Cet article propose d'interroger la notion de contextualisation à partir d'une perspective d'analyse textuelle des discours. La contextualisation est ici définie comme le processus par lequel le chercheur tente d’établir la pertinence d’une mise en relation entre un texte et un autre (ou plusieurs autres) et de leur regroupement au sein d’un corpus. Trois critères (générique, auctorial et thématique) sont identifiés, autorisant les passages de texte à texte(s) et dessinant ce que nous suggérons d'appeler des sphères de contextualisation. Finalement, une (...) hiérarchisation et des articulations possibles entre ces trois sphères sont envisagées. (shrink)

Predictability is a prerequisite for effective human control of artificial intelligence (AI). The inability to predict malfunctioning of AI, for example, impedes timely human intervention. In this paper, we empirically investigate how AI’s predictability compares to the predictability of humans in a real-effort task. We show that humans are worse at predicting AI performance than at predicting human performance. Importantly, participants are not aware of the differences in relative predictability of AI and overestimate their prediction skills. These results raise doubts (...) about the human ability to effectively exercise control of AI — at least in certain contexts. (shrink)

In diesem Beitrag lege ich dar, dass in der zweiten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts das Konzept von Werkstoffen (materials) als charakteristischer ontologischer Typus eines neuen Forschungs- und Wissenschaftsstils aufkam. Das soll nicht heißen, dass Werkstoffe niemals zuvor wissenschaftlich bearbeitet worden wären. Zweifellos hatten sich zahlreiche wissenschaftliche Disziplinen mit den Eigenschaften einer ganzen Reihe von Werkstoffen befasst. Doch wurden dabei Werkstoffe nicht als generische, also alle Arten von Stoffen umfassende, Entität betrachtet.Ziel dieses Aufsatzes ist zu verstehen, wie Werkstoffe als Gattungseinheit entstanden (...) sind und zu Objekten einer Wissenschaft wurden, die so unterschiedliche Dinge wie Papier, Holz, Metalle, Beton, Keramik, Polymere, Halbleiter und Kohlenstoff-Nanoröhren umfasst. Im Bemühen, die historischen Begleitumstände des Auftretens von Werkstoffen zu bestimmen, werde ich diese zunächst in historischer und ontologischer Hinsicht einordnen. Wie war es möglich, all diese Dinge in einer einzigen Gattung zu vereinigen? Dann wende ich mich dem sich verändernden Status von Werkstoffen zu, ein Resultat der erfolgreichen Materialforschung. Werkstoffe sind nicht länger die Vorbedingungen, die dem Entwurfsprozess Beschränkungen auferlegen, sondern werden nun selbst spezifisch entworfen. Solche materials by design sind echte, individuell zugeschnittene Schöpfungen und nicht nur einfach Handelsprodukte. Zudem birgt der Wandel ihres ontologischer Status ein Paradox mit seiner Tendenz zur Entmaterialisierung von Technik. (shrink)

Adopting a broadly compatibilist approach, this volume's authors argue that the behavioral and mind sciences do not threaten the moral foundations of legal responsibility. Rather, these sciences provide fresh insight into human agency and updated criteria as well as powerful diagnostic and intervention tools for assessing and altering minds.

A basic intuition we have regarding the nature of time is that the future is open whereas the past is fixed. For example, whereas we think that there are things we can do to affect how the future will unfold, we think that there are not things we can do to affect how the past unfolded. However, although this intuition is largely shared, it is not a straightforward matter to determine the nature of the asymmetry it reflects. So, in this (...) paper, I survey various philosophical ways of characterizing the asymmetry between the ‘open future’ and the ‘fixed past’ in order to account for our intuition. In particular, I wonder whether the asymmetry is to be characterized in semantic, epistemic, metaphysical or ontological terms. I conclude that, although many of these characterizations may contribute to a global understanding of the phenomenon, an ontological characterization of the asymmetry is to be preferred, since it is superior to the alternatives in explanatory power, intelligibility, and in how it coheres with interesting senses of openness. (shrink)

Individual differences have been neglected in decision-making research on heuristics and cognitive biases. Addressing that issue requires having reliable measures. The author first reviewed the research on the measurement of individual differences in cognitive biases. While reliable measures of a dozen biases are currently available, our review revealed that some measures require improvement and measures of other key biases are still lacking (e.g., confirmation bias). We then conducted empirical work showing that adjustments produced a significant improvement of some measures and (...) that confirmation bias can be reliably measured. Overall, our review and findings highlight that the measurement of individual differences in cognitive biases is still in its infancy. In particular, we suggest that contextualized (in addition to generic) measures need to be improved or developed. (shrink)

