In this note we present a three-valued intensional logic, which is an extension of both Montague's intensional logic and ukasiewicz three-valued logic. Our system is obtained by adapting Gallin's version of intensional logic (see Gallin, D., Intensional and Higher-order Modal Logic). Here we give only the necessary modifications to the latter. An acquaintance with Gallin's work is pressuposed.

Much of the progress in the fields constituting cognitive science has been based upon the use of explicit information processing models, almost exclusively patterned after conventional serial computers. An extension of these ideas to massively parallel, connectionist models appears to offer a number of advantages. After a preliminary discussion, this paper introduces a general connectionist model and considers how it might be used in cognitive science. Among the issues addressed are: stability and noise‐sensitivity, distributed decision‐making, time and sequence problems, and (...) the representation of complex concepts. (shrink)

A cross-sectional study to ascertain what the Singapore population would regard as material risk in the anaesthesia consent-taking process and identify demographic factors that predict patient preferences in medical decision-making to tailor a more patient-centered informed consent. A survey was performed involving patients 21 years old and above who attended the pre-operative evaluation clinic over a 1-month period in Singapore General Hospital. Questionnaires were administered to assess patients’ perception of material risks, by trained interviewers. Patients’ demographics were obtained. Mann–Whitney U (...) test and Kruskal-Wallis one-way analysis of variance was used. Statistical significance was taken at p < 0.05. Four hundred fourteen patients were eligible of which 26 refused to participate and 24 were excluded due to language barrier. 364 patients were recruited. A higher level of education, being employed and younger age group are factors identified in patients who wanted greater participation in medical decisions. Gender, marital status, type of surgery, and previous surgical history did not affect their level of participation. The complications most patients knew about were Nausea, Drowsiness and Surgical Wound Pain. Patients ranked Heart Attack, Death and Stroke as the most significant risks that they wanted to be informed about in greater detail. Most patients wanted to make a joint decision with the anaesthetist, instead of letting the doctor decide or deciding for themselves. Discussion with the anaesthetist is the preferred medium of communication compared to reading a pamphlet or watching a video. Age and educational level can influence medical decision-making. Despite the digital age, most patients still prefer a clinic consult instead of audio-visual multimedia for pre-operative anaesthetic counselling. The local population appears to place greater importance on rare but serious complications compared to common complications. This illustrates the need to contextualize information provided during informed consent to strengthen the doctor-patient relationship. (shrink)

v. 1. Nicomachean ethics. Politics. The Athenian Constitution. Rhetoric. On Poetics.--v. 2. Logic.--v. 3. Physics. Metaphysics. On the soul. Short physical treaties.--v. 4. On the heavens. On generation and corruption. Meteorology. Biological treatises.

Ship design needs to respond to and attract an ever more design conscious society. However, little research has been conducted into perceptions of beauty and pleasure and how such perceptions can be usefully absorbed into ship design. Aesthetic consideration, is seen as a distraction from the bespoke nature of the ship design process and is often avoided, second guessed or left for external consultancy. The ship design discipline requires the nurturing of its own aesthetic methods, for future development, and to (...) adapt some of the aesthetic ideals found in architecture, art and design. This paper argues that philosophy can be effective in interpreting what the passenger finds attractive and pleasurable. To illustrate the philosophical approach proposed, the `Elbe SWATH’ and the `Oasis of the Seas’ are investigated and compared using theoretical resources from the culturally focused philosophy of `Functional Beauty’. Conclusions suggest that the interpretation of the end users most valued appreciations can lead to design directives that deliver subjective qualities of beauty - beauty similar to those seen in the pure aims of the Elbe SWATH’s purposeful work craft, or comparable to nature’s beauty and purity in aim. (shrink)

