What happens to scientific knowledge when researchers outside the natural sciences bring elements of the latest trend across disciplinary boundaries for their own purposes? Researchers in fields from anthropology to family therapy and traffic planning employ the concepts, methods, and results of chaos theory to harness the disciplinary prestige of the natural sciences, to motivate methodological change or conceptual reorganization within their home discipline, and to justify public policies and aesthetic judgments. Using the recent explosion in the use of chaos (...) theory, _Borrowed Knowledge and the Challenge of Learning across Disciplines _examines the relationship between science and other disciplines as well as the place of scientific knowledge within our broader culture. Stephen H. Kellert’s detailed investigation of the myriad uses of chaos theory reveals serious problems that can arise in the interchange between science and other knowledge-making pursuits, as well as opportunities for constructive interchange. By engaging with recent debates about interdisciplinary research, Kellert contributes a theoretical vocabulary and a set of critical frameworks for the rigorous examination of borrowing. (shrink)

In this book, Phillips gives an overview of the contribution of Nyaya--the classical Indian school that defends an externalist position about knowledge as well as an internalist position about justification. Nyaya literature extends almost two thousand years and comprises hundreds of texts, and in this book, Phillips presents a useful overview of the under-studied system of thought. For the philosopher rather than the scholar of Sanskrit, the book makes a whole range of Nyaya positions and arguments accessible to students of (...) epistemology who are unfamiliar with classical Indian systems. (shrink)

This essay introduces the volume Scientific Pluralism (Volume 19 of Minnesota Studies in Philosophy of Science). Varieties of recent pluralisms are surveyed, the difference between monism and pluralism vis a vis the sciences is clarified, and the authors’ notion of scientific pluralism is advanced.

Ethics & Behavior, Volume 22, Issue 1, Page 42-43, January-February 2012.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy, Psychiatry, & Psychology 12.3 (2005) 239-242 [Access article in PDF] The Uses of Borrowed Knowledge: Chaos Theory and Antidepressants Stephen H. Kellert Keywords chaos, metaphor, rhetoric, values Ever since the popularization of chaos the-ory in the 1980s, there has been an explo-sion of interest in work in nonlinear dynamics generally and the study of strange attractors in particular. From law to economics to theology, researchers in the (...) social sciences and the humanities have sought to make use of the concepts, methods, and results of chaos theory. Previous generations have seen similar attempts to explore the consequences of relativity theory or quantum mechanics for their own areas of inquiry. In examining the implications of chaos for the treatment of mental illness, Douglas Heinrichs provides an example of this phenomenon, which I call "borrowed knowledge." Lacking expertise in the areas of psychotherapy or psychopharmacology, I view his suggestions as a case study in the ways that knowledge gets used across disciplinary boundaries. In these remarks, I examine some of the different functions that borrowed knowledge can serve in order to argue that although cross-disciplinary borrowing can be a fruitful source of new insights, it is not without its dangers. I look at the persuasive function that borrowed knowledge can serve in making one's ideas plausible candidates for further exploration, as well as in motivating methodological change. I look at the conceptual work performed by metaphors, paying special attention to the question of how we can judge whether or not a nonliteral use of knowledge from the natural sciences is fruitful. And finally, I look at the ways in which borrowed knowledge can be used to address evaluative questions—in this case, questions about autonomy and appropriate therapeutic practice. I do not mean for these various functions to be thought of as exclusive categories. Instead, they overlap, interact, and combine in various ways. Rhetorical Functions, Disciplinary Prestige, and Methodologic Change In examining the persuasive uses of chaos theory, I should make it clear that by "persuasive" I do not mean illegitimate or deceptive. When Heinrichs points out that what he calls the traditional model of brain function is used to [End Page 239] present and explain the use of antidepressants (ADs) to clinicians and the general public, it becomes clear that he believes an alternative model can be useful for explicating and justifying the use of ADs for clinicians and patients. This descriptive function of the metaphorical appeal to a chaotic "attractor landscape" shows up where Heinrichs discusses the use of the chaotic model for patient education and the "rationale for pharmacotherapy," giving patients "appropriate expectations."But the rhetorical functions of chaos theory also come into play with audiences other than patients; they apply to the audience for the scholarly article itself, perhaps attracting attention because of the novelty or promise of a new field of research, but also harnessing the considerable disciplinary prestige that the natural sciences wield in our culture. All of these functions are useful in directing attention to the author's suggestions for further research, especially where he suggests that it would provide the clinician with guidance in working with an individual patient. Here I take it that Heinrichs has made fruitful use of the work of Thelen and others on the variability of individual developmental trajectories. This proposal for methodological change suggests that focusing on the dynamics of system and its evolution through time may be important in addition to focusing on equilibrium states. The disciplinary prestige of the natural sciences can provide a valuable and legitimate resource for the persuasive task of encouraging one's colleagues to explore a new methodological approach.A further rhetorical use is found in the appeal to the unpredictability of chaotic systems to account for the variability of results in the application of ADs. We see this where Heinrichs says, "a meaningful science of persons is possible even in the face of their ultimate unpredictability" (2005, 221). The disciplinary prestige of the natural sciences, which in studying chaotic systems are able to achieve genuinely "scientific" status without being able... (shrink)

