This article presents an analogical account of the meaning of function attributions in biology. To say that something has a function analogizes it with an artifact, but since the analogy rests on a necessary (but possibly insufficient) basis, function statements can still be assessed as true or false in an objective sense.

Standard biological and philosophical treatments assume that dramatic genotypic or phenotypic change constitutes instantaneous speciation, and that barring such saltation, speciation is gradual evolutionary change in individual properties. Both propositions appear to be incongruent with standard theoretical perspectives on species themselves, since these perspectives are (a) non-pheneticist, and (b) tend to disregard intermediate cases. After reviewing certain key elements of such perspectives, it is proposed that species-membership is mediated by membership in a population. Species-membership depends, therefore, not on intrinsic characteristics (...) of an organism, but on relationship of an organism to others. A new definition of speciation is proposed in the spirit of this proposal. This definition implies that dramatic change is neither necessary nor sufficient for speciation. It also implies, surprisingly, that an organism can change species during its lifetime. (shrink)

Throughout this research, imposing the training of an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) to play tic-tac-toe bored game, by training the ANN to play the tic-tac-toe logic using the set of mathematical combination of the sequences that could be played by the system and using both the Gradient Descent Algorithm explicitly and the Elimination theory rules implicitly. And so on the system should be able to produce imunate amalgamations to solve every state within the game course to make better of results (...) of winnings or getting draw. (shrink)

The study examines the benefits of imaginative teaching practices in enhancing educational quality by focusing on innovative pedagogical approaches. It aims to evaluate the influence of these performances on key variables, including Student Engagement (SE), Academic Performance (AP), Educational Satisfaction (ES), Creativity Development (CD), and Critical Thinking Skills (CTS). Using SPSS software, various statistical methods, such as x2 tests, ANOVA (Analysis of Variance), T-tests, and descriptive statistics, were employed to analyze data collected from educators. The findings reveal significant improvements across (...) all measured variables, indicating that imaginative teaching practices effectively enhance student engagement, academic performance, critical thinking skills, creativity, and overall satisfaction with the educational experience. These results suggest that incorporating creative methods in teaching can create a more dynamic, engaging, and effective learning environment, ultimately leading to improved educational outcomes. (shrink)

What do we directly hear? In section I, I define direct perception, and outline the logical atomist way of attacking the question. I argue in section II that atomism fails. Then, in sections III-V, I propose that a better alternative to atomism is to revive and modernize another traditional empiricist doctrine: that we directly sense what the senses deliver to automatic (i.e., sub-personal) processes of learning.

Seeing, Doing, and Knowing is an original and comprehensive philosophical treatment of sense perception as it is currently investigated by cognitive neuroscientists. Its central theme is the task-oriented specialization of sensory systems across the biological domain. Sensory systems are automatic sorting machines; they engage in a process of classification. Human vision sorts and orders external objects in terms of a specialized, proprietary scheme of categories - colours, shapes, speeds and directions of movement, etc. This 'Sensory Classification Thesis' implies that sensation (...) is not a naturally caused image from which an organism must infer the state of the world beyond; it is more like an internal communication, a signal concerning the state of the world issued by a sensory system, in accordance with internal conventions, for the use of an organism's other systems. This is why sensory states are both easily understood and persuasive.Sensory classification schemes are purpose-built to serve the knowledge-gathering and pragmatic needs of particular types of organisms. They are specialized: a bee or a bird does not see exactly what a human does. The Sensory Classification Thesis helps clarify this specialization in perceptual content and supports a new form of realism about the deliverances of sensation: 'Pluralistic Realism' is based on the idea that sensory systems coevolve with an organism's other systems; they are not simply moulded to the external world. The last part of the book deals with reference in vision. Cognitive scientists now believe that vision guides the limbs by means of a subsystem that links up with the objects of physical manipulation in ways that bypass sensory categories. In a novel extension of this theory, Matthen argues that 'motion-guiding vision' is integrated with sensory classification in conscious vision. This accounts for the quasi-demonstrative form of visual states: 'This particular object is red', and so on. He uses this idea to cast new light on the nature of perceptual objects, pictorial representation, and the visual representation of space. (shrink)

What colour does a white wall look in the pinkish light of the late afternoon? Philosophers disagree: they hold variously that it looks pink, white, both, and no colour at all. A new approach is offered. After reviewing the dispute, a reinterpretation of perceptual constancy is offered. In accordance with this reinterpretation, it is argued that perceptual features such as color must always be predicated of perceptual objects. Thus, it might be that in pinkish light, the wall looks white and (...) the light looks pink. The paper concludes by discussing some criteria for object identification in perceptual states. (shrink)

Argues that the meaning of perceptual states depends on certain simple "actions" of conditioning and habituation innately associated with them. A game theoretic account of the meaning of perceptual states is offered.

