This study explores the sustainability reporting (SR) and assurance market in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region from the Big 4 auditors' perspectives and investigates the drivers and barriers of SR and assurance in the GCC region. We have interviewed ten representatives of auditing firms (i.e., members of Big 4) in the GCC region. The results of study reveal the immaturity of the SR and assurance market in the region but are hopeful for the future contingent upon certain factors. In (...) addition, the voluntary nature of SR, the cost of reporting and assurance, and religious concerns among others are primary barriers in front of the eagerness of firms to adopt SR and its assurance. Reputation building and accessing international markets among others are the main motivations for the adoption of SR and assurance. The interviewees have firmly expressed that there is no direct relationship between SR assurance and financial report audit. (shrink)

The current study aimed at identifying the effect of strategic control on customer satisfaction with e-marketing in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The study used the descriptive approach. A questionnaire was prepared and administered to a sample of (315) customers in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The study found a statistically significant correlation at the significance level of (0.05) between all strategic control dimensions, customer satisfaction with e-marketing, and customer approval of the positivity towards the practices and advantages of strategic (...) control in e-marketing. There is also a statistically significant effect at the significance level of (0.05) for strategic control dimensions: (management information systems, strategic control methods, strategic evaluation) on customers' satisfaction in e-marketing. The current study recommended the need to pay attention to the strategic control function and benefit from its philosophy and the benefits that accrue to supporting customer satisfaction with e-marketing, and raising the efficiency and awareness of employees about strategic control in an organized manner in order to build their capabilities to support and implement control mechanisms and make the necessary improvements. (shrink)

The Sufi saints, in their texts, successfully ingrained Love as the destination of spiritual path, to accomplish the Divine. The objective of this study was to focus on the cult of Sufism, in general, and on the Sufi poetry of Fakhr al-Din ʿIrāqī, in particular as reflected in his anthology, Kitāb al-lamaʿāt. Adopting a historical approach, the study analyzed the evolution of Sufi poetry since the beginning, and examined the poetry of ʿIrāqī in the context of Islamic mysticism. This qualitative (...) study adopted an exploratory content analysis method and documentation research to examine the Sufi philosophy as reflected in the sampled poetry of ʿIrāqī. For the realization of this goal, a research was conducted on the available published resources. The documentation survey helped discover the truth of ʿIrāqī ’s poetry in the context of Spiritual love. It was discovered that ʿIrāqī ’s philosophy of Love was based on metaphysical transcendentalism, where spiritual attainment was achieved through formlessness mirrored in the form of Beauty as the manifestation of Love. (shrink)

This eighth volume of Collected Papers includes 75 papers comprising 973 pages on (theoretic and applied) neutrosophics, written between 2010-2022 by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 102 co-authors (alphabetically ordered) from 24 countries: Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Abduallah Gamal, Firoz Ahmad, Ahmad Yusuf Adhami, Ahmed B. Al-Nafee, Ali Hassan, Mumtaz Ali, Akbar Rezaei, Assia Bakali, Ayoub Bahnasse, Azeddine Elhassouny, Durga Banerjee, Romualdas Bausys, Mircea Boșcoianu, Traian Alexandru Buda, Bui Cong Cuong, Emilia Calefariu, Ahmet Çevik, Chang Su Kim, (...) Victor Christianto, Dae Wan Kim, Daud Ahmad, Arindam Dey, Partha Pratim Dey, Mamouni Dhar, H. A. Elagamy, Ahmed K. Essa, Sudipta Gayen, Bibhas C. Giri, Daniela Gîfu, Noel Batista Hernández, Hojjatollah Farahani, Huda E. Khalid, Irfan Deli, Saeid Jafari, Tèmítópé Gbóláhàn Jaíyéolá, Sripati Jha, Sudan Jha, Ilanthenral Kandasamy, W.B. Vasantha Kandasamy, Darjan Karabašević, M. Karthika, Kawther F. Alhasan, Giruta Kazakeviciute-Januskeviciene, Qaisar Khan, Kishore Kumar P K, Prem Kumar Singh, Ranjan Kumar, Maikel Leyva-Vázquez, Mahmoud Ismail, Tahir Mahmood, Hafsa Masood Malik, Mohammad Abobala, Mai Mohamed, Gunasekaran Manogaran, Seema Mehra, Kalyan Mondal, Mohamed Talea, Mullai Murugappan, Muhammad Akram, Muhammad Aslam Malik, Muhammad Khalid Mahmood, Nivetha Martin, Durga Nagarajan, Nguyen Van Dinh, Nguyen Xuan Thao, Lewis Nkenyereya, Jagan M. Obbineni, M. Parimala, S. K. Patro, Peide Liu, Pham Hong Phong, Surapati Pramanik, Gyanendra Prasad Joshi, Quek Shio Gai, R. Radha, A.A. Salama, S. Satham Hussain, Mehmet Șahin, Said Broumi, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Selvaraj Ganesan, Shahbaz Ali, Shouzhen Zeng, Manjeet Singh, A. Stanis Arul Mary, Dragiša Stanujkić, Yusuf Șubaș, Rui-Pu Tan, Mirela Teodorescu, Selçuk Topal, Zenonas Turskis, Vakkas Uluçay, Norberto Valcárcel Izquierdo, V. Venkateswara Rao, Volkan Duran, Ying Li, Young Bae Jun, Wadei F. Al-Omeri, Jian-qiang Wang, Lihshing Leigh Wang, Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas. (shrink)

