Recent research in numerical cognition has begun to systematically detail the ability of humans and nonhuman animals to perceive the magnitudes of nonsymbolic ratios. These relationally defined analogs to rational numbers offer new potential insights into the nature of human numerical processing. However, research into their similarities with and connections to symbolic numbers remains in its infancy. The current research aims to further explore these similarities by investigating whether the magnitudes of nonsymbolic ratios are associated with space just as symbolic (...) numbers are. In two experiments, we found that responses were faster on the left for smaller nonsymbolic ratio magnitudes and faster on the right for larger nonsymbolic ratio magnitudes. These results further elucidate the nature of nonsymbolic ratio processing, extending the literature of spatial–numerical associations to nonsymbolic relative magnitudes. We discuss potential implications of these findings for theories of human magnitude processing in general and how this general processing relates to numerical processing. (shrink)

A structure is automatic if its domain, functions, and relations are all regular languages. Using the fact that every automatic structure is decidable, in the literature many decision problems have been solved by giving an automatic presentation of a particular structure. Khoussainov and Nerode asked whether there is some way to tell whether a structure has, or does not have, an automatic presentation. We answer this question by showing that the set of Turing machines that represent automata-presentable structures is ${\rm{\Sigma (...) }}_1^1 $-complete. We also use similar methods to show that there is no reasonable characterisation of the structures with a polynomial-time presentation in the sense of Nerode and Remmel. (shrink)

Universality has been an important concept in computable structure theory. A class C of structures is universal if, informally, for any structure of any kind there is a structure in C with the same computability-theoretic properties as the given structure. Many classes such as graphs, groups, and fields are known to be universal. This paper is about the class of finitely generated groups. Because finitely generated structures are relatively simple, the class of finitely generated groups has no hope of being (...) universal. We show that finitely generated groups are as universal as possible, given that they are finitely generated: for every finitely generated structure, there is a finitely generated group which has the same computability-theoretic properties. The same is not true for finitely generated fields. We apply the results of this investigation to quasi Scott sentences, and also answer a question of Alvir, Knight, and McCoy. (shrink)

We study computable Polish spaces and Polish groups up to homeomorphism. We prove a natural effective analogy of Stone duality, and we also develop an effective definability technique which works up to homeomorphism. As an application, we show that there is a $\Delta ^0_2$ Polish space not homeomorphic to a computable one. We apply our techniques to build, for any computable ordinal $\alpha $, an effectively closed set not homeomorphic to any $0^{}$-computable Polish space; this answers a question of Nies. (...) We also prove analogous results for compact Polish groups and locally path-connected spaces. (shrink)

I outline the early Heidegger's views on mood and emotion, and then relate his central claims to some recent finding in neuropsychology. These findings complement Heidegger in a number of important ways. More specifically, I suggest that, in order to make sense of certain neurological conditions that traditional assumptions concerning the mind are constitutionally incapable of accommodating, something very like Heidegger's account of mood and emotion needs to be adopted as an interpretive framework. I conclude by supporting Heidegger's insistence that (...) the sciences constitute a derivative means of disclosing the world and our place within it, as opposed to an ontologically and epistemologically privileged domain of inquiry. (shrink)

Although there is disagreement about the details, John Pollock’s framework for defeat is now part of the received wisdom in analytic epistemology. Recently, however, cracks have appeared in the consensus, particularly on the understanding of undercutting defeat. While not questioning the existence of undercutting defeat, Scott Sturgeon argues that undercutting defeat operates differently from rebutting. Unlike the latter, undercutting defeat, Sturgeon claims, occurs only in conjunction with certain higher-order contributions, i.e., with beliefs about the basis on which one does or (...) would believe. Sturgeon concludes that Pollock misconceives undercutting defeat. I argue that in the case of defeat of inferential justification, undercutting defeat is a genuine phenomenon and takes roughly the shape Pollock suggests, not needing help from higher-order beliefs or justifications. However, I agree with Sturgeon that for noninferential justification the Pollockian account is in trouble. I try to explain why there should be this difference. This difference in defeaters has important implications for epistemology. In a final section, I use the defeat-related difference between inferential and noninferential justification to argue that there is less noninferential perceptual or testimonial justification than is commonly thought. (shrink)

