In this article, the Zerubavelian culturalist cognitive paradigm which comprises an emerging Rutgers School of Sociology is presented. This perspective employs a comparative cognitive pluralist approach to the study of cognition and takes as its central premise that the mind is social. The key roots of the perspective in Simmelian classical sociology and in the twentieth-century sociology of knowledge approaches of Fleck, Mannheim, Berger and Luckmann and others are outlined. The key concepts and parameters of the field and its concern (...) with perception, attention, classification, meaning-making, memory, time and identity are discussed. Finally, its methodological approach is outlined and it is suggested that the Zerubavelian perspective provides a unique analytic literacy that cuts across the various subfields of contemporary sociology. (shrink)

Relational, operator, and predicate systems are distinguished on the basis that they correspond to the three possible pair-wise bracketings into two constituents of the three parts of a proposition: relation, subject, and object. It is asserted that the verbal propositional modality (left hemisphere) uses a predicate grammar, while the spatial-image operational modality (right hemisphere) uses an operator grammar. Verbal propositional memory has the capacity for extensive propositional embedding while spatial operational memory does not.

This article proposes an account of color constancy based on an examination of the relevant scientific literature. Differences in experimental settings and task instructions that lead to variation in subject performance are given particular attention. Based on the evidence discussed, the core of the proposal made is that there are two different forms of color constancy, one phenomenal and the other projective. This follows the hypothesis of Reeves et al. (Perception & Psychophysics 70:219–228, 2008). Unlike Reeves et al. (Perception & (...) Psychophysics 70:219–228, 2008), it is argued that projective color constancy is crucially dependent upon phenomenal color constancy and certain aspects of scene perception. Additionally, it is hypothesized that capacities that support projective color constancy have an important role to play in facilitating our ability to quickly recognize scenes with diagnostic chromatic properties independently of assignments of colors to object surfaces. (shrink)

We consider the connections between belief revision, conditional logic and nonmonotonic reasoning, using as a foundation the approach to theory change developed by Alchourrón, Gärdenfors and Makinson (the AGM approach). This is first generalized to allow the iteration of theory change operations to capture the dynamics of epistemic states according to a principle of minimal change of entrenchment. The iterative operations of expansion, contraction and revision are characterized both by a set of postulates and by Grove's construction based on total (...) pre-orders on the set of complete theories of the belief logic. We present a sound and complete conditional logic whose semantics is based on our iterative revision operation, but which avoids Gärdenfors's triviality result because of a severely restricted language of beliefs and hence the weakened scope of our extended postulates. In the second part of the paper, we develop a computational approach to theory dynamics using Rott's E-bases as a representation for epistemic states. Under this approach, a ranked E-base is interpreted as standing for the most conservative entrenchment compatible with the base, reflecting a kind of foundationalism in the acceptance of evidence for a belief. Algorithms for the computation of our iterative versions of expansion, contraction and revision are presented. Finally, we consider the relationship between nonmonotonic reasoning and both conditional logic and belief revision. Adapting the approach of Delgrande, we show that the unique extension of a default theory expressed in our conditional logic of belief revision corresponds to the most conservative belief state which respects the theory: however, this correspondence is limited to propositional default theories. Considering first order default theories, we present a belief revision algorithm which incorporates the assumption of independence of default instances and propose the use of a base logic for default reasoning which incorporates uniqueness of names. We conclude with an examination of the behavior of an implemented system on some of Lifschitz's benchmark problems in nonmonotonic reasoning. (shrink)

This paper examines the relevance of philosophical work on consciousness to its scientific study. Of particular concern is the debate over whether consciousness can be naturalized, which is typically taken to have consequences for the prospects for its scientific investigation. It is not at all clear that philosophers of consciousness have properly identified and evaluated the assumptions about scientific activity made by both naturalization and anti- naturalization projects. I argue that there is good reason to think that some of the (...) assumptions about physicalism and explanation made by the parties to the debate are open to serious doubt. Thus this paper is an invitation for those inquiring into whether consciousness can be naturalized to more carefully consider the expected payoff of such efforts. (shrink)