Scientific pluralism is an issue at the forefront of philosophy of science. This landmark work addresses the question, Can pluralism be advanced as a general, philosophical interpretation of science?

This book is the first philosophy of religion anthology to offer a broad survey of classical and contemporary, Western and non-Western readings. This book includes the standard topics for traditional philosophy of religion courses, as well as ample material for courses incorporating a more global approach. The text also provides abundant pedagogical support for both instructors and stiudents new to the study of non-Western philosophies of religion. It includes such features as an introductory chapter on world religions, introductions to each (...) reading, study questions, glossary, pronunciation guide, and suggested readings. --. (shrink)

For Descartes, our minds are not natural causes because they are not themselves objects; rather, they are the activities that identify objects. In short, they are our challenges to the natural order of things, both in how we adapt to novel situations (as exhibited in what has been called the “rational action test”) and in how we respond in unexpected yet appropriate ways to linguistic cues (in the “language test”). Because these tests reveal ways in which our minds (as “pure,” (...) creative, willful, and immortal substances) introduce novelty into nature, we are not determined (as animals are) by other objects. That is, our rational or linguistic activities are challenges to the order of nature precisely because they are not part of, but rather constitute, nature. Accordingly, “real” (creative) speech is logically prior to finite differentiations and is not limited by laws of nature that constrain animal behavior. (shrink)

Berkeley’s appeal to a posteriori arguments for God’s existence supports belief only in a God who is finite. But by appealing to an a priori argument for God’s existence, Berkeley emphasizes God’s infinity. In this latter argument, God is not the efficient cause of particular finite things in the world, for such an explanation does not provide a justification or rationale for why the totality of finite things would exist in the first place. Instead, God is understood as the creator (...) of the total unity of all there is, the whole of creation. In this a priori argument, we should not focus on the specific objects that God creates, for that requires that we think that God knows each finite thing as distinct from every other. Rather, we should recognize how God creates all things in creating the complex, infinite totality of finite perceivings, each of which exists in virtue of the distinctions and relations it expresses. (shrink)

The emergence of nanotechnology, with all its promises of economic, social, and medical benefits, along with dire predictions of environmental, health, and safety threats, has occasioned an active debate in the Science and Technology Studies field, in which we have seen five distinct conversations that frame the discussion. The topical threads include ethics, regulation, opportunities and threats including utopian/dystopian visions of the future, public perception, public participation. These conversational distinctions are not absolutes with firm borders as they clearly overlap at (...) many points. Nonetheless, common to all is a strong sense that control and consequence are significant problems that have yet to be addressed adequately by the promoters of nanotechnology. A final section addresses articles on nanotechnology that exemplify the social construction theory of technology. We include herein a selective summary of this recent body of science, technology, and society (STS) journal literature focused on the social and ethical interactions of nanotechnology (SEIN) that has emerged in the last few years. The intent is not to be encyclopedic in coverage, but rather to seek to understand, in a general way, the key issues and concepts STS scholars are discussing. It is clear that STS-oriented scholars are well poised to grapple explicitly with the cultural, socio-political, and ethical dimensions of nanotechnology. Drawing on understandings of earlier socio-technical areas of interest and concern—nuclear power, genetically modified organisms, the human genome—such scholars have moved well beyond the questions of whether and where nanotechnology intersects society. More important is their effort to seek an understanding in depth of exactly how they are socio-politically, culturally, and ethically interconnected. In doing so, SEIN studies have at the same time become increasingly diverse and more sophisticated and mature over the course of the past decade. Scholars have quite rightly recognized the inadequacies of blanket ideas of moratoria versus non-regulatory environments, utopian versus dystopian futures, and whether or not the public has a role to play in nanotechnology decision making. Rather, a more sophisticated, often case specific, flexible understanding of the societal context of a given issue or concern is called for. (shrink)