There are ways that ethical intuitions might be, and the various possibilities have epistemic ramifications. This paper criticizes some extant accounts of what ethical intuitions are and how they justify, and it offers an alternative account. Roughly, an ethical intuition that p is a kind of seeming state constituted by a consideration whether p, attended by positive phenomenological qualities that count as evidence for p, and so a reason to believe that p. They are distinguished from other kinds of seemings, (...) such as those which are content driven (e.g., the sensory experience that a stick in water seems bent) and those which are competence driven (e.g., the intellectual seeming that XYZ is not water, or that one of DeMorgan’s laws is true). One important conclusion is this: when crafting a positive theory of justification ethical intuitionists have fewer resources than intuitionists in other domains, not because of the subject matter of ethical intuitions, but because of the their structure. A second conclusion is that the seemings featured in substantive ethical intuitions deliver relatively weak justification as compared to other seeming states. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that presentism has a problem accounting forthe truth of statements whose truth conditions seem to require therebe relations that hold between present and non-present objects. Imotivate the problem and then examine several strategies for dealingwith the problem. I argue that no solution is forthcoming, and thispresents a prima facie problem for presentism.

A human brain operates as a pattern of switching. An abstract definition of a quantum mechanical switch is given which allows for the continual random fluctuations in the warm wet environment of the brain. Among several switch-like entities in the brain, we choose to focus on the sodium channel proteins. After explaining what these are, we analyse the ways in which our definition of a quantum switch can be satisfied by portions of such proteins. We calculate the perturbing effects of (...) normal variations in temperature and electric field on the quantum state of such a portion. These are shown to be acceptable within the fluctuations allowed for by our definition. Information processing and unpredictability in the brain are discussed. The ultimate goal underlying the paper is an analysis of quantum measurement theory based on an abstract definition of the physical manifestations of consciousness. The paper is written for physicists with no prior knowledge of neurophysiology, but enough introductory material has also been included to allow neurophysiologists with no prior knowledge of quantum mechanics to follow the central arguments. (shrink)

Contemporary scholarship concerning science diplomacy is increasingly taking a historical approach. In our introduction to this special issue, we argue that this approach promises insight into science diplomacy because of the tools historians of science bring to their work. In particular, we observe that not only are historians of science currently poised to chart the diplomatic aspects involved in the transnational circulation of technoscientific knowledge, materials, and expertise. They are ready to bring critical global analysis to an important phenomenon that (...) has too often been treated as a benign diplomacy device deployed by the Global North without equal reference to the Global South. Through cases discussed in the articles of the special issue, however, we see that historically, in the Global South as well as the Global North, science diplomacy has often functioned to mediate the circulation of technoscientific knowledge and materials, and its historical study helps to better illuminate the resulting knowledge-power nexus. (shrink)

Over the past few decades, significant advances have been made in public engagement with, and the democratization of, science and technology. Despite notable successes, such developments have often struggled to enhance public trust, avert crises of expertise and democracy, and build more socially responsive and responsible science and innovation. A central reason for this is that mainstream approaches to public engagement harbor what we call “residual realist” assumptions about participation and publics. Recent coproductionist accounts in science and technology studies offer (...) an alternative way of seeing participation as coproduced, relational, diverse, and emergent but have been somewhat reluctant to articulate what this means in practice. In this paper, we make this move by setting out a new framework of interrelating paths and associated criteria for remaking public participation with science and democracy in more experimental, reflexive, anticipatory, and responsible ways. This framework comprises four paths to: forge reflexive participatory practices that attend to their framings, emergence, uncertainties, and effects; ecologize participation through attending to the interrelations between diverse public engagements in wider systems; catalyze practices of anticipatory reflection to bring about responsible democratic innovations; and reconstitute participation as constitutive of systems of technoscience and democracy. (shrink)

In Being Realistic About Reasons,T.M. Scanlon develops a non-naturalistic realist account of normative reasons. A crucial part of that account is Scanlon’s contention that there is no deep epistemological problem for non-naturalistic realists, and that the method of reflective equilibrium suffices to explain the possibility of normative knowledge. In this critical notice we argue that this is not so: on a realist picture, normative knowledge presupposes a significant correlation between distinct entities, namely between normative beliefs and normative facts. This correlation (...) calls for an explanation. We show that Scanlon does not have the resources to offer such an explanation. (shrink)

Brings together and interprets previously hard-to-find texts, new translations and passages detailing the interplay between philosophy and psychopathology.