This eleventh volume of Collected Papers includes 90 papers comprising 988 pages on Physics, Artificial Intelligence, Health Issues, Decision Making, Economics, Statistics, written between 2001-2022 by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 84 co-authors (alphabetically ordered) from 19 countries: Abhijit Saha, Abu Sufian, Jack Allen, Shahbaz Ali, Ali Safaa Sadiq, Aliya Fahmi, Atiqa Fakhar, Atiqa Firdous, Sukanto Bhattacharya, Robert N. Boyd, Victor Chang, Victor Christianto, V. Christy, Dao The Son, Debjit Dutta, Azeddine Elhassouny, Fazal Ghani, Fazli Amin, (...) Anirudha Ghosha, Nasruddin Hassan, Hoang Viet Long, Jhulaneswar Baidya, Jin Kim, Jun Ye, Darjan Karabašević, Vasilios N. Katsikis, Ieva Meidutė-Kavaliauskienė, F. Kaymarm, Nour Eldeen M. Khalifa, Madad Khan, Qaisar Khan, M. Khoshnevisan, Kifayat Ullah,, Volodymyr Krasnoholovets, Mukesh Kumar, Le Hoang Son, Luong Thi Hong Lan, Tahir Mahmood, Mahmoud Ismail, Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Siti Nurul Fitriah Mohamad, Mohamed Loey, Mai Mohamed, K. Mohana, Kalyan Mondal, Muhammad Gulfam, Muhammad Khalid Mahmood, Muhammad Jamil, Muhammad Yaqub Khan, Muhammad Riaz, Nguyen Dinh Hoa, Cu Nguyen Giap, Nguyen Tho Thong, Peide Liu, Pham Huy Thong, Gabrijela Popović‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬, Surapati Pramanik, Dmitri Rabounski, Roslan Hasni, Rumi Roy, Tapan Kumar Roy, Said Broumi, Saleem Abdullah, Muzafer Saračević, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Shariful Alam, Shyamal Dalapati, Housila P. Singh, R. Singh, Rajesh Singh, Predrag S. Stanimirović, Kasan Susilo, Dragiša Stanujkić, Alexandra Şandru, Ovidiu Ilie Şandru, Zenonas Turskis, Yunita Umniyati, Alptekin Ulutaș, Maikel Yelandi Leyva Vázquez, Binyamin Yusoff, Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas, Zhao Loon Wang.‬‬‬‬. (shrink)

In many areas, technology has facilitated many things, diagnosing diseases, regulating traffic and teaching students in schools rely on Intelligent systems to name a few. At present, traditional classroom-based education is no longer the most appropriate in schools. From here, the idea of intelligent e-learning for students to increase their culture and keep them updated in life began. E-learning has become an ideal solution, relying on artificial intelligence, which has a footprint in this through the development of systems based on (...) education without a teacher taking into account the individual differences of students. This study describes intelligent tutoring system for teaching the Data Manipulation Language (DML) Commands Using SQLite to non IT students to overcome the difficulties they face. The System was built as education system by using the researcher own authoring tool that based on mobile and web App. The basic idea of this system is a systematic introduction into the concept of Database and its DML query. The system presents the topic of DML Commands, help student to execute what they are learn from the system content using the practical part of the system and administers automatically adapted at run time to the student’s individual growth. The system was assessed by a group of teachers and students and the outcome showed as 91% from the database specialists, 94% from Diploma students group and 89% from the secondary school students group. (shrink)

Abstract: Tomatoes are part of the major crops in food security. Tomatoes are plants grown in temperate and hot regions of South American origin from Peru, and then spread to most countries of the world. Tomatoes contain a lot of vitamin C and mineral salts, and are recommended for people with constipation, diabetes and patients with heart and body diseases. Studies and scientific studies have proven the importance of eating tomato juice in reducing the activity of platelets in diabetics, which (...) helps in protecting them from developing deadly blood clots. A tomato classification approach is presented with a data set containing approximately 5,266 images with 7 species belonging to tomatoes. The Neural Network Algorithms (CNN), a deep learning technique applied widely in image recognition, is used for this task. (shrink)

​Imagination will remain a mystery—we will not be able to explain imagination—until we can break it into parts we already understand. Explaining Imagination is a guidebook for doing just that, where the parts are other ordinary mental states like beliefs, desires, judgments, and decisions. In different combinations and contexts, these states constitute cases of imagining. This reductive approach to imagination is at direct odds with the current orthodoxy, according to which imagination is a sui generis mental state or process—one with (...) its own inscrutable principles of operation. Explaining Imagination upends that view, showing how, on closer inspection, the imaginings at work in hypothetical reasoning, pretense, the enjoyment of fiction, and creativity are reducible to other familiar mental states—judgments, beliefs, desires, and decisions among them. Crisscrossing contemporary philosophy of mind, cognitive science, and aesthetics, Explaining Imagination argues that a clearer understanding of imagination is already well within reach. (shrink)

The point of this paper is to reveal a dogma in the ordinary conception of sensory imagination, and to suggest another way forward. The dogma springs from two main sources: a too close comparison of mental imagery to perceptual experience, and a too strong division between mental imagery and the traditional propositional attitudes (such as belief and desire). The result is an unworkable conception of the correctness conditions of sensory imaginings—one lacking any link between the conditions under which an imagining (...) aids human action and inference and the conditions under which it is veridical. The proposed solution is, first, to posit a variety of imaginative attitudes—akin to the traditional propositional attitudes—which have different associated correctness (or satisfaction) conditions. The second part of the solution is to allow for imaginings with “hybrid” contents, in the sense that both mental images and representations with language-like constituent structure contribute to the content of imaginings. (shrink)

