There is considerable interest in the use of neuroimaging techniques for forensic purposes. Memory detection techniques, including the well-publicized Brain Fingerprinting technique (Brain Fingerprinting Laboratories, Inc., Seattle WA), exploit the fact that the brain responds differently to sensory stimuli to which it has been exposed before. When a stimulus is specifically associated with a crime, the resulting brain activity should differentiate between someone who was present at the crime and someone who was not. This article reviews the scientific literature on (...) three such techniques: priming, old/new, and P300 effects. The forensic potential of these techniques is evaluated based on four criteria: specificity, automaticity, encoding flexibility, and longevity. This article concludes that none of the techniques are devoid of forensic potential, although much research is yet to be done. Ethical issues, including rights to privacy and against self-incrimination, are discussed. A discussion of legal issues concludes that current memory detection techniques do not yet meet United States standards of legal admissibility. (shrink)
Winner-takes-all (WTA) typically describes a mechanism for selecting the highest peak of activity in a sensory map that encodes independent representations of potential targets. To Findlay & Walker, WTA is an inherent property of a motor map that is incapable of representing multiple targets independently. Although the output of a WTA system should be characteristic of only one target, actions can be influenced by multiple targets.
La historia de la filosofía interpreta a Descartes desde la perspectiva del subjetivismo o solipsismo. De dónde procede tal interpretación y su plausibilidad desde los propios escritos de Descartes, son las dos cuestiones que trata de resolver este artículo. Para ello se ofrecen las lecturas de Hegel, Husserl y Heidegger. Como conclusión se muestra que la interpretación de Heidegger ha eclipsado otros puntos de vista.
In dynamic system control, cognitive mechanisms and abilities underlying performance may vary depending on the nature of the task. We therefore investigated the effects of system structure and its interaction with cognitive abilities on system control performance. A sample of 127 university students completed a series of different system control tasks that were manipulated in terms of system size and recurrent feedback, either with or without a cognitive load manipulation. Cognitive abilities assessed included reasoning ability, working memory capacity, and cognitive (...) reflection. System size and recurrent feedback affected overall performance as expected. Overall, the results support that cognitive ability is a good predictor of performance in dynamic system control tasks but predictiveness is reduced when the system structure contains recurrent feedback. We discuss this finding from a cognitive processing perspective as well as its implications for individual differences research in dynamic systems. (shrink)
This interdisciplinary study follows an international and ecumenical meeting of twenty-four scholars held in New York at Easter 2000: the Incarnation Summit. After an opening chapter, which summarizes and evaluates twelve major questions concerning the Incarnation, five chapters are dedicated to the biblical roots of this central Christian doctrine. A patristic and medieval section corrects misinterpretations and retrieves for today the significance of the Council of Chalcedon and its aftermath, as well as clarifying Aquinas' enduring metaphysical interpretation of the Incarnation. (...) The volume then moves to theological and philosophical debates: three scholars take up such systematic issues as belief in the Incarnation, the self-emptying that it involves, and its compatibility with divine timelessness. The remaining four essays consider the place of the doctrine of the Incarnation in literature, ethics, art, and preaching. There is a fruitful dialogue between experts in a wide range of areas and the international reputation of the participants reflects and guarantees the high quality of this joint work. The result is a well researched, skilfully argued, and, at times, provocative volume on the central Christian belief: the Incarnation of the Son of God. (shrink)
This interdisciplinary study follows an international and ecumenical meeting of twenty-one scholars held in New York at Easter 2003: the Redemption Summit. After an opening chapter, which explores seven central questions for writers on redemption, five chapters are dedicated to the scriptural roots of the doctrine. A section on the patristic and medieval periods then examines the interpretation of redemption through the centuries. The volume moves on to foundational and systematic issues: the problem of horrendous evil, karma and grace, and (...) differing views on justification. Studies on the redemption in literature, art, music, and preaching form the final part. There is a fruitful dialogue between experts in a wide range of areas and the international reputation of the participants reflects and guarantees the high quality of this joint work. The result is a well researched, skilfully argued, and, at times, provocative volume on the central Christian belief: the redemption of human beings through Jesus Christ. (shrink)
This interdisciplinary study follows an international and ecumenical meeting of twenty-one scholars held in New York at Easter 2003: the Redemption Summit. After an opening chapter, which explores seven central questions for writers on redemption, five chapters are dedicated to the scriptural roots of the doctrine. A section on the patristic and medieval periods then examines the interpretation of redemption through the centuries. The volume moves on to foundational and systematic issues: the problem of horrendous evil, karma and grace, and (...) differing views on justification. Studies on the redemption in literature, art, music, and preaching form the final part. There is a fruitful dialogue between experts in a wide range of areas and the international reputation of the participants reflects and guarantees the high quality of this joint work. The result is a well researched, skilfully argued, and, at times, provocative volume on the central Christian belief: the redemption of human beings through Jesus Christ. (shrink)
In this article, we propose that gestures play an important role in the connection between sensorimotor experience and language. Gestures may be the link between bodily experience and verbal expression that advocates of embodied cognition have postulated. In a developmental sequence of communicative action, gestures, which are initially similar to action sequences, substantially shorten and represent actions in metonymic form. In another process, action sequences are based on kinesthetic schemata that themselves find their metaphoric expression in language. Again, gestures enact (...) kinesthetic schemata that are correlated with verbal expressions. Examples from a large database are used to illustrate the various processes by means of which language arises when students conduct school science investigations. (shrink)
Several lines of evidence indicate that the on-line control of rapid target-aiming movements can be influenced by the visual context in which the movements are performed. Although this may result in movement error when an illusory context is introduced, there are many situations in which the control system must know about context in order to get the limb to the target rapidly and safely.
