This book is a study in the logic of questions (sometimes called erotetic logic). The central topics in erotetic logic have been the structure of questions and the question-answer relationship. This book doesn't neglect these problems, but much of it is focussed on other issues. The main subject is the logical analysis of certain relations between questions and the contexts of their appearance. And our aim is to elaborate the conceptual apparatus of the inferential approach to the logic of questions. (...) Questions are asked for many reasons and for different purposes. Yet, before a question is asked or posed, a questioner must arrive at it. In many cases arriving at a question resembles coming to a conclusion: there are some premises involved and some inferential thought processes take place. If we agree that a conclusion need not be "conclusive", we may say that sometimes questions can play the role of conclusions. But questions can also perform the role of premises: we often pass from some "initial" question to another question. In other words, there are inferential thought processes - we shall call them erotetic inferences - in which questions play the roles of conclusions or conclusions and premises. The inferential approach to the logic of questions focusses its attention on the analysis of erotetic inferences. This book consists of eight chapters. (shrink)

This paper argues for the idea that the logic of questions should focus its attention on the analysis of arguments in which questions play the role of conclusions. The relevant concepts of validity are discussed and the concept of the logic of questions of a semantically interpreted formalized language is introduced.

"The importance of questions is beyond doubt. But the degree of attention paid to them in logic and linguistics is still less than they deserve." What is a question? How to represent questions in formal languages? How to model reasoning in which questions are involved? Can we prove anything by means of pure questioning? How to model goal-directed problem solving? These are the main issues of Andrzej Wi niewski's "Questions, Inferences, and Scenarios." This book offers a state-of-the-art exposition of Inferential (...) Erotetic Logic, that is, an approach to the logic of questions focused on inferences which lead to questions as conclusions. Wi niewski characterizes semantic relations which determine validity of these inferences within the framework of Minimal Erotetic Semantics, applicable to a wide range of formal languages. He elaborates in detail the concept of erotetic search scenario, a tool for modelling problem solving. Moreover, the author presents some applications of Inferential Erotetic Logic in proof theory. Andrzej Wi niewski is one of the most prominent contemporary researchers in the logic of questions. Currently, he is a full professor at the Department of Logic and Cognitive Science, Institute of Psychology, Adam Mickiewicz University in Pozna, Poland. (shrink)

First-order logic is formalized by means of tools taken from the logic of questions. A calculus of questions which is a counterpart of the Pure Calculus of Quantifiers is presented. A direct proof of completeness of the calculus is given.

The concept of search scenario is explicated in terms of erotetic logic, i.e., the logic of questions. Different kinds of erotetic search scenarios are characterized. The basic logical properties of erotetic search scenarios are analyzed.

The discussion around dignity in nursing philosophy has been underway for many years. The literature still lacks philosophical arguments that would justify the thesis that all people have dignity. Scholars who defend dignity as an intrinsic value most often refer to Kant. However, Kant does not seem to be the most suitable candidate to defend the thesis that all human beings possess dignity. In this paper, I attempt to show that Aristotle's and Aquinas's views can help justify this thesis. To (...) this end, I distinguish between actual dignity, potential dignity, and existential dignity. I state that all human beings have existential dignity or potential dignity. (shrink)

Our aim is to express in exact terms the old idea of solving problems by pure questioning. We consider the problem of derivability: "Is A derivable from Δ by classical propositional logic?". We develop a calculus of questions E*; a proof (called a Socratic proof) is a sequence of questions ending with a question whose affirmative answer is, in a sense, evident. The calculus is sound and complete with respect to classical propositional logic. A Socratic proof in E* can be (...) transformed into a Gentzen-style proof in some sequent calculi. Next we develop a calculus of questions E**; Socratic proofs in E** can be transformed into analytic tableaux. We show that Socratic proofs can be grounded in Inferential Erotetic Logic. After a slight modification, the analyzed systems can also be viewed as hypersequent calculi. (shrink)

The concept of erotetic argument is introduced. Two relations between sets of declarative sentences and questions are analysed; and two classes of erotetic arguments are characterized.

