In this book Gerald Vision argues for a new causal theory, one that engages provocatively with direct realism and makes no use of a now discredited subjectivism.

This Article outlines a vision of responsible innovation and outlines a public policy and implementation strategy for it.

Evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo) has undergone dramatic transformations since its emergence as a distinct discipline. This paper aims to highlight the scope, power, and future promise of evo-devo to transform and unify diverse aspects of biology. We articulate key questions at the core of eleven biological disciplines—from Evolution, Development, Paleontology, and Neurobiology to Cellular and Molecular Biology, Quantitative Genetics, Human Diseases, Ecology, Agriculture and Science Education, and lastly, Evolutionary Developmental Biology itself—and discuss why evo-devo is uniquely situated to substantially improve (...) our ability to find meaningful answers to these fundamental questions. We posit that the tools, concepts, and ways of thinking developed by evo-devo have profound potential to advance, integrate, and unify biological sciences as well as inform policy decisions and illuminate science education. We look to the next generation of evolutionary developmental biologists to help shape this process as we confront the scientific challenges of the 21st century. (shrink)

Ethnopedology is the study of local knowledge of soil and land management in an ecological perspective. It is an emerging hybrid discipline that is a component of ethnoecology and stands to offer much for land-based studies. This paper reviews the field of ethnopedology in Latin America and compares some of the many case studies from that region. Various literature sources are considered, including the ethnographical, ethnohistorical, archaeological, geographical, agronomic, ethnoecological, and development studies. Our review invokes the theory of ethnoecology that (...) focuses on the linkages between kosmos, corpus, and praxis of local land-users. The main topics covered are the ethnohistorical and archaeological evidence of ethnopedology, local soil and land classification, local land management systems, local perceptions and beliefs of soil and land resources, and local soil fertility management. After analysing past and present research trends, recommendations are given on how ethnopedological studies can contribute to enhance sustainable land use and management in Latin America. (shrink)

In Veritas, Gerald Vision defends the correspondence theory of truth -- the theory that truth has a direct relationship to reality -- against recent attacks, and critically examines its most influential alternatives. The correspondence theory, if successful, explains one way in which we are cognitively connected to the world; thus, it is claimed, truth -- while relevant to semantics, epistemology, and other studies -- also has significant metaphysical consequences. Although the correspondence theory is widely held today, Vision points (...) to an emerging orthodoxy in philosophy that claims that truth as such carries no significant weight in philosophical explanations. He devotes much of the book to a criticism of that outlook and to a less vulnerable formulation of the correspondence theory.Vision defends the correspondence theory by both presenting evidence for correspondence and examining the claims made by such alternative theories as deflationism, minimalism, and pluralism. The techniques of the argument are thoroughly analytic, but the problem confronted is broadly humanistic. The question examined -- how we, as thinking beings, are connected to and manage to cope in a world that was not designed for our comfort or convenience -- is more likely to be raised by continentalists, but is approached here with the tools of clarity and precision more highly prized in analytic philosophy. The book seeks to avoid both the obscurantism that infects much continental thought and the overly technical concerns and methodology that limit the interest of much work in analytic philosophy. It thus provides a rigorous but largely nontechnical treatment of the topic that will be of interest not only to readers familiar with philosophy but also to those with a background in literary theory and linguistics. (shrink)

Thirty years ago, I elaborated on a position that could be seen as a compromise between an "extreme," symbol-based AI, and a "neurochemical reductionism" in AI. The present article recalls aspects of the espoused framework of schema theory that, it suggested, could provide a better bridge from human psychology to brain theory than that offered by the symbol systems of A. Newell and H. A. Simon.