We present three experiments using a novel problem in which participants update their estimates of propensities when faced with an uncertain new instance. We examine this using two different causal structures (common cause/common effect) and two different scenarios (agent‐based/mechanical). In the first, participants must update their estimate of the propensity for two warring nations to successfully explode missiles after being told of a new explosion on the border between both nations. In the second, participants must update their estimate of the (...) accuracy of two early warning tests for cancer when they produce conflicting reports about a patient. Across both experiments, we find two modal responses, representing around one‐third of participants each. In the first, “Categorical” response, participants update propensity estimates as if they were certain about the single event, for example, certain that one of the nations was responsible for the latest explosion, or certain about which of the two tests is correct. In the second, “No change” response, participants make no update to their propensity estimates at all. Across the three experiments, the theory is developed and tested that these two responses in fact have a single representation of the problem: because the actual outcome is binary (only one of the nations could have launched the missile; the patient either has cancer or not), these participants believe it is incorrect to update propensities in a graded manner. They therefore operate on a “certainty threshold” basis, whereby, if they are certain enough about the single event, they will make the “Categorical” response, and if they are below this threshold, they will make the “No change” response. Ramifications are considered for the “categorical” response in particular, as this approach produces a positive‐feedback dynamic similar to that seen in the belief polarization/confirmation bias literature. (shrink)

The scientific study of chaotic dynamics, popularly known as chaos theory, has been described by several writers as a revolution in the sense of Kuhn. I provide a definition of chaos theory and offer a brief description of this field of research. I then take up the question of whether or not chaos theory should be described as "revolutionary," in light of the fact that no well-developed science of nonlinear dynamics preceded it. In some respects, chaos theory may be fruitfully (...) described as an "immature science," and the semantic view of theories helps to bring out some of its important features. Many aspects of this emerging field make it most appropriate to consider it a new style of scientific reasoning, analogous to statistical thinking as interpreted by Ian Hacking. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Perceiving Particulars Blindly:Remarks on a Nyāya-Buddhist ControversyStephen H. PhillipsIntroductionThe discussion by Mark Siderits in this issue—"Perceiving Particulars"—and two pieces by Monima Chadha—the first her article "Perceptual Cognition: A Nyāya-Kantian Approach" (Chadha 2001) and the second her reply to Siderits in this issue—have taught me much.1 I have little to add beyond agreeing on the whole with Siderits and making a few tweaks concerning Nyāya. Chadha astutely captures the insight (...) of Gaṅgeśa, the fourteenth-century Naiyāyika cited by her (and by Siderits): indeterminate perception does not have a "particular as such" as its object (viṣaya), but only, as she says, a non-particular individual such as a universal or another qualifier that is in principle recurrent (recurrent out in the world), perceivable [End Page 389] again, and thus expressible by a (repeatable) word. Nevertheless, the holism of Wilfred Sellars and Kant and the attack on the "given" are not in the spirit of the Nyāya approach to epistemology, which is thoroughly externalist, as Siderits suggests. In several places (one presented below), Gaṅgeśa shows us controversy within Nyāya about indeterminate perception, including a rival Naiyāyika opinion that bare particulars are indeterminately grasped. This is not his own view, which is that positing indeterminate perception of qualifiers and not also of qualificanda is all that we need. But all in all the issue is not such a big deal, since perception does generate determinate knowledge of particulars, although these are always at least barely clothed.The notion of a "bare particular"—that is, the qualificandum thought about as distinct from all of its qualifiers—is an abstraction from what we directly perceive. We know it only by inference (specifically, by an inference of the sāmānyato dṘṣṭa type). Indeterminate perception is also known only by inference. Even in Navya Nyāya, the big deal is what is known determinately in perception, which is the principal way we know anything (the jyeṣṭa pramāṇa). And, clearly, determinate perceptual awareness is often of a particular—"The pot is blue" and "That's a pot," for instance. The particular known—indeed, the bare particular—is an intrinsic part of the viṣayatā, "intentionality," which is the relation between the knowing cognition and the world known.2Contrary to what Chadha says in her first article, "seeing as" does not require mental construction, according to Nyāya. The property bearer (dharmin = viśeṣya, "qualificandum") is grasped by the sense organ and is known directly in determinate perception as well as the qualifier and the qualificative relation. In two subtypes of perceptual awareness, (a) recurrent experience and (b) the recognition of something perceived previously, Chadha is right: the mind is operative, responsive to the firing of saṃskāra, "memory impressions," and fusing previous perceptual data into a current perceiving: (a) "A cow," "Another," "Another," and (b) "This is that Devadatta (I saw yesterday)." But hardly all cases of determinate perception require the mind (in Chadha's sense). The object known is minimally a complex of a property bearer (the particular as such), property, and an ontological relation tying them up, a-inherence-pothood (where "a" designates the pot as bare particular, "the subject of qualification"); the determinate perception, "That's a pot," makes that particular as qualified known.So, you say, I am agreeing with Chadha, whose argument is directed against the particular as such being known (either determinately or indeterminately) in perception. Yes, but the point is that the particular is known in perception; the particular-as-such is known in perception, although it would be fantasy to think it even possible that we could ever see her, this property bearer, well, not so much bare as disembodied. A rough analogy is seeing a door. We say we "see the door" when we see only one side of it, not the back. We see the thing as a door without grasping everything about the door that its being a door entails.Indeterminate perception of qualifiers is a controversial posit that does various work for Gaṅgeśa and other... (shrink)

