To prepare for potential human infection challenge studies involving SARS-CoV-2, we convened a multidisciplinary working group to address ethical questions regarding whether and how much SAR...

In an online, participatory class, we interpreted The Dream of the Black Planet knowing nothing of the dreamer beyond age and gender, and having none of the dreamer’s associations. Our interpretation included a series of predictions about the dreamer. When it was complete, we asked the bringer of the dream (who had until then been silent and was not visible to us -- her video camera was switched off ) to give us more information about the dreamer. Our predictions were (...) mostly confirmed. The dreamer is in a car with his dad. It is not clear who is driving. This record is another iteration of an experiment that is described more fully in the paper The Dream of the Six-Legged Dog: An Experimental System that Tests Symbolic Meaning, soon to be published. This iteration repeats and confirms the evidence given in that paper. AUDIO RECORD OF COMPLETE BLACK PLANET CLASS: link is given on 1st page of the text you download from this page. (shrink)

Mission-oriented climate change research is often unverifiable. Therefore, many stakeholders look to peer-reviewed climate change research for trustworthy information about deeply uncertain and impactful phenomena. This is because peer-review signals that research has been vetted for scientific standards like reproducibility and replicability. Here we evaluate the transparency of research methodologies in mission-oriented computational climate research. We find that only five percent of our sample meets the minimal standard of fully open data and code required for reproducibility and replicability. The widespread (...) lack of minimal openness standards in peer-reviewed climate change research jeopardizes scientific credibility and risks poor societal outcomes as we manage growing climate risks. The scientific community can and must do better. We, the authors, outline necessary openness standards that we commit to as researchers, reviewers, and readers. We invite you to join us. (shrink)

We largely agree with Grimwade et al ’s1 conclusion that challenge trial participants may ethically be paid, including for risk. Here, we add further arguments, clarify some points from the perspective of economics and indicate areas where economists can support the development of a framework for ethically justifiable payment. Our arguments apply to carefully constructed and monitored controlled human infection model trials that have been appropriately reviewed and approved. Participants in medical studies perform a service. Outside the domain of research (...) participation, there is nearly universal agreement that workers providing a service should be compensated fairly, and that work involving more discomfort and risk should be compensated more generously. Accordingly, labour regulations impose floors, not caps on compensation. Caps, even if intended to protect against undue inducement, also raise concerns about illegal price-fixing that disadvantages workers. Such limits on payment for egg donors have successfully been challenged in court.i Moreover, caps on compensation may harm everyone at risk of infection, not just potential participants. Insufficient compensation may impede the recruitment of enough suitable subjects, for example, when representativeness of the subject sample is required. Delays in vaccine development not only prolong disruption of social, educational and economic activity but also lead to excess infections and deaths. Unlike paid CHIM participants, individuals exposed to such infection do not accept it voluntarily, are not compensated for it, and are unlikely to receive the level of medical supervision afforded to closely monitored CHIM participants. Payment caps can lead to attempts to circumvent the regulation. For example, many countries …. (shrink)

Game-Theoretic Models of Bargaining provides a comprehensive picture of the new developments in bargaining theory. It especially shows the way the use of axiomatic models has been complemented by the new results derived from strategic models. The papers in this volume are edited versions of those given at a conference on Game Theoretic Models of Bargaining held at the University of Pittsburgh. There are two distinct reasons why the study of bargaining is of fundamental importance in economics. The first is (...) that many aspects of economic activity are directly influenced by bargaining between and among individuals, firms, and nations. The second is that bargaining occupies an important place in economic theory, since the 'pure bargaining problem' is at the opposite pole of economic phenomena from the case of 'perfect competition'. This volume is an outgrowth of the renewed interest in the strategic approach to the theory of bargaining and to the general theory of non-cooperative games. (shrink)

Standard practices in experimental economics arise for different reasons. The “no deception” rule comes from a cost-benefit tradeoff; other practices have to do with the uses to which economists put experiments. Because experiments are part of scientific conversations that mostly go on within disciplines, differences in standard practices between disciplines are likely to persist.