Tatiana Ehrenfest-Afanassjewa was an important physicist, mathematician, and educator in 20th century Europe. While some of her work has recently undergone reevaluation, little has been said regarding her groundbreaking work on dimensional analysis. This, in part, reflects an unfortunate dismissal of her interventions in such foundational debates by her contemporaries. In spite of this, her work on the generalized theory of homogeneous equations provides a mathematically sound foundation for dimensional analysis and has found some appreciation and development. It remains to (...) provide a historical account of Ehrenfest-Afanassjewa's use of the theory of homogeneous functions to ground (and limit) dimensional analysis. We take as a central focus Ehrenfest-Afanassjewa's contributions to a debate on the foundations of dimensional analysis started by physicist Richard Tolman in 1914. I go on to suggest an interpretation of the more thoroughgoing intervention Ehrenfest-Afanassjewa makes in 1926 based on this earlier context, especially her limited rehabilitation of a "theory of similitude" in contradistinction to dimensional analysis. It is shown that Ehrenfest-Afanassjewa has made foundational contributions to the mathematical foundations and methodology of dimensional analysis, our conception of the relation between constants and laws, and our understanding of the quantitative nature of physics, which remain of value. (shrink)

Ubuntu has been defined as a moral quality of human beings, as a philosophy or an ethic, as African humanism, and as a worldview. This paper explores these definitions as conceptual tools for understanding the cultural, educational, and philosophical landscape of post-apartheid South Africa. Key to this understanding is the Althusserian concept of state apparatus. Louis Althusser divides the state apparatus into two forces: the repressive state apparatus (RSA); and the ideological state apparatus (ISA). RSAs curtail the working classes, predominately (...) through direct violence or the threat of violence, whereas ISAs function primarily by ideology, including forms of organised religion, the education system, family units, legal systems, trade unions, political parties, and media. This paper discusses the link between increasing inequality in post-apartheid South Africa and education, with specific reference to Althusser’s ISAs and the abuse of Ubuntu as a subterfuge for socio-economic inequality. (shrink)

Given the evolution of the public health (PH) and the changes from the phenomenon of globalization, this area has encountered new ethical challenges. In order to find a coherent approach to address ethical issues in PH policy, this study aimed to identify the evolution of public health ethics (PHE) frameworks and the main moral values and norms in PH practice and policy. According to the research questions, a systematic search of the literature, in English, with no time limit was performed (...) using the main keywords in databases Web of Science (ISI) and PubMed. Finally, the full text of 56 papers was analyzed. Most of the frameworks have common underpinning assumptions and beliefs, and the need to balance PH moral obligation to prevent harm and health promotion with respect for individual autonomy has been specified. As such, a clear shift from liberal values in biomedical ethics is seen toward the community’s collective values in PHE. The main moral norms in PH practice and policy included protecting the population against harm and improving PH benefits, utility and evidenced-based effectiveness, distributive justice and fairness, respect for all, privacy and confidentiality, solidarity, social responsibility, community empowerment and participation, transparency, accountability and trust. Systematic review of PHE frameworks indicates utilization of the aforementioned moral norms through an practical framework as an ethical guide for action in the PH policy. The validity of this process requires a systematic approach including procedural conditions. (shrink)

Physicist Percy Bridgman has been taken by Heather Douglas to be an exemplar defender of an untenable value-free ideal for science. This picture is complicated by a detailed study of Bridgman's philosophical views of the relation between science and society. The normative autonomy of science, a version of the value-free ideal, is defended. This restriction on the provenance of permissible values in science is given a basis in Bridgman's broader philosophical commitments, most importantly, his view that science is primarily an (...) individual commitment to a set of epistemic norms and values. Considerations of external moral or social values are not, on this view, intrinsic to scientific practice, though they have a broader pragmatic significance. What Bridgman takes as the proper relation between science and society is shown through analysis of his many writings on the topic and consideration of his rarely remarked upon involvement in the most problematic example of "Big Science" of his day: the atomic bomb. A reevaluation of Bridgman's views provides a unique characterization of what is at stake in the values in science debate: the normative autonomy of science. (shrink)

This paper recovers an important, century-old debate regarding the methodological and metaphysical foundations of dimensional analysis. Consideration of Richard Tolman's failed attempt to install the principle of similitude---the relativity of size---as the founding principle of dimensional analysis both clarifies the method of dimensional analysis and articulates two metaphysical positions regarding quantity dimensions. Tolman's position is quantity dimension fundamentalism. This is a commitment to dimensional realism and a set of fundamental dimensions which ground all further dimensions. The opposing position, developed primarily (...) by Bridgman, is quantity dimension conventionalism. Conventionalism is an anti-realism regarding dimensional structure, holding our non-representational dimensional systems have basic quantity dimensions fixed only by convention. This metaphysical dispute was left somewhat unsettled. It is shown here that both of these positions face serious problems: fundamentalists are committed to surplus dimensional structure; conventionalists cannot account for empirical constraints on our dimensional systems nor the empirical success of dimensional analysis. It is shown that an alternative position is available which saves what is right in both: quantity dimension functionalism. (shrink)

