We propose a dynamic hyperintensional logic of belief revision for non-omniscient agents, reducing the logical omniscience phenomena affecting standard doxastic/epistemic logic as well as AGM belief revision theory. Our agents don’t know all a priori truths; their belief states are not closed under classical logical consequence; and their belief update policies are such that logically or necessarily equivalent contents can lead to different revisions. We model both plain and conditional belief, then focus on dynamic belief revision. The key idea we (...) exploit to achieve non-omniscience focuses on topic- or subject matter-sensitivity: a feature of belief states which is gaining growing attention in the recent literature. (shrink)

The book investigates how Avicenna's doctrine of efficient causality relates to his general ontology, as well as how the two are interpreted, defended, and challenged in the early phase of Avicenna's Islamic reception (the eleventh and twelfth centuries).

Objective correlates—behavioral, functional, and neural—provide essential tools for the scientific study of consciousness. But reliance on these correlates should not lead to the ‘fallacy of misplaced objectivity’: the assumption that only objective properties should and can be accounted for objectively through science. Instead, what needs to be explained scientifically is what experience is intrinsically— its subjective properties—not just what we can do with it extrinsically. And it must be explained; otherwise the way experience feels would turn out to be magical (...) rather than physical. We argue that it is possible to account for subjective properties objectively once we move beyond cognitive functions and realize what experience is and how it is structured. Drawing on integrated information theory, we show how an objective science of the subjective can account, in strictly physical terms, for both the essential properties of every experience and the specific properties that make particular experiences feel the way they do. (shrink)

In this paper, we take a meta-theoretical stance and aim to compare and assess two conceptual frameworks that endeavor to explain phenomenal experience. In particular, we compare Feinberg & Mallatt’s Neurobiological Naturalism (NN) and Tononi’s and colleagues' Integrated Information Theory (IIT), given that the former pointed out some similarities between the two theories (Feinberg & Mallatt 2016c-d). To probe their similarity, we first give a general introduction to both frameworks. Next, we expound a ground plan for carrying out our analysis. (...) We move on to articulate a philosophical profile of NN and IIT, addressing their ontological commitments and epistemological foundations. Finally, we compare the two point-by-point, also discussing how they stand on the issue of artificial consciousness. (shrink)

Bernard Williams is universally recognised as one of the most important voices in 20th century moral and political philosophy. Yet his thought has only rarely been the subject of comprehensive analysis and interpretation: more often, attention has focused on his celebrated critiques of specific theoretical paradigms, such as the Kantian and the utilitarian ones. This book attempts to fill this gap. Considering Williams' work in its entirety, it reconstructs the particular and fascinating picture of moral philosophy that emerges from it. (...) The ideal of ethical objectivity acts as a thread running through this reconstruction. More precisely, the basic question guiding the investigation is what remains of this ideal once Williams' critique of three fundamental ideas for moral philosophy has been sifted: that of normative theory, that of ethical knowledge and that of human nature (understood as a possible basis for objective ethical prescriptions). The answer, in a nutshell, is 'very little'. But this does not imply an abandonment to relativism. Rather, the answer implies the need to become aware of the historicity of our values and to re-examine them from a peculiar point of view, both historical and philosophical, in order to assess which ones deserve our trust. As suggested in this book, in the last years of his life Williams offered many useful insights for doing this. (shrink)

The experimental approach in economics is a driving force behind some of the most exciting developments in the field. The 'experimental revolution' was based on a series of bold philosophical premises which have remained until now mostly unexplored. This book provides the first comprehensive analysis and critical discussion of the methodology of experimental economics, written by a philosopher of science with expertise in the field. It outlines the fundamental principles of experimental inference in order to investigate their power, scope and (...) limitations. The author demonstrates that experimental economists have a lot to gain by discussing openly the philosophical principles that guide their work, and that philosophers of science have a lot to learn from their ingenious techniques devised by experimenters in order to tackle difficult scientific problems. (shrink)