Does Parmenides really use the non-existence argument to deny the past?

A brief comment on Mark Bedau's critique of naturalist theories of teleology. A positive account is offered in "Teleology and the Product Analogy".

Cognitive definitions cannot accommodate fear as it occurs in species incapable of sophisticated cognition. Some think that fear must, therefore, be noncognitive. This paper explores another option, arguably more in line with evolutionary theory: that like other "biological universals" fear admits of variation across and within species. A paradigm case of such universals is species: it is argued that they can be defined by ostension in the manner of Putnam and Kripke without implying that they must have an invariable essence. (...) Emotions can be defined in this way too, in principle, but the theoretical understanding of homology necessary to do so is lacking at present. (shrink)

The paper argues that material objects are the primary referents of visual states -- not places, as Austen Clark would have it in his A Theory of Sentience.

Argues for a category of “cognitive feelings”, which are representationally significant, but are not part of the content of the states they accompany. The feeling of pastness in episodic memory, of familiarity (missing in Capgras syndrome), and of motivation (that accompanies desire) are examples. The feeling of presence that accompanies normal visual states is due to such a cognitive feeling; the “two visual systems” are partially responsible for this feeling.

Plant reproduction is vital for species survival, and is also central to the production of food for human consumption. Seeds result from the successful fertilization of male and female gametes, but our understanding of the development, differentiation of gamete lineages and fertilization processes in higher plants is limited. Germ cells in animals diverge from somatic cells early in embryo development, whereas plants have distinct vegetative and reproductive phases in which gametes are formed from somatic cells after the plant has made (...) the transition to flowering and the formation of the reproductive organs. Recently, novel insights into the molecular mechanisms underlying male germ‐line initiation and male gamete development in plants have been obtained. Transcriptional repression of male germ‐line genes in non‐male germ‐line cells have been identified as a key mechanism for spatial and temporal control of male germ‐line development. This review focuses on molecular events controlling male germ‐line development especially, on the nature and regulation of gene expression programs operating in male gametes of flowering plants. BioEssays 29:1124–1132, 2007. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

The authors attempt to show that certain forms of behavior of the human immune system are illuminatingly regarded as errors in that system's operation. Since error-ascription can occur only within the context of an intentional/teleological characterization of the system, it follows that such a characterization is illuminating. It is argued that error-ascription is objective, non-anthropomorphic, irreducible to any purely causal form of explanation of the same behavior, and further that it is wrong to regard all errors of the immune system (...) as due to malfunction or maladaptation. <br>. (shrink)

We have argued elsewhere that: (A) Natural selection is not a cause of evolution. (B) A resolution-of-forces (or vector addition) model does not provide us with a proper understanding of how natural selection combines with other evolutionary influences. These propositions have come in for criticism recently, and here we clarify and defend them. We do so within the broad framework of our own “hierarchical realization model” of how evolutionary influences combine.

All living things have sensory capacities. Plants, in particular, have sensory receptors, transduce the activations of these receptors, and process these outputs in order to manage actions that demand sensory integration. However, there is a kind of sensory function that plants cannot perform. They cannot sense something as other than themselves. Animals, by contrast, perceive. They experience two kinds of "othering impressions"—impressions of entities as located outside and available for interaction, and hence as distinct from the perceiving subject. First, they (...) represent external entities in a "body scheme" that enables sensorimotor interaction with these entities. Second, higher animals such as mammals and birds and possibly fish, represent these entities as located relative to a "cognitive map." These othering impressions are very important because they are the foundation for the human conceptions of the self and other. (shrink)

In this paper I shall examine Aristotle's treatment of a certain puzzle concerning change. In section I, I shall show that within a certain standard framework for the semantics of subject-predicate sentences a number of things that Aristotle wants to maintain do not make sense. Then, I shall outline a somewhat non-standard account of the semantics for such sentences — arguably Aristotle's — and show how the proposals concerning change fit quite naturally into this framework. The results of this exercise (...) will enable us to say something quite precise about applications of some obscure but characteristically Aristotelian doctrines: that ‘is’ is ‘said in many ways,’ that his predecessors got the Law of Opposites wrong. They also shed some light upon Aristotle's ontology of predicables. (shrink)