The evidence of blindsight is occasionally used to argue that we can see things, and thus have perceptual belief, without the distinctive visual awareness accompanying normal sight; thereby displacing phenomenality as a component of the concept of vision. I maintain that arguments to this end typically rely on misconceptions about blindsight and almost always ignore associated visual (or visuomotor) pathologies relevant to the lessons of such cases. More specifically, I conclude, first, that the phenomena very likely do not result (...) from dissociations within a single system, but from the interaction of evolutionarily distinct, if interacting, systems; second, that a closer study of spared motor abilities indicates that verbal responses of patients result not from degraded vision but from proprioception; and, finally, above chance verbal responses, being forced guesses, are not tentative beliefs and cannot become beliefs just by training patients to have more confidence in their responses. (shrink)

In his article «A Vision for the Third Millennium, ‘The Age of Global Dialogue’: Dialogue or Death», Swidler attempts to show that humankind is in a crucial transition from a stage where monologue is the chief characteristic of rela- tions, to one where dialogue is the chief characteristic. Because of technological advances, dialogue is both more possible than ever before and also more necessary than ever before. The change from monologue to dialogue is a change from a way of (...) interacting modeled on confronta- tion to one modeled on listening. The change is being caused by a number of important parallel shifts, such as an increased awareness of the tenacity of knowledge and the shrinking of the world to a «global community». But while Swidler characterizes the change from monologue to dialogue as «the most fundamental, most radical and utterly transformative of the key elements of the newly emerging paradigm,» he warns that this change is not a guaranteed event. With the great technological advances that make dialogue more possible than ever come new opportunities for technological abuses. Therefore, he warns, we are faced with two choices: dialogue or death. (shrink)

This article offers a vision for work at the intersection of science and religion over the coming seven years. Because predictions are inherently risky and are more often than not false, the text first offers an assessment of the current state of the science-religion discussion and a quick survey of the last 50 years of work in this field. The implications of the six features of this vision for the future of the field are then presented in some (...) detail. Rather than bemoaning the current diversity of approaches and conclusions as a negative result, I endorse it as a healthy sign—if acknowledged honestly and managed well. (shrink)

This paper presents a general computational treatment of how mammals are able to deal with visual objects and environments. The model tries to cover the entire range from behavior and phenomenological experience to detailed neural encodings in crude but computationally plausible reductive steps. The problems addressed include perceptual constancies, eye movements and the stable visual world, object descriptions, perceptual generalizations, and the representation of extrapersonal space.The entire development is based on an action-oriented notion of perception. The observer is assumed to (...) be continuously sampling the ambient light for information of current value. The central problem of vision is taken to be categorizing and locating objects in the environment. The critical step in this process is the linking of visual information to symbolic object descriptions; this is calledindexing, from the analogy of identifying a book from index terms. The system must also identifysituationsand use this knowledge to guide movement and other actions in the environment. The treatment focuses on the different representations of information used in the visual system.The four representational frames capture information in the following forms: retinotopic, head-based, symbolic, and allocentric. The functional roles of the four frames, the communication among them, and their suggested neurophysiological realization constitute the core of the paper. The model is perforce crude, but appears to be consistent with all relevant findings. (shrink)

One of the most important and consistent voices in the reform of science education over the last thirty years has been that of Peter Fensham. His vision of a democratic and socially responsible science education for all has inspired change in schools and colleges throughout the world. Often moving against the tide, Fensham travelled the world to promote his radical ideology. He was appointed Australia's first Professor of Science Education, and was later made a Member of the Order of (...) Australia in recognition of his work in this new and emerging field of study. In this unique book, leading science educators from around the world examine and discuss Fensham's key ideas. Each describes how his arguments, proposals and recommendations have affected their own practice, and extend and modify his message in light of current issues and trends in science education. The result is a vision for the future of science teaching internationally. Academics, researchers and practitioners in science education around the world will find this book a fascinating insight into the life and work of one of the foremost pioneers in science education. The book will also make inspiring reading for postgraduate students of science education. (shrink)

Although the empirical studies of Terror Management Theory lend support to Ernest Becker's anthropology, they hardly provide a vision with the power to inspire late twentieth century humanity. Becker's own dark view of what it means to be human is, at least in part, to blame. On the basis of an exploration of the positive implications of the religious symbol of creatureliness, an alternative social theory, that of ecologico‐social democracy, is proposed as a vision that requires and may (...) even inspire heroism. (shrink)

In " Re-Emergence" he explores the question of conscious properties arising from brute, unthinking matter, making the case that there is no equally plausible non-emergent alternative.