Understanding Institutions proposes a new unified theory of social institutions that combines the best insights of philosophers and social scientists who have written on this topic. Francesco Guala presents a theory that combines the features of three influential views of institutions: as equilibria of strategic games, as regulative rules, and as constitutive rules. -/- Guala explains key institutions like money, private property, and marriage, and develops a much-needed unification of equilibrium- and rules-based approaches. Although he uses game theory concepts, (...) the theory is presented in a simple, clear style that is accessible to a wide audience of scholars working in different fields. Outlining and discussing various implications of the unified theory, Guala addresses venerable issues such as reflexivity, realism, Verstehen, and fallibilism in the social sciences. He also critically analyses the theory of “looping effects” and “interactive kinds” defended by Ian Hacking, and asks whether it is possible to draw a demarcation between social and natural science using the criteria of causal and ontological dependence. Focusing on current debates about the definition of marriage, Guala shows how these abstract philosophical issues have important practical and political consequences. -/- Moving beyond specific cases to general models and principles, Understanding Institutions offers new perspectives on what institutions are, how they work, and what they can do for us. (shrink)

The first full-scale commentary on the Cratylus, one of Plato's most difficult and intriguing dialogues.

Moving from a behavioral definition of intelligence, which describes it as the ability to adapt to the surrounding environment and deal effectively with new situations (Anastasi, 1986), this paper explains to what extent the performance obtained by ChatGPT in the linguistic domain can be considered as intelligent behavior and to what extent they cannot. It also explains in what sense the hypothesis of decoupling between cognitive and problem-solving abilities, proposed by Floridi (2017) and Floridi and Chiriatti (2020) should be interpreted. (...) The problem of symbolic grounding (Harnad, 1990) is then addressed to show the problematic relationship between ChatGPT and the natural environment, and thus the impossibility for it to understand the symbols it manipulates. To explain the reasons why ChatGPT does not succeed in this task, an investigation is carried out and a possible solution to the problem in the artificial domain is proposed by making a comparison with the natural ability of living beings to ground their own meanings from some basic cognitive-sensory aspects, which, it is explained, are directly related to the emergence of self-awareness in humans. Thus, the question is raised whether a possible and concrete solution to the Symbol Grounding Problem would involve in the artificial domain the development of cognitive abilities fully comparable to those of humans. Finally, I explain the difficulties that would have to be overcome before such a level could be reached, since human cognitive capacities are intimately linked to intersubjectivity and intercorporeality. (shrink)

Background Providing understandable information to patients is necessary to achieve the aims of the Informed Consent process: respecting and promoting patients’ autonomy and protecting patients from harm. In recent decades, new, primarily digital technologies have been used to apply and test innovative formats of Informed Consent. We conducted a systematic review to explore the impact of using digital tools for Informed Consent in both clinical research and in clinical practice. Understanding, satisfaction and participation were compared for digital tools versus the (...) non-digital Informed Consent process. Methods We searched for studies on available electronic databases, including Pubmed, EMBASE, and Cochrane. Studies were identified using specific Mesh-terms/keywords. We included studies, published from January 2012 to October 2020, that focused on the use of digital Informed Consent tools for clinical research, or clinical procedures. Digital interventions were defined as interventions that used multimedia or audio–video to provide information to patients. We classified the interventions into 3 different categories: video only, non-interactive multimedia, and interactive multimedia. Results Our search yielded 19,579 publications. After title and abstract screening 100 studies were retained for full-text analysis, of which 73 publications were included. Studies examined interactive multimedia, non-interactive multimedia, and videos, and most studies were conducted on adults. Innovations in consent were tested for clinical/surgical procedures and clinical research. For research IC, 21 outcomes were explored, with a positive effect on at least one of the studied outcomes being observed in 8/12 studies. For clinical/surgical procedures 49 outcomes were explored, and 21/26 studies reported a positive effect on at least one of the studied outcomes. Conclusions Digital technologies for informed consent were not found to negatively affect any of the outcomes, and overall, multimedia tools seem desirable. Multimedia tools indicated a higher impact than videos only. Presence of a researcher may potentially enhance efficacy of different outcomes in research IC processes. Studies were heterogeneous in design, making evaluation of impact challenging. Robust study design including standardization is needed to conclusively assess impact. (shrink)

