This chapter argues that from a particularly weak recombination principle and plausible assumptions about the nature of parthood and location, it follows that it is possible that the mereological structure of the material world and that of space-time fail to correspond to one another in very radical ways. The chapter suggests, moreover, that rejecting the possibility of such failures of correspondence leaves us with a choice of no less unappealing alternatives. It also discusses a few ways in which their possibility (...) is relevant to various important debates in metaphysics. (shrink)

I argue that from a very weak recombination principle and plausible assumptions about the nature of parthood and location it follows that it's possible that the mereological structure of the material world and that of spacetime fail to correspond to one another in very radical ways. I defend, moreover, that rejecting the possibility of such failures of correspondence leaves us with a choice of equally radical alternatives. I also discuss a few ways in which their possibility is relevant to various (...) debates in metaphysics. (shrink)

I give shape to a neglected debate in metaphysics, the debate over the ontological priority between individuality and collectivity. I distinguish the debate from more familiar ones in the recent literature and articulate what I call ontological collectivism, the view that collectivity is prior to individuality. I defend the in-principle intelligibility of the view from forceful general objections and argue that not only is it coherent but also of significant interest to the literature: it allows for overlooked alternatives on a (...) variety of central discussions. (shrink)

Purpose: To determine the relative value that patients place on consent for procedures in the emergency department (ED) and to define a set of procedures that fall in the realm of implied consent. Methods: A questionnaire was administered to a convenience sample 134 of 174 patients who were seen in the ED of a Midwestern teaching hospital. The questionnaire asked how much time they believed was necessary to give consent for various procedures. Procedures ranged from simple (venipuncture) to complex (procedural (...) sedation). Results: Participants valued a simple blood draw at a low mean of 1.02 minutes of extra time and a lumbar puncture at a high mean of 7.78 minutes. Of all participants 52% and 48% noted a time-value of ?0? time on blood draw and intravenous line starts, respectively, indicating that they desire no additional consent for these procedures. Conclusion: Defining a set of ED procedures covered under implied consent will be difficult because many patients value formal consent for even the simplest procedure. (shrink)

We study whether robots can satisfy the conditions of an agent fit to be held morally responsible, with a focus on autonomy and self-control. An analogy between robots and human groups enables us to modify arguments concerning collective responsibility for studying questions of robot responsibility. We employ Mele’s history-sensitive account of autonomy and responsibility to argue that even if robots were to have all the capacities required of moral agency, their history would deprive them from autonomy in a responsibility-undermining way. (...) We will also study whether humans and technological artifacts like robots can form hybrid collective agents that could be morally responsible for their actions and give an argument against such a possibility. (shrink)

Page 1. Economics and Philosophy, 26 291--320 Copyright C Cambridge University Press doi: 10.1017 / S0266267110000386 TWO KINDS OF WE-REASONING RAUL HAKLI, KAARLO MILLER AND RAIMO TUOMELA University of Helsinki.

Various sources in the literature claim that the deduction theorem does not hold for normal modal or epistemic logic, whereas others present versions of the deduction theorem for several normal modal systems. It is shown here that the apparent problem arises from an objectionable notion of derivability from assumptions in an axiomatic system. When a traditional Hilbert-type system of axiomatic logic is generalized into a system for derivations from assumptions, the necessitation rule has to be modified in a way that (...) restricts its use to cases in which the premiss does not depend on assumptions. This restriction is entirely analogous to the restriction of the rule of universal generalization of first-order logic. A necessitation rule with this restriction permits a proof of the deduction theorem in its usual formulation. Other suggestions presented in the literature to deal with the problem are reviewed, and the present solution is argued to be preferable to the other alternatives. A contraction-and cut-free sequent calculus equivalent to the Hubert system for basic modal logic shows the standard failure argument untenable by proving the underivability of DA from A. (shrink)

Este artículo busca responder si es posible planificar y reflexionar sobre contenidos transversales en educación, sin una aproximación transdisciplinaria sobre la complejidad de lo real, en un contexto de mutación planetaria. Todos los esfuerzos, dice el autor, parten del mismo diagnóstico: los distintos niveles educativos se encuentran obsoletos, se requiere una mirada transdisciplinar, y los docentes no tienen una epistemología acorde. El artículo analiza los estados de avance y las distinciones entre multidisciplinariedad, interdisciplinariedad y transdisciplinariedad.

Endorsing the idea of group knowledge seems to entail the possibility of group belief as well, because it is usually held that knowledge entails belief. It is here studied whether it would be possible to grant that groups can have knowledge without being committed to the controversial view that groups can have beliefs. The answer is positive on the assumption that knowledge can be based on acceptance as well as belief. The distinction between belief and acceptance can be seen as (...) a refinement of the ordinary language concept of belief, and it may be useful in understanding the nature of epistemic justification and classifying various types of epistemic subjects. (shrink)

Epistemic justification of non-summative group beliefs is studied in this paper. Such group beliefs are understood to be voluntary acceptances, the justification of which differs from that of involuntary beliefs. It is argued that whereas epistemic evaluation of involuntary beliefs can be seen not to require reasons, justification of voluntary acceptance of a proposition as true requires that the agent, a group or an individual, can provide reasons for the accepted view. This basic idea is studied in relation to theories (...) of dialectical justification in which justification is taken to require ability to justify. Since the reasons offered can in principle always be challenged, there is no ultimate end to the dialectical chain of justification. This makes justification of acceptance, and thus group belief, social and, in a way, contextual, but this does not seem to entail strong forms of epistemic relativism. (shrink)