This article addresses Paul Churchland’s attempt to identify colors with surface reflectance spectra. Of particular concern is Churchland’s novel method of approximating surface reflectance spectra. While those approximations are generated by objective means and yield a striking match with human phenomenological color space, they are not physically meaningful. The reason for this is that the method used to produce the approximations induces equivalence classes on surface reflectances that are not invariant under physically appropriate changes of measurement convention. This result undermines (...) Churchland’s proposed response to the objection from metamers commonly raised against color physicalism, as his surface reflectance approximations are supposed to provide an objective, physical unifying basis for metamers. *Received December 2007; revised July 2009. †To contact the author, please write to: Department of Logic and Philosophy of Science, School of Social Sciences, 3151 Social Science Plaza A, University of California, Irvine, CA 92697; e‐mail: [email protected]. (shrink)

In this brilliant assessment of the relation between poststructuralism and feminism to current religious thought, philosopher of religion Carol Wayne White convincingly demonstrates that postmodernist continental and feminist philosophies—far from being antithetical to religious concerns—in fact enrich our understanding of religion and its relevance to debates about contemporary culture. By triangulating these three unique perspectives on culture she expands prevailing views of cultural criticism and opens up the discussion to new creative solutions that arise from the intersecting interests of (...) poststructuralist, feminist, and religious studies. Dividing her work into three major sections, White first summarizes the major developments in postmodern and feminist thought in a lucid and refreshingly jargon-free exposition. Next she focuses on two major thinkers in poststructuralist religious scholarship—Sharon Welch and Mark C. Taylor—showing how their work incorporates, on the one hand, Foucault's political critique of power and, on the other, Derrida's textual deconstruction. Finally, she looks at feminist critiques of culture with special emphasis on feminists' contributions to the study of religion. She concludes by highlighting the important role of religious valuing in providing an impetus to action and pragmatic social change. Religion can and should move us beyond the stalemate of postmodern critiques with their often-nihilistic undertones and fruitless academic posturing. Poststructuralism, Feminism, and Religion succeeds in elucidating what it means to think and act religiously in the postmodern era. (shrink)

This paper explores the role of physically impossible idealizations in model-based explanation. We do this by examining the explanation of gravitational waves from distant stellar objects using models that contain point-particle idealizations. Like infinite idealizations in thermodynamics, biology and economics, the point-particle idealization in general relativity is physically impossible. What makes this case interesting is that there are two very different kinds of models used for predicting the same gravitational wave phenomena, post-Newtonian models and effective field theory models. The paper (...) contends that post-Newtonian models are explanatory while effective field theory models are not, because only in the former can we eliminate the physically impossible point-particle idealization. This suggests that, in some areas of science at least, models invoking ineliminable infinite idealizations cannot have explanatory power. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Marx studied how capitalism changes relations to land before and after Capital—but wielded different methodologies and reached different conclusions. In Grundrisse, Marx investigates precapitalism from a speculative standpoint. In Capital, Marx provides a selective and historical description of dispossession but delimits his analysis to Western Europe. Post-Capital, Marx wields Henry Lewis Morgan’s anthropology and Justus von Liebig’s ecology as scientific bases upon which to critique capitalist property relations. Specifically, Marx believed that the capitalist mode of production installed a historically (...) specific relation to land; and that this relation was abstract, accumulative, and proprietorial. This article shows that Marx began to develop a critical theory of dispossession that overspills the historical, metaphysical, and developmental sequencing usually attributed to him. This late Marx believes that Indigenous peoples have a concrete, metabolic, and communal relationship to the land that communism must recapitulate and rehabilitate; this thesis has been misunderstood by readers of Marx, who impose an overly historicized interpretation upon his work. (shrink)

Kracauer’s rehabilitation in the 1990s sidelined his Marxist framework of the middle-to-late Weimar era in favour of the then still dominant if decaying paradigms of poststructuralism and postmodernism. It was also silent on the relationship between Kant and Marxism in Kracauer’s work. This essay addresses these weaknesses by arguing that Kracauer transcoded the structure of Kant’s ‘problematic’ around reification into a Marxist framework in the middle-to-late Weimar period. The essay considers how Kracauer conceived the mass ornament as a site of (...) reification and critical pedagogy. It explores his strategies of de-reification and their overlap with Walter Benjamin and the ruptures and continuities between the radical Weimar work and his later Theory of Film. The essay argues that the Theory of Film can be better understood as a transcoding of Kant’s philosophy of the aesthetic in the third Critique into the film camera itself, although the Marxian framework of the Weimar period is now considerably attenuated. (shrink)