Manufacturing and industry practices are undergoing an unprecedented revolution as a consequence of the convergence of emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, robotics, cloud computing, virtual and augmented reality, among others. This fourth industrial revolution is similarly changing the practices and capabilities of operators in their industrial environments. This paper introduces and explores the notion of the Operator 4.0 as well as how this novel way of conceptualizing the human operator necessarily implicates human values in the technologies that constitute it. (...) The design approach known as value sensitive design (VSD) is used to explore how these Operator 4.0 technologies can be designed for human values. Expert elicitation surveys were used to determine the values of industry stakeholders and examples of how the VSD methodology can be adopted by engineers in order to design for these values is illustrated. The results provide preliminary adoption strategies that industrial teams can take to Operator 4.0 technology for human values. (shrink)

This paper proposes a framework for representing in Bayesian terms the idea that analogical arguments of various degrees of strength may provide inductive support to yet untested scientific hypotheses. On this account, contextual information plays a crucial role in determining whether, and to what extent, a given similarity or dissimilarity between source and target may confirm an empirical hypothesis over a rival one. In addition to showing confirmation by analogy compatible with the adoption of a Bayesian standpoint, the proposal outlined (...) in this paper reveals a close agreement between the fulfillment of Hesse’s (Models and analogies in science, University of Notre Dame Press, 1963) criteria for analogical arguments capable of inductive support and the attribution of confirmatory power by the lights of Bayesian confirmation theory. In this sense, the Bayesian representation not only enriches a framework, Hesse’s, of enduring relevance for understanding scientific activity, but may offer something akin to a proof of concept of it. (shrink)

This paper defends the thesis of learning from non-causal models: viz. that the study of some model can prompt justified changes in one’s confidence in empirical hypotheses about a real-world target in the absence of any known or predicted similarity between model and target with regards to their causal features. Recognizing that we can learn from non-causal models matters not only to our understanding of past scientific achievements, but also to contemporary debates in the philosophy of science. At one end (...) of the philosophical spectrum, my thesis undermines the views of those who, like Cartwright (Erkenntnis 70:45–58, 2009), follow Hesse (Models and Analogies in Science, Notre Dame, University of Notre Dame Press, 1963) in restricting the possibility of learning from models to only those situations where a model identifies some causal factors present in the target. At the other end of the spectrum, my thesis also helps undermine some extremely permissive positions, e.g., Grüne-Yanoff’s (Erkenntnis 70(1):81–99, 2009, Philos Sci 80(5): 850–861, 2013) claim that learning from a model is possible even in the absence of any similarity at all between model and target. The thesis that we can learn from non-causal models offers a cautious middle ground between these two extremes. (shrink)

In this paper, we offer a descriptive theory of analogical reasoning in mathematics, stating general conditions under which an analogy may provide genuine inductive support to a mathematical conjecture (over and above fulfilling the merely heuristic role of ‘suggesting’ a conjecture in the psychological sense). The proposed conditions generalize the criteria of Hesse in her influential work on analogical reasoning in the empirical sciences. By reference to several case studies, we argue that the account proposed in this paper does a (...) better job in vindicating the use of analogical inference in mathematics than the prominent alternative defended by Bartha. (shrink)

Current debates in social ontology are dominated by approaches that view institutions either as rules or as equilibria of strategic games. We argue that these two approaches can be unified within an encompassing theory based on the notion of correlated equilibrium. We show that in a correlated equilibrium each player follows a regulative rule of the form ‘if X then do Y’. We then criticize Searle's claim that constitutive rules of the form ‘X counts as Y in C’ are fundamental (...) building blocks for institutions, showing that such rules can be derived from regulative rules by introducing new institutional terms. Institutional terms are introduced for economy of thought, but are not necessary for the creation of social reality. (shrink)

Recent debates on the nature of preferences in economics have typically assumed that they are to be interpreted either as behavioural regularities or as mental states. In this paper I challenge this dichotomy and argue that neither interpretation is consistent with scientific practice in choice theory and behavioural economics. Preferences are belief-dependent dispositions with a multiply realizable causal basis, which explains why economists are reluctant to make a commitment about their interpretation.