Synthetic biology, materials chemistry and soft robotics are fast becoming leading disciplines within the field of practices which look to nature for inspiration and opportunities. In this article I discuss how these molecular-scale practices fit within the existing trends of bio-informed design defined at the macro level, that is, bionics, biomimetics and more specifically biomimicry. Based on the metaphysical views underlying bio-informed design practices, I argue that none of them currently fit the biomimicry model, as they are not consistently concerned (...) with environmental sustainability. While biomimetic chemistry loosely belongs to the field of biomimetics, and soft robotics to the field of bionics, both practices have a profound impact on their respective fields, as they question the places of nature and engineers. (shrink)

Despite the multidisciplinary dimension of the kinds of research conducted under the umbrella of synthetic biology, the US-based founders of this new research area adopted a disciplinary profile to shape its institutional identity. In so doing they took inspiration from two already established fields with very different disciplinary patterns. The analogy with synthetic chemistry suggested by the term ‘synthetic biology’ is not the only model. Information technology is clearly another source of inspiration. The purpose of the paper, with its focus (...) on the US context, is to emphasize the diversity of views and agendas coexisting under the disciplinary label synthetic biology, as the two models analysed are only presented as two extreme postures in the community. The paper discusses the question: in which directions the two models shape this emerging field? Do they chart two divergent futures for synthetic biology? (shrink)

The purpose of this survey is twofold: (1) to place some centralthemes of epistemic logic in a general epistemological context,and (2) to outline a new framework for epistemic logic developedjointly with S. Andur Pedersen unifying some key ``mainstream''epistemological concerns with the ``formal'' epistemologicalapparatus.

The prospect of replication of human beings through genetic manipulation has engendered one of the most controversial debates about reproduction in our society. Ideology is clearly influencing the direction of research and legislation on human cloning, which may present one of the greatest existential challenges to the meaning of creation. In this article, I argue that, in view of the possibility that human cloning and other emerging technologies could enhance physical and cognitive abilities, there is a need for a different (...) way of thinking about life, new technologies and creation. New scientific discoveries require a shift in the way psychology takes responsibility to help individuals and society. Today, psychology needs to follow the progress that humans are taking toward a transhuman stage of development as a transition to a later posthuman stage. (shrink)

Epistemic logic begins with the recognition that our everyday talk about knowing and believing has some systematic features that we can track and re‡ect upon. Epistemic logicians have studied and extended these glints of systematic structure in fascinating and important ways since the early 1960s. However, for one reason or another, mainstream epistemologists have shown little interest. It is striking to contrast the marginal role of epistemic logic in contemporary epistemology with the centrality of modal logic for metaphysicians. This article (...) is intended to help in correcting this oversight by presenting some important developments in epistemic logic and suggesting ways to understand their applicability to traditional epistemological problems. Obviously, by itself, tweaking the formal apparatus of epistemic logic does not solve traditional epistemological problems. Epistemic logic can help us to navigate through problems in a systematic fashion by unpacking the logic of the problematic concepts, it can also lead us to recognize problems that we had not anticipated. This is basically analogous to the role that modal logic has played in contemporary metaphysics. (shrink)

Der Denkstil der Chemiker. Der Aufsatz diskutiert die Tragfähigkeit des Begriffes “Denkstil”, wie er von Alistair Crombie eingeführt und Ian Hacking aufgegriffen wurde, für das Verständnis dessen, wie das Fach Chemie historisch seine Identität ausgeprägt hat. Obwohl weder Crombie noch Hacking den Begriff “Denkstil” in Bezug auf einzelne Disziplinen verwendet haben, erscheint im Fall der Chemie seine Anwendung besonders vielversprechend, weil er hier hilft, ein zentrales Problem zu thematisieren – nämlich die Frage, wie es Chemikern trotz wechselnder Gegenstandsbereiche und theoretischer (...) Umbrüche gelang, eine eigenständige und stabile Identität auszubilden. Nach einer Einführung in den Begriff “Denkstil”, argumentiert der Aufsatz, dass die Beständigkeit der Chemie als eines Faches wesentlich in ihren Laborpraktiken gründet, die ihrerseits wiederum die spezifische Art der Fragen bestimmten, die Chemiker in ihren Forschungen stellten bzw. die Form der Antworten, nach denen sie suchten. Folgende Merkmale kennzeichnen diesen “chemischen Denkstil” (1) eine spezifische, im Herstellen begründete Form des Wissens, (2) die Befassung mit einzelnen Stoffen und Materialien statt mit Materie im Allgemeinen und (3) eine Beobachtung von Natur besonders im Hinblick auf Transformationsprozesse.The Chemists' Style of Thinking. This paper discusses the relevance of the notion of “styles of scientific thinking” introduced by Alistair Crombie and revisited by Ian Hacking, for understanding how chemistry shaped its identity. Although neither Crombie nor Hacking applied this notion to individual disciplines, it seems appropriate to use it in the case of chemistry because it helps to address a puzzling issue: how did chemists manage to shape an identity of their own, despite shifting territories and theoretical transformations? Following a presentation of the notion of style, I will argue that the stable identity of chemistry is rooted in laboratory practices, which determined the specific questions that chemists put to nature as well as the answers to their questions. The “chemical style of thinking” is characterized by i) a specific way of knowing through making, ii) the concern with individual materials rather than matter in general and iii) a specific commitment to nature. (shrink)