This paper responds to Justin Broackes’ reply to my paper, “On the retinal origins of the Hering primaries.” This paper aims to clarify and further develop the ideas presented in that article. I take up several of the points Broackes raises regarding the connection between my work and that of William Thornton (Journal of the Optical Society of America 61:1155–1163, 1971 ) and (Color Research and Application 24:139–156, 1999 ) on the “prime” and “anti-prime” colors of the human visual system, (...) the connection between those prime and anti-prime colors and hue category boundaries, and my attempt to link facts about low-level processing to the unique hues. Ultimately, while Broackes brings up several interesting issues and usefully illustrates the limits of my approach, I see no reason to retreat from the main claims I made about human spectral sensitivity and the hues. (shrink)

Jonathan Kvanvig's book, The Value of Knowledge and the Pursuit of Understanding (Kvanvig, 2003), is a wonderful example of doing epistemology in a style that Kvanvig himself has termed "value−driven epistemology." On this approach, one takes questions about epistemic value to be central to theoretical concerns, including the concern to provide an adequate account of knowledge. This approach yields the demand that theories of knowledge must provide, not just an adequate account of the nature of knowledge, but also an account (...) of the value of knowledge. Given the near−universal assumption that knowledge has a special kind of value, this demand seems reasonable, though surprisingly hard to satisfy. Another consequence of this approach to doing epistemology is that certain assumptions about epistemic value, like what sorts of things have it and what sorts of things don't, and where such value comes from, become much more salient to the epistemic enterprise. In his book, Kvanvig challenges the assumption that knowledge has some unique store of epistemic value. And he investigates the matter by asking questions about what the bearers of epistemic value are and where they get it. He concludes, of course, that knowledge as we have come to conceive it in 21st century epistemology has no such special value. (shrink)

Andrew Wayne discusses some recent attempts to account, within a Bayesian framework, for the "common methodological adage" that "diverse evidence better confirms a hypothesis than does the same amount of similar evidence". One of the approaches considered by Wayne is that suggested by Howson and Urbach and dubbed the "correlation approach" by Wayne. This approach is, indeed, incomplete, in that it neglects the role of the hypothesis under consideration in determining what diversity in a body of evidence (...) is relevant diversity. In this paper, it is shown how this gap can be filled, resulting in a more satisfactory account of the evidential role of diversity of evidence. In addition, it is argued that Wayne's criticism of the correlation approach does not indicate a serious flaw in the approach. (shrink)

We present a synthetic theory of skilled action which proposes that cognitive processes make an important contribution to almost all skilled action, contrary to influential views that many skills are performed largely automatically. Cognitive control is focused on strategic aspects of performance, and plays a greater role as difficulty increases. We offer an analysis of various forms of skill experience and show that the theory provides a better explanation for the full set of these experiences than automatic theories. We further (...) show that the theory can explain experimental evidence for skill automaticity, including evidence that secondary tasks do not interfere with expert performance, and evidence that experts have reduced memory for performance of sensorimotor skills. (shrink)

A project of the Gandhi Centennial Committee of Southern Illinois University, the book outlines the basic tenets of Gandhian philosophy as interpreted by Western thinkers, deals with problems of American education, and offers some reflec­tions on what kinds of solutions may be posed by educators, primarily at the university level. The Foreword and Epilogue are by two distinguished Indian educators, _K. L. Shrimali_, Vice-chancellor, and _N. A. Nikam_, former Vice-chancellor, University of Mysore.

