Geckos have gained ecological access to novel microhabitats by exploiting intermolecular van der Waals forces, which allow them to climb smooth vertical surfaces. They use microscopic surface‐based phenomena to thrive in a macroscopic mass‐ and kinetic energy‐based world. Here we detail this as a premier example of integrative biology, spanning seven orders of magnitude and a lot of interesting biology. Emergent properties arising from molecular adhesion include several adaptive radiations that have produced a great diversity of geckos worldwide. BioEssays 27:647–652, (...) 2005. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

When Thomas Jefferson placed 'the pursuit of happiness' along with life and liberty in The Declaration of Independence he was most likely referring to Aristotle's concept of happiness, or eudaimonia. Eudaimonia is not about good feelings but rather the fulfilment of human potentials. Fulfilment is made possible by virtue; the moderation of desire and emotion by reason. The Psychology of Happiness was the first book to bring together psychological, philosophical, and physiological theory and research in support of Aristotle's view. It (...) examines the similarity between Aristotle's concept of virtue and modern cognitive theories of emotion. It discusses the discovery of human potentials, the development of virtue and its neurological basis, the mistaken idea that fulfilment is selfish, and several other issues related to the pursuit of a good human life. (shrink)

In this paper I have not, of course, presented all the embryological data that can be collected from the Talmudic and Midrashic literature. More details can be found in Julius Preuss' classical work on biblical and talmudic medicine, now available in Fred Rosner's English translation and in a French M.D. thesis by Martine Michel.75 I also did not present any data on teratology, and did not deal with the very rich Jewish mystical lore, the Cabbala. But a few comments are (...) in order here about the material on embryology.There are very few original ideas in the Talmudic corpus on embryology, but it is obvious that the Sages were well aware of the Greek and Roman theories on embryology.The fact that the Talmud is a compilation that was built up slowly, during several centuries, explains why the information recorded in it cannot be ascribed solely to one school of thought or one clear-cut influence.When a definite problem was difficult to solve because there were many different theories about it, the Sages based their opinion on a famous experiment that seemed to offer guarantees of validity. This was the case with the controversial problem of the formation of the embryo and its sexual differentiation, where the Sages made use of an experiment allegedly initiated by Cleopatra.The Sages were ready to discuss scientific problems with non-Jewish scholars and even to accept their arguments. This was the case with the important topic of the time of the entry of the soul into the embryo. But the legal conclusions drawn from the Sages' opinion were not consistent with those declared by Churth Fathers such as Tertullian. Embryotomy, for instance, was permitted by Jewish law.Wide interest, scholarly discussions, suggestive descriptions and readiness to inquire and to obtain detailed information characterized the Talmudic discussions of embryology.In conclusion, I quote a Talmudic text that reviews the whole process of embryological development through the sequence of prayers of a faithful Jew who learns that his wife is expecting a baby.The first three days, [he should pray to the Lord] that the seed should not putrefy.From the third to the fortieth day: that the child should be a male.From the fortieth day to the third month: that there should not occur any superfetation, which could lead the first embryo to be a fetus compressus.From the third to the sixth month: that an abortion should not occur.From the sixth to the ninth month: that the birth should be without problems.76. (shrink)

I Know There is a God explores the creation of the world and the role of the Designer God. The book refutes the arguments of neo-Darwinism and Punctuated Equilibrium; expounds upon Paley's imagery of the watch as evidence that both the watch and the world need a maker; and seeks to answer Nietzsche's question of whether or not the watchmaker is still alive.

