As part of the development of the Symbolic and Sub-symbolic Robotics Intelligence Control System, we have implemented a memory store to allow a robot to retain knowledge from previous exp...

RationaleThere are growing concerns over the occurrence of adverse physiologic events occurring in pilots during operation of United States Air Force and Navy high-performance aircraft. We hypothesize that a heightened inspiratory work of breathing experienced by jet pilots by virtue of the on-board life support system may constitute a “distraction stimulus” consequent to an increased sensation of respiratory muscle effort. As such, the purpose of this study was to determine whether increasing inspiratory muscle effort adversely impacts on attentional performance.MethodsTwelve, healthy (...) participants were recruited for this study. Participants completed six repetitions of a modified Masked Conjunctive Continuous Performance Task protocol while breathing against four different inspiratory threshold loads to assess median reaction times. A computer-controlled threshold loading device was used to set the inspiratory threshold loads. Repeated measures analysis of variances were performed to examine: the efficacy of the threshold loading device to impose significantly higher loading at each loading condition; the effects of loading condition on respiratory muscle effort sensation; and the influence of hypercapnia on MCCPT scores during inspiratory threshold loading. Generalized additive mixed effects models were used to examine the potential non-linear effects of respiratory muscular effort sensation, device loading, and hypercapnia, on MCCPT scores during inspiratory threshold loading.ResultsInspiratory threshold loading significantly augmented inspiratory effort sensation and the inspiratory pressure-time product. Our analyses also revealed that median hit RT was positively associated with inspiratory effort sensation during inspiratory loading trials.ConclusionThe findings of this work suggest that it was not increasing inspiratory muscle effort per se, but rather participant’s subjective perception of inspiratory “load” that impacts negatively on attentional performance; i.e., as the degree of inspiratory effort sensation increased, sotoo did median hit RT. As such, it is reasonable to suggest that minimizing inspiratory effort sensation during high-performance flight operations may prove useful in reducing pilot RTs during complex behavioral tasks. (shrink)

The relations of comparison and contrast among the viewpoints of characters and between the viewpoints of authors and characters is one of the most important dimensions of meaning in literary texts.... It is for this reason that the analysis of irony, as a central tonal medium for registering differences in point of view, occupies a position of singular importance in the interpretation of literary meaning.Irony stings. Among friends it might be playful, its target joining in the fun. But it is (...) hard to see irony figuring into any how-to guide for making friends in the first place. Indeed, the word is absent from Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People. More often irony is divisive, driving a wedge... (shrink)

Here is a lucid, accessible, and inspiring guide to the six perfections--Buddhist teachings about six dimensions of human character that require "perfecting": ...

This article argues that blacks should reject integration on self-protective and solidarity grounds. It distinguishes two aspects of black devaluation: a ‘stigmatization’ aspect that has to do with the fact that blacks are subject to various forms of discrimination, and an aesthetic aspect (‘phenotypic devaluation’) that concerns the aesthetic devaluation of characteristically black phenotypic traits. It identifies four self-worth harms that integration may inflict, and suggests that these may outweigh the benefits of integration. Further, it argues that, while the integrating (...) process may reduce stigmatization, there is less reason to think that it can do the same for phenotypic devaluation. (shrink)

Starting with this issue, Teaching Philosophy will initiate a series of articles entitled “How to Teach.” The aim of these articles is to provide an overview of how to teach a particular course commonly offered in philosophy departments and programs, with the hope that the articles will assist those who are asked to teach a course unfamiliar to them. We welcome feedback about this series and the articles contained therein.—MC.

The 'Art of Life' is John Stuart Mill's name for his account of practical reason. In this volume, eleven leading scholars elucidate this fundamental, but widely neglected, element of Mill's thought. Mill divides the Art of Life into three 'departments': 'Morality, Prudence or Policy, and Æsthetics'. In the volume's first section, Rex Martin, David Weinstein, Ben Eggleston, and Dale E. Miller investigate the relation between the departments of morality and prudence. Their papers ask whether Mill is a rule utilitarian (...) and, if so, whether his practical philosophy must be incoherent. The second section contains papers by Jonathan Riley and Wendy Donner, who explore the relation between the departments of morality and aesthetics. They discuss issues ranging from supererogation to aesthetic pleasure and humanity's relationship with nature. -/- The papers in the third section consider the Art of Life's axiological first principle, the principle of utility. Elijah Millgram contends that Mill's own life refutes his claim that the Art of Life has a single axiological first principle. Philip Kitcher maintains that Mill has a dynamic axiology requiring us to continually refine our conception of the good. In the final section, three papers address what it means to put the Art of Life into practice. Robert Haraldsson locates an 'Art of Ethics' in On Liberty that is in tension with the Art of Life. Nadia Urbinati plumbs the classical roots of Mill's view of the good life. Finally, Colin Heydt develops Mill's suggestion that we regard our own lives as works of art. (shrink)