The extent to which visual information on the contralateral, unattended side influences the performance of patients with hemispatial neglect was studied in a visuomotor reaching task. We replicated the well-established finding that, relative to target-alone trials, normal subjects are slower to reach to targets in the presence of visual distractors which appear either ipsilateral or contralateral to the target, with greater interference in the former condition. Six patients with hemispatial neglect showed even greater interference than did the normal subjects when (...) the distractor appeared ipsilaterally but showed no significant interference from contralateral distractors. This pattern of performance was qualitatively similar for patients with lesions restricted to posterior regions and for patients with more extensive lesions involving both posterior and anterior brain regions. These findings suggest that, in the visuomotor domain, information on the contralateral side is processed minimally, if at all, in patients with hemispatial neglect. (shrink)
Moral hypocrisy is motivation to appear moral yet, if possible, avoid the cost of actually being moral. In business, moral hypocrisy allows one to engender trust, solve the commitment problem, and still relentlessly pursue personal gain. Indicating the power of this motive, research has provided clear and consistent evidence that, given the opportunity, many people act to appear fair (e.g., they flip a coin to distribute resources between themselves and another person) without actually being fair (they accept the flip only (...) if it favors themselves). New evidence also indicates the power of moral hypocrisy in a situation more obviously relevant to business, resource allocation when one party has information about relative resource value that the other does not. Characteristics of modern business situations likely to encourage moral hypocrisy are outlined. We conclude that moral hypocrisy is not only a pragmatic virtue in modern business but is also fast becoming a prescriptive one. (shrink)
This paper brings out an inconsistency between David Chalmers's dualism, which is the main element of his philosophy of mind, and his structuralism, which is the main element of his epistemology. The point is ad hominem , but the inconsistency if it can be established is of considerable independent interest. For the best response to the inconsistency, I argue, is to adopt what Chalmers calls ‘type‐C Materialism’, a version of materialism that has been much discussed in recent times because of (...) its promise to move us beyond the stand‐off between standard versions of materialism and dualism. In turn, if that version of materialism is true, both dualism and structuralism should be rejected. (shrink)
Abstract: According to the realist about philosophy, the goal of philosophy is to come to know the truth about philosophical questions; according to what Helen Beebee calls equilibrism, by contrast, the goal is rather to place one’s commitments in a coherent system. In this paper, I present a critique of equilibrism in the form Beebee defends it, paying particular attention to her suggestion that various meta-philosophical remarks made by David Lewis may be recruited to defend equilibrism. At the end of (...) the paper, I point out that a realist about philosophy may also be a pluralist about philosophical culture, thus undermining one main motivation for equilibrism. (shrink)
Although this book contains a facsimile of the second London edition of Collins’ Inquiry, the main author is O’Higgins, for his Introduction and Notes seem more important than the 18th-century pamphlet. Collins was a country squire, friend of John Locke, an Anglican Deist, and a convinced determinist in his explanation of volition. His education was spotty: Eton, a year at Cambridge and unfinished studies in law. A general study of Collins’ life and writings was published by O’Higgins (...) in 1970, yet he does not seem aware of another modern printing of the Inquiry, edited by R. Wellek. The Introduction covers the background very thoroughly. It also sketches the situation in which the Inquiry was produced. The editor’s Notes are scholarly and helpful. Collins’ view was that no act of will is uncaused but the necessity to which man’s will is subject is not physical but moral. Much of Collins’ argument is well constructed but he does not seem fully to understand some of his adversaries, such as Bishop John Bramhall. On the whole this book is a useful introduction to a key controversy in British and continental thought of the 17th and 18th centuries.—V.J.B. (shrink)
In a new integration, we show that the visual-spatial structuring of time converges with auditory-spatial left–right judgments for time-related words. In Experiment 1, participants placed past and future-related words respectively to the left and right of the midpoint on a horizontal line, reproducing earlier findings. In Experiment 2, neutral and time-related words were presented over headphones. Participants were asked to indicate whether words were louder on the left or right channel. On critical experimental trials, words were presented equally loud binaurally. (...) As predicted, participants judged future words to be louder on the right channel more often than past-related words. Furthermore, there was a significant cross-modal overlap between the visual-spatial ordering and the auditory judgments , which were continuously related. These findings provide support for the assumption that space and time have certain invariant properties that share a common structure across modalities. (shrink)