The Risk of Freedom presents an in-depth analysis of the philosophy of Jan Patočka, one of the most influential Central European thinkers of the twentieth century, examining both the phenomenological and ethical-political aspects of his work. In particular, Francesco Tava takes an original approach to the problem of freedom, which represents a recurring theme in Patočka’s work, both in his early and later writings.Freedom is conceived of as a difficult and dangerous experience. In his deep analysis of this particular (...) problem, Tava identifies the authentic ethical content of Patočka’s work and clarifies its connections with phenomenology, history of philosophy, politics and dissidence. The Risk of Freedom retraces Patočka’s philosophical journey and elucidates its more problematic and less evident traits, such as his original ethical conception, his political ideals and his direct commitment as a dissident. (shrink)

Economists and biologists have proposed a distinction between two mechanisms – “strong” and “weak” reciprocity – that may explain the evolution of human sociality. Weak reciprocity theorists emphasize the benefits of long-term cooperation and the use of low-cost strategies to deter free-riders. Strong reciprocity theorists, in contrast, claim that cooperation in social dilemma games can be sustained by costly punishment mechanisms, even in one-shot and finitely repeated games. To support this claim, they have generated a large body of evidence concerning (...) the willingness of experimental subjects to punish uncooperative free-riders at a cost to themselves. In this article, I distinguish between a “narrow” and a “wide” reading of the experimental evidence. Under the narrow reading, punishment experiments are just useful devices to measure psychological propensities in controlled laboratory conditions. Under the wide reading, they replicate a mechanism that supports cooperation also in “real-world” situations outside the laboratory. I argue that the wide interpretation must be tested using a combination of laboratory data and evidence about cooperation “in the wild.” In spite of some often-repeated claims, there is no evidence that cooperation in the small egalitarian societies studied by anthropologists is enforced by means of costly punishment. Moreover, studies by economic and social historians show that social dilemmas in the wild are typically solved by institutions that coordinate punishment, reduce its cost, and extend the horizon of cooperation. The lack of field evidence for costly punishment suggests important constraints about what forms of cooperation can or cannot be sustained by means of decentralised policing. (shrink)

After an introduction in which I rehearse some of the main elements of Stoic physics and psychology, I set out the evidence for the Stoic doctrine that the individual soul is both analogous to the cosmic soul and a part of it, as was held by the early exponents of the school (Section I). I argue that the doctrine threatened to land the Stoics in trouble, unless they were ready to qualify it by applying to it certain distinctions (Section II). (...) Then I consider the doctrine’s historical origins, discussing several possible antecedents of it, with a focus on a Socratic report in Xenophon and on Plato’s dialogues, and showing that the Stoics went beyond all their predecessors (Section III). After this historical excursus I turn to examine some of the arguments advanced by the early Stoics to prove that the cosmos has a soul, including one which compares the relation between the cosmos and the individual human beings to that between a father and his offspring (Section IV). This leads me to analyse in more detail this comparison, which occurs also in other contexts and is sometimes problematically connected with the notion that the individual soul is a part of the cosmic soul (Section V). One of the texts which are relevant to this issue, a report in Sextus Empiricus, is the object of a separate discussion in the final Appendix. (shrink)

This article investigates the effects of perceived supervisor support on ethical and unethical employee behavior using a multi-method approach. Specifically, we test the mediating mechanism and a boundary condition that moderate the relationship between support and ethical employee behaviors. We find that supervisor-based self-esteem fully mediates the relationship between supervisor support and ethical employee behavior and that employee task satisfaction intensifies the relationship between supervisor support and supervisor-based self-esteem.

This paper investigates two related aspects of Aristotle’s conception of primary substances in the Categories. In Section 1 I distinguish different interpretations of the relation between a primary substance and its accidental attributes: one (A) according to which a primary substance encompasses all of its attributes, including the accidental ones; another (B) according to which a primary substance encompasses only its essential attributes, whereas the accidental attributes are extrinsic to the substance, though related to it; and a third, intermediate one (...) (C) according to which a primary substance encompasses neither all of its attributes nor only the essential ones, but all the necessary ones. I trace the history of all three interpretations and argue in favour of (B). In Section 2 I defend the view that a particular human being, their soul, and their body all count as primary substances, and that the relation between these three substances is that soul and body are parts of the substance. I show that this hypothesis harmonizes both with some views advanced in the Categories and with some passages from other Aristotelian works. I conclude by drawing a comparison between this view and Aristotle’s mature hylomorphic doctrine. (shrink)

Arguments from non-causal analogy form a distinctive class of analogical arguments in science not recognized in authoritative classifications by, e.g., Hesse and Bartha. In this paper, I illustrate this novel class of scientific analogies by means of historical examples from physics, biology and economics, at the same time emphasizing their broader significance for contemporary debates in epistemology.

