The integrated information theory is a promising theory of consciousness. However, there are several problems with IIT's axioms and postulates. Moreover, IIT entails that some twodimensional grids of identical logic gates have more consciousness than humans. Many have found this prediction to be implausible, and as will be argued here, this prediction also exacerbates the so-called 'hard problem of consciousness'. Recently, it has been argued that if we treat the phenomenological aspects of consciousness as an illusion, we can avoid the (...) hard problem altogether by replacing it with the more tractable illusion problem: the problem of explaining how introspection systematically misrepresents experiences as having phenomenology. IIT is intended to be a theory of the phenomenological aspects of consciousness. However, it is possible to reformulate the axioms and postulates of IIT consistently with illusionism. Here it is argued that the resulting theory -- illusionist integrated information theory -- removes several problems for IIT including the hard problem and the logic gate problem, and also enables meaningful progress for illusionists on solving the illusion problem. (shrink)

Despite a growing body of literature focused on understanding experiences of workplace dignity, attention has centered almost exclusively on employees with lower-level jobs. As a result, little is known about how workplace dignity and indignity are experienced by employees with middle- and upper-level jobs and how their experiences differ from those with lower-level jobs. We address these absences by interviewing employees from a diversity of lower-, middle-, and upper-level jobs about their experiences of indignity at work. We outline common dignity (...) threats, along with typical emotional responses and recourses employees use at each level. We find lower-level employees experience chronic dignity threats from being disrespected, devalued, demeaned, and dehumanized, to which their most typical response is endurance. Middle-level employees experience periodic dignity threats due to undermining of their work, confidence, and reputation. For them, the typical response is strategizing. Finally, on the rare occasions upper-level employees experience dignity threats, it usually is due to a disregard of their special expertise or denial of special rights, to which they respond by rising above. (shrink)

In ‘The nature of moral judgments and the extent of the moral domain’, Fraser criticises findings by Kelly et al. that speak against the moral/conventional distinction, arguing that the experiment was confounded. First, we note that the results of that experiment held up when confounds were removed . Second, and more importantly, we argue that attempts to prove the existence of a M/C distinction are systematically confounded. In contrast to Fraser, we refer to data that support our view. We highlight (...) the implications for the moral/conventional theory. (shrink)

This study aimed to investigate whether a range of tasks that have been generally classed as requiring insight form an empirically separable group of tasks distinct from tasks generally classed as non-insight. In this study, 24 insight tasks, 10 non-insight tasks, and tests of individual differences in cognitive abilities and working memory were administered to 60 participants. Cluster analysis of the problem-solving tasks indicated that the presumed insight problems did tend to cluster with other presumed insight problems, and similarly the (...) presumed non-insight problems tended to cluster with other presumed non-insight tasks. Performance on presumed insight problems was particularly linked to measures of ideational flexibility with a different pattern of results for the non-insight tasks. Spatial insight problems were linked to spatial flexibility and verbal insight tasks were linked to vocabulary scores. The results are discussed in relation to recent developments of dual process theories of thinking. (shrink)

Most of the economic models on basic income account just for pecuniary forms of work, i. e. “time spent making money”, in employment. This restriction is a drawback of these analyses and of the standard economic labor supply model itself. If one wants to understand the potential effects of basic income on individual and social welfare, one should not restrict observation to the pecuniary uses of time. The objective of this contribution is to rethink the meaning of work usually applied (...) in economic models, based on contributions of other social scientists. This reassessment is undertaken through the development of a microeconomic model, which discusses the effects of basic income on time use and interprets work not just as a source of income, but also of non-pecuniary benefits. Further, we disentangle the usual work-leisure dichotomy in two other ones. (shrink)

In recent years there has been an upsurge of research aimed at removing the mystery from insight and creative problem solving. The present special issue reflects this expanding field. Overall the papers gathered here converge on a nuanced view of insight and creative thinking as arising from multiple processes that can yield surprising solutions through a mixture of “special” Type 1 processes and “routine” Type 2 processes.

This manuscript reports on a landmark symposium on the ethical, legal and technical challenges of xenotransplantation in the UK. King’s College London, with endorsement from the British Transplantation Society (BTS), and the European Society of Organ Transplantation (ESOT), brought together a group of experts in xenotransplantation science, ethics and law to discuss the ethical, regulatory and technical challenges surrounding translating xenotransplantation into the clinical setting. The symposium was the first of its kind in the UK for 20 years. This paper (...) summarises the content of the expert lectures showcasing the progress which has been made in xenotransplantation including—the history of xenotransplantation, advances in gene edited animals and progress towards clinical xenotransplantation. We then set out the ethical and legal issues still to be resolved. Finally, we report the themes of the roundtable discussion highlighting areas of consensus and controversy. While the detail of the legal discussion was directed towards the UK, the principles and summary reported here are intended to be applicable to any jurisdiction seeking to implement clinical xenotransplantation. (shrink)

Emotional stimuli (e.g. words, images) are often remembered better than neutral stimuli. However, little is known about how memory is affected by an environmentally induced emotional state (without any overtly emotional occurrences) – the focus of this study. Participants were randomly assigned to discovery (n = 305) and replication (n = 306) subsamples and viewed a desktop virtual environment before rating their emotions and completing objective (i.e. item, temporal-order, duration) and subjective (e.g. vividness, sensory detail, coherence) memory measures. In both (...) samples, a Partial Least Squares Correlation analysis showed that an emotional state characterised by high negative emotion (i.e. threat, fear, anxiety) and arousal was reliably associated with better memory in both objective (i.e. item) and subjective (i.e. vividness and sensory detail) domains. No reliable associations were observed for any temporal memory measures (objective or subjective). Thus, an environmentally induced state of negative emotion corresponds with enhanced memory for indices of episodic memory pertaining to “what” happened, but not necessarily “when” it happened. (shrink)

The history of Attic comedy after the fifth century is not simple. The comic fragments are obscure, because they are fragments: and the ancient interpreters, because they are determined to interpret. But the subject still remains interesting and important, especially in so far as it is concerned with Middle Comedy, which filled the gap between Aristophanes and Menander. Formally and materially, Menander was a modern, while Aristophanes was not: and it was during the fourth century that the ground was being (...) prepared for the change. Now one of the most noticeable differences between Old and New Comedy was the altered position of the chorus; and although the very mixed assortment of facts available makes coherent conclusions difficult, I think it worth enquiring how much can be known of the chorus after Aristophanes. (shrink)

A splendid introduction to set theory. By leaning heavily on modern logic, Quine develops a substantial amount of set theory axiomatically without either being naive about the antinomies or prejudicing the issue of infinite classes. This development felicitously allows Quine a neutral ground on which, in his concluding chapters, to describe, compare and connect various conflicting full-blooded systems: Russell's theory of types, Zermelo's system, two of Quine's own, and von Neumann's. This treatment of set theory, allowing formalism without sectionalism, is (...) singular and should instruct and delight the theorist as well as the beginning reader.—K. J. (shrink)

Collected in this volume are nine of Ayer's recent essays, four of which have not been published before. The essays deal with various philosophic issues: the impossibility of a "neutral" record of facts, the need of linguistic philosophy to take on some of the bigger questions, the possibility of a private language, the ultimate authority of private experience, the status of psycho-physical relations, the subtle relations between names and descriptions, truth, the logic of probability, fatalism and others. Where issues are (...) not treated exhaustively, they are treated suggestively. Good reading for anyone interested in present turns in analytical philosophy.—K. J. (shrink)