Testing economic propositions in laboratory experiments has proven a very fruitful research endeavor in recent years. This volume brings together the major contributors to experimental economics. The papers present their views on the way experiments should be done, on the power and limitations of the techniques, and on the areas in which experimentation could contribute substantially to our understanding of economic behavior. This book distills the main lessons from great experience in experimental work. It will be essential reading for all (...) who wish to follow experimental work or who wish to do such work themselves. (shrink)

This paper presents a cognitive model of the planning process. The model generalizes the theoretical architecture of the Hearsay‐ll system. Thus, it assumes that planning comprises the activities of a variety of cognitive “specialists.” Each specialist can suggest certain kinds of decisions for incorporation into the plan in progress. These include decisions about: (a) how to approach the planning problem; (b) what knowledge bears on the problem; (c) what kinds of actions to try to plan; (d) what specific actions to (...) plan; and (e) how to allocate cognitive resources during planning. Within each of these categories, different specialists suggest decisions at different levels of abstraction. The activities of the various specialists are not coordinated in any systematic way. Instead, the specialists operate opportunistically, suggesting decisions whenever promising opportunities arise. The paper presents a detailed account of the model and illustrates its assumptions with a “thinking aloud” protocol. It also describes the performance of a computer simulation of the model. The paper contrasts the proposed model with successive refinement models and attempts to resolve apparent differences between the two points of view. (shrink)

Learning in educational settings most often emphasizes declarative and procedural knowledge. Studies of expertise, however, point to other, equally important components of learning, especially improvements produced by experience in the extraction of information: Perceptual learning. Here we describe research that combines principles of perceptual learning with computer technology to address persistent difficulties in mathematics learning. We report three experiments in which we developed and tested perceptual learning modules to address issues of structure extraction and fluency in relation to algebra and (...) fractions. PLMs focus students’ learning on recognizing and discriminating, or mapping key structures across different representations or transformations. Results showed significant and persisting learning gains for students using PLMs. PLM technology offers promise for addressing neglected components of learning: Pattern recognition, structural intuition, and fluency. Using PLMs as a complement to other modes of instruction may allow students to overcome chronic problems in learning. (shrink)

What are the implications for agency – and in particular, the idea of acting for reasons – if we are to take seriously the notion of collective responsibility? My thesis is that some cases of individuals subject to a collective form of responsibility and blame will force us to make sense of how it is that an individual can be entitled to collective reasons for action, i.e. entitled to a reason had in the first place by a plurality of individuals (...) together rather than any one of them alone. This entitlement makes it possible for the collective reason to be a reason for which one acts, even if one’s contribution on its own makes little or no difference in the collective effort. Although a full defense of this entitlement cannot be undertaken here, I will gesture at how this might work by suggesting that intentions function to preserve reasons for action. . (shrink)

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)

The peer commentaries on our Target Article, “Promoting Ethical Payment in Human Infection Challenge Studies,” offer a number of insights that will help advance the co...

Conveying emotions in spoken poetry may be based on a poem’s semantic content and/or on emotional prosody, i.e. on acoustic features above single speech sounds. However, hypotheses of more direct sound–emotion relations in poetry, such as those based on the frequency of occurrence of certain phonemes, have not withstood empirical (re)testing. Therefore, we investigated sound–emotion associations based on prosodic features as a potential alternative route for the, at least partially, non-semantic expression and perception of emotions in poetry. We first conducted (...) a pre-study designed to validate relevant parameters of joy- and sadness-supporting prosody in the recitation, i.e. acoustic production, of poetry. The parameters obtained thereof guided the experimental modification of recordings of German joyful and sad poems such that for each poem, three prosodic variants were constructed: one with a joy-supporting prosody, one with a sadness-supporting prosody, and a neutral variant. In the subsequent experiment, native German speakers and participants with no command of German rated the joyfulness and sadness of these three variants. This design allowed us to investigate the role of emotional prosody, operationalized in terms of sound-emotion parameters, both in combination with and dissociated from semantic access to the emotional content of the poems. The findings from our pre-study showed that the emotional content of poems (based on pre-classifications into joyful and sad) indeed predicted the prosodic features pitch and articulation rate. The subsequent perception experiment revealed that cues provided by joyful and sad prosody specifically affect non-German-speaking listeners’ emotion ratings of the poems. Thus, the present investigation lends support to the hypothesis of prosody-based iconic relations between perceived emotion and sound qualia. At the same time, our findings also highlight that semantic access substantially decreases the role of cross-language sound–emotion associations and indicate that non-German-speaking participants may also use phonetic and prosodic cues other than the ones that were targeted and manipulated here. (shrink)

