There are many ontologies of the world or of specific phenomena such as time, matter, space, and quantum mechanics1. However, ontologies of information are rather rare. One of the reasons behind this is that information is most frequently associated with communication and computing, and not with ‘the furniture of the world’. But what would be the nature of an ontology of information? For it to be of significant import it should be amenable to formalization in a logico-grammatical formalism. A candidate (...) ontology satisfying such a requirement can be found in some of the ideas of K. Turek, presented in this paper. Turek outlines the ontology of information conceived of as a part of nature, and provides the ‘missing link’ to the Z axiomatic set theory, offering a proposal for developing a formal ontology of information both in its philosophical and logicogrammatical representations. (shrink)

The concept of information can be viewed from two perspectives, namely epistemic and ontological. In the epistemic view, information is associated with meaning, semantics, and knowledge, while in the ontological view, it is understood as structures and forms of objects. Information is most often perceived as epistemic information, yet a closer look at epistemic information reveals that this concept does not account for ontological information. This paper poses the following question: Should we select epistemic or ontological information as our primary (...) concept of information, or should we acknowledge that both kinds of information are required for a full comprehension? The discussion here is supported by references to modern research in physics, computing, cosmology, and information sciences. (shrink)

There are many ontologies of the world or of specific phenomena such as time, matter, space, and quantum mechanics1. However, ontologies of information are rather rare. One of the reasons behind this is that information is most frequently associated with communication and computing, and not with ‘the furniture of the world’. But what would be the nature of an ontology of information? For it to be of significant import it should be amenable to formalization in a logico-grammatical formalism. A candidate (...) ontology satisfying such a requirement can be found in some of the ideas of K. Turek, presented in this paper. Turek outlines the ontology of information conceived of as a part of nature, and provides the ‘missing link’ to the Z axiomatic set theory, offering a proposal for developing a formal ontology of information both in its philosophical and logicogrammatical representations. (shrink)

We argue that the Internet is, and is acting as, an EA because it shapes our belief systems, our worldviews. We explain key concepts for this discussion and provide illustrative examples to support our claims. Furthermore, we explain why recognising the Internet as an EA is important for Internet users and society in general. We discuss several ways in which the Internet influences the choices, beliefs, and attitudes of its users, and we compare this effect with those of psychological conditioning (...) and brainwashing techniques. Finally, we present examples where the Internet’s epistemic agency acts at scale, affecting large portions of society rather than individuals. (shrink)

Looking into the future is always a risky endeavour, but one way to anticipate the possible future shape of AI-driven societies is to examine the visionary works of some sci-fi writers. Not all sci-fi works have such visionary quality, of course, but some of Stanisław Lem’s works certainly do. We refer here to Lem’s works that explore the frontiers of science and technology and those that describe imaginary societies of robots. We therefore examine Lem’s prose, with a focus on the (...) Cyberiad stories, to see what challenges our future technological societies may face when they entrust their lives to AI technology. For example, what questions should we ask, and what questions do we forget to ask, when developing AI systems and allowing these systems to control our lives. The technologically honed minds of our current technocrats are perhaps too limited to guide us into this future, because AI-based technology is relatively unchartered territory, as any new, complex technology is by nature. Lem’s visions of future societies oriented around AI and robotics portray AI technology in a deeper and more nuanced way than the current technological visions offered by our leading technological prophets. Based on Lem’s visions, what is to come may not turn out to be an AI-driven nirvana. (shrink)

In this paper, we examine the meta-ontology of AI systems with human-level intelligence, with us denoting such AI systems as AI E. Meta-ontology in philosophy is a discourse centered on ontology, ontological commitment, and the truth condition of ontological theories. We therefore discuss how meta-ontology is conceptualized for AI E systems. We posit that the meta-ontology of AI E systems is not concerned with computational representations of reality in the form of structures, data constructs, or computational concepts, while the ontological (...) commitment of AI E systems is directed toward what exists in the outside world. Furthermore, the truth condition of the ontology (which is meta-ontological assumption) of AI E systems does not require consistency with closed conceptual schema or ontological theories but rather with reality, or in other words, “what is the world” (Smith, 2019, p.57). In addition, the truth condition of AI E systems is verified through operational success rather than by coherence with theories. This work builds on ontological postulates about AI systems that were formulated by Brian Cantwell Smith (2019). (shrink)