A survey with readings in critical theory, hermeneutics, structuralism, deconstruction, psychoanalytic feminism, poststructuralism, postcolonialism, and postmodernism. Aimed at students and scholars interested in an overview of movements in continental philosophy in the past century.

Some argue that individuals and organizations doing business in countries where corruption is prevalent should not be expected to adhere to strict standards of ethical practice. The basis for such arguments is faulty. Ethics, unlike etiquette, has a universal basis; it is fundamentally the same all over the world. Even in a practical sense, there are long range advantages to be gained by ethical behavior in these situations. Engineering employees of companies operating in areas where corruption is common are sometimes (...) forced to make very difficult decisions. The focus in this paper is on the ethical aspects of the problem. Laws applying to companies doing business abroad, for example the US Corrupt Practices Act, are not discussed. (shrink)

Drawing on modern physics and ancient metaphysics, Stephen H. Webb constructs a philosophy of Christian materialism based on the unity of matter and spirit in the incarnation.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:“The Whole Internal World His Own”: Locke and Metaphor ReconsideredS. H. ClarkWhy need I name thy Boyle, whose pious search, Amid the dark recesses of his works, The great Creator sought? And why thy Locke, Who made the whole internal world his own?Oh decus! Anglicae certe oh lux altera gentis!... Tu caecas rerum causas, fontemque severum Pande, Pater; tibi enim, tibi, veri magne Sacerdos, Corda patent hominum, atque altae (...) penetralia Mentis.Fourfold Annihilation & at the clangor of the Arrows of Intellect The innumerable Chariots of the Almighty appeard in Heaven And Bacon & Newton & Locke, & Milton & Shakespear & Chaucer1Two features of these encomia to John Locke, composed by James Thomson, Thomas Gray, and William Blake, are immediately striking. Firstly, they are delivered by poets in a tradition customarily seen as a reaction to the intellectual climate induced by Locke’s Essay, a book which Blake famously claimed to regard with “Contempt and Abhorrence.” 2 Secondly, the familiar and somewhat hackneyed characterizations of Locke as philosopher of common-sense, [End Page 241] empiricism, and liberal ideology are refreshingly absent. For Gray he is “veri magne Sacerdos,” great priest of truth; Thomson places him in a pantheon including Shakespeare, Milton, Spenser, and Chaucer; and this ranking is explicitly endorsed in Blake’s “Milton & Shakspear & Chaucer.” Comparable praise of Locke’s imaginative power is conspicuously absent from even the most generous tributes of recent commentators. 3Even if Locke’s philosophical contribution to a variety of debates is fully acknowledged, the question remains of why his major work, An Essay concerning Human Understanding, was held in such high popular esteem—veneration is not too strong a word—during the subsequent century. The text itself appears an improbable candidate for such canonization: George Saintsbury accused its prose of being “positively mean in every point of style,” 4 and certainly in comparison with the poised and lucid ironies of Berkeley and Hume, it cannot but appear prolix, diffuse, and repetitive. The chief (and frequently only) merit grudgingly accorded to it is of disarming informality. Rosalie Colie’s emphasis on the “exploitation of the generic and rhetorical possibilities in the essay form itself “ highlights the conscious manipulation of authorial distance through which Locke creates the effect of sprawling inclusiveness and incom-pletion, but at the expense of conceding that “in exchange for the frankness with which the essayist appeared to present his thinking self, he was allowed certain liberties from logical rigour.” 5 Though the suggestion that a major philosophical text seeks to evade “logical rigour” might seem damning enough, there is a still more insidious equation of Locke’s “middle-style,” his desire “to make, what I have to say, as easie and intelligible to all sort of Readers as I can,” with a complicity with the expectations of his audience. 6 Other critics, notably John Richetti, have put a more positive gloss on the “simple and fortuitously concocted circle of friends” to whom the Essay is addressed, but even these accounts have been obliged to stress the representative and consensual nature of Locke’s thought. 7 This view is perhaps most elegantly expressed by Leslie Stephen: “Locke ruled the thought of his own and the coming period [End Page 242] because he interpreted so completely the fundamental beliefs which had been worked out at this time. He ruled, that is, by obeying.” 8William Walker correctly observes that “identifying and interpreting metaphors of mind” in the Essay are “standard practices of mainstream philosophical commentary from Leibniz to Rorty,” but also notes that these analyses are usually concerned with the degree to which Locke’s reliance on figuration was at variance with and compromised his epistemological doctrine. 9 I would argue that the poetic tributes previously quoted offer a more suggestive and adequate guide to the original impact of his work. In order to substantiate this claim, I shall begin by examining Locke’s apparent renunciation of, yet paradoxical dependence upon metaphor; go on to look at the connection of the “Horizon” to the elegiac presentation of memory and the ethic of mental “Labour”; and conclude by analyzing the complex interdependence of candle and sun within the light imagery employed in the... (shrink)