Inferential erotetic logic and inquisitive semantics give accounts of questions and model various aspects of questioning. In this paper we concentrate upon connections between inquisitiveness, being the core concept of INQ, and question raising, characterized in IEL by means of the concepts of question evocation and erotetic implication. We consider the basic system InqB of INQ, remain at the propositional level and show, inter alia, that: a disjunction of all the direct answers to an evoked question is always inquisitive; a (...) formula is inquisitive if, and only if it evokes a yes–no question whose affirmative answer expresses a possibility for the formula; inquisitive formulas evoke questions whose direct answers express all the possibilities for the formulas, and each question erotetically implies a question whose direct answers express the possibilities for the direct answers to the implying question. (shrink)

By and large, Inferential Erotetic Logic (IEL, for short) is an approach to the logic of questions which puts in the centre of attention inferential aspects of questioning. IEL is not an enterprise of the last few years only. The idea originates from the late 1980s. It evolved through time. Initially, the stress was put on the phenomenon of question raising. This changed gradually, as some forms of reasoning that involve questions have appeared to be analyzable by means of the (...) conceptual apparatus developed. In this essay I present the basics of IEL and comment on them. Most, though not all, of the ideas discussed here have been scattered across my earlier publications. The invitation from the organizers of the Asking and Answering workshop (Greifswald, September 2020) resulted in an attempt of presenting the themes of IEL in a concise but, as I hope, also comprehensible way. (shrink)

Three semantic relations are analyzed: the relation of implication of a question by a question and a set of declarative sentences, the relation of implication of a question by a question, and the relation of strong implication of a question by a question and a set of declarative sentences. The connections between these concepts and the concepts of relative soundness, partial answerhood and presupposition are examined. The principal results are theorems about, to speak generally, epistemic reducibility of well-posed questions to (...) sequences of implied yes-no questions. (shrink)

In the book, I argue that the mind can be explained computationally because it is itself computational—whether it engages in mental arithmetic, parses natural language, or processes the auditory signals that allow us to experience music. All these capacities arise from complex information-processing operations of the mind. By analyzing the state of the art in cognitive science, I develop an account of computational explanation used to explain the capacities in question.

This article presents the works of great Polish philosopher, Mieczysław Albert Krąpiec, whose creative output can be applied to professional nursing practice. Krąpiec's philosophical heritage is extensive and encompasses many philosophical fields: metaphysics, philosophical anthropology, philosophy of law, philosophy of culture, philosophy of politics and philosophy of language. Krąpiec created an original philosophical synthesis characterized by a realistic approach. In this paper, I present only one of several original philosophical concepts developed by Krąpiec: the theory of the person based on (...) seven essential characteristics, that is the ability for cognition, love, freedom, religion, legal subjectivity, completeness and dignity. I attempt to show how these personal characteristics correspond to various patient needs. I argue that the qualitative deficit of any personal characteristics indicated by Krąpiec corresponds to a patient's real need that must be satisfied. I also stress that the skilful diagnosing of all—not only selected—qualitative deficits of characteristics can be defined as holistic care in the nursing profession. (shrink)

In this paper, I suggest that the notion of module explicitly defined by Peter Carruthers in The Architecture of The Mind (Carruthers 2006) is not really In use in the book. Instead, a more robust notion seems to be actually in play. The more robust notion, albeit implicitly assumed, seems to be far more useful for making claims about the modularity of mind. Otherwise, the claims would become trivial. This robust notion will be reconstructed and improved upon by putting it (...) into a more general framework of mental architecture. I defend the view that modules are the outcome of structural rather than functional decomposition and that they should be conceived as near decomposable systems. (shrink)

In this article I address the following question: When are reformulations in argumentative criticisms reasonable and when do they become fallacious straw men? Following ideas developed in the integrated version of pragma-dialectics, I approach argumentation as an element of agonistic exchanges permeated by arguers’ strategic manoeuvring aimed at effectively defeating the opponent with reasonable means. I propose two basic context-sensitive criteria for deciding on the reasonableness of reformulations: precision of the rules for interpretation (precise vs. loose) and general expectation of (...) cooperativeness (critical vs. constructive). On the basis of analysis of examples taken from online political discussions, I argue that in some contexts, especially those that are critical and loose, what might easily be classified as a straw man following conventional treatment should be taken as a harsh, yet reasonable, strategic argumentative criticism. (shrink)

An alternative conceptual setting of the basic system of inquisitive semantics is presented. A situational interpretation of the proposed formalism is discussed.

The concepts of question evocation and erotetic implication play central role in Inferential Erotetic Logic. In this paper, deduction theorems for question evocation and erotetic implication are proven. Moreover, it is shown how question evocation by a finite non-empty set of declaratives can be reduced to question evocation by the empty set, and how erotetic implication based on a finite non-empty set of declaratives can be reduced to a relation between questions only.