Physical information is a property of nature. How does physical information persist over time? Does it do so as an object, process, or event, which are things considered in the current persistence theories? Physical information is none of these, however, this implies that persistence theories cannot explain the persistence of information. We therefore study the persistence of snowflakes, ephemeral natural structures, to better understand the persistence of natural things, such as physical information. The transitory nature of snowflakes suggests that physical (...) information persists as nature’s latent order, therefore, it is associated with natural structures, but it is not identical to them. This interpretation preserves the properties attributed to physical information, particularly its foundational character. The concept of physical information as latent order accords with Burgin’s General Theory of Information (GTI), which is currently the most comprehensive conceptualization of information that has been proposed. (shrink)

Presented here is a review of the book by Michael Wooldridge The Road to Conscious Machines: The Story of AI. The book was published in 2021 by Pelican Publishing Company. The book presents a philosophical exploration of the AI-related quest to understand the essence of our minds, ethics, and consciousness. Nonetheless, the book is unconventional as it focuses on failures of past AI programs rather than on AI success stories. The author also indicates the possible pathways to develop new, more (...) efficient AI paradigms. The short technical section at the end of the book offers more in-depth information on topics like Prolog, Bayesian, and deep neural networks. (shrink)

Book review: Contemporary Polish Ontology. Skowron, B., Philosophical Analysis, 82. Berlin; Boston: De Gruyter, 2020. pp.320.

This special edition of Philosophical Problems in Science (Zagadnienia Filozoficzne w Nauce or ZFN) focuses on concepts of information and computing. On reading this issue, you may be surprised by the absence of traditional perspectives and themes that one would usually expect from such collections, but this apparent oversight is deliberate. The eight papers collected in this special edition of ZFN bring together perspectives that aim to inspire readers rather than confirm concepts that have already been researched. The main motivation (...) behind this collection is a desire to explore the philosophical dimensions of computing and information sciences. Thus, for anyone looking for new ideas related to the philosophy of computing and information and wondering what is on the horizon, this special edition of ZFN may be the place to start. (shrink)

James Lovelock, who is famous for the Gaia hypothesis, has written a new book called Novacene: The Coming Age of Hyperintelligence. It is an extended argument about an impending new epoch on Earth called Novacene in which biological life as we know it will evolve into lifeforms based on cyber technology built from non-biological materials. Novacene may be seen as a development of the ideas presented in Lovelock’s earlier book A Rough Guide to The Future. In Novacene, the Earth will (...) be populated by cyborgs, which are self-replicating and self-improving mechanical systems that will eventually dominate and rule the Earth. These cyborgs will possess intelligence and knowledge beyond our understanding. (shrink)

Social robotics are autonomous robots or Artificial Moral Agents (AMA), that will interact respect and embody human ethical values. However, the conceptual and practical problems of building such systems have not yet been resolved, playing a role of significant challenge for computational modeling. It seems that the lack of success in constructing robots, ceteris paribus, is due to the conceptual and algorithmic limitations of the current design of ethical robots. This paper proposes a new approach for developing ethical capacities in (...) robotic systems, one based on the concept of Aristotelian phronesis. Phronesis in principle reflexes closer human ethics than the ethical paradigms we employ today in ethical robotics. This paper describes the essential features of phronesis and proposes a high-level architecture for implementing phronetic principles in autonomous robots. Phronetic robotics is in its early stages of conceptualization, so many of the presented ideas are speculative and require further research.2. (shrink)

Book review of: M. Heller, _Przestrzenie Wszechświata_. Od geometrii do kosmologii, Copernicus Center Press, Kraków 2017, ss. 284.

Book review of: M. Heller, Przestrzenie Wszechświata. Od geometrii do kosmologii, Copernicus Center Press, Kraków 2017, ss. 284.

Zajmował się informatyką i telekomunikacją przez 30 lat. Obecnie koncentruje się na filozofii informatyki i w ramach pracy doktorskiej z filozofii na zagadnieniu istoty informacji. Doktorat uzyskał na Uniwersytecie w Londynie na podstawie dysertacji o przestrzennych algorytmach genetycznych. Opublikował kilka książek na temat sztucznej inteligencji, telekomunikacji i filozofii Tao.

Stuart Richie’s book discusses social, political, and cultural influences on science. In a series of well documented cases Richie shows how many of top scientific journals publish poorly executed studies with dubious conclusions. Such publications distort a public image of science as an unbiased search for truth. The roots of such practices, Richie traces to the way science enterprise is done in academia and in private research centers, where only positive and “expected” results are valued. While according to Richie there (...) is a small chance to cure scientific practices from these ills, science itself is and remains the search for truth, even if our social moors make it so much harder. (shrink)

Book review: Homo Deus. A Brief History of Tomorrow. Yuval Noah Harari. Vintage, UK. 2017. p. 512.