I argue that dimensional analysis provides an answer to a skeptical challenge to the theory of model mediated measurement. The problem arises when considering the task of calibrating a novel measurement procedure, with greater range, to the results of a prior measurement procedure. The skeptical worry is that the agreement of the novel and prior measurement procedures in their shared range may only be apparent due to the emergence of systematic error in the exclusive range of the novel measurement procedure. (...) Alternatively: what if the two measurement procedures are not in fact measuring the same quantity? The theory of model mediated measurement can only say that we _assume_ that there is a common quantity. In contrast, I show that the satisfaction of dimensional homogeneity across the metrological extension is independent evidence for the so-called assumption. This is illustrated by the use of dimensional analysis in high pressure experiments. This results in an extension of the theory of model mediated measurement, in which a common quantity in metrological extension is no longer assumed, but hypothesized. (shrink)

Currie’s (2010) argument that “i-desires” must be posited to explain our responses to fiction is critically discussed. It is argued that beliefs and desires featuring ‘in the fiction’ operators—and not sui generis imaginings (or "i-beliefs" or "i-desires")—are the crucial states involved in generating fiction-directed affect. A defense of the “Operator Claim” is mounted, according to which ‘in the fiction’ operators would be also be required within fiction-directed sui generis imaginings (or "i-beliefs" and "i-desires"), were there such. Once we appreciate that (...) even fiction-directed sui generis imaginings would need to incorporate ‘in the fiction’ operators, the main appeal of the idea that sui generis imaginings (or "i-beliefs" or "i-desires") are at work in fiction-appreciation dissipates. [This is Chapter 10 of Explaining Imagination (OUP, 2020)]. (shrink)

Ibadiyya is one of the earliest Islamic sects and one of the few to have survived to the present day. The Ibadiyya sect is still active in many places, including Tanzania, the Sultanate of Oman, and North Africa. Despite all of this information, fewer studies on Ibadis exist than on other extant and non-member sects. An Islamic group known as the Ibadiyya first appeared following the so-called “great acts of sedition” (büyük fitne) in the first century AH. This group initially (...) supported the Kharijites, but over time, it gradually shifted away from them in terms of politics and mindset. Even though the Kharijites were exterminated from the historical scene at an early age, the Ibadis have survived until the present. However, according to many researchers, the Ibadis still exist as a branch of the Kharijites. In this study, the theological thoughts of North African Ibadis are discussed. Since the Ibadis and Kharijites generally held different ideological and political perspectives. And the North African Ibadis in particular are distinguished from the Kharijites as well as from the general Ibadis by their differences. And it is essential to understand the underlying and guiding thinking behind these differences in order to understand their essence. (shrink)

In this paper a symmetry argument against quantity absolutism is amended. Rather than arguing against the fundamentality of intrinsic quantities on the basis of transformations of basic quantities, a class of symmetries defined by the Π-theorem is used. This theorem is a fundamental result of dimensional analysis and shows that all unit-invariant equations which adequately represent physical systems can be put into the form of a function of dimensionless quantities. Quantity transformations that leave those dimensionless quantities invariant are empirical and (...) dynamical symmetries. The proposed symmetries of the original argument fail to be both dynamical and empirical symmetries and are open to counterexamples. The amendment of the original argument requires consideration of the relationships between quantity dimensions. The discussion raises a pertinent issue: what is the modal status of the constants of nature which figure in the laws? Two positions, constant necessitism and constant contingentism, are introduced and their relationships to absolutism and comparativism undergo preliminary investigation. It is argued that the absolutist can only reject the amended symmetry argument by accepting constant necessitism. I argue that the truth of an epistemically open empirical hypothesis would make the acceptance of constant necessitism costly: together they entail that the facts are nomically necessary. (shrink)

A supplement to "Metaphysics and Convention in Dimensional Analysis, 1914-1917" in HOPOS. Includes a transcription of the correspondence along with an editorial introduction and expository notes.

This essay unites current philosophical thinking on imagination with a burgeoning debate in the philosophy of memory over whether episodic remembering is simply a kind of imagining. So far, this debate has been hampered by a lack of clarity in the notion of imagining at issue. Several options are considered and constructive imagining is identified as the relevant kind. Next, a functionalist account of episodic remembering is defended as a means to establishing two key points: first, one need not defend (...) a factive view of remembering in order to hold that causal connections to past experiences are essential to how rememberings are typed; and, second, current theories that equate remembering with imagining are in fact consistent with a functionalist theory that includes causal connections in its account of what it is to remember. This suggests that remembering is not a kind of imagining and clarifies what it would take to establish the contrary. (shrink)

This chapter considers the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) to exhibit creativity and imagination, in light of recent advances in generative AI and the use of deep neural networks (DNNs). Reasons for doubting that AI exhibits genuine creativity or imagination are considered, including the claim that the creativity of an algorithm lies in its developer, that generative AI merely reproduces patterns in its training data, and that AI is lacking in a necessary feature for creativity or imagination, such as consciousness, (...) agency, metacognitive awareness, or the use of mental imagery. In each case, a counterargument is provided that AI already has or soon will overcome the apparent barrier. In some instances, this is because the critical features deemed lacking in AI may not be necessary for human creativity and imagination either. In others, it is because important developmental and structural similarities between humans and generative AI have been insufficiently appreciated. (shrink)

