Landini discusses the second edition of Principia Mathematica, to show Russella (TM)s intellectual relationship with Wittgenstein and Ramsey.

U większości ludzi lewa półkula odgrywa decydującą rolę zarówno w kontroli zdolności językowych jak i wyuczonych gestów manualnych. U osób praworęcznych, lewostronne obszary kory mózgowej kontrolują ponadto działania dłoni i palców ręki dominującej, włączając w to ruchy sięgania w kierunku celu, chwytania przedmiotów i manipulowania nimi. Dlatego do niedawana nie było oczywiste, czy lateralizacja funkcji językowych jest ściślej związana z kontrolą preferowanej ręki, czy też z przetwarzaniem informacji wyższego rzędu niezbędnych w sprawnej komunikacji przy pomocy gestów, niezależnie od wykorzystywanego ramienia (...) i dłoni. Za drugą z tych opcji przemawia to, że u większości osób leworęcznych lewa półkula także dominuje w kontroli języka i~gestów. Przeciw zdają się świadczyć przykłady nietypowej lateralizacji zdolności językowych do prawej półkuli, przy lewopółkulowej reprezentacji gestów manualnych. Choć dotąd względnie dobrze poznano jak często dochodzi do nietypowej lateralizacji niektórych funkcji w mózgu, ciągle nie jest jasne, jakie są tego przyczyny. Co ważniejsze, dopiero niedawno naukowcy zaczęli z sukcesem badać wzajemne relacje pomiędzy różnymi zdolnościami poznawczymi u ludzi zdrowych. Badania te sugerują istnienie bliskich zależności pomiędzy lateralizacją na pozór odmiennych funkcji, takich jak język i gesty, w przypadkach dotąd uznawanych za raczej wyjątkowe. Te ostatnie, z kolei, często łączono z reorganizacją mózgu w następstwie choroby lub innych zakłóceń jego działania. Tymczasem, istnienie ścisłych relacji pomiędzy reprezentacjami na pozór odmiennych dyspozycji poznawczych w przypadkach nietypowych, a nie mających źródła w chorobie i urazach, sugeruje nieco inny model lateralizacji funkcji w mózgu. (shrink)

A re-issue of Gregory Bateson's classic work. It summarizes Bateson's thinking on the subject of the patterns that connect living beings to each other and to their environment.

Now in its twentieth year of publication, this rich collection, popular among teachers and students alike, provides an in-depth look at major cases that have shaped the field of medical ethics. The book presents each famous (or infamous) case using extensive historical and contextual background, and then proceeds to illuminate it by careful discussion of pertinent philosophical theories and legal and ethical issues.

The debate between instrumentalist and technological determinist positions on the nature of technology characterised the early history of the philosophy of technology. In recent years however technological determinism has ceased to be viewed as a credible philosophical position within the field. This paper uses Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology to reconsider the technological determinist outlook in phenomenological terms as an experiential response to the encounter with the phenomenon of modern technology. Recasting the instrumentalist-determinist debate in a phenomenological manner enables one to reconcile the (...) apparent dualism of the instrumentalist and determinist positions through Merleau-Ponty’s ontology of the flesh. This ontology has recently been used to ground accounts of virtual embodiment. We argue that in addition to explaining away the classical form of technological determinism, it can also phenomenologically ground a novel understanding of technological determinism. Namely, a technological determinism of virtual embodiment. (shrink)

Recreative Minds develops a philosophical theory of imagination that draws upon the latest work in psychology. This theory illuminates the use of imagination in coming to terms with art, its role in enabling us to live as social beings, and the psychological consequences of disordered imagination. The authors offer a lucid exploration of a fascinating subject.

This important book provides a theory about the nature of fiction, and about the relation between the author, the reader and the fictional text. The approach is philosophical: that is to say, the author offers an account of key concepts such as fictional truth, fictional characters, and fiction itself. The book argues that the concept of fiction can be explained partly in terms of communicative intentions, partly in terms of a condition which excludes relations of counterfactual dependence between the world (...) and the text. This communicative model is then applied to the following problems: how can something be 'true in the story' without being explicitly stated in the text? In what ways does interpreting a fictional story depend upon grasping its author's intentions? Is there always a unique best interpretation of a fictional text? What is the correct semantics for fictional names? What is the nature of our emotional response to a fictional work? In answering these questions the author explores the complex interaction between author, reader, and text. This interaction requires the reader to construct a 'fictional author' - a character in the story whose personality, beliefs and emotional states must be interpreted if the reader is to grasp the meaning of the work. (shrink)