In the 30 years since its inception under the auspices of the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), the field devoted to examining the ethical, legal and social implications (ELSI) of g...

(http://philpapers.org/profile/112741 ) [https://plus.google.com/108060242686103906748/posts/cwvdB6mK3J6 ] "Let generation know to procure the love, the concept, knowledge and ideas with thoughts they are acquiring on versatile English Language, instead of making themselves to be felt dealing with only burden." -/- I too realize, -/- "Literature is not merely going through a book, It is the moment of definition of per feeling that : I am acquiring through an imagery.".

As early-career neuroethicists, we come to the field of neuroethics at a unique moment: we are well-situated to consider nearly two decades of neuroethics scholarship and identify challenges that have persisted across time. But we are also looking squarely ahead, embarking on the next generation of exciting and productive neuroethics scholarship. In this article, we both reflect backwards and turn our gaze forward. First, we highlight criticisms of neuroethics, both from scholars within the field and outside it, that have focused (...) on speculation and lack of skepticism; the dearth of consideration of broader social issues such as justice and equality, both with regard to who speaks for neuroethics as a field and who benefits from its recommendations and findings; and the insufficient focus on the practical impact of our ethical work. Second, we embrace the concept of “translational neuroethics” to outline a vision for neuroethics that is integrated, inclusive, and impactful. Integration can help us identify more pertinent, real-world issues, and move away from speculation; inclusivity can help ensure that the questions we attend to are not merely relevant to a single subgroup but aim toward just distribution of benefits; and impact can help us think beyond guidelines and recommendations to focus on implementation. Our goal is for this call to action to help shape neuroethics into a discipline that develops rigorous research agendas through relationships with interdisciplinary partners, that is broadly inclusive and attends to issues beyond novel neurotechnologies, and that is devoted to the translation of scholarship into practice. (shrink)

Frances Egan argues that the states of computational theories of vision are individuated individualistically and, as far as the theory is concerned, are not intentional. Her argument depends on equating the goals and explanatory strategies of computational psychology with those of its algorithmic level. However, closer inspection of computational psychology reveals that the computational level plays an essential role in explaining visual processes and that explanations at this level are nonindividualistic and intentional. In conclusion, I sketch an account of (...) content in which content does the sort of explanatory work that Egan denies is possible. (shrink)

In specifying the sensory evidence for perceptual belief, thinkers have either chosen a common perceptual idiom or have invented one of their own as a starting-point for their enquiries. It is becoming clearer that the choice harbours crucial, often disputable, assumptions. I compare two sorts of constructions, a variety of propositional ones and an objectual one, and I argue that the objectual idiom is indispensable in order to explain how a perceptual belief can arise out of what is not already (...) a belief. This has implications not only for the question of how belief is generated from perceptual evidence, but also for various other controversies. I discuss two of these implications: the character of inferences from evidence, and basic belief. (shrink)

Vision scientists are interested in three diverse entities: physical stimuli, neural states, and consciously perceived colors, and in the mapping rules among the three. In this worldview, the three kinds of entities have coequal status, and views that attribute color exclusively to one or another of them, such as color realism, have no appeal.

In virtue of its form [‘I am here’] must be true on any occasion on which [it is] asserted, and yet the proposition it expresses on each occasion [is] contingent. Intuitively, [‘I am here now’] is deeply, and in some sense universally, true. One need only understand the meaning of [it] to know that it cannot be uttered falsely. The sentence ‘I am here’ has the peculiar property that whenever I utter it, it is bound to be true. Even if (...) I am lost and do not know where I am, I can bravely say ‘I am here’, and know that I am expressing a truth. (shrink)