The (im)moral character of art works often affects how we respond to them. But should it affect our evaluation of them as art? The article surveys the contemporary debate whilst outlining further lines of argument and enquiry. The main arguments in favour of aestheticism, the claim that there is no internal relation between artistic value and moral character, are considered. Nonetheless the connection between art's instructional aspirations and artistic value, as well as the ways in which works solicit responses from (...) us, underwrite the claim that a work's moral character can be directly relevant to a work's value as art. Various competing accounts of how the relationship goes, ethicism, moderate moralism and immoralism, are considered. The article goes on to elaborate novel considerations in favour of a suitably qualified cognitive immoralism and suggests avenues of further enquiry with respect to the moral character of art works. (shrink)

Organoids and specifically human cerebral organoids (HCOs) are one of the most relevant novelties in the field of biomedical research. Grown either from embryonic or induced pluripotent stem cells, HCOs can be used as in vitro three-dimensional models, mimicking the developmental process and organization of the developing human brain. Based on that, and despite their current limitations, it cannot be assumed that they will never at any stage of development manifest some rudimentary form of consciousness. In the absence of behavioral (...) indicators of consciousness, the theoretical neurobiology of consciousness being applied to unresponsive brain-injured patients can be considered with respect to HCOs. In clinical neurology, it is difficult to discern a capacity for consciousness in unresponsive brain-injured patients who provide no behavioral indicators of consciousness. In such scenarios, a validated neurobiological theory of consciousness, which tells us what the neural mechanisms of consciousness are, could be used to identify a capacity for consciousness. Like the unresponsive patients that provide a diagnostic difficulty for neurologists, HCOs provide no behavioral indicators of consciousness. Therefore, this article discusses how three prominent neurobiological theories of consciousness apply to human cerebral organoids. From the perspective of the Temporal Circuit Hypothesis, the Global Neuronal Workspace Theory, and the Integrated Information Theory, we discuss what neuronal structures and functions might indicate that cerebral organoids have a neurobiological capacity to be conscious. (shrink)

Technical results about the time dependence of eigenvectors of reduced density operators are considered, and the relevance of these results is discussed for modal interpretations of quantum mechanics which take the corresponding eigenprojections to represent definite properties. Continuous eigenvectors can be found if degeneracies are avoided. We show that, in finite dimensions, the space of degenerate operators has co-dimension 3 in the space of all reduced operators, suggesting that continuous eigenvectors almost surely exist. In any dimension, even when degeneracies are (...) hit, we find conditions under which a theorem due to Rellich can provide continuous eigenvectors. We use this result to formulate an extended version of the modal interpretation. We also discuss eigenvector instability which we argue poses a serious problem for the modal interpretation, even in our extended version. Many examples are given to illustrate the mathematics. (shrink)

With this issue, we begin a regular feature on bioethics and public health. We welcome Matthew K. Wynia, M.D., M.P.H., Director of the Institute for Ethics of the American Medical Association as our new Contributing Editor. If you have comments or suggestions regarding this feature, please email us at manuscript@ bioethics.net.