We study sincere-strategy preference-based approval voting (SP-AV), a system proposed by Brams and Sanver [1] and here adjusted so as to coerce admissibility of the votes (rather than excluding inadmissible votes a priori), with respect to procedural control. In such control scenarios, an external agent seeks to change the outcome of an election via actions such as adding/deleting/partitioning either candidates or voters. SP-AV combines the voters' preference rankings with their approvals of candidates, where in elections with at least two candidates (...) the voters' approval strategies are adjusted – if needed – to approve of their most-preferred candidate and to disapprove of their least-preferred candidate. This rule coerces admissibility of the votes even in the presence of control actions, and hybridizes, in effect, approval with pluralitiy voting. We prove that this system is computationally resistant (i.e., the corresponding control problems are NP-hard) to 19 out of 22 types of constructive and destructive control. Thus, SP-AV has more resistances to control than is currently known for any other natural voting system with a polynomial-time winner problem. In particular, SP-AV is (after Copeland voting, see Faliszewski et al. [2, 3]) the second natural voting system with an easy winner-determination procedure that is known to have full resistance to constructive control, and unlike Copeland voting it in addition displays broad resistance to destructive control (© 2009 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim). (shrink)

Compiled by scholars at the court of Liu An, king of Huainan, in the second century B.C.E, _The Huainanzi_ is a tightly organized, sophisticated articulation of Western Han philosophy and statecraft. Outlining "all that a modern monarch needs to know," the text emphasizes rigorous self-cultivation and mental discipline, brilliantly synthesizing for readers past and present the full spectrum of early Chinese thought. _The Huainanzi_ locates the key to successful rule in a balance of broad knowledge, diligent application, and the penetrating (...) wisdom of a sage. It is a unique and creative synthesis of Daoist classics, such as the _Laozi_ and the _Zhuangzi_; works associated with the Confucian tradition, such as the _Changes_, the _Odes_, and the _Documents_; and a wide range of other foundational philosophical and literary texts from the _Mozi_ to the _Hanfeizi_. The product of twelve years of scholarship, this remarkable translation preserves _The Huainanzi_'s special rhetorical features, such as parallel prose and verse, and showcases a compositional technique that conveys the work's powerful philosophical appeal. This path-breaking volume will have a transformative impact on the field of early Chinese intellectual history and will be of great interest to scholars and students alike. (shrink)

English summary: The account of the fate of Stephen takes up a large part in the Acts of the Apostles. Being the first martyr, Stephen became a Saint and the patron of many churches. There is, however, a modern exegetical tradition which blames Stephen himself for his violent death. Against this, Haaker emphasises the psychological and historical plausibility of Luke's account. The volume reflects the drama of the biblical narrative of Stephen and provides incisive examples of its reception history until (...) the 20th century. German description: Der Sammelband dokumentiert die Tagungen der Kulturhermeneutischen Sozietat e. V. der Jahre 2009 bis 2011, bei denen der Diskurs uber Emotionen und Verhalten im Zentrum stand. In den Zusammenhangen der philosophischen und theologischen Ethik werden Artikulationsformen der Moral, Entwicklungen der Theoriebildung und Probleme der Normativitat erortert. Mit Beitragen von Stefan Beyerle, Volker Caysa, Ferdinand Fellmann, Stephan Gratzel, Peter Fischer, Bernd Harbeck-Pingel, Susanne Klinger, Michael Roth, Friedrike Schick und Albrecht Scriba. (shrink)