Descartes holds that when you perceive something with perfect clarity, you are compelled to assent and cannot doubt. (This is a psychological claim.) Many commentators read him as endorsing Psychologism, according to which this compulsion is a matter of brute psychological force. I show that, in Descartes’s view, perfect clarity provides a reason for assent—indeed a perfect reason, which precludes any reason for doubt. (This is a normative claim.) Furthermore, advancing a view I call Rational Force, he holds that the (...) normative claim explains the psychological one: since your will is naturally responsive to reasons, you are compelled to assent because you have a perfect reason to assent. This coheres with his view that will is essentially active, self-determined, and free. The force that clarity exerts on the will is not the brute push of an efficient cause, but the rational pull of a final cause. (shrink)

Clear and distinct perception is the centrepiece of Descartes’s philosophy — it is the source of all certainty — but what does he mean by ‘clear’ and ‘distinct’? According to the prevailing approach, what it means for a perception to be clear is that its content has a certain objective property, like truth. I argue instead that clarity is at least partly a subjective, phenomenal quality whereby a content is presented as true to the perceiving subject. Clarity comes in degrees. (...) Any weak degree of clarity, available to the senses, can be merely subjective, since what it presents as true may not actually be true. But complete clarity, available to intellectual perception, has an objective dimension, since what it presents as true is always some truth, some bit of reality. Further, I argue that the other perceptual qualities that Descartes identifies — obscurity, confusion, and distinctness — are all defined in terms of clarity. Of particular note is the fact that distinctness is not a positive feature to be added to clarity: a distinct perception is just a completely clear perception. (shrink)

The essay aims to discuss a global skepticism about epistemic justification called Agrippa's Trilemma. Based on its exposition, the article will deal with the infinitist alternative of justification, traditional foundationalism and the hypothesis of the infallibility of introspection. It concludes that introspection beliefs are not verifiable propositional attitudes, representing an advantage to the infinitist theory. Keywords: Skepticism; Infinitism; Agrippa’s Trilemma; Epistemic Justification.

Written by researchers in their field, this book is about the skills beyond basic word recognition that are necessary for the processing and comprehension of spoken and written language. It offers topics such as: language and text analysis; cognitive processing and comprehension; development of literacy; literacy and schooling; and more.

European Journal of Philosophy, Volume 30, Issue 1, Page 3-16, March 2022.

Garry Young has made three objections against Sebastian Ostritsch’s endorsement view on the immorality of computer games. In this paper, we want to defend the endorsement view against all three of them.

Judith Butler has been arguably the most important gender theorist of the past 20 years. This edited volume draws leading international political theorists into dialogue with her political theory.

One implication of Bell’s theorem is that there cannot in general be hidden variable models for quantum mechanics that both are noncontextual and retain the structure of a classical probability space. Thus, some hidden variable programs aim to retain noncontextuality at the cost of using a generalization of the Kolmogorov probability axioms. We generalize a theorem of Feintzeig to show that such programs are committed to the existence of a finite null cover for some quantum mechanical experiments, i.e., a finite (...) collection of probability zero events whose disjunction exhausts the space of experimental possibilities. (shrink)

For this new edition, Roger Ariew has adapted Samuel Clarke's edition of 1717, modernizing it to reflect contemporary English usage. Ariew's introduction places the correspondence in historical context and discusses the vibrant philosophical climate of the times. Appendices provide those selections from the works of Newton that Clarke frequently refers to in the correspondence. A bibliography is also included.

This paper responds to Friend’s (2023) critique of the Powers-BSA, a view according to which laws of nature are efficient descriptions of how modally laden properties (powers) are possibly distributed in spacetime. In the course of this response, the paper discusses the nature of scientific and metaphysical explanation, the aim of science and the structure of modal space.

Buss, S.R., The undecidability of k-provability, Annals of Pure and Applied Logic 53 75-102. The k-provability problem is, given a first-order formula ø and an integer k, to determine if ø has a proof consisting of k or fewer lines . This paper shows that the k-provability problem for the sequent calculus is undecidable. Indeed, for every r.e. set X there is a formula ø and an integer k such that for all n,ø has a proof of k sequents if (...) and only if n ε X. (shrink)