Norms provide a valuable mechanism for establishing coherent cooperative behaviour in decentralised systems in which there is no central authority. One of the most influential formulations of norm emergence was proposed by Axelrod :1095–1111, 1986). This paper provides an empirical analysis of aspects of Axelrod’s approach, by exploring some of the key assumptions made in previous evaluations of the model. We explore the dynamics of norm emergence and the occurrence of norm collapse when applying the model over extended durations. It (...) is this phenomenon of norm collapse that can motivate the emergence of a central authority to enforce laws and so preserve the norms, rather than relying on individuals to punish defection. Our findings identify characteristics that significantly influence norm establishment using Axelrod’s formulation, but are likely to be of importance for norm establishment more generally. Moreover, Axelrod’s model suffers from significant limitations in assuming that private strategies of individuals are available to others, and that agents are omniscient in being aware of all norm violations and punishments. Because this is an unreasonable expectation, the approach does not lend itself to modelling real-world systems such as online networks or electronic markets. In response, the paper proposes alternatives to Axelrod’s model, by replacing the evolutionary approach, enabling agents to learn, and by restricting the metapunishment of agents to cases where the original defection is observed, in order to be able to apply the model to real-world domains. This work can also help explain the formation of a “social contract” to legitimate enforcement by a central authority. (shrink)

One of the main arguments intended to show that content externalism undermines the privileged access thesis is the ‘slow switching argument’, originally proposed by Boghossian. In this argument, it is supposed that a subject is unknowingly switched back and forth between Earth and Twin Earth: then it is claimed that, given externalism, when the subject is on Earth thinking that water is wet, he cannot know the content of his thought a priori, for he cannot, by mere reflection, rule out (...) the relevant alternative hypothesis that he is on Twin Earth thinking that twater is wet. One of the controversies surrounding this argument stems from the fact that it is not clear which epistemological principle underlies it. Here, I examine two suggestions made in the literature as to what that underlying principle might be. I argue that neither of these suggested principles is plausible, and thus that the slow switching argument never gets off the ground. (shrink)

If imagination is subject to the will, in the sense that people choose the content of their own imaginings, how is it that one nevertheless can learn from what one imagines? This chapter argues for a way forward in addressing this perennial puzzle, both with respect to propositional imagination and sensory imagination. Making progress requires looking carefully at the interplay between one’s intentions and various kinds of constraints that may be operative in the generation of imaginings. Lessons are drawn from (...) the existing literature on propositional imagination and from the control theory literature concerning the prediction and comparison mechanisms (or “forward models”) involved in ordinary perception. A more general conclusion is reached that, once we have the tools to understand how some imaginings are both under willful control and helpfully guide action and inference, we will have what we need to understand the cognitive basis of imagination in general. (shrink)

Martin and Deutscher’s causal theory of remembering holds that a memory trace serves as a necessary causal link between any genuine episode of remembering and the event it enables one to recall. In recent years, the causal theory has come under fire from researchers across philosophy and cognitive science, who argue that results from the scientific study of memory are incompatible with the kinds of memory traces that Martin and Deutscher hold essential to remembering. Of special note, these critics observe, (...) is that a single memory trace can be shaped by multiple past experiences. This appears to prevent traces from underwriting Martin and Deutscher’s distinction between remembering an event and merely forming an accurate representation of it. This paper accepts such criticisms of the standard causal theory and, through considering the phenomenon forgetting through repetition, raises several others. A substantially revised causal theory is then developed, compatible with the thesis that individual memory traces are shaped by multiple past experiences. The key strategy is to conceive of episodic remembering not as the simple retrieval and projection of a static memory trace, but as a complex quasi-inferential process that makes use of multiple forms of information and cues—“prop-like” memory traces included—in generating the experience known as episodic remembering. When remembering is understood as a multi-componential process, there are a variety of ways in which a representation of the past may be appropriately causally dependent upon a prior experience of the event remembered. (shrink)

It has previously been argued that Schopenhauer is a distinctive type of virtue ethicist (Hassan, 2019). The Aristotelian version of virtue ethics has traditionally been accused of being fundamentally egoistic insofar as the possession of virtues is beneficial to the possessor, and serve as the ultimate justification for obtaining them. Indeed, Schopenhauer himself makes a version of this complaint. In this chapter, I investigate whether Schopenhauer’s moral framework nevertheless suffers from this same objection of egoism in light of how (...) he conceives of the relationship between morality and ascetic 'salvation'. Drawing upon his published works and letters, I argue that Schopenhauer has the resources to avoid the objection. Because of his idiosyncratic metaphysics, I argue that Schopenhauer can also avoid the problem of self-effacement which may result from the way in which he avoids the egoism objection. The discussion thus intends to establish further nuance to Schopenhauer’s conception of virtue and its value. (shrink)

A popular view has it that the mental representations underlying human pretense are not beliefs, but are “belief-like” in important ways. This view typically posits a distinctive cognitive attitude (a “DCA”) called “imagination” that is taken toward the propositions entertained during pretense, along with correspondingly distinct elements of cognitive architecture. This paper argues that the characteristics of pretense motivating such views of imagination can be explained without positing a DCA, or other cognitive architectural features beyond those regulating normal belief and (...) desire. On the present “Single Attitude” account of imagination, propositional imagining just is a form of believing. The Single Attitude account is also distinguished from “metarepresentational” accounts of pretense, which hold that both pretending and recognizing pretense in others require one to have concepts of mental states. It is argued, to the contrary, that pretending and recognizing pretense require neither a DCA nor possession of mental state concepts. (shrink)