How come quantum theory has anything to do with mind? Is your theory refutable? What is the point of all the technical detail? Do you suggest that the operation of the brain involves large scale quantum coherence? Isn't large scale quantum coherence necessary to solve the problem of the unity of consciousness? How does a many-minds interpretation survive Occam's razor? What, briefly, is your current philosophical position? What is your understanding of the relationship between mind and brain for split-brain patients? (...) Do you believe that the mind can survive the death of the brain? No journal reference is given for several of the recent papers on your home page. Where will these papers be printed? How are the “source” and “pdf” versions of the papers on your home page produced and viewed? Why does the page with your photograph behave oddly in some browsers? Where can I find an elementary introduction to the interpretation of quantum theory? Doesn't decoherence theory solve all the problems of the interpretation of quantum theory? How do the ambiguities of decoherence affect the many-worlds interpretation? Could you expand on your answers to the two previous questions? Why isn't the conventional interpretation of quantum theory adequate? What about the Bohm interpretation? What about consistent histories? Does the present many-minds interpretation solve all the problems? (shrink)

In the attempt to understand the norms governing believers, epistemologists have tended to focus on individual belief as the primary object of epistemic evaluation. However, norm governance is often assumed to concern, at base, things we can do as a free exercise or manifestation of our agency. Yet believing is not plausibly conceived as something we freely do but rather as a state we are in, usually as the mostly automatic or involuntary result of cognitively processes shaped by nature, bias, (...) and ideology. In this paper, I sketch a response to this tension. This response is based on rejecting the traditional theoretical focus on an individual’s particular beliefs as the primary object of normative epistemic evaluation. If we shift our focus from the particular beliefs of individuals to the community and its information managing practices, we may lessen the tension between norm governance and automaticity and involuntariness in a way that construes autonomous cognitive agency as a resultant of rather than a precondition for our norm-governed epistemic sociality. (shrink)

Although Kant defends a cosmopolitan ideal, his philosophy is problematically vague regarding how to achieve it, which lends support to the empty formalism charge. How Kant would respond to the crisis in Syria reveals that judgement plays too central a role, because Kantian principles lead to equally reasonable but opposite conclusions on how to weigh the duty of hospitality to refugees against a state’s duty to its own citizens, the right of prevention towards ISIS against the duty not to harm (...) non-combatants, and the responsibility to protect the people of Syria against the duty of non-interference in its internal affairs. (shrink)

The influential account of contractualist moral theory offered recently by T. M. Scanlon in What We Owe to Each Other is not intended to account for all the various moral commitments that people have; it covers only a narrow—though important—range of properly moral concerns and claims. Scanlon focuses on what he calls the morality of right and wrong or, as he puts it in his title, what we owe to each other. The question arises as to whether nonhuman animals can (...) be wronged in the narrow sense of a moral wrong with which contractualism is concerned. Can we owe things to nonhuman animals? Scanlon is sensitive to the importance of this question, but he ultimately favors an account in which the perspectives of nonhuman animals are not explicitly included in contractualist theorizing. Nevertheless, it appears that contractualism, largely as Scanlon conceives it, can accommodate duties to nonhuman animals. Moreover, if contractualism cannot make this accommodation, then its status as a theory that answers to important common-sense moral intuitions becomes questionable in ways that extend beyond its failure to live up to intuitions many share about the status of nonhuman animals. (shrink)

How should we make interpersonal comparisons of well-being levels and differences? One branch of welfare economics eschews such comparisons, which are seen as impossible or unknowable; normative evaluation is based upon criteria such as Pareto or Kaldor-Hicks efficiency that require no interpersonal comparability. A different branch of welfare economics, for example optimal tax theory, uses “social welfare functions” to compare social states and governmental policies. Interpersonally comparable utility numbers provide the input for SWFs. But this scholarly tradition has never adequately (...) explained the basis for these numbers. John Harsanyi, in his work on so-called “extended preferences,” advanced a fruitful idea. While an ordinary preference is a ranking of outcomes, an “extended preference” is a ranking of individual histories. To say that individual k has an extended preference for history over means something like the following: k prefers to have the attributes of individual i in outcome x, as opposed to having the attributes of individual j in outcome y. Harsanyi’s proposal was to endow individuals with “extended preferences”; to represent such preferences using “extended” utility functions; and to employ such functions, in turn, as the basis for interpersonal comparisons of well-being levels and differences. Harsanyi’s analysis, however, had various gaps and flaws. In this Article, I both diagnose these difficulties, and show how they can be remedied - yielding a viable account of interpersonal comparisons, one sufficient for the needs of the SWF approach. (shrink)