Fulfilling the "unmet need for contraceptives" in Latin America is still a contested rallying cry for local activists, policymakers, and physicians. It evokes both the consumerist aspiration to choose birth control methods, as well as implies the existence of health and welfare institutions that ought to guarantee a human right. In the 1940s, however, the "unmet need for contraceptives" was a fledgling notion that a group of experts had only begun to popularize through the use of a crucial population-making technology: (...) the fertility survey. This paper analyzes the role fertility surveyors played in the mid-twentieth century, framing Latin American populations as rapidly growing and likely... (shrink)

En el texto se presenta a la sofística como precursora de la filosofía práctica, y se la reconoce como anticipadora del pensamiento aristotélico. La vía por la que se muestra dicha relación es el reconocimiento del papel primordial que esta concede al lenguaje y en especial al que adquiere la forma de discursos que buscan persuadir, a la retórica como piedra angular de la formación ciudadana en cuanto preparación para la vida pública. De esta manera se reconoce la importancia que (...) la retórica tuvo para la filosofía en sus orígenes, y cómo perfilaba otra manera de entender la racionalidad, no como teórica sino como práctica. Después se pasa a mostrar cómo según Chaïm Perelman, a partir de una reinterpretación de cierta parte de la obra de Aristóteles, es plausible postular a la retórica como un modelo más adecuado para entender la filosofía. (shrink)

The year 1992 is a year for reflection, because whether or not the quincentenary celebration of the arrival of the Europeans to this continent seems justified, one cannot escape thinking about the impact of this event on our land.As archeology is my area of study, my reflections are directed toward the changes that came about in the relationship between man and animals after 1492, specifically toward what occurred in Mexico once the Spaniards established themselves in this territory.

This analysis comes from a philosophical glance at Aristophanic comedy, where the problem seems to move towards universality of poetry. The common manner to face this problem is getting close to the concepts of learning and inference, introduced in the field of a sort of action or a sort of character without consideration for the Aristotle’s horizon of the poetic research télos, érgon, oikeía hedone and katharsis, or the Greek theatrical-poetic representation as an autonomous form of universal mythos. The underestimation (...) of the comic genre has centered the research upon Aristophanes in the fields of politics, philology and history, but seldom philosophy. (shrink)

GIS has captured planning practice to an unprecedented degree, and this article on how it reconfigures and is configured by institutional context. The author inquires into GIS as a technology for incorporating knowledge into institutional use and includes five propositions: GIS's efficiencies in data processing allows it unprecedented facility and scope of analysis, its use increases alienation, its mimetic language furthers its role in planning, its logic appears rational—purposive, but it conceals an underlying normative logic, and its most profound effect (...) is on the mapper, and the alienating and normative character of GIS necessitate new modes of “social ground-truthing.” The author studies the southeast Los Angeles initiatives to demonstrate these propositions. This article compares two studies: one GIS-based, and the other based on participatory action research and discusses how GIS might be recontextualized into a technology for liberating democratizing processes. (shrink)

Resumen: En el presente artículo se propone una revisión de carácter descriptivo respecto a distintos momentos en los que el llamado giro semiótico de las ciencias sociales colinda con algunas categorías epistémicas fundamentales para la construcción de un proceso consciente de acercamiento a lo social. Así, la realidad como constructo discursivo, el carácter semiótico-perceptual de la observación, los procesos de transcodificación entre doxa y episteme o el peso estructural de la disciplina, serán los ejes fundamentales planteados para esta relación. A (...) partir de este planteamiento, se proponen como criterios de integración semiótico-epistémica dos paradigmas claves en la construcción de un proceso de investigación cualitativa: la adopción de estructuras interdisciplinarias y el enfoque de la complejidad, que permiten problematizar las categorías anteriores, integrándolas como elementos fundamentales en la organización social del sentido.: The present article proposes a descriptive review of those moments in which the social sciences semiotic turn borders with some epistemic categories that results fundamental for the construction of a conscious approach to the social. Thus, the reality as a discursive construct, the semiotic character of observation, the transcoding process between doxa and episteme, or the structural wealth of discipline will be presented as fundamental axes to this relationship. Based on this approach, there are proposed as semiotic-epistemic integration judgements, two fundamental keys in the construction of a qualitative research process: the adoption of interdisciplinary structures, and the complexity perspective that allows to problematize the previous categories, integrating them as fundamental elements in the social meaning organization. (shrink)

This contribution offers reflections about Chilean Cybersyn, 50 years ago. In recent years, Cybersyn, has received significant attention. It was the brainchild of Stafford Beer, who conceived it to support the transformation of the Chilean economy from its bureaucratic history to hopefully create a vibrant and modern society, driven by cybernetic tools. These aspects have received much attention in recent times; however, in this contribution, I want to discuss how working in Cybersyn influenced my work after the coup of 1973. (...) Perhaps, for me, its major influence was in the management of complexity, through what I refer here as variety engineering and through the Viable System Model VSM as a paradigm to the management of relationships with implications to enterprises, society and the economy. After the 1973 coup major interest was in technological aspects of Cybersyn such as real-time management and its contribution to decision support and executive information systems. In the late 70s I was personally influenced by information management, but by the early 1980s my work moved towards methodological aspects of how to use the VSM. By 1989 I had created the VIPLAN method. Key questions I attempted to answer were, how to model the complexity of enterprises and their interactions with environmental agents. Later on, in the 1990s and 2000s, the main direction of my work was epistemological, ontological and methodological towards second-order cybernetics and relationships. Only in recent decades the political transformations proposed by Cybersyn have captured the imagination of many commentators. The confluence of social and cultural changes with information technology, data models, artificial intelligence, algorithms and several additional technological developments have challenged the excesses of capitalism, particularly after the banking crisis of 2008–2009. The purpose in this paper is discussing this evolution in the light of those early days in Chile. (shrink)