In this short paper, I outline four philosophical arguments concerning the objects we perceive. These arguments build up to the conclusion that the objects of perceptual experience are material objects. I then show that the first three of these arguments parallel important psychological positions in vision science. Thus, (1) the notion of object used in Logical Atomism resembles the concept as it is defined in the Feature Integration Theory of Treisman and Gelade (1980). But (2) Frank Jackson's (1975) Many-Property Problem (...) leads to a substrate-quality structure for visual experience that corresponds to the structure of attended experience in Feature Integration Theory. A third philosophical argument (3) concerns the perception of movement. This argument culminates in the proposition that perceptual features are seen as belonging to material objects. There is a close resemblance between these objects and those of Zenon Pylyshyn's (1980) FINSTs. Finally, (4) I argue that material objects are the only substrates of multimodal perceptual experience. Perceptual psychology has yet to investigate this structure. (shrink)

What is color? What is color vision? Most philosophers answer by reference to humans: to human color qualia, or to the environmental properties or "quality spaces" perceived by humans. It is argued, with reference to empirical findings concerning comparative color vision and the evolution of color vision, that all such attempts are mistaken. An adequate definition of color vision must eschew reference to its outputs in the human cognition and refer only to inputs: color vision consists in the use of (...) wavelength discrimination in the construction of visual representations. A color quality is one that is generated from such processing. (shrink)

Molyneux addressed his question to Locke in two forms. The question that is most often discussed in the literature is the 1693 version–about whether a newly sighted man could distinguish a globe and a cube when they are presented to his sight alone. But in 1688, he asked whether this man could know which was the globe. While Locke and Molyneux probably thought this an unnecessary add-on, we argue that it changes the question. Locke had no account of how one (...) could know a contingent singular fact by sight or by vision. We argue that we know in these ways by using a process of active sensory exploration that employs the modality in question. A new form of Molyneux’s question emerges from this understanding of perceptual knowledge. While the variety of sensory exploration methods within and across modalities raises considerable difficulties for a positive answer, the original question, like the later version, can ultimately be answered only by empirical investigation. (shrink)

Perception is the ultimate source of our knowledge about contingent facts. It is an extremely important philosophical development that starting in the last quarter of the twentieth century, philosophers have begun to change how they think of perception. The traditional view of perception focussed on sensory receptors; it has become clear, however, that perceptual systems radically transform the output of these receptors, yielding content concerning objects and events in the external world. Adequate understanding of this process requires that we think (...) of perception in new ways—how it operates, the differences among the modalities, and integration of content provided by the individual senses. Philosophers have developed new analytic tools, and opened themselves up to new ways of thinking about the relationship of perception to knowledge. The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Perception is a collection of entries by leading researchers that reviews these new directions in philosophical thought. The Introduction to the Handbook reviews the history of the subject from its beginnings in ancient Greece to the nineteenth century, and the way that science and philosophy have together produced new conceptions during the last hundred years. It shows how the new thinking about perception has led to a complex web of theories. (shrink)

When I act on something, three kinds of idea (or representation) come into play. First, I have a non-visual representation of my goals. Second, I have a visual description of the kind of thing that I must act upon in order to satisfy my goals. Finally, I have an egocentric position locator that enables my body to interact with the object. It is argued here that these ideas are distinct. It is also argued that the egocentric position locator functions in (...) the same way as a demonstrative, and that the involvement of such demonstratives in visual content negates naive realism. (This is a nearly final draft of a paper that is to be published in Raftopoulos and Machamer (eds), Perception, Realism, and the Problem of Reference (forthcoming from Cambridge UP. It is a shorter revised version of "Visual Reference", posted earlier.). (shrink)

Homeostatic Property Cluster (HPC) theory suggests that species and other biological taxa consist of organisms that share certain similarities. HPC theory acknowledges the existence of Darwinian variation within biological taxa. The claim is that “homeostatic mechanisms” acting on the members of such taxa nonetheless ensure a significant cluster of similarities. The HPC theorist’s focus on individual similarities is inadequate to account for stable polymorphism within taxa, and fails properly to capture their historical nature. A better approach is to treat distributions (...) of traits in species populations as irreducible facts, explained in terms of selection pressures, genealogy, and other evolutionary factors. We call this view Population Structure Theory (PST). PST accommodates the view, implicit in biological systematics, that species are identified by reference to particular historical populations. (shrink)