The discussion around the use of the term ‘medical futility’ began in the late 1980s. The Polish Working Group on End-of-Life Ethics joined this discussion in 2008. They offered their own approach to the issues regarding medical futility based on the category of persistent therapy. According to the PWG, ‘persistent therapy is the use of medical procedures to maintain the life function of the terminally ill in a way that prolongs their dying, introducing excessive suffering or violating their dignity’. In (...) this paper I attempt to show that the term ‘persistent therapy’ is neither worse nor better than the term ‘medical futility’, but it captures different aspects and nuances. Additionally, the Polish social and religious background plays a significant role in shaping the category of persistent therapy. (shrink)

The novel "Mephisto" is one of the most well-known texts by Klaus Mann. Its fame results not only from its literary virtuosity, but also and primarily from the enormous media attention which was caused by the novel’s publication. The decision of the Federal Constitutional Court, in which it dealt with the relationship between freedom of art and other constitutionally guaranteed rights of individuals, launched the unprecedented career of this novel. This article describes Klaus Mann’s political views and their development in (...) the 1920s during the time when the National Socialist movement was strengthening and the writer made the decision to emigrate. The essay deals with the circumstances of creating the novel considering both biographical and political issues. The novelist is described from the perspective of the reality of the 1930s during the National Socialist regime and the time after his emigration. The concern of the article is not a literary analysis of the novel, but to take a look at the novelist’s development up until the moment of finishing his work as a protest against National Socialism. Another goal of the essay is to analyze the decision of the Federal Constitutional Court, which regards the balance between freedom of art and other basic rights. Considering the synergy of both methodological approaches and the interdisciplinary view on the problem, the article represents a novel attempt to give a complex view on the relationship between art and the reality of a totalitarian state and between the relationship art–state in the conditions of a democratic state. (shrink)

This paper scrutinizes some peculiarities of the culture of Internet argumentation: it is a qualitative pragma-dialectical study of different strategies arguers employ to question or attack argumentation of their opponents in online political discussion forums. The basic assumption of the paper is that this particular context of argumentation—or: argumentative activity type—creates special opportunities and constraints for critical reactions regarding propositional content and relevance of argumentation. These opportunities and constraints, it is argued, may lead online discussions to being endless, yet not (...) necessarily fruitless from an argumentative perspective. (shrink)

Initially “meaningless” and randomly generated sounds can be learned over exposure. This is demonstrated by studies where repetitions of randomly determined sound patterns are detected better if they are the same sounds presented on previous trials than if they are novel. This experiment posed two novel questions about this learning. First, does familiarization with a sound outside of the repetition detection context facilitate later performance? Second, does familiarization enhance performance when repeats are interleaved with distracters? Listeners were first trained to (...) categorize a unique pattern of synchronous complex tone trains from other tone trains with similar qualities. They were then tasked to detect repeated pattern presentations interleaved with similar distracters in 4.2 s long excerpts. The familiarized pattern, an unfamiliar pattern that remained fixed throughout, or patterns that were uniquely determined on each trial could be presented as repeats. FF patterns were learned at a faster rate and achieved higher repetition detection sensitivity than UF and UU patterns. Similarly, FF patterns also showed steeper learning slopes in their response times than UF patterns. The data show that familiarity with a “meaningless” sound pattern on its own can facilitate repetition detection even in the presence of distracters. Familiarity effects become most apparent in the potential for learning. (shrink)

According to Bocheński’s description of the history of formal logic, there clearly is some objective development, though far from being cumulative or linear. The history of logic throughout the world consists of three relatively short pinnacles preceded by also short periods of awakening and followed by periods of extensive commentary running into long periods of standstill and decadence, when nearly all achievements are consigned to oblivion.

We present the logic$${\mathsf {LCB}}$$LCBwhich is expressed in a propositional language constantly enriched by new atomic expressions. Our formal framework is the propositional doxastic logic$${\mathsf {KD45}}$$KD45with the belief operator$${\mathcal {B}}$$B, extended by the$${\mathcal {C}}$$Coperator, to be readit changes that.... We describe the changing beliefs of an agent who uses progressively expanding language. The approach presented here allows us to weaken pragmatic objections to the so-called principle ofnegative retrospectionaccepted in$${\mathsf {KD45}}$$KD45and the problem oflogical omniscience. In what follows, we present the expanding (...) propositional language used in our formalism, interpreted using an epistemic version of Kripke semantics. Next, we give a syntactic characterization of logic$${\mathsf {LCB}}$$LCBand prove the soundness and completeness of$${\mathsf {LCB}}$$LCBin respect to our semantics. Finally, we compare the idea of expanding language with the notion ofagent awarenessand we relate our formalism to two epistemic temporal logics. (shrink)

entailment; families of sets; logic of questions.