In the past decade, the use of the Chapter XI has soared to the detriment of many creditors, workers, and consumers. A good number of cases were not based on imminent insolvency, but on firms attempts to avoid litigation claims against them, to terminate labor or other contractual obligations, or to gain new financing.These filings for Chapter XI highlight the use of bank-ruptcy as a strategic option used by management in running a viable organization. This usage is even advised by (...) some academics and management consultants. (shrink)

Author replies to commentaries from Christopher Hill, Hannah Kim, Emine Hande Tuna, and Neil Van Leeuwen on Explaining Imagination (OUP, 2020) by Peter Langland-Hassan.

The (dis)continuism debate in the philosophy and cognitive science of memory concerns whether remembering is continuous with episodic future thought and episodic counterfactual thought in being a form of constructive imagining. I argue that settling that dispute will hinge on whether the memory traces (or “engrams”) that support remembering impose arational, perception-like constraints that are too strong for remembering to constitute a kind of constructive imagining. In exploring that question, I articulate two conceptions of memory traces—the replay theory and the (...) prop theory—that return conflicting answers to whether remembering is constructive imagining. The prop theory’s vision of traces is suggestive of continuism, while the replay theory’s is a natural fit for discontinuism. Which view of traces is in fact correct remains undetermined by current empirical work. Nevertheless, it may already be possible to reach a compromise in the (dis)continuism debate, through the development of a conciliatory continuist causal theory. This view—only outlined here—accepts the continuism-friendly prop theory of traces, while still requiring that genuine remembering fulfills an appropriate causation condition, as required by the kinds of causal theories of remembering typically favored by discontinuists. (shrink)

Inner speech travels under many aliases: the inner voice, verbal thought, thinking in words, internal verbalization, “talking in your head,” the “little voice in the head,” and so on. It is both a familiar element of first-person experience and a psychological phenomenon whose complex cognitive components and distributed neural bases are increasingly well understood. There is evidence that inner speech plays a variety of cognitive roles, from enabling abstract thought, to supporting metacognition, memory, and executive function. One active area of (...) controversy concerns the relation of inner speech to auditory verbal hallucinations in schizophrenia, with a common proposal being that sufferers of AVH misidentify their own inner speech as being generated by someone else. Recently, researchers have used artificial intelligence to translate the neural and neuromuscular signatures of inner speech into corresponding outer speech signals, laying the groundwork for a variety of new applications and interventions. (shrink)

Much of what we say is never said aloud. It occurs only silently, as inner speech. We chastise, congratulate, joke and cajole, all without making a sound. This distinctively human ability to create public language in the privacy of our own minds is no less remarkable for its familiarity. And yet, until recently, inner speech remained at the periphery of philosophical and psychological theorizing. This essay collection, from an interdisciplinary group of leading philosophers, psychologists, and neuroscientists, displays the rapidly growing (...) interest among researchers in the puzzles surrounding the nature and cognitive role of the inner voice. Questions explored include: the aids and obstacles inner speech presents to self-knowledge; the complex relation it bears to overt speech production and perception; the means by which inner speech can be identified and empirically assessed; its role in generating auditory verbal hallucinations; and its relationship to conceptual thought itself. (shrink)

This essay was published in the September 2023 edition of Griffith Observer. It is an examination of the curious friendship between writer Aldous Huxley and astronomer Edwin Hubble and its philosophical basis: empiricism. I hope that by consideration of these two thinker''s lives and work light may be shed on each of their ideas and on the 20th century conceptions of empiricism more broadly.

In this paper, I take up the question of “how fast does time flow?” This question is usually asked as a rejoinder to the view that time is irreducibly tensed, which is motivated by the fact that we experience the passage of time. I consider what the meaning of this question could be and provide a defence of the view that the passage of time is meaningless (due to its rate of passage being dimensionless), undercutting the motivation for a tensed (...) view of time. (shrink)

This paper focuses on Nietzsche’s claim that suffering is closely related to the realization of certain perfectionist values, such as artistic excellence. According to Bernard Reginster, creative achievement consists in overcoming suffering, and therefore, suffering is an essential ingredient of creative achievement. Because suffering forms an essential part of a valuable whole in this way, Reginster argues that we must in turn value suffering ‘for its own sake’. This paper argues that Reginster’s position is open to the following objection: from (...) the fact that suffering is an essential part of a valuable whole, it does not follow that suffering is itself valuable. Rather, by taking advantage of the principle of organic unities, it would have to form an essential part of a valuable whole in a particular way. The author considers two ways the principle might be attributed to Nietzsche’s views on suffering: first, as an ‘enabling condition’, in which suffering allows for a whole that outweighs its disvalue; and second, as ‘a contributor’, in which suffering positively contributes value to the whole. The paper explores how Nietzsche’s ethics turns out to be crucially informed by this conceptual distinction. (shrink)