We extend some results of Adam Kolany to show that large sets of satisfiable sentences generally contain equally large subsets of mutually consistent sentences. In particular, this is always true for sets of uncountable cofinality, and remains true for sets of denumerable cofinality if we put appropriate bounding conditions on the sentences. The results apply to both the propositional and the predicate calculus. To obtain these results, we use delta sets for regular cardinals, and, for singular cardinals, a generalization of (...) delta sets. All of our results are theorems in ZFC. (shrink)

There is a widespread assumption that Berkeley and Spinoza have little in common, even though early Jesuit critics in France often linked them. Later commentators have also recognized their similarities. My essay focuses on how Berkeley 's comments on the Arnauld-Malebranche debate regarding objective and formal reality and his treatment of god's creation of finite minds within the order of nature relate his theory of knowledge to his doctrine in a way similar to that of Spinoza. On estime souvent que (...) Berkeley et Spinoza ont peu en commun, même si les premières critiques jésuites en France les ont souvent liés. D'autres commentateurs ont également reconnu leurs similitudes. Mon essai se concentre sur la manière dont 1 / les remarques de Berkeley sur la discussion entre Arnauld et Malebranche concernant la réalité objective et formelle et 2 / son traitement de la création par Dieu des esprits finis dans l'ordre de la nature mettent en relation sa théorie de la connaissance et sa doctrine de la liberté dans une manière semblable à celle de Spinoza. (shrink)

In his work on the moral status of nonhuman animals, David Clough rejects the theory of anthropocentrism while accepting its practical importance. He thus leaves theology in a dilemma: reflection on animals should not support the very concept that practical approaches to animals require. An alternative is a “weak anthropocentrism” along the line of Gianni Vattimo's “weak ontology.” A weak anthropocentrism is better suited to a Neoplatonic theory of participation, not the traditional framework of creation out of nothing, and it (...) also can give new meaning to the idea of imago Dei and a Christocentric affirmation of nonhuman value. (shrink)

Well-known for its criticism of totalizing accounts of reason and truth, postmodern thought also makes positive contributions to our understanding of the sensual, ideological, and linguistic contingencies that inform modernist representations of self, history, and the world. The positive side of postmodernity includes structuralism and poststructuralism, particularly as expressed by theorists concerned with practices of the body (Lacan, Foucault, Deleuze), commodity differences (Adorno, Althusser), language (Derrida), and gender (Kristeva, Irigaray). Though these challenges to modernity do not privilege subjectivity, they suggest (...) provocative new strategies for appreciating the work of thinkers from Bacon to Kant. (shrink)