Introduction: In The Netherlands, physicians have to be convinced that the patient suffers unbearably and hopelessly before granting a request for euthanasia. The extent to which general practitioners (GPs), consulted physicians and members of the euthanasia review committees judge this criterion similarly was evaluated. Methods: 300 GPs, 150 consultants and 27 members of review committees were sent a questionnaire with patient descriptions. Besides a “standard case” of a patient with physical suffering and limited life expectancy, the descriptions included cases in (...) which the request was mainly rooted in psychosocial or existential suffering, such as fear of future suffering or dependency. For each case, respondents were asked whether they recognised the case from their own practice and whether they considered the suffering to be unbearable. Results: The cases were recognisable for almost all respondents. For the “standard case” nearly all respondents were convinced that the patient suffered unbearably. For the other cases, GPs thought the suffering was unbearable less often (2–49%) than consultants (25–79%) and members of the euthanasia review committees (24–88%). In each group, the suffering of patients with early dementia and patients who were “tired of living” was least often considered to be unbearable. Conclusions: When non-physical aspects of suffering are central in a euthanasia request, there is variance between and within GPs, consultants and members of the euthanasia committees in their judgement of the patient’s suffering. Possible explanations could be differences in their roles in the decision-making process, differences in experience with evaluating a euthanasia request, or differences in views regarding the permissibility of euthanasia. (shrink)

XLRI, in association with a few Tata Group companies, established the XLRI-JRD Tata Foundation in Business Ethics in 1991 to mark their long-standing commitment and contribution to business ethics in India. The foundation seeks to address this by publicly affirming the urgent need for ethics in business and the need to bring about a conducive culture in which it can thrive.

A fresh, daring, and genuine alternative to the traditional story of scientific progress Explaining the world around us, and the life within it, is one of the most uniquely human drives, and the most celebrated activity of science. Good explanations are what provide accurate causal accounts of the things we wonder at, but explanation's earthly origins haven't grounded it: we have used it to account for the grandest and most wondrous mysteries in the natural world. Explanations give us a sense (...) of understanding, but an explanation that feels right doesn't mean it is true. For every true explanation, there is a false one that feels just as good. A good theory's explanations, though, have a much easier path to truth. This push for good explanations elevated science from medieval alchemy to electro-chemistry, or a pre-inertial physics to the forces underlying nanoparticles. And though the attempt to explain has existed as long as we have been able to wonder, a science timeline from pre-history to the present will reveal a steep curve of theoretical discovery that explodes around 1600, primarily in the West. Ranging over neuroscience, psychology, history, and policy, Wondrous Truths answers two fundamental questions-Why did science progress in the West? And why so quickly? J.D. Trout's answers are surprising. His central idea is that Western science rose above all others because it hit upon successive theories that were approximately true through an awkward assortment of accident and luck, geography and personal idiosyncrasy. Of course, intellectual ingenuity partially accounts for this persistent drive forward. But so too does the persistence of the objects of wonder. Wondrous Truths recovers the majesty of science, and provides a startling new look at the grand sweep of its biggest ideas. (shrink)

A new criterion is introduced for judging the suitability of various fuzzy logics for practical uncertain reasoning in a probabilistic world and the relationship of this criterion to several established criteria, and its consequences for truth functional belief, are investigated.

Volume 46, Issue 6, November 2020, Page 727-743.

The King Report on Corporate Governance (1994) evoked unprecedented interest in corporate governance in South Africa. This does not mean that corporate governance was not an issue of concern before the release of this historical report. To the contrary, corporate governance in its broader sense has been at stake since the inception of the first publicly owned companies in South Africa. This article intends to give an overview of corporate governance in South Africa. It starts by making a distinction between (...) broad and narrow conceptions of corporate governance. Before applying this distinction to the practice of corporate governance in South Africa, a brief overview of the corporate landscape in South Africa is provided. Then the South African situation with regard to broad and narrow corporate governance respectively is analysed. The article ends with a discussion of the review of corporate governance that currently is in the making in South Africa. Throughout the article both the financial and ethical dimensions of corporate governance is attended to. (shrink)