Browning, Grayson Douglas was born on March 7, 1929, in Seminole, Oklahoma.He received his PhD from the University Texas, Austin, 1958, where he returned later in 1972 to become its Philosophy Department chairman for four years.He was president of the Southwestern Philosophical Association in 1977, of the Florida Philosophical Association in 1967, and of the Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology in 1972.He was not only a member of the Society for Advancement of America Philosophy; he encouraged all of his (...) students to attend and become members of this society. Among these former students are Bill Myers, David Hildebrand, and Gregory Pappas.He thought that this was one of the best societies, not only because... Read More. (shrink)

Philosophers have recently argued that self-fulfilling beliefs constitute an important counter-example to the widely accepted theses that we ought not and cannot believe at will. Cases of self-fulfilling belief are thought to constitute a special class where we enjoy the epistemic freedom to permissibly believe for pragmatic reasons, because whatever we choose to believe will end up true. In this paper, I argue that this view fails to distinguish between the aim of acquiring a true belief and the aim of (...) believing what is true. While one cannot usually fail to establish that one will acquire a true belief without establishing the truth of the believed proposition, in the case self-fulfilling belief the two can come apart. I argue that insofar as the aim of belief has to do with determining whether the believed proposition is true, it will be both impossible and impermissible to believe for pragmatic reasons. (shrink)

A comprehensive introduction to current research on the psychology of concept formation and use.

Discusses mental processes, the role of humans in nature, experience, and the connection between myth, religion, and science.

Technological determinism, as a position on the nature and effects of technology/technologies can be divided into optimistic and critical forms. The optimistic variety, of which contemporary cyber-utopianism is an instance, holds that the development of technology shapes or at least facilitates ameliorative alterations in society. The critical variety, on the other hand, tends to problematise or condemn the positive narrative of technological impact on human existence. Whilst the optimistic form still retains some academic credibility, especially concerning digital technologies, the critical (...) variety tends to be viewed as reductionist, essentialist and pessimistic. Furthermore, the fact that many of its leading proponents base their critiques on the analysis of industrial technology, reinforces the impression that critical technological determinism is outdated. I argue that focussing on the specific forms of technology analysed by classic technological determinists is to miss the key point of their arguments. Critical determinism warns that with the increasing integration of technology into everyday life, we run the risk of idealising technological organisation and making sociotechnical relations a model for all social relations. Drawing upon Rendueles’s (2017) analysis of the sociophobic tendencies of the online public sphere, I argue for the continuing relevance of so-called ‘Classic’ technological determinism. The danger posed by the ubiquity of the internet on this account is not that it possesses some innate quality that imposes a particular social pattern on humanity, but that the way in which we interact in cyberspace becomes the norm for social relations outside the cybersphere. (shrink)

This text offers a reflection on the nature and significance of narrative in human communication.

In The Decline of the West Spengler puts forward a type of philosophical anthropology, an account of the structures of human experiential consciousness and a method of “physiognomic” analysis, which I argue has dimensions that can be understood as akin to existential phenomenology. Humanity, for Spengler, is witness to the creative flux of “Becoming” and constructs a world of phenomena bounded by death, underpinned by the two prime feelings of dread and longing and structured by the two forms of Destiny (...) (Time) and Direction (Space). Human existence, Spengler argues, is future-directed and open in the sense that there is a certain degree of freedom in the ways in which humanity can actualize its existential possibilities. In the course of elaborating the existential implications of this future-orientation, Spengler introduces the concept of care (Sorge), the fundamental experiential structure. (shrink)

Gregory Currie defends the view that works of fiction guide the imagination, and then considers whether fiction can also guide our beliefs. He makes a case for modesty about learning from fiction, as it is easy to be too optimistic about the psychological insights of authors, and empathy is hard to acquire while not always morally advantageous.

This paper considers the relationship between evidence and self-fulfilling beliefs. Following Grice (1971), many philosophers hold that adopting a self-fulfilling belief would involve an impermissible form of bootstrapping. I argue that such objections gets their force from a popular but problematic model of theoretical deliberation which pictures deliberation as a function, treating the deliberation’s inputs as given, fixed prior to and independently from the deliberation. Though such a picture may seem plausible, attending to the case of self-fulfilling beliefs can help (...) us see how such a function-model is inadequate for a general understanding of theoretical deliberation. Because it is unable to accommodate the possibility that the outcomes of our deliberation can sometimes be evidence for the proposition we are deliberating about, the function model is unable to account for cases where what we believe affects the truth of what is believed. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Although Alasdair MacIntyre has criticized both the market economy and applied ethics, his writing has generated significant discussion within the literature of business ethics and organizational studies. In this article, I extend this conversation by proposing the use of MacIntyre’s account of the virtues to conceive of management as a domain-relative practice that requires and develops practical wisdom. I proceed in four steps. First, I explain MacIntyre’s account of the virtues in light of his definition of a “practice.” Second, I (...) examine his distinction between “practices” and “institutions.” Third, I explain what I mean by a “domain-relative practice” and defend the claim that it is helpful to conceive of management in those terms. Finally, I highlight several features of practical wisdom as a virtue developed in and integral to standards of excellence within management as a domain-relative practice. (shrink)