Book review: Daniel C. Dennett, From Bacteria to Bach and Back. The evolution of mind, Penguin Random House, UK 2017, pp. 467.

Stanisław Lem is mostly known as a sci-fi writer and not widely perceived as a visionary of the cyber age, despite the fact that he foresaw the future of information technology better than most scientific experts. Indeed, his visions of future information-based societies have proved to be remarkably accurate. Lem’s stories fuse together elements of fantasy, philosophy, and science, but what we can really learn from them is the nature of humanity, technology, and philosophy, as well as the values of (...) technological prophecies. Moreover, Lem gave birth to, without naming it as such, the concept of philosophy in technology, which is a perspective on technology and philosophy that explores the deep implicit philosophical foundations of technology and humanity. (shrink)

In this review, we present the philosophical blog “Cafe Aleph”, which was founded by Witold Marciszewski in collaboration with Paweł Stacewicz. The blog contains numerous expert entries on issues from the border of philosophy, science and technology. “Cafe Aleph” is an area for developing, popularizing and discussing the idea of philosophy of computing.

As one may have noticed, the title of this paper is somewhat provocative. We found Roman Krzanowski’s (2020a,b,c; 2022) proposed approach to the problem of information very intriguing. Our aim here is to highlight some advantages when it comes to answering some fundamental questions in the philosophy of physics and metaphysics, as well as the philosophy of information and computer science. This issue is of great importance, so we propose that the introduction of some subtle distinctions between ontological (...) and epistemological information can be regarded as being analogous to G.F.R. Ellis’s analyses of the passage of time in his concept of the Crystallizing Block Universe (Ellis and Goswami, 2012). This analogy could be useful when further studying the relations between different types of information. We also suggest some subjects for further study, ones where Krzanowski’s proposal could serve as a very solid foundation for examining traditional metaphysical issues by combining classical philosophical doctrines with the new approach. (shrink)

While Hermann Levin Goldschmidt didn’t read Yiddish anarchists, there seems to have been a convergent evolution in their thinking. Goldschmidt’s looking up to Jewish lore as a source of liberating creativity is commonly encountered in Yiddish anarchist texts. His view of action as a constant response to internal and external challenges in the struggle for an open future is developed by Isaac Nachman Steinberg on the basis of nineteenth-century vitalism. Goldschmidt’s theory of anarchist individualism as willed self-limiting solidarity has a (...) compelling parallel in Hillel Solotaroff’s view of history. His use of impressionism and photography to eternalize the immediacy of human actuality is akin to Rudolf Rocker’s championing of decadent literature. In both cases, the goal of anarchism is not a dictatorship of the former downtrodden, but a continuous and contradictory evolution of freedom in ever-changing contexts. (shrink)

Why do systems prepared in a non-equilibrium state approach, and eventually reach, equilibrium? An important contemporary version of the Boltzmannian approach to statistical mechanics answers this question by an appeal to the notion of typicality. The problem with this approach is that it comes in different versions, which are, however, not recognised as such, much less clearly distinguished, and we often find different arguments pursued side by side. The aim of this paper is to disentangle different versions of typicality-based explanations (...) of thermodynamic behaviour and evaluate their respective success. My conclusion will be that the boldest version fails for technical reasons, while more prudent versions leave unanswered essential questions. (shrink)

This is an extensive review of recent work on the foundations of statistical mechanics.

Обґрунтовано стратегію високочастотної біржової торгівлі (high-frequency trading) акціями. Для цього досліджено особливості та обмеження біржової високочастотної торгівлі, визначено верхню межу прибутку агресивного «шкідливого» високочастотного трейдера, обґрунтовано оптимальну частоту стратегії біржової високочастотної торгівлі акціями, розглянуто емпіричне підтвердження прогнозованості біржових курсів акцій на надкоротких горизонтах інвестування.

