The problem we discuss is whether mammalian cells possess genes whose expression is specifically enhanced by DNA damage in order to cope with the damage. The paradigm is the SOS response in E. coli. We conclude that there is compelling evidence that DNA‐damaging agents do affect gene expression, and that mutation frequencies are increased, but proof that a repair process per se is induced remains elusive. We offer here the hypothesis that recognition of the presence of DNA damage by poly(ADPribose) (...) polymerase effects preprogrammed changes in gene expression. (shrink)

The thin red line ( TRL ) is a theory about the semantics of future-contingents. The central idea is that there is such a thing as the ‘actual future’, even in the presence of indeterminism. It is inspired by a famous solution to the problem of divine foreknowledge associated with William of Ockham, in which the freedom of agents is argued to be compatible with God’s omniscience. In the modern branching time setting, the theory of the TRL is widely regarded (...) to suffer from several fundamental problems. In this paper we propose several new TRL semantics, each with differing degrees of success. This leads up to our final semantics, which is a cross between the TRL and supervaluationism. We discuss the notions of truth, validity and semantic consequence which result from our final semantics, and demonstrate some of its pleasing results. This account, we believe, answers the main objection in the literature, and thus places the TRL on the same level as any other competing semantics for future contingents. (shrink)

The book written by top experts in CI provides such clear directions and the much-needed focus on the most important and challenging research issues, showing a ...

In 1953, exactly 50 years ago to this day, the first volume of Studia Logica appeared under the auspices of The Philosophical Committee of The Polish Academy of Sciences. Now, five decades later the present volume is dedicated to a celebration of this 50th Anniversary of Studia Logica. The volume features a series of papers by distinguished scholars reflecting both the aim and scope of this journal for symbolic logic.

Fr. Paweł Siwek, SJ may be considered the only Polish Jesuit philosopher of the 20th century to have achieved worldwide recognition. This article surveys his work from a broad perspective reflecting philosophy, psychology and theology as pursued in Catholic circles in the 19th and 20th centuries. We review his achievements, while also offering an interpretation. We put forward the thesis that he found his own way of practising neo-Thomism in the spirit of Pope Leo XIII’s Aeterni Patris. To substantiate our (...) claims, we first briefly sketch his biography, providing a synthetic overview of the relevant contexts for his philosophical oeuvre. We then identify his four main areas of interest: namely, the history of philosophy, systematic philosophy, the scientific psychology of religion and spirituality, and Christian apologetics in the face of world religions and spiritual movements. In our conclusion, we discuss the main traits of his intellectual work, along with its impact. (shrink)

This volume investigates what is beyond the Principle of Non-Contradiction. It features 14 papers on the foundations of reasoning, including logical systems and philosophical considerations. Coverage brings together a cluster of issues centered upon the variety of meanings of consistency, contradiction, and related notions. Most of the papers, but not all, are developed around the subtle distinctions between consistency and non-contradiction, as well as among contradiction, inconsistency, and triviality, and concern one of the above mentioned threads of the broadly understood (...) non-contradiction principle and the related principle of explosion. Some others take a perspective that is not too far away from such themes, but with the freedom to tread new paths. Readers should understand the title of this book in a broad way,because it is not so obvious to deal with notions like contradictions, consistency, inconsistency, and triviality. The papers collected here present groundbreaking ideas related to consistency and inconsistency. (shrink)

The previous volume of the series Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science at Warsaw University---entitled Imperatives from Different Points of View---was the first result of the project Theory of Imperatives and Its Applications realized by the group composed by Anna Brożek, Jacek Jadacki and Berislav Žarnić. The project was supported by the Foundation for Polish Science within the program Homing Plus. One of the most important points of this project was the International Symposium Imperatives in Theory and Practice which (...) took place in Warsaw, on the 18th and 19th May, 2012. The symposium was the meeting of many specialists in the domain of the theory of imperatives – from China, Croatia, Japan, Poland and The United States. Contents: Berislav Žarnić, Logical Root of Linguistic Commitment; Jacek Jadacki, Witwicki’s Square; Tomoyuki Yamada, On the Very Idea of Imperative Inference; Fengkui Ju, Semantics of Sentences in Mixed Moods of Indicative and Imperative; Piotr Kulicki & Robert Trypuz, Two Faces of Obligation; Bartosz Brożek, Types of Obligations; Anna Brożek, Functional Ambiguity of Imperatives; Anna Brożek, Logic of Prescriptions and Instruction; Aleksandra Horecka, Imperative Sentence as a Performative Sentence, which Refers to the Optative State of Affairs; Jakub Bazyli Motrenko, The Concept of Praxiological Directive; Maciej Witek, How to Establish Authority with Words: Imperative Utterances and Presupposition Accommodation; Wojciech Załuski, Remarks on the Lexical Order of Rawls’s Two Principles of Justice; Natalia Miklaszewska, Acts of Will as Convictions; Anna Brożek, Imperatives in the Gospel. (shrink)