Living systems are characterized as self-generating and self-maintaining systems. This type of characterization allows integration of a wide variety of detailed knowledge in biology.The paper clarifies general notions such as processes, systems, and interactions. Basic properties of self-generating systems, i.e. systems which produce their own parts and hence themselves, are discussed and exemplified. This makes possible a clear distinction between living beings and ordinary machines. Stronger conditions are summarized under the concept of self-maintenance as an almost unique character of living (...) systems. Finally, we discuss the far-reaching consequences that the principles of self-generation and self-maintenance have for the organization, structure, function, and evolution of single- and multi-cellular organisms. (shrink)

In order to contribute to the consolidation in the field ofPositive Psychology, we reinvestigated the factor structure of top 10 positive emotions of Barbara Fredrickson. Former research in experimental settings resulted in a three-cluster solution, which we tested withexploratoryandconfirmatorymethodology against different factor models. Within our non-experimental data (N= 312), statistical evidence is presented, advocating for a single factor model of the 10 positive emotions. Different possible reasons for the deviating results are discussed, as well as the theoretical significance to various (...) subfields inPositive Psychology(e.g., therapeutical interventions). Furthermore, the special role ofawewithin the study and its implications for further research in the field are discussed. (shrink)

Three theories contend as explanations of perpetrator behavior in the Holocaust as well as other cases of genocide: structural, intentional, and situational. Structural explanations emphasize the sense in which no single individual or choice accounts for the course of events. In opposition, intentional/cutltural accounts insist upon the genocides as intended outcomes, for how can one explain situations in which people ‘step up’ and repeatedly kill defenseless others in large numbers over sustained periods of time as anything other than a choice? (...) Situational explanations offer a type of behavioral account; this is how people act in certain environments. Critical to the situational account as I discuss it is the ‘Asch paradigm’, i.e. experimentally attested conditions for eliciting conformityof behavior regardlesss of available evidence of prior beliefs. In what follows, I defend what I term above a version of situational explanations of perpetrator behavior. Moreover, I maintain that the factors that explain provide an understanding as well. While not committed to the complete irrelevance or exclusion of cultural or structural factors, nonetheless situational analyses can account both for what happened and why. A cardinal virtue of this version of situational explanations consists in showing how shallow the problem of understanding turns out to be for such cases. (shrink)

Riddles of induction – old or new, Hume’s or Goodman’s – pose unanswered challenges to assumptions that experiences logically legitimate expectations or classifications. The challenges apply both to folk beliefs and to scientific ones. In particular, Goodman’s ‘new riddle’ famously confounds efforts to specify how additional experiences confirm the rightness of currently preferred ways of organizing objects, i.e. our favored theories of what kinds there are.1 His riddle serves to emphasize that neither logic nor experience certifies accepted groupings of objects (...) into kinds.2 Hacking strongly endorses Goodman’s riddle and its chief consequences – nature does not dictate any organizing scheme to us, and different schemes need have no connection to one another. (shrink)

Compiled in the second century B.C.E, the _Huainanzi_ clarifies a crucial period in the development of Chinese conceptions of the cosmos, human nature, and the social order. Outlining "all that a modern monarch needs to know," the text emphasizes rigorous self-cultivation and mental discipline, attributing successful rule to a balance of broad knowledge, diligent application, and penetrating wisdom. In 2010, the editors of this volume completed the first complete English-language translation of the _Huainanzi_, opening exciting new pathways in the study (...) of philosophy, Asian studies, political science, and Asian literature. This abridgement contains essential selections from each of the _Huainanzi_'s twenty-one chapters and adds a new introduction and chapter descriptions. The text represents a remarkable synthesis of Daoist classics, such as the _Laozi_ and the _Zhuangzi_; works associated with the Confucian tradition, such as the _Changes_, the _Odes_, and the _Documents_; and a range of other foundational philosophical and literary works, from the _Mozi_ to the _Hanfeizi_. The abridgement preserves the _Huainanzi_'s special rhetorical features, such as its parallel prose, verse, and unique compositional techniques. For decades, Western scholars overlooked the _Huainanzi'_s sophisticated structure, creative content, and rich historical value, yet all that changed with the translation of the full text. Designed for classroom use and general readers, _The Essential Huainanzi_ continues to increase awareness of this brilliant work and change our understanding of early Chinese history. (shrink)