On the assumption that phenomenal consciousness is real, and ruling out Cartesian isolation from the non-mental world, we have two choices for its introduction: either it comes about in the course of the development of the non-conscious realm or it was there from the beginning. The latter comprises versions of panpsychism, a recently trending view in some quarters. In their view the former are broadly taken to be versions of emergentism, embracing even non-eliminatiivist materialisms. After producing what seem to me (...) to be powerful objections to panpsychism, I defend emergentism against pansychist attacks on it. As I explain, my version is also dualist. Finally, with respect to both outlooks I briefly review the prospects of a rapidly advancing AI for expanding the current population of natural mental subjects. (shrink)

Problems concerning identity in possible worlds and the view that proper names are rigid designators pose no threat to the doctrine that names of fictional characters (fictional names) are referential. Some philosophers, notably Saul Kripke and David Kaplan, have held otherwise; but a close examination of their arguments discovers fatal flaws in them. Furthermore, the most readily available proposals for the alternative functions of fictional names — that is, proposals in which fictional names are not referential — are open to (...) objections of a principled kind. This raises serious doubts that any such alternative could work. (shrink)

Problems concerning identity in possible worlds and the view that proper names are rigid designators pose no threat to the doctrine that names of fictional characters (fictional names) are referential. Some philosophers, notably Saul Kripke and David Kaplan, have held otherwise; but a close examination of their arguments discovers fatal flaws in them. Furthermore, the most readily available proposals for the alternative functions of fictional names — that is, proposals in which fictional names are not referential — are open to (...) objections of a principled kind. This raises serious doubts that any such alternative could work. (shrink)

This article seeks to contribute to a vision for leadership in business based on a recovery of virtue. The vision for leadership articulated here draws principally on the writings of the classical philosopher Aristotle and of the contemporary philosopher Josef Pieper. Without discounting the ever-increasing complexity of modern business, this essay will attempt to reconstruct Aristotle’s emphasis on virtue and moral character, and argues for the philosopher’s relevance to modern management and corporate leadership. The paper concludes that the (...) message of virtue is a message of hope and attempts to find plain language to articulate its value to those engaged in business or concerned with the formulation of government policy. (shrink)

Emergentism is generally viewed as a non‐materialist alternative to physicalism, although the exceptionally tolerant may count it as consistent with their physicalism. It disarms the threat of Causal Exclusion. The popular conception of explored emergentism is played off against two forms, including physical states and tokens of conscious states (c‐states). Emergentism competes not only with physicalism, but also with panpsychism. Panpsychism is the view that all matter has a conscious aspect. Panpsychism (and its various forms) suffers from several problems. This (...) chapter summarizes a few of the major ones. It scratches the surface of the issues separating emergentism and physicalism, on the one hand, and emergentism and panpsychism, on the other. However, perhaps enough has been divulged to show that emergentism is a live option, a serious candidate when trying to discover a c‐state's place in concrete reality. (shrink)

From the popular view that the property of truth adds nothing not already inherent in its bearers it has been inferred that classical theories of truth are thereby refuted. Taking as representative a version of deflationism based on a certain way of interpreting the Tarskian schema convention T–and popularly called "disquotational"–I argue that the view is beset by fatal difficulties. These include: an unavoidable awkwardness in handling indexicals; an inability to accept anything more than a too anemic notion of a (...) truth condition, leaving it defenseless against clearly inadequate alternatives; and an incapacity to show that its characteristic biconditional can support any acceptable dependency claims (made evident by replacing the biconditional with 'because'). Finally, were there no predicate on the order of 'is true', this would not annihilate the property of being true or the current grounds for philosophical inquiries about it. This is an important clue to why deflationary approaches in general are dead ends. (shrink)

Tobias examines the ancient cultures of the Mediterranean, the ascetics of Sinai and Tibet, and the Pure Land Buddhists. He introduces the reader to the Jains of India, whose lifestyle is one of the most ecologically balanced in all of human history. In profiling various artists of 19th-century Europe and America, Tobias discovers incisive continuities among such luminaries as British poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, Austrian impressionist Emilie Mediz-Pelikan, and American intimist painters Ralph Blakelock and George Inness.