We formulate a cosmogonic indifference principle in cosmology in terms of a dynamical system theory. While the choice between generic and fine tuned initial condition for our Universe has a rather philosophical character, there is a very generic set of initial conditions which give rise to the concordance inflectional ΛCDM model which becomes in good agreement with astronomical observations.

Alan Robinson This set of essays pays tribute to Bob Kowalski on his 60th birthday, an anniversary which gives his friends and colleagues an excuse to celebrate his career as an original thinker, a charismatic communicator, and a forceful intellectual leader. The logic programming community hereby and herein conveys its respect and thanks to him for his pivotal role in creating and fostering the conceptual paradigm which is its raison d’Œtre. The diversity of interests covered here reflects the variety (...) of Bob’s concerns. Read on. It is an intellectual feast. Before you begin, permit me to send him a brief personal, but public, message: Bob, how right you were, and how wrong I was. I should explain. When Bob arrived in Edinburgh in 1967 resolution was as yet fairly new, having taken several years to become at all widely known. Research groups to investigate various aspects of resolution sprang up at several institutions, the one organized by Bernard Meltzer at Edinburgh University being among the first. For the half-dozen years that Bob was a leading member of Bernard’s group, I was a frequent visitor to it, and I saw a lot of him. We had many discussions about logic, computation, and language. (shrink)

It is proved that free dynamic algebras superamalgamate. Craig interpolation for proposi- tional dynamic logic and superamalgamation for the variety of dynamic algebras follow.

In this essay, we defend the design of the Salk polio vaccine trial and try to put some limits on the role schemata should play in designing clinical research studies. Our presentation is structured as a response to de Freitas and Pietrobon who identified the CONSORT statement as a schema that would have, had it existed at the time, ruled out the design of the Salk polio vaccine trial of 1954 in favor of a completely randomized controlled clinical trial. We (...) argue that large-scale public health interventions often require evidence beyond simple efficacy, the limit of what an RCT can provide, and that the design actually adopted for the Salk trial represented a reasonable—albeit imperfect—compromise. This is of more than historical interest in that many contemporary studies are of the scale and scope to require a more pragmatic, rather than explanatory, approach to study design. (shrink)

Jacek Urbaniec: Platonism in the philosophy of mathematics does not necessarily imply that there are links between the temporal physical world and the eternal world of mathematics..

In this paper we present a characterization of hyper-connexivity by means of a relating semantics for Boolean connexive logics. We also show that the minimal Boolean connexive logic is Abelardian, strongly consistent, Kapsner strong and antiparadox. We give an example showing that the minimal Boolean connexive logic is not simplificative. This shows that the minimal Boolean connexive logic is not totally connexive.

We cannot escape Indiana Jones! (Not that we would want to, of course.) Harrison Ford deserves credit for the character's popularity. His ability to subtly play up Indy's foibles while playing down the character's heroism, makes Indiana Jones relatable. Of course, Lucas and the screenwriters are also responsible, as they magnificently depict Indy battling antagonists seeking to possess mystical objects for world domination. But Indy is no mere action hero. He also struggles with unrequited love that lingers for decades, an (...) estrangement from his over-bearing father that lasts just as long, and a life-long obsession with regaining an important object unfairly taken from him. As we know, Indy doesn't always choose wisely, and if the Young Indiana Jones Chronicles are to be trusted, he made many missteps in his youth on the way to becoming the hero we know and love. Indy loses a fight as often as he wins, and when he wins, he doesn't always fight fairly. In fact, he stumbles so often, one might wonder why he persists decade after decade toward his goals. He's not getting any younger. What's the point? And, as he inexplicably trudges on, he-in the four films and various graphic novels-has many alleged encounters with the supernatural. He's not a religious person (at all), so what should he make of those? Should he take the leap of faith and become a believer? While we often see him conducting his highly unconventional fieldwork, spending an unusual amount of time in caves, he cannot completely ignore his "day job" teaching undergraduates and aiding their pursuit of knowledge. But why should archaeologists strive to put artifacts in a museum, or search for "fact," but not "truth" (and who is Dr. Tyree, anyway)? The Indiana Jones character is expressive of the human condition, vividly illuminating our struggles and issues on the big screen. True, we don't have John Williams's orchestra filling us with pride when we manage to do the right thing or play the part of the hero. Still, no one would blame you if you imagined Indy's theme blaring in the background while rising to meet a challenge! (shrink)