Fitch's Paradox and the Paradox of the Knower both make use of the Factivity Principle. The latter also makes use of a second principle, namely the Knowledge-of-Factivity Principle. Both the principle of factivity and the knowledge thereof have been the subject of various discussions, often in conjunction with a third principle known as Closure. In this paper, we examine the well-known Surprise Examination paradox considering both the principles on which this paradox rests and some formal characterisations of the surprise notion, (...) crucial in this paradox. Standard formalizations of the Surprise Examination paradox in modal logic do not seem, at first glance, to depend on either factivity or knowledge-of-factivity, but we will argue that both factivity and knowledge-of-factivity play a key implicit role in the paradox. Namely, they are implicitly, perhaps unintentionally, used in order to simplify the definition of surprise. We analyze modal logical formalizations of three versions of the paradox concluding that the Surprise Examination paradox is the result of two flaws: the assumption of knowledge-of-factivity, and the over-simplification of the definition of "surprise" accordingly. By fixing these two flaws, the Surprise Examination paradox vanishes. (shrink)

Whereas a large body of research has focused on the development of children as learners, relatively little research has focused on the development of children as teachers. Moreover, even less research has focused on the potential cognitive mechanisms associated with high-quality teaching. Here, we review evidence that children’s selective teaching is associated with at least three cognitive skills: the ability to represent mental states, the ability to infer mental states in real-time, as well as executive function skills. We note potential (...) cultural differences in children’s teaching and highlight the need for future research. (shrink)

The UK Government’s Code of Conduct for data-driven health and care technologies, specifically artificial intelligence -driven technologies, comprises 10 principles that outline a gold-standard of ethical conduct for AI developers and implementers within the National Health Service. Considering the importance of trust in medicine, in this essay I aim to evaluate the conceptualisation of trust within this piece of ethical governance. I examine the Code of Conduct, specifically Principle 7, and extract two positions: a principle of rationally justified trust that (...) posits trust should be made on sound epistemological bases and a principle of value-based trust that views trust in an all-things-considered manner. I argue rationally justified trust is largely infeasible in trusting AI due to AI’s complexity and inexplicability. Contrarily, I show how value-based trust is more feasible as it is intuitively used by individuals. Furthermore, it better complies with Principle 1. I therefore conclude this essay by suggesting the Code of Conduct to hold the principle of value-based trust more explicitly. (shrink)

Recent investigations have uncovered large, consistent deviations from the predictions of the textbook representation of Homo economicus (Roth et al, 1992, Fehr and Gächter, 2000, Camerer 2001). One problem appears to lie in economists’ canonical assumption that individuals are entirely self-interested: in addition to their own material payoffs, many experimental subjects appear to care about fairness and reciprocity, are willing to change the distribution of material outcomes at personal cost, and reward those who act in a cooperative manner while punishing (...) those who do not even when these actions are costly to the individual. These deviations from what we will term the canonical model have important consequences for a wide range of economic phenomena, including the optimal design of institutions and contracts, the allocation of property rights, the conditions for successful collective action, the analysis of incomplete contracts, and the persistence of noncompetitive wage premia. Fundamental questions remain unanswered. Are the deviations from the canonical model evidence of universal patterns of behavior, or do the individual’s economic and social environments shape behavior? If the latter, which economic and social conditions are involved? Is reciprocal behavior better explained statistically by individuals’ attributes such as their sex, age, or relative wealth, or by the attributes of the group to which the individuals belong? Are there cultures that approximate the canonical account of self-regarding behavior? Existing research cannot answer such questions because virtually all subjects have been university students, and while there are cultural differences among student populations throughout the world, these differences are small compared to the range of all social and cultural environments. To address the above questions, we and our collaborators undertook a large cross-cultural study of behavior in ultimatum, public good, and dictator games.. (shrink)

Abstract: Contemporary analytic philosophers of the “reactive attitudes” tend to share a simple conception of guilt as “self-directed blame”—roughly, an “unpleasant affect” felt in combination with, or in response to, the thought that one has violated a moral requirement, evinced substandard “quality of will,” or is blameworthy. I believe that this simple conception is inadequate. As an alternative, I offer my own theory of guilt’s logic and its connection to morality. In doing so, I attempt to articulate guilt’s defining thought (...) or proposition through an extended investigation and analysis of guilt’s many competing metaphors, which I trace from the Hebrew Bible to the New Testament to Shakespeare to contemporary vernacular. My interpretation of this literary genealogy offers a way to understand guilt’s seemingly disparate metaphors in terms of a single master-image that illuminates our self-conceptions and our relationship to morality. I conclude by making a very brief start toward a moral vindication of guilt against the backdrop of Nietzschean and Freudian analyses that explicitly call guilt’s place in a healthy social and personal life into question. I suggest that once guilt’s logic is made explicit, we can see that it makes sense of, honors, and addresses some of our deepest aspirations and needs. (shrink)