On the ethics of extending human life: healthy people have a right to carry on livingHumanity has long demonstrated a paradoxical ambivalence concerning the extension of a healthy human lifespan. Modest health extension has been universally sought, whereas extreme health extension has been regarded as a snare and delusion—a dream beyond all others at first blush, but actually something we are better off without. The prevailing pace of biotechnological progress is bringing ever closer the day when humanity will be able (...) to act on the latter view by rejecting a clear and present opportunity for much longer healthy lives. Indeed, some biogerontologists contend that that day has already arrived, to the extent that our hesitation in embarking on a vigorous “war on ageing” is already delaying the point at which a cure for ageing will be developed. Here I consider whether our present caution concerning the wisdom of truly curing ageing is likely to survive the increased scrutiny that it will receive in coming years as a result of these technical advances. I conclude that it will not, because of its irreconcilability with values that are more deeply held by the large majority of humanity than any values that argue against the quest for a cure. I further conclude that all the major current reasons given for not curing ageing are mere crutches to help us cope with the immutability of ageing that we have been brought up to accept. Our failure to set aside such irrationality is already shortening potential longevity—quite probably of those already alive today—to a staggering degree. Once we realise this, our determination to consign human ageing to history will be second …. (shrink)

The King Report on Corporate Governance (1994) evoked unprecedented interest in corporate governance in South Africa. This does not mean that corporate governance was not an issue of concern before the release of this historical report. To the contrary, corporate governance in its broader sense has been at stake since the inception of the first publicly owned companies in South Africa. This article intends to give an overview of corporate governance in South Africa. It starts by making a distinction between (...) broad and narrow conceptions of corporate governance. Before applying this distinction to the practice of corporate governance in South Africa, a brief overview of the corporate landscape in South Africa is provided. Then the South African situation with regard to broad and narrow corporate governance respectively is analysed. The article ends with a discussion of the review of corporate governance that currently is in the making in South Africa. Throughout the article both the financial and ethical dimensions of corporate governance is attended to. (shrink)

Ausgehend von einer postulierten Abstammung der verschiedenen Gymnospermengruppen und der Angiospermen von Progymnospermen werden die Semophylesen der Samenanlagen und deren „Hüll- und Schutzorganen” eingehend besprochen. Das innere Integument ist phylogenetisch wohl aus verwachsenen sterilen Megasporangien entstanden, das aussere ist das Homologon der Cupula der Samenfarnen und ein Achsengebilde.Die dritte Hülle — die interseminalen Schuppen bei den Bennettiteen, die Chlamys bei den Chlamydospermen, die Fruchtknotenwand bei einigen Angiospermengruppen wie Pandanaceen und Cyperaceen, und der Arillus bei Angiospermen mit karpellaten Gynoezien — ist (...) wahrscheinlich aus reduzierten Samenanlagen hervorgegangen. Die vierte, aus sterilen brakteenartigen Phyllomen entstanden, hat in verschiedenen Kombinationen mit fertilen Achsen, die karpellaten Fruchtknoten der Angiospermen gebildet.Die Herkunft der Blütenpflanzen von chlamydospermen- und bennettiteen-ähnlichen Vorfahren wird sehr wahrscheinlich da Übergänge zwischen den „nackten” Samenanlagen vomGnetum-Typ und sogenannten pseudomonomeren Griffeln von Angiospermen vorliegen.En basant la phylogénie de plusieurs groupes de Gymnospermes et d'Angiospermes sur une descente des Progymnospermes du Devonien Supérieur , les sémophylèses des ovules et de ses couches protectrices ont été discuté.Le tégument interne très probablement représente une groupe de mégasporanges stériles fusés, le tégument externe est l'homologue des cupules des ptéridospermes et d'origine axillaire. La troisième couche — les écailles interséminales chez les Bennettitales, la chlamys chez les Chlamydospermes, le paroi de l'ovaire chez quelques Angiospermes comme les Pandanacées, les Piperacées..., l'arille de l'ovule dans les ovaires carpellaires des Angiospermes — est probablement l'homologue d'un nombre d'ovules steriles. La quatrième couche, constituée de phyllomes steriles, s'est associée avec des axes ovulifères en formant les pistils carpellaires des Angiospermes. L'origine des Angiospermes des ancêtres d'un type Chlamydosperme-Bennettitale est indiqué par la morphologie transitoire de quelques ovaires soi-disant „pseudo-monomères” liant les ovules „nues” du typeGnetum avec les pistils du type des Piperacées, Chloranthacées etc. (shrink)