The principle of charity is used in philosophy of language and argumentation theory as an important principle of interpretation which credits speakers with “the best” plausible interpretation of their discourse. I contend that the argumentation account, while broadly advocated, misses the basic point of a dialectical conception which approaches argumentation as discussion between two parties who disagree over the issue discussed. Therefore, paradoxically, an analyst who is charitable to one discussion party easily becomes uncharitable to the other. To overcome this (...) paradox, I suggest to significantly limit the application of the principle of charity depending on contextual factors. (shrink)

Preview: /Review: Graham Harman and Christopher Witmore, Objects Untimely: Object-Oriented Ontology and Archaeology, (Cambridge and Hoboken: Polity Press, 2023), 240 pages./ This is a very unusual book and it is so in several different respects. Firstly, it is co-authored and that already makes it a rare bird in contemporary philosophical output. Secondly, the author duo represent different academic disciplines. Graham Harman is a philosopher devoted to developing and promoting his own metaphysical system, which he dubbed Object Oriented Ontology (OOO), whereas (...) Christopher Witmore is an archaeologist and classicist focused on the material heritage of Ancient Greece. It is not just the fact that the book is co-authored by people with different professional backgrounds that makes it unique, but also that both authors themselves stand apart within their own fields. With his consistent focus on creating and constantly improving his own “theory of everything” while at the same time refusing to conform to either of the dominant trends in both continental and analytical philosophy, Harman is an exceptional figure in the landscape of contemporary philosophy. Also, Witmore – who displays a lot of interest in the abstract problems of methodological, philosophical and anthropological nature – is far from being a “typical” archaeologist of the day. Finally, the main topic of the book, which is on the nature and possible ways of conceptualizing time, is not often explicitly addressed in the recent literature within these fields – despite its undoubtedly fundamental significance for both philosophy and archaeology. (shrink)

The paper deals with the contemporary state of semiotic ethnology in Poland (connected with New Polish Ethnology group), its internal and external influences, its specifics, subjects and its reaction to the other theoretical propositions. The “neotribe” of New Polish Ethnology was established by few younger scholars, ethnologists in the early 1980s, in an opposition to the dominant stream of positivistic ethnology. Today they have become classics of Polish anthropology, masters that have educated a new generation of their students, and lead (...) some anthropological institutes. The most inspiring set of theories that influenced the group and its heirs was taken from Soviet semiotics of culture (Lotman, Uspensky, Toporov, Ivanov), and French structural-semiotics (Levi-Strauss, Barthes), but there are some individual differences also. On that basis they have developed a specific scope, aim and methods of interpretation with as its key terms myth and mythical thinking. They have explained many cultural events (relation we-others, body image, commercials, and anthropology itself) within the framework ofmythical thinking, making it the most productive and attractive frame of interpretation within Polish humanities and social sciences. In the 1990s they had to face critical ethnography, deconstruction and postmodern anthropology and they did it with perfect flexibility that even strengthened their project, because the potential of reflexivity and self-consciousness lied within semiotics from its beginning. (shrink)

The aim of the paper is to describe possible e-learning activities that a university can develop. Examples of projects carried out in Warsaw School of Economics have been presented with conclusions and experience gathered during their implementation. In the last part, trends for the future of academic e-learning have been discussed.

The paper outlines various concepts of rationality, their characteristics and consequences. In the first, most general part, the metaphysical, instrumental and discursive rationality is distinguished. The following part focuses on instrumental rationality and the rational choice theory and ordinal and cardinal utility, expected utility and game theory, respectively. All those concepts are summarised as being the most mathematically elegant and mostly decidable and helpful in the decision-making process. Giving primacy to individual preferences and withholding the judgment on their “objective” value, (...) they are also devoid of double standards. They are, however, strongly normative and weakly coincide with actual agents’ behaviour. Empirical findings on agents’ decision making seem to demonstrate their irrationality, unless we introduce into the analysis different concepts of rationality, namely based on costs efficient heuristics, inclusive fitness and ecological rationality. They are discussed respectively, and although they seem better to explain the set of humans’ seemingly irrational behaviour, they are likely week in predicting that behaviour. They are also losing their normative dimension and thus cease to be helpful in decision making. Applying the particular theory of rationality, either descriptively or normatively, seems to depend strongly on the environment, which can be characterised by its extension from a small to a large world. The more the small world’s features an environment reveals, the more effective is the application of the particular model of rationality. Beyond the small worlds, rule stochasticity, underspecification and misspecification and the only reasonable method are consecutive trials and errors, which eventually may reduce the large world to the small one. (shrink)