The statistical interpretation of the Theory of Natural Selection claims that natural selection and drift are statistical features of mathematical aggregates of individual-level events. Natural selection and drift are not themselves causes. The statistical interpretation is motivated by a metaphysical conception of individual priority. Recently, Millstein, Skipper, and Dietrich (2009) have argued (a) that natural selection and drift are physical processes, and (b) that the statistical interpretation rests on a misconception of the role of mathematics in biology. Both theses are (...) contested. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Omissions and Chronological ComplexitiesJyoti Mohan (bio)The stated purpose of Chinese and Indian Ways of Thinking in Early Modern European Philosophy: The Reception and the Exclusion by Selusi Ambrogio is "to examine the European understanding of China and India within the histories of philosophy from 1600 to 1744."1 Specifically, Ambrogio sets out to investigate the antecedents of the "othering" of non-Western philosophies. How far back did the notion go, (...) that non-Western philosophies were inferior? While Ambrogio often extends his argument to non-Western philosophies in general, in this monograph he examines only what he defines as "orientalist" philosophies—the philosophies of India and China. Since Ambrogio is investigating the histories of philosophy written in Europe, this choice makes sense: India and China were the two philosophical giants that most European philosophers needed to include in their works in order to claim to be universalist. No philosopher who wrote about world philosophies—and by extension no historian of philosophy—could ignore India and China, whether it was to dismiss the philosophies emanating from these geographic regions as inferior, or to extol them as proof that Europe was not the birthplace of "original thought."Ambrogio has chosen a time span from 1600 to 1744 c.e. to represent "the year 1600 … [,] the publication of Barbaricae philosophae antiquitatum by Otto van Heurn[,] and 1744[,] the year of the publication of the last book of the Historia critica by Jakob Brucker."2 Within the limits of this time [End Page 220] span, Ambrogio examines the work of several scholars who included Indian and Chinese philosophies in their "world histories of philosophies" and delineates three major historiographical trends. His rationale for ending his study with Brucker's work is that after this eighteenth-century opus, "Asians were usually excluded from the histories of philosophy."3 This time span seems puzzling to me. I know that most, if not all, of the authors Ambrogio cites had successors in their individual traditions well into the nineteenth century, if not the twentieth. While many histories of philosophy focused solely on the Western and classical traditions (as they did during the period under review by Ambrogio as well), the work of historians and scholars on Orientalist philosophies continued to multiply. To the extent that Ambrogio diligently studies his sources and constructs his argument, his work is commendable, but as a historian my questions for Ambrogio have to do with the underlying rationale for the time span he has chosen, and, by that extension, by the choices of his sources. Below I collect evidence that Asians continue to be included in the histories of philosophy past 1744, and in so doing suggest that this fact has an impact on his historiographical model.For instance, I would like to understand why, in his choice of sources, he has omitted all colonial works, especially since he engages with the argument that descriptions and understandings of Indian and Chinese philosophies were meditated through lenses of proselytization and of conquest. Granted, he is beginning with historians of philosophy, but as the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries progressed, historians also diversified their writings—as Ambrogio acknowledges—into histories of religion for instance. The connections between, and descriptions of, non-Western religions and philosophies were so muddled that it is impossible to separate them, save by attending to the titles of individual authors' works as being about religion or philosophy, respectively.The contents of such works are so closely related, at least in the Indian context, that contemporary historians, especially of the colonial period and of Indology, do not quibble over whether these works are about religion or philosophy. For instance, Paul Masson-Oursel wrote in 1923 that the development of Indian philosophy was integral to and proceeded alongside the development of religion.4 Systems of philosophical thought in India operated within larger systems of religious practice. Based on this model, Masson-Oursel describes the development of Indian philosophy as proceeding from the needs of religion. So, for example, he theorized that the mix of an Indo-Iranian religion and a pastoral, fire-worshipping people with an older indigenous Dravidian culture of agriculture, Goddess worship, and belief in amulets, spells, talismans, and other... (shrink)

