In several semantics for branching-time logic, the evaluation rules involve a quantification over the set of all histories in a given tree-like structure T. These semantics are often generalized by replacing these quantifications by quantifications over a bundle in T, that is, over a set of histories fulfilling suitable closure properties. According to this generalization, the basic semantical structures are pairs 〈T, B〉 in which B is a bundle in T.The problem of the definability of the class of complete bundled (...) trees, in a given class G, concerns the existence of a set Γ of formulas such that, for every bundled tree 〈T, B〉 in G, Γ is true in 〈T, B〉 if and only if B is the set of all histories in T. In Ockhamist branching-time logic, sets Γ corresponding to particular classes G have been found. It will be proved that Γ does not exist if G is the class of all bundled trees. (shrink)

Studies of change blindness indicate that more intentional monitoring of changes is necessary to successfully detect changes as scene complexity increases. However, there have been conflicting reports as to whether people are aware of this relation between intention and successful change detection as scene complexity increases. Here we continue our dialogue with [Beck, M. R., Levin, D. T., & Angelone, B. . Change blindness blindness: Beliefs about the roles of intention and scene complexity in change detection. Consciousness and Cognition, 16, (...) 31–51; Beck, M. R., Levin, D. T., & Angelone, B. . Metacognitive errors in change detection: Lab and life converge. Consciousness and Cognition, 16, 58–62] by reporting two experiments that show participants do in fact intuit that more intentional monitoring is needed to detect changes as scene complexity increases. We also discuss how this dialogue illustrates the need for psychological studies to be grounded in measurements taken from real world situations rather than laboratory experiments or questionnaires. (shrink)

The mathematical model of physical problems interprets physical phenomena closely. This research work is focused on numerical solution of a nonlinear mathematical model of fractional Maxwell nanofluid with the finite difference element method. Addition of nanoparticles in base fluids such as water, sodium alginate, kerosene oil, and engine oil is observed, and velocity profile and heat transfer energy profile of solutions are investigated. The finite difference method involving the discretization of time and distance parameters is applied for numerical results by (...) using the Caputo time fractional operator. These results are plotted against different physical parameters under the effects of magnetic field. These results depicts that a slight decrease occurs for velocity for a high value of Reynolds number, while a small value of Re provides more dominant effects on velocity and temperature profile. It is observed that fractional parameters α and β show inverse behavior against u y, t and θ y, t. An increase in volumetric fraction of nanoparticles in base fluids decreases the temperature profile of fractional Maxwell nanofluids. Using mathematical software of MAPLE, codes are developed and executed to obtain these results. (shrink)

[T. M. Scanlon] It is clearly impermissible to kill one person because his organs can be used to save five others who are in need of transplants. It has seemed to many that the explanation for this lies in the fact that in such cases we would be intending the death of the person whom we killed, or failed to save. What makes these actions impermissible, however, is not the agent's intention but rather the fact that the benefit envisaged does (...) not justify an exception to the prohibition against killing or the requirement to give aid. The difference between this explanation and one appealing to intention is easily overlooked if one fails to distinguish between the prospective use of a moral principle to guide action and its retrospective use to appraise the way an agent governed him or herself. Even if this explanation is accepted, however, it remains an open question whether and how an agent's intention may be relevant to the permissibility of actions in other cases. \\\ [Jonathan Dancy] My first four sections concentrate on the second section of Professor Scanlon's contribution, where he lays out his conception of moral principles and of the role they play in theory and practice. I will raise questions on the following issues: 1. Scanlon's initial introduction of the notion of a principle. 2. His rejection of the standard view that principles are concerned with the forbidding, permitting and requiring of actions. 3. His rejection of pro tanto conceptions of principles in favour of a conception of them as conclusive. 4. The resulting account of what it is for a principle to face and survive exceptions. Scanlon's discussion of these matters here both appeals to and is in some respects more detailed than the relevant section of his recent What We Owe to Each Other. The topic is interesting both for the role played by principles in Scanlon's present discussion of intention and permissibility, and more generally because of his account of wrongness: an act is wrong iff it is ruled out by principles that nobody could reasonably reject. The remainder of my contribution is concerned with the ostensible focus of IP, namely the relevance of agent-intentions to the permissibility of what is done. (shrink)

This collection investigates the current state of play in studies informed by Marxism. It includes a magisterial essay on state theory by Bob Jessop, a discussion of fundamental socialist values using analytical Marxism by Alan Carling, an introduction to Fromm's humanist Marxism by Lawrence Wilde, and provocative pieces on Marxism and ecology, Marxism and feminism, the debate between Marxists and post-Marxists, the democratic Marxism of Hal Draper, the confrontation between Marxism and Liberalism, and Marxism's place in the history of political (...) thought. (shrink)

This paper argues that epistemic errors rooted in group- or identity- based biases, especially those pertaining to disability, are undertheorized in the literature on medical error. After sketching dominant taxonomies of medical error, we turn to the field of social epistemology to understand the role that epistemic schemas play in contributing to medical errors that disproportionately affect patients from marginalized social groups. We examine the effects of this unequal distribution through a detailed case study of ableism. There are four primary (...) mechanisms through which the epistemic schema of ableism distorts communication between nondisabled physicians and disabled patients: testimonial injustice, epistemic overconfidence, epistemic erasure, and epistemic derailing. Measures against epistemic injustices in general and against schema-based medical errors in particular are ultimately issues of justice that must be better addressed at all levels of health care practice. (shrink)