This paper brings needed clarity to the influential view that species are cohesive entities held together by gene flow, and then develops an empirical argument against that view: Neglected data suggest gene flow is neither necessary nor sufficient for species cohesion. Implications are discussed. ‡I'm grateful to Rob Wilson, Alex Rueger and Lindley Darden for important comments on earlier drafts, and to Joseph Nagel, Heather Proctor, Ken Bond, members of the DC History and Philosophy of Biology reading group, and audience (...) members at the November 2006 meeting of the PSA, for helpful comments or discussion. Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada fellowship 752-2005-1208 supported research. †To contact the author, please write to: Philosophy Department, University of Wisconsin–Madison, 5185 Helen C. White Hall, 600 North Park Street, Madison, WI 53706; e-mail: [email protected]. (shrink)

This paper argues, in response to Huw Price, that deflationism has the resources to account for the normativity of truth. The discussion centers on a principle of hyper-objective assertibility, that one is incorrect to assert that p if not-p. If this principle doesn't state a fact about truth, it neednt be explained by deflationists. If it does,, it can be explained.

A veritable tidal shift in Herder scholarship has taken place over the last quarter century, primarily but not exclusively in German. This review essay seeks to evoke the richness and vitality of this revival with the hope of persuading American academics that some ill-founded opinions still circulating concerning Herder's "irrationalism" and chauvinistic, even racist nationalism, and his philosophical naivety and literary effrontery, might at last be put to rest. The recent revival has brough sharply to the fore two crucial aspects (...) of Herder. First, there is the contribution of Herder's thought to the emergent cultural and social sciences. Second, for Herder the "science of man" was also a natural science: the division between the humanities and the natural sciences that has been such a hallmark of the age from Kant until very recently did not exist for Herder. (shrink)

This book explores how ancient philosophers, particularly Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, and Sextus Empiricus, understood relativity and how their theories of the phenomenon affected, and were affected by, their broader philosophical outlooks.

This paper addresses how and why social restrictions imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic have affected people’s experiences of grief. To do so, I adopt a broadly phenomenological approach, one that emphasizes how our experiences, thoughts, and activities are shaped by relations with other people. Drawing on first-person accounts of grief during the pandemic, I identify two principal (and overlapping) themes: (a) deprivation and disruption of interpersonal processes that play important roles in comprehending and adapting to bereavement; (b) disturbance of an (...) experiential world in the context of which loss is more usually recognized and negotiated. The combination, I suggest, can amount to a sort of “grief within grief”, involving a sense of stasis consistent with clinical descriptions of prolonged grief disorder. (shrink)

In this paper I discuss the circumstances in which it would be right to revise a common-sense psychological categorisation -- such as the common-sense categorisation of emotions -- in the light of the results of empirical investigation. I argue that an answer to that question, familiar from eliminitivist arguments, should be rejected, and suggest that the issue turns on the ontological commitments of the explanations that common-sense psychological states enter into.

Getting Emotional -- Constructing Discourse -- Telling and Remembering -- Inviting Emotional Tellings -- Eliciting Feelings -- (re)formulating Emotionality -- Managing Emotionality and Distress -- Being Negative -- Reflecting Back, Moving Forward.

This paper addresses the political constraints on science through a pragmatist critique of Philip Kitcher’s account of “well-ordered science.” A central part of Kitcher’s account is his analysis of the significance of items of scientific research: contextual and purpose-relative scientific significance replaces mere truth as the aim of inquiry. I raise problems for Kitcher’s account and argue for an alternative, drawing on Peirce’s and Dewey’s theories of problem-solving inquiry. I conclude by suggesting some consequences for understanding the proper conduct of (...) science in a democracy. (shrink)