There's no doubt that reproductive technologies can transform lives for the better. Infertile couples and single, lesbian, gay, intersex, and transgender people have the potential to form families in ways that would have been inconceivable years ago. Yet we are concerned about the widespread commercialization of certain egg‐freezing programs, the messages they propagate about motherhood, the way they blur the line between care and experimentation, and the manipulative and exaggerated marketing that stretches the truth and inspires false hope in women (...) of various ages. We argue that although reproductive technology, and egg freezing in particular, promise to improve women's care by offering more choices to achieve pregnancy and childbearing, they actually have the potential to be disempowering. First, commercial motives in the fertility industry distort women's medical deliberations, thereby restricting their autonomy; second, having the option to freeze their eggs can change the meaning of women's reproductive choices in a way that is limiting rather than liberating. (shrink)

The only complete edition in English of Baruch Spinoza's works, this volume features Samuel Shirley's preeminent translations, distinguished at once by the lucidity and fluency with which they convey the flavor and meaning of Spinoza's original texts. Michael L. Morgan provides a general introduction that places Spinoza in Western philosophy and culture and sketches the philosophical, scientific, religious, moral and political dimensions of Spinoza's thought. Morgan's brief introductions to each work give a succinct historical, biographical, and philosophical overview. A (...) chronology and index are included. (shrink)

We revisit the flight-to-quality and flight-from-quality occurrences vis-à-vis the stock-bond nexus across differing investment time scales in the COVID-19 era, using a novel technique hinged on a denoised frequency-domain transfer entropy. Our findings divulge that flights, both FTQ and FFQ, could be attained during stress periods. Generally, in the intermediate term of the COVID-19 pandemic, both Islamic and conventional bonds could act as safe havens, diversifiers, and hedges for international equities, and the same could be observed for international equities. We (...) reiterate empirically that flights may improve the financial system’s stability and robustness by allowing diversity to be effective when it is most required. The findings have financial and portfolio implications for investors considering how to deploy their investments in the COVID-19 era. Our findings may impact policymakers’ responses to changes in various asset classes, allowing them to better monitor financial markets and adjust macroeconomic policies. (shrink)

In this essay, the authors explore the phenomenon of utterance we find in speech and teaching. Jean-Luc Marion’s third phenomenological reduction serves as a methodological foundation for this exploration which moves through Biblical literature and autobiography – both centred on the story of the election of Samuel – before leading into a meditation on the Call of and Response to the Other. The Call and Response guide the essay to a theory of prophetic teaching emerging within its phenomenology of (...) utterance that situates itself between philosophical anthropology and philosophical theology, and between Jewish and Catholic traditions. (shrink)

The continuum between involuntary autobiographical memories and déjà vu, as proposed by Barzykowski and Moulin, can be better defined by considering research on autobiographical retrieval in patients with Alzheimer's disease. Although autobiographical retrieval in patients with Alzheimer's disease can generally be associated with a sense of familiarity, involuntary retrieval can trigger an autonoetic experience of retrieval in these patients.

Two articles by Lewis Feuer caught my attention in the '40s when 1 was wondering, asa student physicist, about the relations of physics to philosophy and to the world in turmoil. One was his essay on 'The Development of Logical Empiricism' (1941), and the other his critical review of Philipp Frank's biography of Einstein, 'Philosophy and the Theory of Relativity' (1947). How extraordinary it was to find so intelligent, independent, critical, and humane a mind; and furthermore he went further, as (...) I soon realized when I looked for his name on other publications. I recall arguing with myself over his exploration of 'Indeterminacy and Economic Development' (1948), and even more when I read his 'Dialectical Materialism and Soviet Science' (1949). More papers, and then the fascinating, sometimes irritating, always insightful, books. His monograph on Psychoanalysis and Ethics 1955, the beautiful sociological and humanist study of Spinoza and the Rise of Liberalism (1958), his essays on 'The Social Roots of Einstein's Theory of Relativity' (1971) together with the book on Einstein and the Genera tions of Science (1974), the splendid reader from the works of Marx and Engels, Basic Writings on Politics and Philosophy (1959) which was a major text of the '60s, the stimulating essays on the social formation which seems to have been required for a modern scientific movement to develop, set forth most convincingly in The Scientific Intellectual (1963). (shrink)