Knowing as having the right to be sure, by A. J. Ayer.--Knowledge and belief, by N. Malcolm.--Is justified true belief knowledge? By E. L. Gettier.--The foundation of empirical statements, by R. M. Chisholm.--Knowledge, truth, and evidence, by K. Lehrer.--A causal theory of knowing, by A. I. Goldman.--The explication of 'X knows that p', by B. Skyrms.--An analysis of factual knowledge, by P. Unger.--Why I know so much more than you do, by W. W. Rozeboom.--Does knowing imply believing? By J. Harrison.--Knowledge, (...) by examples, by C. Radford.--The logic of knowing, by R. M. Chisholm.--Bibliography (p. 221-224). (shrink)

It has been commonplace in epistemology since its inception to idealize away from computational resource constraints, i.e., from the constraints of time and memory. One thought is that a kind of ideal rationality can be specified that ignores the constraints imposed by limited time and memory, and that actual cognitive performance can be seen as an interaction between the norms of ideal rationality and the practicalities of time and memory limitations. But a cornerstone of naturalistic epistemology is that normative assessment (...) is constrained by capacities: you cannot require someone to do something they cannot or, as it is usually put, ought implies can. This much we take to be uncontroversial. We argue that differences in architectures, goals and resources imply substantial differences in capacity, and that some of these differences are ineliminable. It follows that some differences in goals and architectural and computational resources matter at the normative level: they constrain what principles of normative epistemology can be used to describe and prescribe their behavior. As a result, we can expect there to be important epistemic differences between the way brains, individuals, and science work. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine how a manifest disagreement between Richard Rorty and Alasdair MacIntyre concerning the history of philosophy is but one of a series of deep and interrelated disagreements concerning, in addition, the history of science, the good life for human beings, and, ultimately, the character of and prospects for humankind as well. I shall argue that at the heart of this series of disagreements rests a dispute with regard to the nature of rationality. And this disagreement concerning (...) the norms of rationality, despite its theoretical and practical importance, is one which is, or so I argue, irresolvable. Moreover, the series of disagreements which I examine in the context of the debate between Rorty and MacIntyre is not peculiar or idiosyncratic to them. Their dispute reflects presumptions common to contemporary analytical philosophy. And while analytical philosophers have not made discussions of human nature one of their characteristic concerns, I indicate that such concerns do play a central role in the controversy which I examine. Differences of opinion concerning the political and social nature of human beings are reflected up and down the philosophical line. My argument is in no way concerned with issues of psychological priority or causality (e.g. whether having certain views disposes one psychologically to accepting other views). What I establish are the logical relations, and the points of philosophical contention, among certain epistemo logical and political theses. In Part I, I rehearse Rorty's epistemological views and examine how these views are connected to his views on morality and human nature. In Part II, I begin with MacIntyre's position concerning the virtues and modern moral philosophy and then reconstruct, ex pede Herculem, his views on rationality. Part III examines the prospects of reconciling the perspectives discussed in the first two sections. (shrink)

Despite global warming and climate change remaining top environmental issues, many people do not prioritize the environment. However, religious and spiritual beliefs can influence pro-environmental behavior. Therefore, we focused on understanding how religiosity and spirituality among Christians, the non-religious, and atheists, influence ecologically conscious consumer behavior (ECCB) through environmental values (i.e. egoistic, altruistic, and biospheric) and issue involvement. Using Qualtrics, we recruited a US sample of Christians ( n = 362), the non-religious ( n = 132), and atheists ( n (...) = 84). Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) analyses confirmed the hypothesized model. Overall, the findings suggest that religiosity is related to the environmental values of Christians and the non-religious. This relationship increased issue involvement and positively impacted participants’ ECCB. More importantly, irrespective of religious affiliation, perceived spiritual connection with nature promoted ECCB. (shrink)