The Oxford Companion to the Mind is a classic. Published in 1987, to huge acclaim, it immediately took its place as the indispensable guide to the mysteries - and idiosyncracies - of the human mind. In no other book can the reader find discussions of concepts such as language, memory, and intelligence, side by side with witty definitions of common human experiences such as the 'cocktail-party' and 'halo' effects, and the least effort principle. Richard Gregory again brings his wit, (...) wisdom, and expertise to bear on this most elusive of subjects. Research into the mind and brain has moved on in bounds in recent years, and interest in the subject has never been so high. There has been a shift in focus away from Freud's concept of the unconscious onto consciousness itself. The new edition of the Companion includes three 'mini symposia' - on consciousness, brain scanning, and artificial intelligence - with contributions from a number of specialists, and encompassing a range of approaches. Cultural as well as scientific in approach, this accessible book offers authoritative descriptions and analysis. With new entries on controversial topics such as artificial life, attachment theory, caffeine, cruetly, drama, extra-terrestrial intelligence, genetics of mental illness, imagination, lying, puzzles, and twins, this highly-anticipated second edition explores the most intriguing of subjects. (shrink)

Darwin begins his “one long argument” not in the natural world of the deep past but – surprisingly and, for some readers, disappointingly – on the present-day world of the farm, providing a detailed look at domesticated plants and animals as well as the humans who breed them. Darwin’s opening chapter divides roughly into two halves. In the first half, Darwin surveys the amazing variability of plants and animals under domestication and some of the main causes of that variability. In (...) the second half, he turns from variation to selection: the picking for breeding of the individual dogs or pigeons or cabbages or whatever which are the fastest or the strongest or the most colorful or the tastiest or whatever, in the hopes that those attractive variations will be inherited by offspring. It is mainly through selection of inheritable variation, Darwin argues, that humans have created so many and such diverse domesticated varieties of plants and animals, suited so splendidly to human needs and desires. A large part of being able to follow Darwin’s reasoning through the densely fact-packed paragraphs in this chapter lies with seeing where, in his view, it’s all going: namely, the laying down of the foundations for an analogical argument linking the selective breeding-into-being by humans of new varieties, or “artificial selection,” with a comparable process in nature capable of producing not merely new varietiesSpeciesand varieties but new species – what he will call, to flag the analogy, “natural selection.” It also helps to be alert to a number of ideas that Darwin held but which modern biologists reject, such as the notion that domestication itself induces animals and plants to become far more variable than they are in the wild, and the idea that characters acquiredInheritanceof characters acquired in the course of an individual’s lifetime can be inherited (so-called “Lamarckian inheritance”). (shrink)

How do words stand for things? Taking ideas from philosophical semantics and pragmatics, this book offers a unique, detailed, and critical survey of central debates concerning linguistic reference in the twentieth century. It then uses the survey to identify and argue for a novel version of current 'two-dimensional' theories of meaning, which generalise the context-dependency of indexical expressions. The survey highlights the history of tensions between semantic and epistemic constraints on plausible theories of word meaning, from analytic philosophy and modern (...) truth-conditional semantics, to the Referentialist and Externalist revolutions in theories of meaning, to the more recent reconciliatory ambition of two-dimensionalists. It clearly introduces technical semantical notions, theses, and arguments, with easy-to-follow, step-by-step guides. Wide-ranging in its scope, yet offering an accessible route into literature that can seem complex and technical, this will be essential reading for advanced students, and academic researchers in semantics, pragmatics, and philosophy of language. (shrink)

What can we learn from fiction? I argue that we can learn about the consequences of a certain course of action by projecting ourselves, in imagination, into the situation of the fiction's characters.

