The pseudo-Aristotelian Mechanical Problems is the earliest known ancient Greek text on mechanics, principally concerned with the explanation of a variety of mechanical phenomena using a particular construal of the principle of the lever. In the introduction, the author (thought to be an early Peripatetic) quotes the tragic poet Antiphon to summarise a discussion of the techne-physis (art-nature) relationship and the status of mechanics as a techne. I argue that this citation of a poet is an Aristotelian cultural signature, intended (...) to guide its reader(s) towards a better understanding of the nature of mechanics as expounded in the Mechanical Problems. By analysing several instances where Aristotle cites Antiphon (as well as other tragic poets) in the Aristotelian corpus, I propose that both the author of the Mechanical Problems and Aristotle use poets for the purpose of persuasion. This is in turn explained by understanding the homologous relationship between mechanics-as-techne (according to the author of the Mechanical Problems) and poetics-as-techne (according to Aristotle) in terms of their shared status as poietike techne (productive art) and claims to universal knowledge. A final facet of the proposed relationship between mechanics and poetry is hypothesised on the grounds of their mimetic nature. (shrink)

No single theory so far proposed gives a wholly satisfactory account of the origin and maintenance of bird-song dialects. This failure is the consequence of a weak comparative literature that precludes careful comparisons among species or studies, and of the complexity of the issues involved. Complexity arises because dialects seem to bear upon a wide range of features in the life history of bird species. We give an account of the principal issues in bird-song dialects: evolution of vocal learning, experimental (...) findings on song ontogeny, dialect descriptions, female and male reactions to differences in dialect, and population genetics and dispersal.We present a synthetic theory of the origin and maintenance of song dialects, one that accommodates most of the different systems reported in the literature. The few data available suggest that large, regional dialect populations are genetically differentiated; this pattern is correlated with reduced dispersal between dialects, assortative mating by females, and male-male exclusion. At the same time, “subdialects” may be formed within regional dialects. Subdialect clusters are usually small and may represent vocal mimicry among a few adjacent territorial males. The relative importance of genetic and social adaptation may contribute to the emergence of subdialects; their distinctiveness may be correlated with the degree of polygyny, for example. Thus, subdialect formation is linked to one theory of the evolution of repertoire size, but data are too fragmentary to examine this idea critically. (shrink)

Graphical AbstractCarrying out research means being innovative, which requires novelty. Novelty is an important source of scientific breakthroughs and has great technological impact. Research institutions stand to benefit from fostering innovation. Here, we outline what academic institutions can do to help their scientists become more innovative.

RationaleSurrogates of critically ill patients often have inaccurate expectations about prognosis. Yet there is little research on how intensive care unit clinicians should discuss prognosis, and existing expert opinion-based recommendations give only general guidance that has not been validated with surrogate decision makers.ObjectiveTo determine the perspectives of key stakeholders regarding how prognostic information should be conveyed in critical illness.MethodsThis was a multicenter study at three academic medical centers in California, Pennsylvania, and Washington. One hundred eighteen key stakeholders completed in-depth semistructured (...) interviews. Participants included 47 surrogates of adult patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome; 45 clinicians working in study ICUs, including physicians, nurses, social workers, and spiritual care providers; and 26 experts in health communication, decision science, ethics, family-centered care, geriatrics, healthcare disparities, palliative care, psychology, psychiatry, and critical care.Measurements and main resultsThere was broad support among surrogates for existing expert recommendations, including truthful prognostic disclosure, emotional support, tailoring the disclosure strategy to each family's needs, and checking for understanding. In addition, stakeholders offered suggestions that add specificity to existing recommendations, including: In addition to conveying prognostic estimates, clinicians should help families "see the prognosis for themselves" by showing families radiographic images and explaining the clinical significance of physical manifestations of severe disease at the bedside. Many physicians did not support using numeric estimates to convey prognosis to families, whereas many surrogates, clinicians from other disciplines, and experts believed numbers could be helpful. Clinicians should conceptualize prognostic communication as an iterative process that begins with a preliminary mention of the possibility of death early in the ICU stay and becomes more detailed as the clinical situation develops. Although prognostic information should be initially disclosed by physicians, other members of the multidisciplinary team-nurses, social workers, and spiritual care providers-should be given explicit role responsibilities to reinforce physicians' prognostications and help families process a poor prognosis emotionally.ConclusionsFamily members, clinicians, and experts identified specific communication behaviors that clinicians should use to discuss prognosis in the critical care setting. These findings extend existing opinion-based recommendations and should guide interventions to improve communication about prognosis in ICUs. (shrink)