The article argues, "contra" berger, that quine's advocacy alleged of classical logic is not based on any alleged "fit" between classical logic and some empirical account of language learning. roth begins by examining berger's claim that quine has changed his position on the acceptability of alternative logics. in berger's account, quine now accepts alternative logics because he could not defend his commitment to classical logic alone based on empirical evidence (e.g., verdict tables). roth argues that berger is mistaken both in (...) thinking that quine has changed his position and in berger's belief that evidence regarding language learning is the basis of quine's view on logic. the actual basis, roth argues, is pragmatic. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Anonymous Versus Open Donation and Queerness as Political:Comments on Groll's Conceiving PeopleAmanda Roth (bio)1. IntroductionIn this commentary on Daniel Groll's 2021 book Conceiving People: Genetic Knowledge and the Ethics of Sperm and Egg Donation, I examine a number of the book's major themes, especially around the idea that donor-conceived children have a significant interest in genetic knowledge and therefore, donor-conceiving parents are morally required to use an open donor.1 (...) I point to some concerns about Groll's case for this view and, in doing so, highlight the way in which taking up an LGBTQ+ perspective complicates and undermines the case against anonymous donation. The major theme of my comments is that the open versus anonymous decision is not merely an ethical decision, but a political one.My comments are organized around a few of the book's major themes, so I'll begin with laying out the most relevant themes in some detail. I then take up four points to consider in more depth. In so doing, I'll be drawing on my own scholarly perspective on issues of nontraditional reproduction, which is informed by my own social positionality in relation to family matters; this means that I (not so subtly) bring a queer perspective to the discussion of Groll's book. The through-line of my comments is this: While I agree with and appreciate much of Groll's approach, I want to stress the sense in which gamete donation is not just an ethical issue, but a political one, given its implication in bionormativity (and heteronormativity). I wonder if a deeper acknowledgment of the political nature of the issues might lead to moral conclusions that are different from those that Groll comes to, even assuming similar ethical values as starting points.2. Groll's major claims(1) Claim 1: Disclosure to donor-conceived offspring—in the usual case at least—is morally required given the intimacy argument: [End Page 166]The intimacy argument suggests that keeping "the secret" about donor conception involves intentional deception and undermines the proper intimacy of parent-child relationships (Groll 2021, 36–49).(2) Claim 2: Anonymous donor conception is (generally) morally impermissible because of the significant interest view.Donor-conceiving parents can reasonably foresee that their children will likely develop a significant interest in genetic knowledge. Significant interests "matte[r] quite a lot to the person who has [them]," "tak[e] up a space … in a person's mental economy" and/or "pla[y] a structuring role in a person's life and self-conception" (Groll 2021, 62–3). But not all donor-conceived people take such an interest in genetic information, and this information is not necessary for identity construction or psychological wellbeing (Groll 2021, 58, 61).2 Rather, multiple routes to self-identity exist, the genetic route being one among the options. Moreover, one needn't experience any loss in not taking this route; however, for those who take it up, genetic knowledge is objectively valuable and nonfungible (Groll 2021, 81–9). This is because genetic knowledge is uniquely relevant to the identity-related question "Who am I?" (Groll 2021, 112–3).3Groll argues that donor-conceiving parents should assume that their child will form such an interest because this is empirically a "good bet." Further, significant interests—at least when they are worthwhile (that is, not trivial and not morally objectionable)—are connected to one's wellbeing by the wellbeing principle: In satisfying a non-instrumental significant worthwhile interest, one's life goes better (Groll 2021, 62). It follows, then, that parents ought to choose open donors since (to simplify) parents are obligated to promote their children's wellbeing (ibid).4Counter to what one might expect, Groll does not take his ethical case against anonymous donor conception to justify prohibition of the practice. This is because wronging children in this way is within the realm of (unethical) choices we allow parents to make without societal interference.5 Moreover, to aim regulation at anonymous donor conception could reinforce bionormativity and target already marginalized families for special negative attention (Groll 2021, chapter 8).(3) "Claim" 3: Groll's own personal... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hume Studies Volume XXII, Number 2, November 1996, pp. 273-298 Hume's Psychology of Identity Ascriptions ABRAHAM SESSHU ROTH Introduction Hume observes that we naturally believe ordinary objects to persist through time and change. The question that interests him in the Treatise1 is, What causes such a belief to arise in the human mind? Hume's question is, of course, the naturalistic one we would expect given that the project of (...) the Treatise is the construction of a "science of man." This paper seeks to clarify Hume's discussion of how we acquire the notion of persisting objects. In the first section, I note that several observations Hume makes about the actions of the mind may all come under the heading of "seeing successions as simple." These observations pose a problem for Hume's system, revealing a tension between his accounts of our ideas of time and persistence: if (as Hume believes) only successions, which are not simple, endure through time, how is it that bodies seen as simple are nevertheless thought to endure or have duration as well? In the second section I show how Hume answers this question. The third section is devoted to an interpretation of Hume's notions of the identity relation and what he calls an "object existent at a time." Identity through time is standardly treated in contemporary analytic philosophy using the notion of a unity relation connecting various temporal parts or stages of a persisting object. One interpretation of Hume takes his talk of the identity relation as signifying just such a unity relation, and "object existent at a time" as referring to a temporal part of an object. Another interpretation makes use of the notion of substance Abraham Sesshu Roth is at the Department of Philosophy, Brandeis University, Waltham MA 02254-9110 USA. Email: [email protected] 274 Abraham Sesshu Roth and of qualities inhering in a substance at different times. These interpretations concentrate upon metaphysical issues, and neglect the psychological aspects of Hume's discussion of identity. I demonstrate that these interpretations are unacceptable because they cannot be reconciled with Hume's psychologically significant distinction between vulgar or commonplace views on the one hand, and those views held by philosophers on the other. Finally, I propose and defend an alternative view of Hume's account of identity. This new understanding makes use of the notion of distinctions of reason to interpret Hume's idea of an object existent at a time. It turns out that a focus upon Hume's psychology of identity ascriptions will allow us to discern an interesting metaphysical alternative to the temporal parts view of identity. 1. Seeing Successions as Simples There has been some dispute in the literature about the temporal nature of Humean impressions. According to Barry Stroud, Hume holds that if one stares at an unchanging object (in unchanging conditions) for some more than minimal amount of time, one's experience takes the form of a sequence of qualitatively identical impressions, each of which occupies a temporal minimum.2 Thus when I fix my gaze upon an object, I am subject to a temporal series of impressions which may be represented as follows: (1) A A A A Eli Hirsch and Don Baxter question Stroud's assumption that a Humean perception occupies only a temporal minimum.3 Baxter holds that in Hume's view an impression will last as long as you keep looking and the conditions under which you look remain unchanged. So to stare fixedly at an object would on his view be represented in this way: (I') A I side with Baxter and Hirsch on this matter.4 But the dispute in any case has minimal ramifications for the purposes of this paper. My concern is with how Hume thinks a sequence or succession of impressions such as (1) would normally be experienced, i.e., with what idea the common person would derive from such a succession, and with how such an individual would characterize this succession. According to Hume, regardless of whether or not perceptions are extended, if a perceiver were to be presented with a succession like (1), it would be experienced or taken as (V). Hume... (shrink)