The COVID-19 pandemic has placed an enormous burden on health systems, and guidelines have been developed to help healthcare practitioners when resource shortage imposes the choice on who to treat. However, little is known on the public perception of these guidelines and the underlying moral principles. Here, we assess on a sample of 1033 American citizens’ moral views and agreement with proposed guidelines. We find substantial heterogeneity in citizens’ moral principles, often not in line with the guidelines recommendations. As the (...) guidelines are likely to directly affect a considerable number of citizens, our results call for policy interventions to inform people on the ethical rationale behind physicians or triage committees decisions to avoid resentment and feelings of unfairness. (shrink)

In this article I investigate what the Stoic doctrine of the two principles, God and matter, owes to Plato. I discuss recent scholarly views to the effect that the Stoics were influenced by Old Academic interpretations of the Timaeus and argue that, although the Timaeus probably did play a role in the genesis of the Stoic doctrine, some role was also played by a dualist theory of flux set forth in the etymologies of the Cratylus. I also discuss Theophrastus’ account (...) of Plato’s achievements in physics (fr. 230 FHS&G) and the report of Old Academic physics contained in Cicero’s Academica, 1. 24–9, and commonly taken to go back to Antiochus of Ascalon, and I show that those reports too are likely to have been influenced by the Cratylus. (shrink)

The deep comprehension of a text is tantamount to the construction of an articulated mental model of that text. The number of correct recollections is an index of a learner's mental model of a text. We assume that another index of comprehension is the timing of the gestures produced during text recall; gestures are simultaneous with speech when the learner has built an articulated mental model of the text, whereas they anticipate the speech when the learner has built a less (...) articulated mental model. The results of four experiments confirm the predictions deriving from our assumptions for both children and adults. Provided that the recollections are correct, the timing of gestures can differ and can be considered a further measure of the quality of the mental model, beyond the number of correct recollections. (shrink)

Naturalism is still facing a strong opposition in the philosophy of social science from influential scholars who argue that philosophical analysis must be autonomous from scientific investigation. The opposition exploits philosophers’ traditional diffidence toward social science and fuels the ambition to provide new foundations for social research. A classic anti-naturalist strategy is to identify a feature of social reality that prevents scientific explanation and prediction. An all-time favorite is the dependence of social phenomena on human representation. This article examines two (...) prominent versions of the dependence thesis and concludes that they both fail. Contemporary social science is capable of accounting for the causal dependence of social reality on representation, and there is no reason to believe that social entities are ontologically dependent on the collective acceptance of a constitutive rule. (shrink)

This paper examines the role and power of the state in modernity and its transformation throughout it and into the present. First, it recognizes the centrality of the role of information control for the modern state constitution, which allows sovereign power to extend to the national level. Secondly, it discusses the shift of state power from a purely informational power to an informational and bargaining power, as well as the gradual transformation of sovereignty into governmentality. Finally, it analyzes the transformations (...) that have led to a critical loss of both powers by the state and have enabled their acquisition by tech corporations. It examines the implications of this shift in power and the consequent disempowerment of the state, defining the mode of operation of the power embodied by tech corporations as a regime of performativity, rephrasing the Foucauldian regime of truth, which presided over the ways in which governmental power was performed. Such a regime bases its power not on the ability to order discourse and knowledge, but on the ability to automate it, and to predict and manipulate human behaviors. In this way, it has disintermediated not only the state in its role as the primary informational agent, but also, to some extent, the ability of individuals to assert rights through their actions. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that in several passages Plato sympathizes with the following view: sensible particulars undergo continuous, pervasive physical change; as a consequence, where there seems to be one and the same object which is identical through time, there is in fact a succession of impermanent objects numerically distinct from each other but similar to each other. I illustrate the difference between this view—which invites interesting comparisons with modern and contemporary theories—and other, superficially similar views which Plato criticizes. (...) I also suggest that this view might contribute to explaining Plato’s contention that sensible particulars lack being and are confined to coming to be. Finally, I show that my interpretation was well attested in antiquity; and I put forward the hypothesis that part of the aim of certain Aristotelian claims about substance might be to correct Plato in this respect. (shrink)

