Performing and listening to music occurs in specific situations, requiring specific media. Empirical research on music listening and appreciation, however, tends to overlook the effects these situations and media may have on the listening experience. This article uses the sociological concept of the frame to develop a theory of an aesthetic experience with music as the result of encountering sound/music in the context of a specific situation. By presenting a transdisciplinary sub-field of empirical studies, we unfold this theory for one (...) such frame: the classical concert. After sketching out the underlying theoretical framework, a selective literature review is conducted to look for evidence on the general plausibility of the single elements of this emerging theory and to identify desiderata. We refer to common criticisms of the standard classical concert, and how new concert formats try to overcome alleged shortcomings and detrimental effects. Finally, an empirical research program is proposed, in which frames and frame components are experimentally manipulated and compared to establish their respective affordances and effects on the musical experience. Such a research program will provide empirical evidence to tackle a question that is still open to debate, i.e., whether the diversified world of modern-day music listening formats also holds a place for the classical concert – and if so, for what kind of classical concert. (shrink)

The process [by which any individual settles into new opinions] is always the same. The individual has a stock of old opinions already, but he meets a new experience that puts them to a strain…. The result is an inward trouble to which his mind till then had been a stranger, and from which he seeks to escape by modifying his previous mass of opinions. He saves as much of it as he can, for in this matter of belief we (...) are all extreme conservatives. So he tries to change first this opinion, and then that (for they resist change very variously), until at last some new idea comes up which he can graft upon the ancient stock with a minimum of disturbance of the latter, some idea that mediates between the stock and the new experience and runs them into one most felicitously and expediently.The new idea is then adopted as the true one. It preserves the older stock of truths with a minimum of modification, stretching them just enough to make them admit the novelty, but conceiving that in ways as familiar as the case leaves possible. (William James, Lectures on Pragmatism, 1907). (shrink)

Although it can be straightforward to define the features of physical traits, complex cultural categories tend to elude widely accepted definitions that transcend cultural and historical context. Addressing papers by Mehr et al. and Savage et al., which both aim to explain music as an evolved trait, we discuss fundamental problems that arise from their conceptualizations of music.

The paper presents the main ideas of Ultrafilter Logic (UL), as introduced by Veloso and others. A new proposal, Normality Logic (NL), is outlined for expanding the expressive power of UL. The system NL appears to offer a simpler solution to the problem of expressive power than the sorting strategy of Carnielli and Veloso. Interpretations of NL are discussed and an important point of contact to Hansson's notion of non-prioritized belief revision is observed.

The paper presents the main ideas of Ultrafilter Logic (UL), as introduced by Veloso and others. A new proposal, Normality Logic (NL), is outlined for expanding the expressive power of UL. The system NL appears to offer a simpler solution to the problem of expressive power than the sorting strategy of Carnielli and Veloso. Interpretations of NL are discussed and an important point of contact to Hansson's notion of non-prioritized belief revision is observed.

The book generalises earlier theories of belief change to cover all kinds of changes of sets by sets. The principal focus is still on changes of belief sets in response to new evidence, but the formal theory extends to all domains with a closure operation and a preference structure including, for example, systems of action. Contraction is the key notion; all other changes can be defined. Various new applications of the theory are outlined. A sentential version of contraction, subtraction, is (...) proposed as a formal counterpart to 'except'-locutions in natural language. Connections are emphasised with other areas at the interface between philosophical logic and artificial intelligence such as reasoning from default assumptions or from inconsistent premises. A relation of merge inference is proposed as a means of retrieving maximal but nontrivial information from inconsistent premises. Merge inference respects certain anti-Boolean intuitions while avoiding a revision of classical logic. (shrink)

Comprehensive evaluation and study of man's theories and knowledge of genetical characteristics and the evolutionary processes.

Explores the development of the ideas of evolutionary biology, particularly as affected by the increasing understanding of genetics and of the chemical basis of inheritance.

The AGM theory of belief contraction is extended tomultiple contraction, i.e. to contraction by a set of sentences rather than by a single sentence. There are two major variants: Inpackage contraction all the sentences must be removed from the belief set, whereas inchoice contraction it is sufficient that at least one of them is removed. Constructions of both types of multiple contraction are offered and axiomatically characterized. Neither package nor choice contraction can in general be reduced to contractions by single (...) sentences; in the finite case choice contraction allows for reduction. (shrink)

Provides a philosophical analysis of such biological concepts as natural selection, adaptation, speciation, and evolution.

Published just after the Second World War, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages is a sweeping exploration of the remarkable continuity of European literature across time and place, from the classical era up to the early nineteenth century, and from the Italian peninsula to the British Isles. In what T. S. Eliot called a "magnificent" book, Ernst Robert Curtius establishes medieval Latin literature as the vital transition between the literature of antiquity and the vernacular literatures of later centuries. (...) The result is nothing less than a masterful synthesis of European literature from Homer to Goethe. European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages is a monumental work of literary scholarship. In a new introduction, Colin Burrow provides critical insights into Curtius's life and ideas and highlights the distinctive importance of this wonderful book. (shrink)

The causal/explanatory exclusion argument is one of the principal weapons against the possibility of mental causes/explanations having genuine causal/explanatory power. I argue that the causal and the explanatory versions of the exlusion argument should be distinguished. There are really two arguments, one of them perhaps successful, the other one not.

I analyze a number of widespread misconceptions concerning species. The species category, defined by a concept, denotes the rank of a species taxon in the Linnaean hierarchy. Biological species are reproducing isolated from each other, which protects the integrity of their genotypes. Degree of morphological difference is not an appropriate species definition. Unequal rates of evolution of different characters and lack of information on the mating potential of isolated populations are the major difficulties in the demarcation of species taxa.