Abstract: How it is that one's own thoughts can seem to be someone else's? After noting some common missteps of other approaches to this puzzle, I develop a novel cognitive solution, drawing on and critiquing theories that understand inserted thoughts and auditory verbal hallucinations in schizophrenia as stemming from mismatches between predicted and actual sensory feedback. Considerable attention is paid to forging links between the first-person phenomenology of thought insertion and the posits (e.g. efference copy, corollary discharge) of current cognitive (...) theories. I show how deficits in the subconscious mechanisms regulating inner speech may lead to a 'fractured phenomenology' responsible for schizophrenic patients' reports of inserted thoughts and auditory verbal hallucinations. Supporting work on virtual environments is discussed, and lessons concerning the fixity of delusional belief are drawn. (shrink)

In this paper I present and evaluate van Inwagen’s famous Consequence Argument, as presented in An Essay on Free Will. The grounds for the incompatibility of freewill and determinism, as argued by van Inwagen, is dependent on our actions being logical consequences of events outside of our control. Particularly, his arguments depend upon, in one guise or another, the transference of the modal property of not being possibly rendered false through the logical consequence relation, i.e. the β-principle. I argue that, (...) due to the symmetric nature of determinism, van Inwagen is exposed to what I call “reversibility arguments” in the literature. Such arguments reverse the β-principle and start from our apparent control over our own actions to our control over the initial conditions. Since van Inwagen does not endorse a particular theory of laws or logical consequence, he is open to such counterarguments. The plausibility of such reversibility arguments depends on what would be called a Wittgensteinian conception of logical consequence. In the _Remarks on the Foundation of Mathematics_, one of Wittgenstein’s main concerns is the normativity of logical inference i.e. proof. Such concerns with normativity and rule-following are generally a feature of his later philosophy. In the _Remarks_ Wittgenstein resists a conception of logical deduction which places the source of normativity outside of human practice. (shrink)

Cats and dogs are the same kind of thing in being mammals, even if cats are not a kind of dog. In the same way, remembering and imagining might be the same kind of mental state, even if remembering is not a kind of imagining. This chapter explores whether episodic remembering, on the one hand, and future and counter-factual directed imagistic imagining, on the other, may be the same kind of mental state in being instances of the same cognitive attitude. (...) I outline a continuist position where all three involve the same judgment-like attitude and compare its advantages to a discontinuist alternative where remembering requires use of its own distinctive attitude. Reasons are given for favoring a version of the continuist position, though this chapter’s focus is on the metatheoretical questions of how to go about understanding remembering in terms of a content and attitude pair, and which considerations are relevant when deciding among competing content/attitude pairs. (shrink)

Comparatively easy questions we might ask about creativity are distinguished from the hard question of explaining transformative creativity. Many have focused on the easy questions, offering no reason to think that the imagining relied upon in creative cognition cannot be reduced to more basic folk psychological states. The relevance of associative thought processes to songwriting is then explored as a means for understanding the nature of transformative creativity. Productive artificial neural networks—known as generative antagonistic networks (GANs)—are a recent example of (...) how a system’s ability to generate novel products can both be finely tuned by prior experience and grounded in strategies that cannot be articulated by the system itself. Further, the kinds of processes exploited by GANs need not be seen as incorporating something akin to sui generis imaginative states. The chapter concludes with reflection on the added relevance of personal character to explanations of creativity. [This is Chapter 12 of the book Explaining Imagination.]. (shrink)

Pretense is a topic of keen interest to philosophers and psychologists. But what is it, really, to pretend? What features qualify an act as pretense? Surprisingly little has been said on this foundational question. Here I defend an account of what it is to pretend, distinguishing pretense from a variety of related but distinct phenomena, such as (mere) copying and practicing. I show how we can distinguish pretense from sincerity by sole appeal to a person's beliefs, desires, and intentions – (...) and without circular recourse to an ‘intention to pretend’ or to a sui generis mental state of ‘imagining.’. (shrink)

Many theorists claim that inner speech is importantly linked to human metacognition (thinking about one's own thinking). However, their proposals all rely upon unworkable conceptions of the content and structure of inner speech episodes. The core problem is that they require inner speech episodes to have both auditory-phonological contents and propositional/semantic content. Difficulties for the views emerge when we look closely at how such contents might be integrated into one or more states or processes. The result is that, if inner (...) speech is especially valuable to metacognition, we do not currently understand why it is. The article concludes with two positive proposals for understanding the content and structure of inner speech episodes, which should serve as constraints on future accounts of the metacognitive value of inner speech. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The aim of this paper is to elucidate Schopenhauer’s moral philosophy in terms of an ethics of virtue. This paper consists of four sections. In the first section I outline three major objections Schopenhauer raises for Kant’s moral philosophy. In section two I extract from these criticisms a framework for Schopenhauer’s own position, identifying how his moral psychology underpins a unified and hierarchical conception of virtue and vice. I then ascertain some strengths of this view. In section three I (...) focus in upon the issue of fixed character and moral education as at least one major point of divergence between Schopenhauer’s virtue ethics and typical trends within the tradition. In the fourth and final section, I consider and respond to this ethical framework’s possible susceptibility to the charge of egoism, and adjudicate among competing solutions in the secondary literature. I conclude that refined forms of Schopenhauer’s ethical views offer rich and plausible insights into both virtue and vice which have received less attention than they deserve. Hence, Schopenhauer warrants more serious concern in contemporary discussions of virtue ethics alongside the likes of Aristotle, Hume and Nietzsche. (shrink)