Smilek, Eastwood, Reynolds, and Kingstone suggests that the studies reported in Beck, M. R., Levin, D. T. and Angelone, B. A. are not ecologically valid. Here, we argue that not only are change blindness and change blindness blindness studies in general ecologically valid, but that the studies we reported in Beck, Levin, and Angelone, 2007 are as well. Specifically, we suggest that many of the changes used in our study could reasonably be expected to occur in the real world. (...) Furthermore, the conclusion from Beck et al. that knowledge about the role of intention and scene complexity in change detection is not readily accessible applies not only to the laboratory studies we conducted but also to real world situations. (shrink)

Bhattacharyya, K. The Advaita concept of subjectivity.--Deutsch, E. Reflections on some aspects of the theory of rasa.--Nakamura, H. The dawn of modern thought in the East.--Organ, T. Causality, Indian and Greek.--Chatterjee, M. On types of classification.--Lacombe, O. Transcendental imagination.--Bahm, A. J. Standards for comparative philosophy.--Herring, H. Appearance, its significance and meaning in the history of philosophy.--Chang Chung-yuan. Pre-rational harmony in Heidegger's essential thinking and Chʼan thought.--Staal, J. F. Making sense of the Buddhist tetralemma.--Enomiya-Lassalle, H. M. The mysticism of Carl Albrecht (...) and Zen.--Parrinder, G. The nature of mysticism.--Cairns, G. E. Axiological contributions of East and West to the spiritual development of mankind.--Mayeda, S. Śaṇkara's view of ethics.--Mercier, A. On peace.--Barlingay, S. S. A discussion of some aspects of Gaudapāda's philosophy. (shrink)

Logic; Islamic philosophy; Islam--doctrines.

This “Legal Briefing” column covers recent legal developments involving patient decision aids. This topic has been the subject of recent articles in JCE. It is included in the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. And it has received significant attention in the biomedical literature, including a new book, a thematic issue of Health Affairs, and a recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine. Moreover, physicians and health systems across the United States are increasingly integrating decision aids into (...) their clinical practice. Both federal and state laws play a significant role in promoting this expanded use. On the other hand, concerns about liability could stymie development and implementation. We categorize legal developments concerning patient decision aids into the following five sections:1. Development of decision aids2. Effectiveness of decision aids3. Federal regulation of decision aids4. State regulation of decision aids5. Legal concerns regarding decision aids. (shrink)

We introduce a simple model for so-called spin-echo experiments. We show that the model is a mincing system. On the basis of this model we study fine-grained entropy and coarse-grained entropy descriptions of these experiments. The coarse-grained description is shown to be unable to provide an explanation of the echo signals, as a result of the way in which it ignores dynamically generated correlations. This conclusion is extended to the general debate on the foundations of statistical mechanics. We emphasize the (...) need for an appropriate mechanism to explain the gradual suppression over time of the correlations in a thermodynamic system. We argue that such a mechanism can only be provided by the interventionist approach, in which the interaction of the system with its environment is taken into account. Irreversible behavior is then seen to arise not as a result of limited measurement accuracy , but as a result of the fact that thermodynamic systems are limited systems which interact with their environment. A detailed discussion is given of recent objections to the interventionist approach in the literature. (shrink)

In response to comments on my book, Being Realistic about Reasons, by Justin Clarke-Doane, David Enoch and Tristram McPherson, and Gideon Rosen, I try to clarify my domain-based view of ontology, my understanding of the epistemology of normative judgments, and my interpretation of the phenomenon of supervenience.

Explains how a contractualist moral theory can explain the moral phenomena commonly called rights, although it does not appeal to the notion of a right as a basic element of moral thinking, or explain the difference between rights violations and wrongs of other kinds. Argues that the latter failure is not an important fault.

This is the text of The Lindley Lecture for 1996, given by T.M. Scanlon, an American philosopher.

What if human joy went on endlessly? Suppose, for example, that each human generation were followed by another, or that the Western religions are right when they teach that each human being lives eternally after death. If any such possibility is true in the actual world, then an agent might sometimes be so situated that more than one course of action would produce an infinite amount of utility. Deciding whether to have a child born this year rather than next is (...) a situation wherein an agent may face several alternatives whose effects could well ramify endlessly on such suppositions, for the child born this year would be a different person—one who preferred different things, performed different actions, and had different descendants—from a child born next year. It has recently been suggested that traditional utilitarianism stumbles on such cases of infinite utility. Specifically, utilitarianism seems to require, for its application, that all experience of pleasure and pain cease at some time in the future or asymptotically approach zero.2 If neither of these conditions holds, then the utility produced by each of two alternative actions may turn out to be infinite, and utilitarianism thus loses its ability to discriminate morally between them. (shrink)

Beginning from a basis in the theoretical analysis of comparative religious ethics provided by David Little and Sumner Twiss, this essay extends that analysis by sketching certain "benchmark" theoretical options in comparative religious ethics and by identifying certain fundamental questions which ethicists ought to address to the data supplied by descriptive studies of comparative religions. To illustrate the application of the theoretical model thus defined, the essay concludes with an analysis of selected themes in the essays by Campany, Guberman, and (...) Read in this Focus. (shrink)

We are appreciative of the broad range of commentaries our target article generated. The inquiry into the contingency phase of public health emergencies is nascent and the cl...