Daniel Dennett is one of the most influential thinkers at the interface between philosophy and science. This book is the first comprehensive examination of Dennett ’s ideas on the nature of thought, consciousness, free will, and the significance of Darwinism. A highly original introduction to contemporary thinking about the relationship between mind and science. This is the first comprehensive examination of Dennett ’s ideas on the nature of thought, consciousness, free will, and the significance of Darwinism. Examines Dennett ’s unique (...) response to the question of when and how science should affect the conception that we have of ourselves. Casts new light on specific controversies: Could robots ever think, feel, and enjoy freedom? Does Dennett really explain consciousness? Are mental states real or merely ‘useful fictions’? Do we have free will? Is the self a ‘centre of narrative gravity’? (shrink)

This book reviews Foucault's philosophy on power and ethics to investigate the possibility of restructuring freedom available to the subject. Foucault's Kantian inspired view of critique as an art of voluntary inservitude, of reflective indocility is applied to biopolitics, bioethics, artificial intelligence, and bureaucracy. This work of freedom is a process of self-creation where the subject seeks to rearrange power relations and open possibilities for autonomy and agency. This book shows how the critical attitude identifies limitations of power to open (...) the possibility for transgression as an escape from normalized submission. This involves revealing and exposing unrecognised forms of power influencing the subject to enable new ways to think differently. Psychoanalysis combined with Foucault is also shown to enhance an understanding of power relations and the task of an ethics of freedom. This is then integrated with a philosophy of place to better understand the relationship between home, self-creation, ethics, and freedom. The book outlines that Foucault's philosophy has important relevance to the writings of Heidegger, Lacan, Aristotle, Jung and Arendt which is essential reading for students and professionals of politics, ethics, phenomenology and psychoanalysis. (shrink)

Westworld is a television series on HBO (2016–present), based on a movie of the same name by Michael Crichton. The plot of the show is wide-reaching. The first season shows us an adult theme park where android “hosts” serve the wealthy “guests.” Seasons two and three show the attempt of the hosts to escape this servitude, and then, in a twist, help humans do the same outside of the parks. This chapter links all three seasons of Westworld to theories of (...) colonization. First, it explores the types of colonialism as they pertain to Westworld. Then it looks at the various scopes of colonization in Westworld – the colonization of space, time, and psychic space. Next, it explores the psychology of colonizers and the colonized as it pertains to the show. Lastly, it explores possible forms of liberation from colonization that the show has to offer. (shrink)

This paper develops a model of individual decision-making under bounded rationality in which discretionary cognitive adjustment creates a durable stock that complements choice of action. While it increases utility, adjustment also entails a cost, because focusing attention optimally is effortful and mental resources are scarce. Associated behavioral phenomena are categorized based on whether the operative motivation in adjusting is forward-looking utility maximization or justification of prior action. The theory is in line with prior conceptions of cognitive dissonance, but also offers (...) a more empirically consistent explanation of the endowment effect, persuasive advertising, and sunk-cost effects than existing accounts. (shrink)

We enjoy modes of sensory imagining corresponding to our five modes of perception - seeing, touching, hearing, smelling and tasting. An account of what constitutes these different modes of perseption needs also to explain what constitutes the corresponding modes of sensory perception. In this paper I argue that we can explain what distinguishes the different modes of sensory imagination in terms of their characteristic experiences without supposing that we must distinguish the senses in terms of the kinds of experience involved. (...) thus the fact that we enjoy different modes of sensory imagining poses no threat to someone who thinks that the five senses are to be distinguished by appeal to the kinds of mechanism or psychological capacities their exercise involves, and not by appeal to experience. (shrink)

Achille Varzi [2000] has suggested a nice response to the familiar argument purporting to establish the existence of perfectly coinciding objects – objects which, if they existed, would trouble mereological extensionality and the “Minimalist View” of ontology. The trick is to defend Minimalism without tarnishing its status as a meta-principle: that is, without making any firstorder ontological claims. Varzi’s response, though seeming to allow for a comfortable indifference about metaphysical matters peripheral to Minimalism, is not general enough to stave off (...) attacks on extensionality from more sophisticated corners. However, Varzi’s argument bears a kinship with a more general argument against coincident objects. I consider how such an argument sits with the meta-doctrinal status of Minimalism. (shrink)