The paper intends to objectively review the ecological understanding of Upaniṣhadic ṛṣis. Since ecology is a modern notion, it is required to precisely place it within the Upaniṣhadic thought. For that purpose, a possible ontological structure of Upaniṣhadic philosophy is sorted in which the discussion of ecology becomes meaningful. Upaniṣhadic ṛṣis conceived ecology as a part of their metaphysics, that is, one which is assisted by the devatas. There is a dependent coexistence between Devatas, Humans and the world. This feature (...) of Upaniṣhadic philosophy should not be treated as a declaration for environmental conservation. It is rather seen as a theory of consumption and calibration from both sides. Although ecology is integrated into the Upaniṣhadic metaphysics, it is not one of the subject matters of Upaniṣhads. An understanding of ecology traceable from Upaniṣhads is supplementary to Upaniṣhadic theory of Devatas. Thus, the author concludes that the Upaniṣhadic ecology is metaphysical rather than natural. (shrink)

Patient referral management is an integral part of clinical practice. However, in low-resource settings, referrals are often delayed. The World Health Organization categorizes three types of referral delays; delay in seeking care, in reaching care and in receiving care. Using two case studies of maternal referrals (from a low-resource state in India), this article shows how a culture of downstream blaming permeates referral practice in India. With no referral guidelines to follow, providers in higher-facilities evaluate the clinical decision-making of their (...) peers in lower-facilities based on patient outcome, not on objective measures. The fear of punitive action for an unfavorable maternal outcome is a larger driving factor than patient safety. The article argues for the need to formulate an ecosystem where patient responsibility is shared across the health system. In conclusion, it discusses possible solutions which can bridge communication and information gap between referring facilities. (shrink)

This paper examines the political and ethical problems which arise in the course of undertaking participatory research in developing countries. It argues that, rather than supplanting relationships of power within the knowledge creating process, most participatory research actually strengthens them. Instead a more complete form of dialogic research is required, which will involve struggles within our academies as well as in those other organisations in which our research is situated.

This paper defends two theses about sensory objects. The more general thesis is that directly sensed objects are those delivered by sub-personal processes. It is shown how this thesis runs counter to perceptual atomism, the view that wholes are always sensed indirectly, through their parts. The more specific thesis is that while the direct objects of audition are all composed of sounds, these direct objects are not all sounds—here, a composite auditory object is a temporal sequence of sounds (whereas a (...) composite visual object is a spatial composite). Many composite objects are directly heard in the sense just mentioned. There is a great variety of such composite auditory objects—melodies, harmonies, sequences of phonemes, individual voices, meaning-carrying sounds, and so on. This diversity of auditory objects has an important application to aesthetics. Perceivers do not naturally or easily attend simultaneously to auditory objects that overlap in time. Yet, aesthetic appreciation depends on such an allocation of attention to overlapping objects. (shrink)

Hunger is a psychological state that serves physiological energy homeostasis. I argue that it is a pure underived desire to eat and examine its role in homeostasis. After scene-setting explanations of homeostasis and desire, I argue that hunger is a close phenomenological match with underived desire. Then, I show why desire is an apt instrument for energy homeostasis. Finally, I argue that energy homeostasis is a multi-factorial future-regarding behavioural strategy. Hunger is a special purpose sensory state that serves only to (...) implement the strategy. Thus, it is a sensory desire. I conclude by reflecting on the credibility of this desire. (shrink)

It is evident that disunity is a reality wherever we look in the world today. Even within the Body of Christ there is a lack of unity that is appalling. The universal church needs to develop a greater urgency about it and at the same time, do more about it than most are doing. If the universal church comes to a realization that genuine Christian unity is already ‘an established reality and can progressively be realized and brought into the actualities (...) of life’, perhaps then the universal church would strive harder to create and maintain a sustainable Christian unity making it a ‘lived reality’. As a Reformed family, we believe in the creative and redemptive activity of God, inaugurated in Jesus Christ but not yet completed. The Kingdom of God is a present reality, which will be expressed anew in all its fullness. This is our Christian hope, which is fundamental to our Christian faith and Christian faith is expectant faith. The universal Church therefore must offer the image of a people who are mature in faith and capable of finding a meeting-point beyond denominational barriers and not the image of a people divided and separated because of ecclesiastical differences. It is hoped that the Global Christian Forum will continue to reflect that image. (shrink)