Insofar as John Stuart Mill can be accurately described as a socialist, his is a socialism that a classical liberal ought to be able to live with, if not to love. Mill's view is that capitalist economies should at some point undergo a `spontaneous' and incremental process of socialization, involving the formation of worker-controlled `socialistic' enterprises through either the transformation of `capitalistic' enterprises or creation de novo. This process would entail few violations of core libertarian principles. It would proceed by (...) way of a series of voluntary transactions. Capitalists' property rights would be respected throughout. The process would take place within a national system of laws that permits private ownership of productive property and competition, and would not result in that system's overthrow. And, if we accept some basic tenets of Mill's social philosophy, the outcome at which we should expect the process to arrive is a `patchwork' economy in which capitalistic and socialistic enterprises exist side by side. Key Words: Ludwig von Mises • John Stuart Mill • socialism • capitalism • worker control. (shrink)

Following an account of the incommensurability argument, an objection, based on assumptions concerning rival theories, is examined and rejected. This rejection leads to an alternative direction of criticism of incommensurability, a direction that involves the articulation of comparative standards of theory evaluation that are independent of meaning invariance.

This dissertation argues that recent theoretical attempts to understand fallacious reasoning fail because these theories presuppose problematic accounts of the nature of argument. Current fallacy theories agree that a fallacy is a mistake, but differ wildly about what sort of mistake it is. Chapters one through three explore three very different suggestions. Chapter one is devoted to an examination of the oldest of the modern theoretical accounts of fallacious reasoning, what Hamblin calls the standard treatment. Chapter two begins with a (...) discussion of Finocchiaro's skeptical argument against the very possibility of a fallacy theory. It then turns to a discussion of van Eemeren and Grootendorst's pragma-dialectical treatment of fallacious reasoning as a possible response to Finocchiaro's skeptical challenge. Chapter three examines two epistemic responses to Finocchiaro's analysis: Fogelin and Duggan's frequency treatment and Wreen's mistaken inference treatment. The first three chapters set the stage for an alternative account of fallacies developed in chapter four. This alternative view of fallacious reasoning is consistent with Wright's recent work on the concept of an argument. It suggests that fallacious reasoning results from a kind of incompetency. Such failures of competency, however, are not nearly as common as traditional accounts of fallacious reasoning suggests. Moreover, the very possibility of being tempted by fallacious reasoning depends on our being very competent in normal cases. Chapter four ends with a discussion of some of the implications of this alternative theory of fallacious reasoning for the way we understand and teach argument and reasoning. (shrink)

Curiosity and creativity are expressions of the trade-off between leveraging that with which we are familiar or seeking out novelty. Through the computational lens of reinforcement learning, we describe how formulating the value of information seeking and generation via their complementary effects on planning horizons formally captures a range of solutions to striking this balance.

Designed for courses in environmental ethics, this reader is also an attractive supplement to contemporary moral issues or any applied ethics courses. It features readings in environmental ethics, including Paul Taylor's seminal essay The Ethics of Respect for Nature and works by Vice Preseident Al Gore, Jr. and J. Baird Callicott. Features: * Includes only readings of highest quality, chosen to be accessible to students who do not have an extensive knowledge of philosophy. * Exposes students to all major areas (...) of environmental ethics, including wilderness, pollution and animals. * Ideal length is appropriate as a core text or supplement to a variety of contemporary ethics courses. * Extensive bibliography provides a unique resource for research materials in this growing field. * Essays contain philosohical arguments as well as critique. * Presents an agenda of protection and stewardship that involves students in the management of our planets ecosystem. (shrink)