This book surveys the leading modern theories of property - Lockean, libertarian, utilitarian/law-and-economics, personhood, Kantian and human flourishing - and then applies those theories to concrete contexts in which property issues have been especially controversial. These include redistribution, the right to exclude, regulatory takings, eminent domain and intellectual property. The book highlights the Aristotelian human flourishing theory of property, providing the most comprehensive and accessible introduction to that theory to date. The book's goal is neither to cover every conceivable theory (...) nor to discuss every possible facet of the theories covered. Instead, it aims to make the major property theories comprehensible to beginners, without sacrificing accuracy or sophistication. The book will be of particular interest to students seeking an accessible introduction to contemporary theories of property, but even specialists will benefit from the book's lucid descriptions of contemporary debates. (shrink)

This paper considers the relationship between evidence and self-fulfilling beliefs—beliefs whose propositional contents will be true just in case—and because—an agent believes them. Following Grice, many philosophers hold that believing such propositions would involve an impermissible form of bootstrapping. This paper argues that such objections get their force from a popular but problematic function-model of theoretical deliberation, and that attending to the case of self-fulfilling belief can help us see why such a model is mistaken. The paper shows that on (...) a revised model of theoretical deliberation our evidence will problematically underdetermine any appropriate doxastic attitude: when belief in a proposition is self-fulfilling, our evidence is insufficient to support belief, disbelief, or even suspended judgment toward that proposition. (shrink)

With Empire, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri reinvigorated debates in political theory and radical philosophy about the cultivation of revolutionary subjectivity. Their theorization of Empire and multitude has also significantly affected the tenor of critical approaches to educational theory during the past two decades. In this article, we discuss Hardt and Negri’s contribution to what we call the biopolitical turn in educational theory, emphasizing the influence of autonomist Marxism on their work. Even more specifically, we discuss the impact of the (...) autonomist tradition on their formulation of the nature of the relationship between the multitude and Empire: that the multitude is the generative force of the social world, whereas Empire is merely an apparatus of capture. This autonomist approach reveals a set of questions regarding subjectivity, materialism, and social ontology, which we argue are ripe for engagement by educational theorists, and indicate the enduring relevance of Empire as a valuable text for educational theorists interested in matters of biopolitical production, collective opposition, and revolutionary subjectivity. (shrink)

This book is a sustained examination of issues in the philosophy of ecology that have been a source of controversy since the emergence of ecology as an explicit scientific discipline. The controversies revolve around the idea of a balance of nature, the possibility of general ecological knowledge and the role of model-building in ecology. The Science of the Struggle for Existence is also a detailed treatment of these issues that incorporates both a comprehensive investigation of the relevant ecological literature and (...) the development of an explicit theoretical framework in the philosophy of science. It addresses issues in the philosophy of ecology that are of particular importance for the deployment of ecology in the solution of environmental problems. It will have a cross-disciplinary appeal and will interest students and professionals in science, the philosophy of science, and environmental studies as well as policy-makers. (shrink)

This is a book about the nature of film: about the nature of moving images, about the viewer's relation to film, and about the kinds of narrative that film is capable of presenting. It represents a very decisive break with the semiotic and psychoanalytic theories of film which have dominated discussion. The central thesis is that film is essentially a pictorial medium and that the movement of film images is real rather than illusory. A general theory of pictorial representation is (...) presented, which insists on the realism of pictures and the impossibility of assimilating them to language. It criticizes attempts to explain the psychology of film viewing in terms of the viewer's imaginary occupation of a position within the world of film. On the contrary, film viewing is nearly always impersonal. (shrink)

Leave it to the boob tube to explain the meaning of existence. Let Gilligan's Island teach you about situational ethics. Learn about epistemology from The Brady Bunch. Explore Aristotle's Poetics by watching 24. Television has grappled with a wide range of philosophical conundrums. According to the networks, it's the ultimate source of all knowledge in the universe. So why not look at the small screen for answers to all of humanity's dilemmas? There's not a single issue discussed by the great (...) thinkers of the past that hasn't been hashed out between commercials in shows like Mad Men and Leave It To Beaver..."--P. [4] of cover. (shrink)

Leonard Harris’s work on Alain Locke and insurrectionism are invaluable contributions to American philosophy, but for some reason his “insurrectionist challenge to Pragmatism” gets the most attention; it presses Pragmatism to show how it can facilitate insurrection and revolt against moral abominations such as oppression, racism, and slavery. For some, the implication of the challenge is that Pragmatism and insurrectionism are incompatible; for others, there is still hope that at least future Pragmatism could meet the challenge. But overall the legitimacy (...) or soundness of the insurrectionist challenge has not been questioned. Pragmatism does have weaknesses and should be subject to criticism, but I argue that none of the arguments presented by Harris, and repeated by others, undermine the adequacy of Pragmatism in any significant way. Pragmatism is compatible or includes everything that Harris accuses it of lacking, or it has good reasons not to meet his expectations of adequacy. (shrink)

This clear, learner-friendly text helps today's students bridge the gap between everyday culture and critical thinking. The text covers all the basics of critical thinking, beginning where students are, not where we think they should be. Its comprehensiveness allows instructors to tailor the material to their individual teaching styles, resulting in an exceptionally versatile text.

