetically arranged entries about key scientists, concepts, discoveries, technological innovations, and learned institutions, the Oxford Guide to Physics and Astronomy traces the history of physics and astronomy from the Renaissance to the present. For students, teachers, historians, scientists, and readers of popular science books such as Galileo's Daughter, this guide deciphers the methods and philosophies of physics and astronomy as well as the historical periods from which they emerged. Meant to serve the lay reader and the professional (...) alike, this book can be turned to for the answer to how scientists learned to measure the speed of light, or consulted for neat, careful summaries of topics as complicated as quantum field theory and as vast as the universe. The entries, each written by a noted scholar and edited by J. L. Heilbron, Professor of History and Vice Chancellor, Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley, reflect the most up-to-date research and discuss the applications of the scientific disciplines to the wider world of religion, law, war, art and literature. No other source on these two branches of science is as informative or as inviting. Thoroughly cross-referenced and accented by dozens of black and white illustrations, the Oxford Guide to Physics and Astronomy is the source to turn to for anyone looking for a quick explanation of alchemy, x-rays and any type of matter or energy in between. (shrink)

CITATION: Smith, J. P. 2014. A note on name individuation and identifying descriptions. Stellenbosch Papers in Linguistics, 43:165-170, doi:10.5774/43-0-165.

Chu spaces are a new model for information structure and mathematical structure in general. Their properties are usually developed as a form of category theory. In this note, we show how they may also be viewed as models for a two-sorted first-order language, and we determine the exact flow of information across the natural Chu transforms. Our analysis is akin to that of process graphs via bisimulation and modal formulas.

Upon first glance, readers might not think there is much new to be found in the most recent book from Wesley Wildman. After all, seven of the nine chapters contained between its covers began as essays previously published. However, this volume is also the sixth of six in his Religious Philosophy series, so clearly the author is making something of its contents. Indeed, there is much that is worthwhile to be found within. Taken together with the new material, this collection (...) of essays immediately reveals the depths of Wildman's pragmatic commitments. The chapters do not build upon one another like links in a chain or floors in a building from the foundation to the executive suites.... (shrink)

This study investigates the role of language in cross‐sector collaboration between mental health hospitals and municipalities, focusing on the challenges of maintaining continuity of care and integrating patient‐centered approaches. Using Fairclough's framework for critical discourse analysis, we examined focus group interviews with 21 healthcare professionals, including nurses, social workers, and psychiatrists, to identify key themes and patterns in how cross‐sector collaboration is discussed. The analysis revealed a dominant medicalized discourse in hospital settings, which often emphasized structured care processes like treatment (...) plans and medication management, overshadowing more flexible, patient‐centered approaches common in community‐based services. Power dynamics were evident, with hospital professionals frequently positioned as active agents, while patients and community‐based workers were portrayed in more passive roles. Although efforts to involve patients in decision‐making were noted, these were often controlled by professionals, reflecting a mediated approach to patient empowerment. The findings highlight the cultural and structural divides between hospital and community services and suggest the need for improved communication strategies, integrated care pathways, and a shift toward more inclusive, patient‐centered care models. Addressing these discursive barriers is crucial for achieving more effective, integrated, and patient‐centered care, ultimately improving outcomes for patients. (shrink)