Scholars explore from many fresh angles the interweavings of two of the richest strands of human culture-music and esotericism-with examples from the medieval period to the modern age. Music and esotericism are two responses to the intuition that the world holds hidden order, beauty, and power. Those who compose, perform, and listen to music have often noted that music can be a bridge between sensory and transcendent realms. Such renowned writers as Boethius expanded the definition of music to encompass not (...) only sounded music but also the harmonic fabric of human and cosmic life. Those who engage in pursuits called "esoteric," from ancient astrology, magic, and alchemy to recent and more novel forms of spirituality, have also remarked on the relevance of music to their quests. Esotericists have composed music in order to convey esoteric meaning, performed music to create esoteric influences, and listened to music to raise their esoteric awareness. The academic study of esotericism is a young field, and few researchers have probed the rich interface between the musical and esoteric domains. In Explorations in Music and Esotericism, scholars from numerous fields introduce the history of esotericism and current debates about its definition and extent. The book's sixteen chapters present rich instances of connections between music and esotericism, organized with reference to four aspects of esotericism: as a form of thought; as the keeping and revealing of secrets; as an identity; and as a signifier. Edited by Marjorie Roth and Leonard George. Contributors: Elizabeth Abbate, Malachai Komanoff Bandy, Adam Bregman, Charles E. Brewer, Benjamin Dobbs, Anna Gawboy, Pasquale Giaquinto, Adam Knight Gilbert, Joscelyn Godwin, Virginia Christy Lamothe, Andrew Owen, Christopher Scheer, Codee Ann Spinner, Woodrow Steinken, and Daphne Tan. (shrink)