We argue that: (1) disappointment in the effectiveness of i-frame interventions depends on realistic expectations about how they could work; (2) opportunities for system reform are rare, and i-frame interventions can lay important groundwork; (3) Chater & Loewenstein's evidence that i-frame interventions detract from s-frame approaches is limited; and (4) nonetheless, behavioural scientists should consider what more they can contribute to systemic reforms.

Since his debut feature The Return (2003), Andrey Zvyagintsev's films have drawn focus from film critics and theorists seeking to investigate a contextual analysis or the director's religious allusions. Hailed as the New Tarkovsky by some, a western-centric perspective has placed Zvyagintsev within the Russian canon from which he originates. However, in doing so, there has been a tendency to overlook a form and aesthetic that seeks to avoid these categorisations. By attempting to engage with his films independently from these (...) frameworks and from a purely humanist perspective of subjectivity, the depth of Zvyagintsev's cinema comes to the surface. We find that the metaphysical reflections of Zvyagintsev's films relate not only to the cinema and its artificial worlds, but also to the position of the human in the real world. Independent of a prior historical or religious perspective, this metaphysical relationship to Zvyagintsev's films focuses on the human and the human consciousness. This article will engage with Zvyagintsev's first two features, The Return (2003) and The Banishment (2007), considering metaphysical aphorisms of one of Zvyagintsev's constant reference points, Georgian philosopher Merab Mamardashvili. This will allow us the opportunity to rethink the relations between cinematic form, the human and the consciousness. (shrink)

SPANISH: La suposición de la obediencia estricta, y las demás características de la sociedad bien ordenada (SBO), es una considerable idealización que hace Rawls de las circunstancias históricas reales en las que existen las sociedades contemporáneas. De allí la objeción de que todo el proyecto de la justicia como equidad es inútil, pues de nada sirve saber cuáles serían los principios de la justicia para una SBO que solamente existe en la teoría. Los objetivos de este artículo son aclarar el (...) significado de la suposición de una SBO del que se ocupa una teoría ideal, indicar las relaciones de este tipo de teoría con la metodología de la filosofía política y la noción de factibilidad y reevaluar la objeción de inutilidad a la luz de estas consideraciones. Se propone una respuesta doble a la objeción de inutilidad derivada de obra de Rawls. ENGLISH: The assumption of strict obedience, and other features of the well ordered society (WOS), is a great idealization that Rawls does from the actual and historical circumstances in which contemporary societies exist. From there comes the objection according to which the whole Project of justice as fairness is just useless, for it has no purpose at all to know what would it be the principles of justice for a well ordered society that only exist in theory. The aims of this paper are to make clear the meaning of the well ordered society’s assumption - the society which the ideal theory takes care of -; to point out the links between this kind of theory and the methodology of the political philosophy and the notion of feasibility; and to look again the useless objection in the light of the above considerations. Before the useless objection, it is proposed a twofold answer that could be inferred from Rawls work. (shrink)

A mime presented on videotape Adler’s six great ideas of truth, goodness, beauty, liberty, equality, and justice; their opposites; and the transitions from the positive or “good” concepts to their opposites. Using Johansson’s (1973) technique, the performer’s 12 joints were marked with points of light. Overall, the viewers had marginal success in identifying the concepts, but females were much more successful than males in identifying the “bad” ones of evil, slavery, falsehood, and ugliness, averaging 62% correct to the males’ 23%. (...) The results agree with Hall’s (1984) discussion of sex differences in the interpretation of nonverbal behavior. (shrink)