Introduction: education, philosophy and politics -- Writing the self: Wittgenstein, confession and pedagogy -- Nietzsche, nihilism and the critique of modernity: post-Nietzschean philosophy of education -- Heidegger, education and modernity -- Truth-telling as an educational practice of the self: Foucault and the ethics of subjectivity -- Neoliberal governmentality: Foucault on the birth of biopolitics -- Lyotard, nihilism and education -- Gilles Deleuze's 'societies of control': from disciplinary pedagogy to perpetual training -- Geophilosophy, education and the pedagogy of the concept - (...) Humanism, Derrida and the new humanities -- Politics and deconstruction: Derrida, neoliberalism and democracy -- Neopragmatism, ethnocentrism and the politics of the ethnos: Rorty's 'postmodernist bourgeois liberalism' -- Achieving America: postmodernism and Rorty's critique of the cultural left -- Deranging the investigations: Cavell on the philosophy of the child -- White philosophy in/of America. (shrink)

This article is concerned with developing a philosophical approach to a number of significant changes to academic publishing, and specifically the global journal knowledge system wrought by a range of new digital technologies that herald the third age of the journal as an electronic, interactive and mixed-media form of scientific communication. The paper emerges from an Editors' Collective, a small New Zealand-based organisation comprised of editors and reviewers of academic journals mostly in the fields of education and philosophy. The paper (...) is the result of a collective writing process. (shrink)

In this book, Michael Arbib, a researcher in artificial intelligence and brain theory, joins forces with Mary Hesse, a philosopher of science, to present an integrated account of how humans 'construct' reality through interaction with the social and physical world around them. The book is a major expansion of the Gifford Lectures delivered by the authors at the University of Edinburgh in the autumn of 1983. The authors reconcile a theory of the individual's construction of reality as a network (...) of schemas 'in the head' with an account of the social construction of language, science, ideology and religion to provide an integrated schema-theoretic view of human knowledge. The authors still find scope for lively debate, particularly in their discussion of free will and of the reality of God. The book integrates an accessible exposition of background information with a cumulative marshalling of evidence to address fundamental questions concerning human action in the world and the nature of ultimate reality. (shrink)

Science and philosophy study well-being with different but complementary methods. Marry these methods and a new picture emerges: To have well-being is to be "stuck" in a positive cycle of emotions, attitudes, traits and success. This book unites the scientific and philosophical worldviews into a powerful new theory of well-being.

Bishop and Trout here present a unique and provocative new approach to epistemology. Their approach aims to liberate epistemology from the scholastic debates of standard analytic epistemology, and treat it as a branch of the philosophy of science. The approach is novel in its use of cost-benefit analysis to guide people facing real reasoning problems and in its framework for resolving normative disputes in psychology. Based on empirical data, Bishop and Trout show how people can improve their reasoning by relying (...) on Statistical Prediction Rules. They then develop and articulate the positive core of the book. Their view, Strategic Reliabilism, claims that epistemic excellence consists in the efficient allocation of cognitive resources to reliable reasoning strategies, applied to significant problems. The last third of the book develops the implications of this view for standard analytic epistemology; for resolving normative disputes in psychology; and for offering practical, concrete advice on how this theory can improve real people's reasoning. This is a truly distinctive and controversial work that spans many disciplines and will speak to an unusually diverse group, including people in epistemology, philosophy of science, decision theory, cognitive and clinical psychology, and ethics and public policy. (shrink)

There is an ecology of bad ideas, just as there is an ecology of weeds, and it is characteristic of the system that basic error propagates itself.–Gregory Bateson, Steps Towards an Ecology of Mind...