"Vom Erkennen des literarischen Kunstwerks" ist zuerst (poln. 1937) als erkenntnistheoretisches - und geringfügig populäreres - Pendant zur ontologischen Theorie "Das literarische Kunstwerk" (1931) angelegt. In der deutschen Fassung (Erstpublikation 1968) wird es zum gedankenreichen literaturphilosophischen Alterswerk. Wie schon "Der Streit um die Existenz der Welt" (Erstpublikation 1947/48), so ist auch "Vom Erkennen" als Antwort auf Krieg, Völkermord und Totalitarismen zu lesen, im Sinne des Beharrens auf den Fundamenten der humanen Existenz. Dem "Ende der Ontologie" setzt Roman Ingarden (1893-1970) (...) den Nachweis der Notwendigkeit ontologischer Reflexion bei der Ergründung erkenntnistheoretischer Sachverhalte entgegen (vgl. die 'ästhetische Konkretisation'), der am Wert verzweifelten Nachkriegsliteratur die Erörterung der Werte, Wertqualitäten und ihrer möglichen Synthesen im konkretisierten literarischen Kunstwerk. Gegenüber "Das literarische Kunstwerk" arbeitet er neu die quasi-zeitliche Dimension des literarischen Kunstwerks aus, 'entdeckt' die künstlerischen Funktionen der Unbestimmtheit, bezieht die Lyrik und das Gattungswesen der Literatur ein und analysiert die verschiedenen Erkenntnisziele und -zugänge zum literarischen Kunstwerk. Dem Liebhaber vermittelt das Buch eine Begründung des legitimen Entzückens am ästhetischen Gegenstand, dem Literaturwissenschaftler eine Grundlegung seiner analytischen und funktionellen Erkenntnisoperationen. Ein ausführliches analytisches Inhaltsverzeichnis, ein davon abgeleitetes System von Kolumnentiteln sowie ein Personenverzeichnis erleichtern in dieser neuen Ausgabe die Arbeit mit diesem Buch. (shrink)

In two recent papers Barry Loewer (2001, 2004) has suggested to interpret probabilities in statistical mechanics as Humean chances in David Lewis’ (1994) sense. I first give a precise formulation of this proposal, then raise two fundamental objections, and finally conclude that these can be overcome only at the price of interpreting these probabilities epistemically.

As scientists spend a substantial part of their time building, testing, comparing and revising theories or models, it is no surprise that the nature of theories and models is a subject of central importance within the philosophy of science. This book provides a critical survey of, and introduction to, the debates surrounding theories and models within analytical philosophy of science. It combines coverage of standard topics such as the syntactic and semantic views of theories as well as ones less often (...) discussed in connection with models and theories but which nevertheless are shown to have a clear bearing on the topic, such as Munich structuralism, thought experiments, the applicability of mathematics in the empirical sciences and measurement theory. The book provides a clearly structured and systematic introduction to a field, which, due to its richness and complexity, can be difficult to master. (shrink)

Machine ethics and robot rights are quickly becoming hot topics in artificial intelligence and robotics communities. We will argue that attempts to attribute moral agency and assign rights to all intelligent machines are misguided, whether applied to infrahuman or superhuman AIs, as are proposals to limit the negative effects of AIs by constraining their behavior. As an alternative, we propose a new science of safety engineering for intelligent artificial agents based on maximizing for what humans value. In particular, we challenge (...) the scientific community to develop intelligent systems that have human-friendly values that they provably retain, even under recursive self-improvement. (shrink)

This volume is a serious attempt to open up the subject of European philosophy of science to real thought, and provide the structural basis for the interdisciplinary development of its specialist fields, but also to provoke reflection on the idea of ‘European philosophy of science’. This efforts should foster a contemporaneous reflection on what might be meant by philosophy of science in Europe and European philosophy of science, and how in fact awareness of it could assist philosophers interpret and motivate (...) their research through a stronger collective identity. The overarching aim is to set the background for a collaborative project organising, systematising, and ultimately forging an identity for, European philosophy of science by creating research structures and developing research networks across Europe to promote its development. (shrink)

Models are of central importance in many scientific contexts. The centrality of models such as inflationary models in cosmology, general-circulation models of the global climate, the double-helix model of DNA, evolutionary models in biology, agent-based models in the social sciences, and general-equilibrium models of markets in their respective domains is a case in point (the Other Internet Resources section at the end of this entry contains links to online resources that discuss these models). Scientists spend significant amounts of time building, (...) testing, comparing, and revising models, and much journal space is dedicated to interpreting and discussing the implications of models. In short, models are one of the principal instruments of modern science. (shrink)

The volume contains twenty essays devoted to the philosophy of mathematics and the history of logic. They have been divided into four parts: general philosophical problems of mathematics, Hilbert's program vs. the incompleteness phenomenon, philosophy of mathematics in Poland, mathematical logic in Poland. Among considered problems are: epistemology of mathematics, the meaning of the axiomatic method, existence of mathematical objects, distinction between proof and truth, undefinability of truth, Goedel's theorems and computer science, philosophy of mathematics in Polish mathematical and logical (...) schools, beginnings of mathematical logic in Poland, contribution of Polish logicians to recursion theory. (shrink)