Defences of inference to the best explanation (IBE) frequently associate IBE with scientific realism, the idea that it is reasonable to believe our best scientific theories. I argue that this linkage is unfortunate. IBE does not warrant belief, since the fact that a theory is the best available explanation does not show it to be (even probably) true. What IBE does warrant is acceptance: taking a proposition as a premise in theoretical and/or practical reasoning. We ought to accept our best (...) scientific theories since they are the theories that are most likely to lead to the goal of science, which is that of knowledge. In support of this claim I invoke Bill Lycan's Panglossian reflections regarding Mother Nature.1. (shrink)

The Ethics of War is an indispensable collection of essays addressing issues both timely and age-old about the nature and ethics of war. Features essays by great thinkers from ancient times through to the present day, among them Plato, Augustine, Aquinas, Machiavelli, Grotius, Kant, Russell, and Walzer Examines timely questions such as: When is recourse to arms morally justifiable? What moral constraints should apply to military conduct? How can a lasting peace be achieved? Will appeal to a broad range of (...) readers interested in morality and ethics in war time Includes informative introductions and helpful marginal notes by editors. (shrink)

Mounting evidence shows that nature contact is associated with affective benefits. However, the psychological mechanisms responsible for these effects are not well understood. In this study, we examined whether more time spent in nature was associated with higher levels of positive affect in general, and lower levels of negative affect and rumination in general. We also conducted a cross-sectional mediation analysis to examine whether rumination mediated the association of nature contact with affect. Participants reported their average time spent in nature (...) each week, as well as their general levels of positive and negative affect, and the degree to which they typically engaged in rumination in daily life. We then used structural equation modeling to test our hypotheses. Our results support the hypothesis that nature contact is associated with general levels of affect, and that rumination mediates this association for negative affect, and marginally mediates this association for positive affect. (shrink)

The article examines the effects of non-financial disclosure on corporate social responsibility. We conceptualise trade-offs between two ideal types in relation to CSR. Whereas self-regulation is associated with greater flexibility for businesses to develop best practices, it can also lead to complacency if firms feel no external pressure to engage with CSR. In contrast, government regulation is associated with greater stringency around minimum standards, but can also result in rigidity owing to a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach. Given these potential trade-offs, we ask (...) how mandatory non-financial disclosure has been shaping CSR practices and examine its potential effectiveness as a regulatory instrument. Our analysis of 24 OECD countries using the Asset4 database shows that firms in countries that require non-financial disclosure adopt significantly more CSR activities. However, we also find that NFD regulation does not lead to lower levels of corporate irresponsibility. Furthermore, our analysis demonstrates that, over time, the variation in CSR activities declines as firms adopt increasingly similar practices. Our study thereby contributes to understanding the impact of government regulation on CSR at firm level. We also discuss the limits of mandatory NFD in addressing regulatory trade-offs between stringency and flexibility in the field of corporate social responsibility. (shrink)

Vocal affect is a subcomponent of emotion programs that coordinate a variety of physiological and psychological systems. Emotional vocalizations comprise a suite of vocal behaviors shaped by evolution to solve adaptive social communication problems. The acoustic forms of vocal emotions are often explicable with reference to the communicative functions they serve. An adaptationist approach to vocal emotions requires that we distinguish between evolved signals and byproduct cues, and understand vocal affect as a collection of multiple strategic communicative systems subject to (...) the evolutionary dynamics described by signaling theory. We should expect variability across disparate societies in vocal emotion according to culturally evolved pragmatic rules, and universals in vocal production and perception to the extent that form–function relationships are present. (shrink)

Chris Frith has argued that a loss of the sense of agency is central to schizophrenia. This suggests a connection between hallucinations and delusions on the one hand, and the misidentification of the subject’s imaginings as perceptions and beliefs on the other. In particular, understanding the mechanisms that underlie imagination may help us to explain the puzzling phenomena of thought insertion and withdrawal. Frith sometimes states his argument in terms of a loss of metarepresentational capacity in schizophrenia. I argue that (...) this formulation is unhelpful. (shrink)