Wayne Davis presents a highly original approach to the foundations of semantics, showing how the so-called "expression" theory of meaning can handle names and other problematic cases of nondescriptive meaning. The fact that thoughts have parts ("ideas" or "concepts") is fundamental: Davis argues that like other unstructured words, names mean what they do because they are conventionally used to express atomic or basic ideas. In the process he shows that many pillars of contemporary philosophical semantics, from twin earth arguments (...) to the necessity of identity, are unfounded. (shrink)

Beyond Chance and Credence introduces a new way of thinking of probabilities in science that combines physical and epistemic considerations. Myrvold shows that conceiving of probabilities in this way solves puzzles associated with the use of probability and statistical mechanics.

In _The Company We Keep_, Wayne C. Booth argues for the relocation of ethics to the center of our engagement with literature. But the questions he asks are not confined to morality. Returning ethics to its root sense, Booth proposes that the ethical critic will be interested in any effect on the ethos, the total character or quality of tellers and listeners. Ethical criticism will risk talking about the quality of _this_ particular encounter with _this_ particular work. Yet it (...) will give up the old hope for definitive judgments of "good" work and "bad." Rather it will be a conversation about _many_ kinds of personal and social goods that fictions can serve or destroy. While not ignoring the consequences for conduct of engaging with powerful stories, it will attend to that more immediate topic, What happens to us _as we read_? Who am I, _during the hours of reading or listening_? What is the quality of the life I lead in the company of these would-be friends? Through a wide variety of periods and genres and scores of particular works, Booth pursues various metaphors for such engagements: "friendship with books," "the exchange of gifts," "the colonizing of worlds," "the constitution of commonwealths." He concludes with extended explorations of the ethical powers and potential dangers of works by Rabelais, D. H. Lawrence, Jane Austen, and Mark Twain. (shrink)

Landauer’s principle is, roughly, the principle that logically irreversible operations cannot be performed without dissipation of energy, with a specified lower bound on that dissipation. Although widely accepted in the literature on the thermodynamics of computation, it has been the subject of considerable dispute in the philosophical literature. Proofs of the principle have been questioned on the grounds of insufficient generality and on the grounds of the assumption, used in the proofs, of the availability of reversible processes at the microscale. (...) The relevance of the principle, should it be true, has also been questioned, as it has been argued that microscale fluctuations entail dissipation that always greatly exceeds the Landauer bound. In this article Landauer’s principle is treated within statistical mechanics, and a proof of the principle is given that neither relies on neglect of fluctuations nor assumes the availability of thermodynamically reversible processes. In addition, it is argued that microscale fluctuations are no obstacle to approximating thermodynamic reversibility, in the appropriate sense, as closely as one would like. (shrink)

The causal theory of reasons holds that acting for a reason entails that the agents action was caused by his or her beliefs and desires. While Donald Davidson (1963) and others effectively silenced the first objections to the theory, a new round has emerged. The most important recent attack is presented by Jonathan Dancy in Practical Reality (2000) and subsequent work. This paper will defend the causal theory against Dancy and others, including Schueler (1995), Stoutland (1999, 2001), and Ginet (2002).Dancy (...) observes that our reasons are neither psychological states nor causes, and that our reasons can be both motivating and normative. I argue that these observations are fully compatible with the causal theory. According to the reductive version I develop for both cognitive and optative reasons, what it is for an action to be done for a reason is for certain beliefs and desires to cause the action in a particular way. Our reasons for action are the objects of some of those beliefs and desires. The causal process has two stages. This theory explains not only Dancys observations, but also many other facts about reasons that alternative theories leave unexplained. I argue against Schueler and others that the non-appetitive desires entailed by acting for reasons are no less distinct and independent causal factors than the beliefs entailed. I go on to rebut arguments that the relation between psychological states and actions cannot be causal because it is non-empirical, rational, normative, or non-deterministic, and that explanations in terms of psychological causes are incompatible with explanations in terms of reasons. (shrink)

Wayne Waxman here presents an ambitious and comprehensive attempt to link the philosophers of what are known as the British Empiricists--Locke, Berkeley, and Hume--to the philosophy of German philosopher Immanuel Kant. Much has been written about all these thinkers, who are among the most influential figures in the Western tradition. Waxman argues that, contrary to conventional wisdom, Kant is actually the culmination of the British empiricist program and that he shares their methodological assumptions and basic convictions about human thought (...) and knowledge. (shrink)