According to J=K, only beliefs that qualify as knowledge are epistemically justified. Traditionalists about justification have objected to this view that it predicts that radically deceived subjects do not have justified beliefs, which they take to be counter-intuitive. In response, proponents of J=K have argued that traditionalists mistake being justified with being excused in the relevant cases. To make this response work, Timothy Williamson has offered a dispositional account of excuse which has recently been challenged by Jessica Brown. She has (...) presented cases in which Williamson’s account excuses subjects believing things in an epistemically reckless fashion. To steer clear of Brown’s counterexamples, I argue for a modification of Williamson’s account that employs a more fine-grained notion of the dispositions involved. (shrink)

The paper proposes an outline of a reconciliatory approach to the perennial controversy between epistemological realism and anti-realism (constructionism). My main conceptual source in explaining this view is the philosophy of pragmatism, more specifically, the epistemological theories of George H. Mead, John Dewey, and also William James’ radical empiricism. First, the paper analyzes the pragmatic treatment of the goal-directedness of action, especially with regard to Mead’s notion of attitudes, and relates it to certain contemporary epistemological theories provided by the cognitive (...) sciences (Maturana, Rizzolatti, Clark). Against this background, the paper presents a philosophical as well as empirical justification of why we should interpret the environment and its objects in terms of possibilities for action. In Mead’s view, the objects and events of our world emerge within stable patterns of organism-environment interactions, which he called “perspectives”. According to pragmatism as well as the aforementioned cognitive scientists, perception and other cognitive processes include not only neural processes in our heads but also the world itself. Elaborating on Mead’s concept of perspectives, the paper argues in favor of the epistemological position called “constructive realism.”. (shrink)

John Dewey's Ethics: Democracy as Experience.

Narrative views of agency and identity arise in opposition to reductionism in both domains. While reductionists understand both identity and agency in terms of their components, narrativists respond that life and action are both constituted by narratives, and since the components of a narrative gain their meaning from the whole, life and action not only incorporate their constituent parts but also shape them. I first lay out the difficulties with treating narrative as constitutive of metaphysical identity and turn to its (...) function in practical identity. I then explore the ways narrative shapes our agency—by tapping into our motivational structures, providing an understanding of the social background within which our agency operates, guiding our agency through an understanding of our histories and aspirations, providing the links that structure actions internally, and allowing us to change the meaning of our pasts. I suggest that putting these functions of narrative together may allow us to genuinely shape our past motivational structures through our actions. Finally, if life has the form of a narrative, it may seem as if mortality is necessary for our lives and their contents to be meaningful: a narrative, it might seem, relies on the ending for its meaning. If so, an immortal life would be meaningless. I examine the possibility that even an immortal life may draw meaning from local narratives that constitute projects within such a life, while arguing that, to the contrary, narrative may be a tool exclusively adapted to mortal lives. (shrink)

Williams’s famous argument against immortality rests on the idea that immortality cannot be desirable, at least for human beings, and his contention has spawned a cottage industry of responses. As I will intend to show, the arguments over his view rest on both a difference of temperament and a difference in the sense of desire being used. The former concerns a difference in whether one takes a forward-looking or a backward-looking perspective on personal identity; the latter a distinction between our (...) normal desire to continue living and the kind of desire implied in desiring immortality. Showing that there is some sense of identity and desire that support Williams’s conclusion goes some way toward providing support for his argument, if not a full-fledged defense of it. (shrink)

Le Polonais Roman Ingarden (1893-1970) est un phénoménologue disciple de Husserl à Göttingen. Leur dialogue continu représente le conflit classique entre idéalisme et réalisme, mais aussi la tension qu'est l'articulation entre la description eidétique de régions ontologiques et l'entreprise de constitution génétique du monde. Une première approche à travers quatre des textes d'Ingarden.

Der hier vorgelegte Band 8 der Gesammelten Werke Roman Ingardens folgt den 1994 und 1996 edierten Bänden 6 und 7 und bringt somit die Herausgabe der erkenntnistheoretischen Werke des polnischen Phänomenologen zum Abschluß. Er enthält eine deutsche Übersetzung von Ingardens Nachlaßschriften, die sich auf die äußere Wahrnehmung und speziell auf das Problem ihrer Objektivität beziehen. Die Texte dokumentieren Ingardens beachtenswürdigen Versuch, in Anlehnung an die Analysen E. Husserls und anderer Phänomenologen seine eigene, realistisch ausgerichtete Version der phänomenologischen Wahrnehmungstheorie zu (...) erarbeiten. (shrink)