This article surveys the discursive turns of a conventional historical trope: the change in the valence of alcohol (and drugs) from happy to miserable. This change is commonly told as the story of a golden age of drinking and a fall into addiction (although there is a confused relationship in many of the stories between a condition called medical alcoholism and the social behavior of drunkenness). This fall is variously dated from the fifteenth to the late nineteenth centuries (both the (...) conceptualization and the fact of alcoholism). Is this real historical change or only nominal change? Was alcoholism unknown in previous ages or has it always been around? Certain material factors (supply, absence of alternative drinks) may have impeded the visibility of alcoholism. The theory of nominal change is involved with factors like conspiratorial behavior, the conditions of scientific knowledge (i.e., the structure of investigation itself ), the baffles of categorization (heavy drinking was hidden within gluttony for most of history). Real change involves various facets of modernity and industrial capitalism: individualism and privacy, temperance, respectability, and rigid class formation, etcetera. But this shift is also a movement across class lines, from middle to lower-class drinkers. (shrink)

The problem to which the present paper is addressed is one aspect of that of the relationship between Religion and Morality. That God is good is a proposition which presents itself to many with axiomatic force, and by its help the path is traced which leads directly either from Religion to Morality or from Morality to Religion. Yet the reflective mind may well ask: By what evidence, or in what way, do we know that God is good? If the proposition (...) rests on evidence in the ordinary sense, what is it and wherein lies its convincing character? Or if it rests, as is often asserted, on another sort of knowledge altogether, what is this non-experiential cognition and what are its guarantees? Or again, we may ask whether the proposition is analytic, i.e. (shrink)

Toward the end of his life, the Russian psychologist L.S. Vygotsky turned away from his earlier work that he has become famous for only to sow the seeds for a new theory. In this theory, affect was to play a central role, there was to be a primacy of social relations, and anything mental (mind, thought, self, other, knowledge) was an event rather than a thing. This is essentially a transactional perspective. In this book, the author articulates a transactional psychology (...) of education drawing on the works of G.H. Mead, J. Dewey, G. Bateson, F. Mikhailov, and E. Il'enkov. All theoretical positions are developed out of videotaped exchanges, thereby giving concrete character to every psychological concept articulated. (shrink)

Before one can give a fully adequate account of action, one must know where the action is. This amounts to understanding the nature of basic or unmediated action, the performance of which does not require performing any other act as a means. There is little consensus on what sort of act is basic. Volitionists such as H. A. Prichard, Brian O'Shaughnessy, Jennifer Hornsby and Carl Ginet, hold that a special type of mental act is basic and underlies all overt bodily (...) action. They believe that action, in its fundamental form, occurs in the head or mind of the agent that performs it. "Corporealists" like Donald Davidson hold that the basic act is one of bodily movement. Finally, "environmentalists" include events beyond the body as part of the basic act. ;The dissertation is devoted to establishing the viability and exploring the ramifications of the environmentalist conception of basicness. Ideas of various theorists are discussed, including Donald Davidson, G. E. M. Anscombe, George Wilson, Gilbert Harman, John Searle, Alfred Mele, Tyler Burge, and John Perry. I address a number of arguments for volitionism or corporealism which draw upon some aspect of action, such as its individuation , its description , its rationalization , and its intentionality or content--in particular its self-referential content . Discussions of these topics serve to further articulate the environmentalist notion that in acting we can have an unmediated or direct effect upon our surroundings. A defense of environmentalism offers, in turn, a new understanding of these various aspects of action. (shrink)