Is vision informationally encapsulated from cognition or is it cognitively penetrated? I shall argue that intentions penetrate vision in the experience of visual spatial constancy: the world appears to be spatially stable despite our frequent eye movements. I explicate the nature of this experience and critically examine and extend current neurobiological accounts of spatial constancy, emphasizing the central role of motor signals in computing such constancy. I then provide a stringent condition for failure of informational encapsulation that emphasizes a computational (...) condition for cognitive penetration: cognition must serve as an informational resource for visual computation. This requires proposals regarding semantic information transfer, a crucial issue in any model of informational encapsulation. I then argue that intention provides an informational resource for computation of visual spatial constancy. Hence, intention penetrates vision. (shrink)

From the leader of the nation's most powerful animal-protection organization comes a frontline account of how conscience and creativity are driving a revolution in American business that is changing forever how we treat animals and create wealth. Wayne Pacelle of the Humane Society of the United States reveals how entrepreneurs, Fortune 500 CEOs, world-class scientists, philanthropists, and a new class of political leaders are driving the burgeoning, unstoppable growth of the "humane economy." Every business grounded on animal exploitation, Pacelle (...) argues, is ripe for disruption. Indeed each one of us is, and will be, touched by this far-reaching transformation in food and agriculture; in the pharmaceutical, chemical, and cosmetics industries; in film, television, and live entertainment; in tourism and wildlife management; in the pet trade for dogs and cats and exotic wildlife; and in fur and leather fashions. Collectively it promises to relieve or end the suffering of billions of creatures, while allowing businesses aligned with the best instincts and values of their customers to flourish. Pacelle shows, for instance, how the cruelties of industrial chicken farming are quickly becoming obsolete with a visit to Hampton Creek, the makers of a plant-based egg substitute and the world's fastest-growing food startup ever. Pacelle also recounts the stories of how established companies are joining in this economic transformation: from Petco and PetSmart, which have turned the conventional pet store model on its head by forswearing puppy mill suppliers in favor of shelter dogs; to John Paul Mitchell Systems, the Body Shop, and Lush, which use safe ingredients instead of animal tests for their cosmetics; to major food retailers like Whole Foods, Chipotle, and even Costco and Walmart, which are embracing animal welfare standards that are one by one unwinding the horrors of the factory farm. The Humane Economy is a clarion call to business leaders and to the world's growing animal protection movement; it is equally a warning to the static thinking of animal-use industries and their apologists: "Here, in this humane economy," Pacelle argues, "human ingenuity meets human virtue, and we discover at last that we can have it both ways--a better world for us and for animals, too. (shrink)

How might attention intersect with normative issues and the psychology surrounding them? I provide an empirically grounded framework integrating three attentional phenomena: salience, vigilance (or broadly attunement) and attentional character. Using this frame, I review recent philosophical work on attention and norms. -/- Section 1 establishes a common ground conception of attention no more controversial than the established experimental paradigms for attention. This conception explicates the concept of a bias, which explains core features of action and attention, one that intersects (...) biological, psychological and philosophical concerns. I emphasize historical biases associated with learning and experience. Section 2 presents an analysis of automaticity and control, concepts needed to fully characterize action. Historical biases are revealed as automatic. Specifically, the automatization of attention is central to acquiring skills and excellence in light of normative standards for a practice. Section 3 argues that salience involves the deployment of attention, while Section 4 characterizes vigilance not merely as a disposition but as an active orientation to attend. Vigilance is one type of attunement, and the set of attunements constitutes the agent’s varied orientations to deploy attention, part of their attentional character. As discussed in Section 5, shaping this character is a goal of a normatively sensitive upbringing where appropriate attention is automatized through proper practice. Section 6 examines a common epistemic bias in academia and subsequent attempts to debias. I conclude with an example of acquired epistemic skill to give hope that attentional excellence is achievable. (shrink)