The purpose of the paper is to rethink the role of actuality in the branching model of possibilities. We investigate the idea that the model should be enriched with an additional factor—the so-called Thin Red Line—which is supposed to represent the single possible course of events that gets actualized in time. We believe that this idea was often misconceived which prompted some unfortunate reactions. On the one hand, it suggested problematic semantic models of future tense and and on the other, (...) it provoked questionable lines of criticism. We reassess the debate and point to potential pitfalls, focusing on the semantic dimension of the Thin Red Line theory. Our agenda transcends the semantics, however. We conclude that semantic considerations do not threaten the Thin Red Line theory and that the proper debate should be carried in the domain of metaphysics. (shrink)

Author: Kowalski Andrzej P. Title: CULTURAL ARCHAEOLOGY AND PREHISTORY OF THE CONTINENT OF ART (Kulturoznawcza archeologia i prehistoria Kontynentu sztuki) Source: Filo-Sofija year: 2011, vol:.12, number: 2011/1, pages: 291-310 Keywords: JERZY KMITA, CULTURAL ARCHAEOLOGY, THE CONTINENT OF ART, SHAMANISTIC ORIGINS OF ART Discipline: PHILOSOPHY Language: POLISH Document type: ARTICLE Publication order reference (Primary author’s office address): E-mail: www:The paper presents an attempt at application of Jerzy Kmita’s achievements in philosophy of art, aesthetics, axiology, and history of culture to the (...) research on genesis of art. The problem of cultural genealogy of art shall be addressed in following contexts: 1. The context of the so-called ‘end of art in postmodern culture’ which manifests itself in the thesis concerning elimination of “grand narrations”, myths, and ideologies. According to J. Kmita, the art takes recourse to idea-meanings which are not ascribed to a handicraft. The meanings of superior axiological level express themselves in the art only. 2. The context of Bild-Anthropologie developed by H. Belting. Works of art are regarded here as images, especially—images of a cultural type. The accent lies here on genealogy of iconoclasm and theological discourse which uses Greek philosophical terminology. Ontology of “image as a presence” is analyzed with regard to magical realism and symbolism. Primordial and prehistoric images do not operate with signs of objects but instead they constitute objects themselves. 3. The context of structural anthropology where the art is interpreted within the horizon of mytho-logics and metaphoric-metonymical transformations. Kmita’s adjustment shows that metaphorical and metonymical meanings are indistinguishable. The art—which was ascribed a classificatory meaning—provided also socio-morphic categories. Totemic signs were more appreciated than totems themselves. It shows that the art transcends the reality which itself becomes a subject of the image. 4. The context of shamanistic origins of art. This conception universalizes results of neuropsychological research. Trance-practices are considered here as the origin of cave painting which presents a scheme of shamanistic visions. However, in folk cultures not all imaginary objects originate from trance-experience and the acceptance of their reality does not presuppose sensory deprivations (which is one of ethnological arguments showing limits of such interpretation). (shrink)

In a recent paper in this journal, John Worrall (2008) used the example of a series of trials involving extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), a technology for the treatment of respiratory failure in newborns, to illustrate the relationship between ethics and epistemology in medical research. One of the issues considered was whether or not it was ethical to perform a particular clinical trial at all, and he showed clearly that the answer was intimately related to epistemological judgments about the weight to (...) be given existing evidence concerning treatment effectiveness. In the case of ECMO, a trial was initiated at the University of Michigan (Bartlett et al. 1985), despite the fact that the researchers had .. (shrink)

This is also where we begin investigating lattices of logics and varieties, rather than particular examples.