In The Second-Person Standpoint, Stephen Darwall offers an interpretation of P. F. Strawson’s “Freedom and Resentment” according to which the essay advances the thesis that good consequences are the “wrong kind of reason” to justify “practices of punishment and moral responsibility.” Darwall names this thesis “Strawson’s Point.” I argue for a different reading of Strawson, one according to which he holds this thesis only in a qualified way and, more generally, is not the unequivocal critic of consequentialism that Darwall makes (...) him out to be. In fact, I contend, Strawson’s account of the reactive attitudes can potentially be a useful resource for consequentialists. (shrink)

Interest in the Keynesian concept of evidential weight has led to divergent views concerning the burden of proof in adjudication. It is argued that Keynes's concept is properly engaged only in the context of one special kind of decision, the decision whether or not the evidence is ripe for a decision on the underlying merits, whether the latter decision is based on probability, relative plausibility, coherence or otherwise. As a general matter, this question of ripeness is appropriately assigned to the (...) judiciary for resolution as part of the burden of production, rather than to the jury or other factfinder as part of the burden of persuasion. (shrink)

Volume 46, Issue 2, July 2019, Page 296-300.

Knowledge as a Feeling offers new reflective and metacognitive tools that help meet this moment in the evolution of our information ecosystem. The book has significant implications for information science, challenging theoreticians and practitioners to reconsider how individuals process information.

The argument from incremental differences among objects with indefinite property-Complement demarcations arranged along a continuum is known classically as the sorites or slippery slope fallacy. The inferences are typically unsound, And may contain structural logical defects, Though the precise source of error is the subject of wide-Ranging philosophical dispute. In this treatment, Slippery slopes are reduced to a single category of logically valid (but sometimes unsound) conditional chains of hypothetical syllogism. The analysis provides a framework for distinguishing between unsound slippery (...) slope sophisms, And logically valid semantically sound slippery slope arguments. (shrink)

RésuméDans Faces of Inequality, Sophia Moreau propose une théorie pluraliste de la discrimination, selon laquelle un comportement discriminatoire implique un ou plusieurs torts, identifiés parmi au moins trois types. Elle ajoute que chacun de ces torts représente un manquement à l'obligation de traiter une personne comme l’égale des autres. Je soutiens que cette seconde affirmation est erronée. Je suggère également qu'il n'est peut-être pas nécessaire pour une théorie pluraliste de la discrimination d'identifier une propriété partagée par les différents types de (...) torts reconnus par la théorie (au-delà du fait qu'ils sont tous présents dans les cas de discrimination répréhensible). (shrink)

In his paper, “Identity Statements and Essentialism,” Loux seeks to demonstrate sortal essentialism based on Frege’s thesis that all statements of number concerning a collection require that the members fall under the same sortal concept. I shall attempt to argue that a detailed analysis of Loux’s argument reveals it as failing to imply the type of sortal dependency thesis necessary for the justification of sortal essentialism. However, if one construes the transworld identity relation as no different from our run of (...) the mill identity relation, then his argument can serve as the basis for a proof of a type of nontrivial essentialism, thereby showing that the possible worlds picture of modality is indeed committed to a robust essentialism. (shrink)

In contemporary Indian Country, the majority of people who identify as “Indian” fall into the “urban” category: away from traditional lands and communities, in cities and towns wherein the opportunities to live one’s identity as Native can be restricted, and even more so for American Indian religious practice and activity. This article will explore a possible theoretical model for discussing the religious nature of urban Indians, using aspects of the contemporary powwow as exemplary, and suggest ways in which the discourse (...) on Native American religious practices can inform the larger discussion of religion in general by implying a comparative direction between urban Indians and other religious actors in American secular society. (shrink)

Students in 80 kindergarten to grade six classrooms photographed and captioned experiences in class which they identified as examples of democratic citizenship education. With the assistance of a teacher candidate placed in their classroom for a semester, students chose and captioned five of the photographs they considered to best represent demonstrate citizenship education. Four main categories of citizenship events emerged describing key elements associated with democratic citizenship education; shared decision making, participating in a learner-oriented classroom context in which students have (...) some individual choice of daily activities, equality of opportunity, and activities extending into the community and integrating community and classroom. Early grades students (K-3) identified activities they associated with democratic citizenship education while upper grades (4-6) students additionally presented rationales and gave evidence to support their representations. Empowerment, problem solving, and contributing to the common good were additional elements associated with democratic citizenship education in the classes sampled, although these were not strongly represented as were the four key elements. This study provides an initial portrait indicating a need for deeper investigation of K-6 students' own representations of the democratic citizenship education they experience. (shrink)