This paper focuses on several issues that arise in Miranda Fricker?s book Epistemic injustice surrounding her claims about our (moral) culpability for perpetrating acts of testimonial injustice. While she makes frequent claims about moral culpability with respect to specific examples, she never addresses the issue in its full generality, and we are left to extrapolate her general view about moral culpability for acts of testimonial injustice from these more restricted and particular claims. Although Fricker never describes testimonial injustice in such (...) terms, I argue that the fundamental wrong done in acts of testimonial injustice is a form of negligence. Once we understand testimonial injustice in this way, it is easier to see when and why we are culpable for perpetrating such injustices. Indeed, explicitly recognizing testimonial injustice as a form of negligence solves several problems for Fricker?s view, which are elucidated briefly along the way. However, construing testimonial injustice as a form of negligence has a cost as well. It highlights the fact that the normative core of Fricker?s view is deontological, rather than virtue-theoretic. Fricker claims to be offering a theory of the virtue of testimonial justice along the model of current virtue theories in epistemology, yet it seems that there is no compelling reason to think of what she has offered as a virtue theory, at least not on the model of virtue theories that one finds in epistemology. This is not to say that her view is any less plausible for not being a virtue theory. But calling it a virtue theory affects how one interprets its various claims, and tends to lead one away from, rather than toward, a proper understanding of the deep deontological nature of her account. (shrink)

Harvey Brown’s Physical Relativity defends a view, the dynamical perspective, on the nature of spacetime that goes beyond the familiar dichotomy of substantivalist/relationist views. A full defense of this view requires attention to the way that our use of spacetime concepts connect with the physical world. Reflection on such matters, I argue, reveals that the dynamical perspective affords the only possible view about the ontological status of spacetime, in that putative rivals fail to express anything, either true or false. I (...) conclude with remarks aimed at clarifying what is and isn’t in dispute with regards to the explanatory priority of spacetime and dynamics, at countering an objection raised by John Norton to views of this sort, and at clarifying the relation between background and effective spacetime structure. (shrink)

According to Jules Coleman, Rational Choice Theory holds that human action is both intentional and rational. “The rationality of intentional action is evaluated along the two dimensions corresponding to the two elements of the belief-desire model.” On the belief-dimension, RC Theory assumes that people are “able to draw appropriate inferences from the information they possess.”.

The nature of the cognition-motor interface has been brought to prominence by Butterfill & Sinigaglia, who argue that the representations employed by the cognitive and motor systems should not be able to interact with each other. Here I argue that recent empirical evidence concerning the interface contradicts several of the assumptions incorporated in Butterfill & Sinigaglia’s account, and I seek to develop a theoretical picture that will allow us to explain the structure of the interface presented by this evidence. The (...) central idea is that neural plasticity incorporates metarepresentational rules for constructing representational systems and linking them. The structure of the cognition-motor interface is constructed flexibly during development and skill learning based on information processing demands. (shrink)

Reliabilism has come under recent attack for its alleged inability to account for the value we typically ascribe to knowledge. It is charged that a reliably-produced true belief has no more value than does the true belief alone. I reply to these charges on behalf of reliabilism; not because I think reliabilism is the correct theory of knowledge, but rather because being reliably-produced does add value of a sort to true beliefs. The added value stems from the fact that a (...) reliably-held belief is non-accidental in a particular way. While it is widely acknowledged that accidentally true beliefs cannot count as knowledge, it is rarely questioned why this should be so. An answer to this question emerges from the discussion of the value of reliability; an answer that holds interesting implications for the value and nature of knowledge. (shrink)

Quantum information theory has given rise to a renewed interest in, and a new perspective on, the old issue of understanding the ways in which quantum mechanics differs from classical mechanics. The task of distinguishing between quantum and classical theory is facilitated by neutral frameworks that embrace both classical and quantum theory. In this paper, I discuss two approaches to this endeavour, the algebraic approach, and the convex set approach, with an eye to the strengths of each, and the relations (...) between the two. I end with a discussion of one particular model, the toy theory devised by Rob Spekkens, which, with minor modifications, fits neatly within the convex sets framework, and which displays in an elegant manner some of the similarities and differences between classical and quantum theories. The conclusion suggested by this investigation is that Schrödinger was right to find the essential difference between classical and quantum theory in their handling of composite systems, though Schrödinger's contention that it is entanglement that is the distinctive feature of quantum mechanics needs to be modified. (shrink)