I provide an account of the physical appropriate to the task of the physicalist while remaining faithful to the usage of “physical” natural to physicists. Physicalism is the thesis that everything in the world is physical, or reducible to the physical. I presuppose that some version of this position is a live epistemic possibility. The physicalist is confronted with Hempel’s dilemma: that physicalism is either false or contentless. The proposed account of the physical avoids both horns and generalizes a recent (...) proposal by Vicente (2011). My account defines physicalism as the thesis that there are no objects that cannot be described by physical quantities. A dimensional account of physical quantities is given: quantities are determined by measurement procedures. (shrink)

The academic literature on unethical leadership is witnessing an upward trend, perhaps given the magnitude of unethical conduct in organisations, which is manifested in increasing corporate fraud and scandals in the contemporary business landscape. Despite a recent increase, scholarly interest in this area has, by and large, remained scant due to the proliferation of concepts that are often and mistakenly considered interchangeable. Nevertheless, scholarly investigation in this field of inquiry has picked up the pace, which warrants a critical appraisal of (...) the extant research on unethical leadership. To this end, the current study systematically reviews the existing body of work on unethical leadership and offers a robust and multi-level understanding of the academic developments in this field. We organised the studies according to various themes focused on antecedents, outcomes and boundary conditions. In addition, we advance a multi-level conceptualisation of unethical leadership, which incorporates macro, meso and micro perspectives and, thus, provide a nuanced understanding of this phenomenon. The study also explicates critical knowledge gaps in the literature that could broaden the horizon of unethical leadership research. On the basis of these knowledge gaps, we develop potential research models that are well grounded in theory and capture the genesis of unethical leadership under our multi-level framework. Scholars and practitioners will find this study useful in understanding the occurrence, consequences and potential strategies to circumvent the negative effects of unethical leadership. (shrink)

Despite the ubiquity of inner speech in our mental lives, methods for objectively assessing inner speech capacities remain underdeveloped. The most common means of assessing inner speech is to present participants with tasks requiring them to silently judge whether two words rhyme. We developed a version of this task to assess the inner speech of a population of patients with aphasia and corresponding language production deficits. As expected, patients’ performance on the silent rhyming task was severely impaired relative to controls. (...) More surprisingly, however, patients’ performance on this task did not correlate with their performance on a variety of other standard tests of overt language abilities. In particular, patients who were generally unimpaired in their abilities to overtly name objects during confrontation naming tasks, and who could reliably judge when two words spoken to them rhymed, were still severely impaired (relative to controls) at completing the silent rhyme task. This seems to suggest that inner speech was more severely impaired in these patients than outer speech. However, these results should also cause us to critically reflect on the relation between inner speech and silent rhyme judgments more generally. (shrink)

The theories of reasoned action and planned behaviour have fundamentally changed the view that attitudes directly translate into behaviour by introducing intentions as a crucial intervening stage. Much research across numerous ethical contexts has drawn on these theories to offer a better understanding of how consumers form intentions to act in an ethical way. Persistently, researchers have suggested and discussed the existence of an intention–behaviour gap in ethical consumption. Yet, the factors that influence the extent of this gap and its (...) magnitude have not been systematically examined. We, therefore, contribute to the debate on the intention–behaviour gap by reviewing the empirical TRA/tpb studies that have assessed both intention and behaviour in ethical contexts. The findings from our review show that few studies assessed the intention–behaviour relationship and as a result, there is limited empirical evidence to date to quantify more accurately the intention–behaviour gap in ethical consumption. Our second contribution aims to provide an empirical case study which assesses the magnitude of the intention–behaviour gap in the context of avoidance of sweatshop clothing and to assess the roles of planning and actual behavioural control in potentially reducing the intention–behaviour gap. The findings of our case study suggest that there is indeed a large gap between intention and behaviour, and we conclude by calling for more empirical longitudinal studies to assess the complex nature of the relationship between intention and behaviour. (shrink)

Consistency of choice is a fundamental and recurring theme in decision theory, social choice theory, behavioral economics, and psychological sciences. The purpose of this paper is to study the consistency of choice independent of the particular decision model at hand. Consistency is viewed as an inherently logical concept that is fundamentally void of connotation and is thus disentangled from traditional rationality or consistency conditions imposed on decision models. The proposed formalization of consistency takes two forms: internal consistency, which refers to (...) the property that a choice model does not generate contradictory statements; and semantic consistency, which refers to the idea that a theory’s predictions are valid with respect to some observed data. In addressing semantic consistency, the relationship between theory and data is analyzed in terms of so-called duality mappings, which allow a passage between the two universes in a way that consistency is preserved. The formalization of consistency concepts relies on adapting the revealed preference theory to the context-dependent setting. The paper concludes by discussing the implications of the proposed framework and how it relates to classical revealed preference theory and other formalizations of the relationship between the theory and reality of choice. (shrink)

This article exploits the synergy of critical discourse studies and Corpus Linguistics to study the pervasive representation of Islam and Muslims in an approximate 670,000-word corpus of US news media stories published between 2001 and 2015. Following collocation and concordance analysis of the most frequent topics or categories which revolve around the representation of Islam and Muslims in US news stories, the Discourse-Historical Approach to critical discourse analysis was adopted to investigate how the discursive strategies of nomination and predication are (...) used in US news media stories. The findings indicated that, in general, Islam and Muslims are associated with violence, religious radicalism, and Islamic extremist militants. Finally, the article discusses the discursive themes resulting from the analysis of personal pronouns as well as the educational implications of the findings for social studies and multicultural education. (shrink)