The book is comprised of three components. The first component analyses the creative contribution to the theory of imperatives and norms provided by 20th-century Polish researchers. The second component summarizes their reflections and considerations. The third component is an anthology of the classic writings of Polish authors of the time; it constitutes an illustration of the first part and indicates that their research covered practically the whole scope of this theory. Author Jacek Jadacki (born 1946) is professor at Warsaw (...) University. His scholarly production includes approximately hundred works spanning almost every domain in philosophy: from logic, through ontology, epistemology, aesthetics and ethics, to the history of these disciplines. Among his more than twenty books are Possible Ontologies (with Zdzislaw Augustynek; 1993), From the Viewpoint of the Lvov-Warsaw School (2003), and Polish Analytical Philosophy (2009). His pupils include such well-known figures of modern Polish thought as Anna Brozek, Mariusz Grygianiec, Joanna Odrowaz-Sypniewska, and Mieszko Talasiewicz. (shrink)

Despite the obvious duality of physical and non‐physical astral forms in Doctor Strange, the film can't avoid the numerous problems with interactionism and substance dualism in general. This chapter utilizes the good Doctor Stephen Strange to look at how some philosophers attempt to answer the question: Are we simply flesh and bone, as Strange seems to think, or is there more—especially when it comes to the nature of our minds and souls. In the process, the chapter gains some deeper insights (...) about philosophy itself. Some philosophers agree with the Ancient One that the spirit is a thing unto itself and can affect and influence the body, a view called substance dualism. Interactionism is the “explanatory glue” holding Cartesian dualism together, and without it, the Cartesian dualist cannot account for our experience of a unified wholeness of our physical and mental lives. (shrink)

This chapter revisits some favorite moments in The Good Place to understand Janet's character. Philosophers distinguish between three types of knowledge: competence knowledge, acquaintance knowledge, and propositional knowledge. There are three generally accepted conditions that must be met for someone to have propositional knowledge: belief, truth, and justification. Some contemporary philosophers attempt to specify what kind of justification is required for knowledge. This contemporary debate arises as a result of conflicting interpretations of Plato's classic statement about how one's beliefs must (...) be “tied down” to the truth “by giving an account”. Perceptual knowledge is invariably interpreted via externalism. One need not be able to explain exactly how vision works and how it consequently plays a role in forming perceptual beliefs. Janet is merely a tool, and tools don't know anything because they cannot offer good reasons for how they behave. (shrink)

Jacek Filek criticizes the modern “nonethical” ethics. He points out its break with philosophy, lack of self-criticism, inanity, undue and fruitless formalism, and academism. His article makes a general request for the restitution of ethics as the independent and dignified scholarly discipline closely connected with world and life.

A syntactic derivation of Cornish identity from the axioms of HBCK is presented which amounts to a syntactic proof of Wronski's conjecture that naturally ordered BCK-algebras form a variety.

There are books that debate math, science, and history; there are books that help you build walls or even pyramids; there are even books that discuss Neanderthals with tools and autotrophs that drool. This book discusses philosophy. But you don't need an IQ of 187 to enjoy it. I swear to cow! As you'll see, the philosophy is theoretical, but the fun is real.

The use of quality of life (QOL) outcomes in clinical trials is increasing as a number of practical, ethical, methodological, and regulatory reasons for their use have become apparent. It is important, then, that QOL measurements and differences between QOL scores be readily interpretable. We study interpretation in two contexts: when determining QOL and when basing decisions on QOL differences. We consider both clinical situations involving individual patients and research contexts, e.g., randomized clinical trials, involving groups of patients. We note (...) the ethical importance of such understanding: proper interpretation and communication facilitate health care decision making. Communication that facilitates interpretation is of moral significance since better communication can attenuate ethical problems and inform choices. Much of what is communication worthy about QOL assessments is determined by the particular QOL instrument used in the assessment and how it is administered. In practice, these choices will be driven by the purpose of the assessment, but, it is argued, to maximize understanding, we should combine the information garnered from traditional standardized QOL instruments, from individualized QOL assessments, and from a recently proposed dialogic paradigm, where QOL is determined by shared conversation regarding the interpretation of texts. And, while some studies can surely succeed using abbreviated methods of administration (e.g., postal surveys may suffice for certain purposes), we will focus on methods of administration involving interviewer–respondent interaction. We suggest that during the QOL elicitation process, interviewer and respondent should engage in a two-way conversation in order to achieve a shared understanding of the “answers” to QOL “questions” and, finally, to reach a shared interpretation of the individual’s QOL. (shrink)