Experimental “localism” stresses the importance of context‐specific knowledge, and the limitations of universal theories in science. I illustrate Latour's radical approach to localism and show that it has some unpalatable consequences, in particular the suggestion that problems of external validity (or how to generalize experimental results to nonlaboratory circumstances) cannot be solved. In the last part of the paper I try to sketch a solution to the problem of external validity by extending Mayo's error‐probabilistic approach.

In De int. 9 Aristotle argues that some declarative sentences are neither true nor false. This raises the problem of how we should understand the words of ch. 4, which introduces the declarative sentence as ‘that in which being true or being false holds’. In this paper I remove the contradiction by arguing that in ch. 4 Aristotle does not intend to claim that *all* declarative sentences are either true or false, but rather that *only* they are either true or (...) false, unlike other kinds of sentence; I defend the soundness of this interpretation on the linguistic and textual level; and I show how we can make good philosophical sense of it. (shrink)

Le contrôle de constitutionnalité, dont la magistrature parlementaire de l’Ancien Régime revendiquait le plein droit, n’était pas fondé uniquement sur les lois fondamentales du royaume, mais sur l’ensemble des principes (« les maximes ») tirés de la « Tradition ». Cette dernière était composée en premier lieu par le droit divin et le droit naturel, c’est-à-dire par des systèmes juridiques qui nécessitaient, tous les deux, une interprétation juridictionnelle ‘sapientiale’. Cette activité interprétative était ‘révélatrice’ d’un corpus de valeurs métaphysiques à laquelle (...) seule la Scientia Juris des magistrats pouvait puiser. Mais dans la sphère de la Tradition juridique rentraient aussi le « dépôt légal », c’est-à-dire l’ensemble de toutes les lois, même des lois ainsi dites « ordinaires », c’est-à-dire celles qui avaient été produites par la simple manifestation de volonté souveraine d’un roi prédécesseur « car tel avait été son plaisir » (moderne formulation du brocarde de droit romain : « quidquid principi placuit legis habet vigorem »). Ainsi la juridiction parlementaire donnait lieu à un jugement de constitutionnalité qui était normalement exercé de manière très flexible par le corps de la magistrature, dépendant des circonstances et des intérêts politiques momentanés des situations juridiques qu’elle voulait protéger. La hiérarchie des normes était ainsi un formidable instrument de protection de cet ordre juridique dont les legum doctores se sentaient les tuteurs. Elle était, donc, directement liée au gouvernement politique des juges. (shrink)

Comparative process tracing is the best analysis of extrapolation inferences in the philosophical and scientific literature so far. In this essay I examine some similarities and differences between comparative process tracing and former attempts to capture the logic of extrapolation, such as the analogical approach. I show that these accounts are not different in spirit, although comparative process tracing supersedes previous proposals in terms of analytical detail. I also examine some qualms about the possibility of drawing extrapolation inferences in the (...) social sciences and conclude by suggesting that there may be cases of extrapolation without process tracing. (shrink)

Nominalism in formal ontology is still the thesis that the only acceptable domain of quantification is the first-order domain of particulars. Nominalists may assert that second-order well-formed formulas can be fully and completely interpreted within the first-order domain, thereby avoiding any ontological commitment to second-order entities, by means of an appropriate semantics called “substitutional”. In this paper I argue that the success of this strategy depends on the ability of Nominalists to maintain that identity, and equivalence relations more in general, (...) is first-order and invariant. Firstly, I explain why Nominalists are formally bound to this first-order concept of identity. Secondly, I show that the resources needed to justify identity, a certain conception of identity invariance, are out of the Nominalist’s reach. (shrink)

Constellations, Volume 29, Issue 3, Page 375-392, September 2022.