At first glance twentieth-century philosophy of science seems virtually to ignore chemistry. However this paper argues that a focus on chemistry helped shape the French philosophical reflections about the aims and foundations of scientific methods. Despite patent philosophical disagreements between Duhem, Meyerson, Metzger and Bachelard it is possible to identify the continuity of a tradition that is rooted in their common interest for chemistry. Two distinctive features of the French tradition originated in the attention to what was going on in (...) chemistry.French philosophers of science, in stark contrast with analytic philosophers, considered history of science as the necessary basis for understanding how the human intellect or the scientific spirit tries to grasp the world. This constant reference to historical data was prompted by a fierce controversy about the chemical revolution, which brought the issue of the nature of scientific changes centre stage.A second striking—albeit largely unnoticed—feature of the French tradition is that matter theories are a favourite subject with which to characterize the ways of science. Duhem, Meyerson, Metzger and Bachelard developed most of their views about the methods and aims of science through a discussion of matter theories. Just as the concern with history was prompted by a controversy between chemists, the focus on matter was triggered by a scientific controversy about atomism in the late nineteenth-century.Keywords: France; Epistemology; Chemistry; Revolution; Atomism; Realism. (shrink)

The aim of this thematically unified anthology is to track the history of epistemic logic, to consider some important applications of these logics of knowledge and belief in a variety of fields, and finally to discuss future directions of research with particular emphasis on 'active agenthood' and multi-modal systems. It is accessible to researchers and graduate students in philosophy, computer science, game theory, economics and related disciplines utilizing the means and methods of epistemic logic.

My aim in this paper is twofold. First, I provide an analysis of the notion of cognitive homology. In contrast with the well-known concept of structural homology in biology—defined as the same structure in different animals regardless of form and function—the notion of cognitive homology captures the idea that the basic cognitive contribution of a given homologous brain structure tends to remain stable over long evolutionary time scales. Second, I argue that this notion provides a powerful conceptual tool for the (...) study of cognition. Since a cognitive homology will often consist of an evolutionarily conserved relationship between a homologous brain structure and its basic cognitive contribution, such structure–function mappings can be conceived as basic building blocks of human cognition. (shrink)

This paper is a critical assessment of the epistemological impact of the systematic quantification of nature with the accumulation of big datasets on the practice and orientation of ecological science. We examine the contents of big databases and argue that it is not just accumulated information; records are translated into digital data in a process that changes their meanings. In order to better understand what is at stake in the ‘datafication’ process, we explore the context for the emergence and quantification (...) of biodiversity in the 1980s, along with the concept of the global environment. In tracing the origin and development of the global biodiversity information facility we describe big data biodiversity projects as a techno-political construction dedicated to monitoring a new object: the global diversity. We argue that, biodiversity big data became a powerful driver behind the invention of the concept of the global environment, and a way to embed ecological science in the political agenda. (shrink)

The strong opposition of nineteenth-century French chemists to atomism is usually described as a national attitude due to the overarching influence of positivism in France. The explanation sounds plausible, at first glance. However, the idea that a philosophy of science acted as an obstacle to the advancement of science needs further investigation. What is meant exactly by a philosophical influence on a scientific community? In analysing the alleged influence of positivism on the chemists' community it is argued that the common (...) connection established between philosophical views and scientific attitudes leads to a misunderstanding of both philosophy and scientific activity. This paper first stresses the misreading of Auguste Comte's works; then the misunderstanding of scientific debates about atomism in chemistry. Finally it suggests an alternative view: that the atomic debates generated a variety of positivisms. (shrink)

This article identifies two mistakes commonly made about the concept of punishment. First, confusion exists about when an analysis of punishment counts as retributive, and when as justificatorily n...

"Public engagement in science" is one of the buzzwords that, since 2000, has been used in nanotechnology programs. To what extent does public engagement disrupt the traditional relations between science and the public? This paper briefly contrasts the traditional model of science communication - the diffusionist model - that prevailed in the twentieth century and the new model - the participatory model - that tends to prevail nowadays. Then it will try to disentangle the assumptions underlying the public dialogue initiated (...) about nanotechnology, and conclude that nanotechnology actually develops a managerial model of society. (shrink)

Some of the most important achievements in the field of empiricist ethics were made by the School of Moral Sentiment, comprising Francis Hutcheson, David Hume, and Adam Smith. This book throws new light on their consensus theory of virtue. Hope works some of their ideas into a merit theory of rights applicable to conventional rights, defends ethical cognitivism, and analyzes pleasure.