Research on implicit learning - a cognitive phenomenon in which people acquire knowledge without conscious intent or awareness - has been growing exponentially. This volume draws together this research, offering the first complete reference on implicit learning by those who have been instrumental in shaping the field. The contributors explore controversies in the field, and examine: functional characteristics, brain mechanisms and neurological foundations of implicit learning; connectionist models; and applications of implicit learning to acquiring new mental skills.

Open Peer Review: Educational Philosophy and Theory (EPAT)Michael A. Peters, Beijing Normal University, PR ChinaIn 2016 EPAT started experimenting with open peer review for articles that were part...

First-ever comprehensive introduction to the major new subject of quantum computing and quantum information.

Organ transplantation is an accepted therapy for major organ failure, but it depends on the availability of viable organs. Most organs transplanted in the U.S. come from either "brain-dead" or living related donors. Recently organ procurement from patients pronounced dead using cardiopulmonary criteria, so-called "non-heart-beating cadaver donors" (NHBCDs), has been reconsidered. In May 1992, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) enacted a new, complicated policy for procuring organs from NHBCDs after the elective removal of life support. Seventeen months later (...) only one patient has become a NHBCD. This article describes her case and the results of interviews with the health care team and the patient's family. The case and interviews are discussed in relation to several of the ethical concerns previously raised about the policy, including potential conflicts of interest, the definition of cardiopulmonary death, and a possible net decrease in organ donation. The conclusion is reached that organ procurement from non-heart-beating cadavers is feasible and may be desirable both for the patient's family and the health care providers. (shrink)

The Psychology of Meditation: Research and Practice explores the practice of meditation and mindfulness and presents accounts of the cognitive and emotional processes elicited during meditation practice. Written by researchers and practitioners with considerable experience in meditation practice and from different religious or philosophical perspectives, he book examines the evidence for the effects of meditation on emotional and physical well-being in therapeutic contexts and in applied settings. The areas covered include addictions, pain management, psychotherapy, physical health, neuroscience and the application (...) of meditation in school and workplace settings. Uniquely, the contributors also present accounts of their own personal experience of meditation practice including their history of practice, phenomenology, and the impact it has had on their lives. (shrink)

With an up-to-date synopsis, review, and critique of his writings, this book demonstrates Derrida's almost singular power to reconceptualize and reimagine the ...

This dialogue (trilogue) is an attempt to critically discuss the technoscientific convergence that is taking place with biodigital technologies in the postdigital condition. In this discussion, Sarah Hayes, Petar Jandrić and Michael A. Peters examine the nature of the convergences, their applications for bioeconomic sustainability and associated ecopedagogies. The dialogue paper raises issues of definition and places the technological convergence (‘nano-bio-info-cogno’) – of new systems biology and digital technologies at the nano level – in an evolutionary context to speculate, (...) on the basis of the latest research, future possibilities. The paper also reviews these developments within familiar landscapes of posthumanism and postmodernism, raises the question of political bioeconomy and the role of postdigital education within it. (shrink)

Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) grants people with disabilities access to public accommodations, including the offices of medical providers, equal to that enjoyed by persons without disabilities. The Department of Justice (DOJ) has unequivocally declared that the law requires effective communication between the medical provider and the Deaf patient. Because most medical providers are not fluent in sign language, the DOJ has recognized that effective communication calls for the use of appropriate auxiliary aids, including sign language (...) interpreters. The final decision on what to offer the Deaf patient is the doctor's, and under current DOJ regulations, the doctor does not have to consult with the patient or give "primary consideration" to the patient's choice of auxiliary aid as long as what the doctor offers results in effective communication. However, given the great variation in people's communication styles and skills, a standard, one-size-fits-all auxiliary aid would fail to achieve effective communication in many cases, harming not only that Deaf patient, but also the medical provider, who would be potentially liable for violating the ADA as well as hamstrung in getting accurate information for purposes of diagnosis and treatment. Moreover, most doctors are not savvy about Deafness and Deaf culture. Thus, the best way to ensure effective communication would be to require the medical provider to ask the Deaf patient for his or her choice of auxiliary aid and to give "primary consideration" to the patient's expressed choice of auxiliary aid. Such an approach is required under Title II of the ADA, which makes it mandatory for state and local governments to consult with people with disabilities and give "primary consideration" to the patient's choice of auxiliary aid. Given that there is no difference between a public doctor and a private doctor that would justify the two different approaches and that cost is not a factor, since under either title, a medical provider cannot pass on the costs to the person with a disability, the DOJ should revise its interpretation of Title III in order to bring in into line with its interpretation of Title II. To fail to do so would operate to frustrate both the letter and the spirit of the ADA. Until the DOJ brings the titles into line, the courts should decline to give controlling weight to the DOJ's interpretation of Title III. (shrink)

Laudan's "progress and its problems" is of two, incompatible, minds. proto-laudan argues that science is indexed to historical contexts, such that scientific rationality depends on progress and not vice-versa. deutero-laudan claims that sociology assumes "a rationality" and so misunderstands science. the latter is confused and offers no argument against sociology which does not also apply against historical approaches to philosophy of science, proto-laudan included. such tribal warfare is unprogressive, and best abandoned.

“Offsetting” habitat destruction has widespread appeal as an instrument for balancing economic growth with biodiversity conservation. Requiring proponents to pay the nontrivial costs of habitat loss encourages sensitive planning approaches. Offsetting, biobanking, and biodiverse carbon sequestration schemes will play an important role in conserving biodiversity under increasing human pressures. However, untenable assumptions in existing schemes are undermining their benefits. Policies that allow habitat destruction to be offset by the protection of existing habitat are guaranteed to result in further loss of (...) biodiversity. Similarly, schemes that allow trading the immediate loss of existing habitat for restoration projects that promise future habitat will, at best, result in time lags in the availability of habitat that increases extinction risks, or at worst, fail to achieve the offset at all. We detail concerns about existing approaches and describe how offsetting and trading policies can be improved to provide genuine benefits for biodiversity. Due to uncertainties about the way in which restored vegetation matures, we propose that the biodiversity bank should be a savings bank. Accrued biodiversity values should be demonstrated before they can be used to offset biodiversity losses. We provide recommendations about how this could be achieved in practice. (shrink)

Educational philosophies of self-cultivation as the foundation and cultural ethos for education have a strong and historically effective tradition stretching back to antiquity in the classical ‘cra...

In Wyoming Revisited, Michael A. Amundson uses the power of rephotography to show how landscapes across the state have endured over the last century. Three sets of photographs—the original black-and-white photographs taken by famed Wyoming photographer Joseph E. Stimson more than a century ago, repeat black-and-white images taken by Amundson in the 1980s, and a third view in color taken by the author in 2007–2008—are accompanied by captions explaining the history and importance of each site as well as information (...) on the process of repeat photographic fieldwork. The 117 locations feature street views of Wyoming towns and cities, as well as views from the state's famous natural landmarks like Yellowstone National Park, Grand Teton National Park, Devil's Tower National Monument, Hot Springs State Park, and Big Horn and Shoshone National Forests. In addition, Amundson provides six in-depth essays that explore the life of Joseph E. Stimson, the rephotographic process and how it has evolved, and how repeat photography can be used to understand history, landscape, historic preservation, and globalization. Wyoming Revisited highlights the historic evolution of the American West over the past century and showcases the significant changes that have occurred over the past twenty-five years. This book will appeal to photographers, historians of the American West, and anyone interested in Wyoming's history or landscape. The publication of this book is supported in part by the Wyoming Cultural Trust Fund. (shrink)