This volume grew out of a conference held in 2016 at the Claremont School of Theology, while the conference itself grew out of "innovative conversations between philosophers, Erin Manning and Brian Massumi, and process philosophers, Roland Faber and Michael Halewood". Its title in effect conjoins a Whiteheadian conception of propositions and a Jamesian understanding of "things.". As such, a proposition is set forth on behalf of "a collectivity...

Private associations abounded in the ancient Greek world and beyond, and this volume provides the first large-scale study of the strategies of governance which they employed. Emphasis is placed on the values fostered by the regulations of associations, the complexities of the private-public divide and the dynamics of regional and global networks and group identity. The attested links between rules and religious sanctions also illuminate the relationship between legal history and religion. Moreover, possible links between ancient associations and the early (...) Christian churches will prove particularly valuable for scholars of the New Testament. The book concludes by using the regulations of associations to explore a novel and revealing aspect of the interaction between the Mediterranean world, India and China. (shrink)

Le but de cet article est de montrer les limites des théories de la ressemblance en musique. Ces théories cherchent à justifier que nous puissions attribuer des émotions à une musique, et soutiennent que l’expression musicale des émotions est analogue à l’expression émotionnelle chez les êtres humains. Une musique triste devrait alors posséder quelque propriété en vertu de laquelle elle puisse ressembler à l’expression de la tristesse chez une personne. Ces approches ont le défaut de reposer sur une notion de (...) similarité qui est à la fois vague et inadéquate. Elles ne parviennent jamais à spécifier en quoi, précisément, la musique et les émotions pourraient bien se ressembler. Je montrerai qu’il est fort peu probable que cette notion de ressemblance, fondée sur un réquisit d’objectivité, puisse nous aider à mieux comprendre la façon dont nous pouvons correctement attribuer des propriétés expressives à une œuvre musicale. (shrink)

Les systèmes de transport et de télécommunication procurent des potentiels de vitesse considérables. Largement utilisés, ces potentiels ont consacré un rétrécissement de l’espace et du temps dont les conséquences sociales et spatiales interrogent : les mobilités, de plus en plus réversibles, ont-elles pour effet de rendre les sociétés socialement et spatialement plus fluides ? Partant des débats sur la fluidification sociale, l’article propose d’explorer le système d’intentionnalité qui caractérise les mobilités au moyen du concept de motilité. Cette discussion, suivie d’un (...) examen empirique, laisse apparaître que les mobilités réversibles, loin d’être l’expression unilatérale d’une « liberté » renouvelée, sont des réponses à un nouvel univers de contraintes situationnelles et sont porteuses d’inégalités.Transportation and telecommunications systems provide considerable speed potentials. Widely used, these potentials have had the effect of shrinking time and space – and thus bringing with them social and spatial consequences. Are we to infer that these increasingly reversible forms of mobility are producing societies with greater social and spatial fluidity ? The article, which is based on debates about social fluidification, proposes to use the concept of motility to explore the intentionality system that characterizes forms of mobility. This discussion, which is followed by an empirical examination, reveals that these reversible forms of mobility, far from being the unilateral expression of a renewed « freedom », are answers to a new universe of situation constraints that houses inequalities. (shrink)

This discussion paper proposes that a meaningful distinction between science and technoscience can be found at the level of the objects of research. Both notions intermingle in the attitudes, intentions, programs and projects of researchers and research institutions – that is, on the side of the subjects of research. But the difference between science and technoscience becomes more explicit when research results are presented in particular settings and when the objects of research are exhibited for the specific interest they hold. (...) When an experiment is presented as scientific evidence, which confirms or disconfirms a hypothesis, this agrees with traditional conceptions of science. When organic molecules are presented for their capacity to serve individually as electric wires that carry surprisingly large currents, this would be a hallmark of technoscience. Accordingly, we propose research on the ontology of research objects. The focus on the material presence of research objects makes this a specifically philosophical project. (shrink)

A number of increasingly sophisticated technologies are now being used to support complex decision-making in a range of contexts. This paper reports on work undertaken to provide decision support in the discretionary domain of sentencing by referring to a recently created Toulmin argument based model that involves the interplay and weighting of relevant rule-based and discretionary factors used in a decisional process. Judicial discretion, particularly in the sentencing phase, is one of the mainstays of justice systems that favour individualised justice. (...) The study discusses the modelling process in Victorian courts in Australia, where the handing down of an appropriate custodial or non-custodial sentence requires the consideration of many factors. Tools and techniques used to capture relevant expert knowledge and display it both as a paper model and as an online prototype application are discussed. (shrink)