Cultural psychologists often describe the relationship between mind and culture as ‘dynamic.’ In light of this, we provide two desiderata that a theory about encultured minds ought to meet: the theory ought to reflect how cultural psychologists describe their own findings and it ought to be thoroughly naturalistic. We show that a realist theory of causal powers — which holds that powers are causally-efficacious and empirically-discoverable — fits the bill. After an introduction to the major concepts in cultural psychology and (...) describing causal power realism, we use a case study — the effects of pathogen prevalence on culture and cognition — to show the explanatory capacities of the powers framework. (shrink)

A generalized Veltman semantics developed by de Jongh is used to investigate correspondences between several extensions of intepretability logic . In this paper we present some new results on independences.

The aim of this paper is primarily to consider some basic concepts and their meanings related to contemporary social interactions, starting from the classical sociological concepts of social relationship and social interaction, and to see what is changing and what remains the same in the age of networking and “moving” to virtual space. In other words, we want to re-examine their form and content in an age without the necessity of the spatial dimension for a relationship, in which new forms (...) and concepts occur, such as network, networking, virtuality, etc. The first chapter will show the meaning of social relations and social interaction, which imply those social relations in which contact/encounter or communication is present and which leads us to the concept of social interaction in the same space and at the same time. The topic of the second chapter is social interaction at the same time without space, when, with the application of information technology, individuals and societies enter the cyberspace of a new virtual reality. This leads us to the development of various forms of interaction on social networks, which is the topic of the third chapter. The fourth chapter discusses some of the risks and positive possibilities of virtual interactions over real ones. (shrink)

Lockean accounts of personhood propose that an individual is a person just in case that individual is characterized by some advanced cognitive capacity. On these accounts, human beings with severe cognitive impairment are not persons. Some accept this result—I do not. In this paper, I therefore advance and defend an account of personhood that secures personhood for human beings who are cognitively impaired. On the account for which I argue, an individual is a person just in case that individual belongs (...) to a natural kind that is normally characterized by advanced cognitive capacities. Since “human being” is just such a natural kind, individual human beings can be persons even when they do not themselves have advanced cognitive capacities. I argue, furthermore, that we have good reason to accept this account of personhood over rival accounts since it is uniquely able to accommodate the intuitive concept of an impaired person. (shrink)

The scope of this short paper is to show that the examples Ilhan Inan uses to undermine Donnellan's distinction (primarily, the attributive uses of definite descriptions in general) fall short on account of wrong interpretation those examples were provided with in his paper. Whilst Ilhan Inan showed how complex definite descriptions (having an embedded referential term) may cause doubts as to which category they should be put in, these referring terms only play a secondary role. I argue that all of (...) his three key examples are, in fact, sheer attributive uses of definite descriptions and have to be taken as such, which seriously diminishes the pedestal Inan places his argument on. (shrink)

This paper analyzes classical concepts of division of labour and offers some contemporary theoretical model which includes causes and effects of it. For Smith, the main cause is a tendency of human nature to exchange and the main effect is a progress of the country. For Marx, the fundamental cause is historical development of productive forces and effects are accumulation of capital on the one side but also an alienation of working class on the other. Spencer considers as the main (...) cause specialization of functions in generally, which consequence is integration of society. For Durkheim, causes are social density and volume, and its effect or function is new interconnection in society known as term organic solidarity. Weber derives division of labour from his theory of rational economic actions, and its most important effect is development of occupational structure. (shrink)

Memory blunting is a pharmacological intervention that decreases the emotional salience of memories. The technique promises a brighter future for those suffering from memory-related disorders such as PTSD, but it also raises normative questions about the limits of its permissibility. So far, neuroethicists have staked out two primary camps in response to these questions. In this paper, I argue both are problematic. I then argue for an alternative approach to memory blunting, one that can accommodate the considerations that motivate rival (...) approaches even while avoiding the problems these rivals face. In addition to arguing for this primary thesis, the paper also aims to suggest something about neuroethics generally: despite what some neuroethicists claim, new discoveries in neuroscience may not typically upend traditional views of morality. Rather, discoveries in neuroscience often provide us with new occasions to reflect on enduring questions about what it means to be human. (shrink)

The scope of this short paper is to show that the examples Ilhan Inan uses to undermine Donnellan's distinction fall short on account of wrong interpretation those examples were provided with in his paper. Whilst Ilhan Inan showed how complex definite descriptions may cause doubts as to which category they should be put in, these referring terms only play a secondary role. I argue that all of his three key examples are, in fact, sheer attributive uses of definite descriptions and (...) have to be taken as such, which seriously diminishes the pedestal Inan places his argument on. (shrink)

The idea that the mind, i.e., common sense, is not an inherent human structure but a cultural system, has become a general assumption taken for granted by many. Richard Rorty’s post-Philosophical culture serves as an illustrative example. One of the most renowned representatives of the radical critique of the mind, i.e., of common sense, is the cultural anthropologist Clifford Geertz. He believes that we are in need of an ethnography based on the “thick description”. Geertz’s insights have strongly influenced the (...) postliberal theologians. Consequently, the centre of the theology—the faith—has once again been obscured. Therefore, this article seeks to emphasize the importance of faith, based on Josef Pieper’s sagacious insights. (shrink)

The idea that the mind, i.e., common sense, is not an inherent human structure but a cultural system, has become a general assumption taken for granted by many. Richard Rorty’s post-Philosophical culture serves as an illustrative example. One of the most renowned representatives of the radical critique of the mind, i.e., of common sense, is the cultural anthropologist Clifford Geertz. He believes that we are in need of an ethnography based on the “thick description”. Geertz’s insights have strongly influenced the (...) postliberal theologians. Consequently, the centre of the theology—the faith—has once again been obscured. Therefore, this article seeks to emphasize the importance of faith, based on Josef Pieper’s sagacious insights. (shrink)

Understanding the difference between conscious and unconscious states is important for making sense of human cognition. Consider: your perception of these words is currently conscious while the feeling of the floor beneath your left foot presumably is not. But what does the difference between these states consist in? Contemporary philosophers disagree about how to answer this kind of question. Extrinsic theorists claim states are conscious because of how they are related to other states, entities, or processes. Intrinsic theorists deny this (...) by claiming that consciousness is internal to states. As it stands, debates about consciousness are thus stuck at an impasse.^ So I approach things differently. In this dissertation, I argue there is a way to overcome the gridlock that plagues contemporary debates about consciousness, and to accommodate the considerations that motivate both intrinsic and extrinsic theorists. The way forward lies in developing a robust account of causal powers. Causal powers, on my view, correspond to dispositions things have. For example, salt’s disposition to dissolve in water corresponds to a power salt has: its solubility. Causal powers, moreover, can help us account for how things behave, for how and why things interact with each other in the ways they do. For example, we can account for salt’s dissolving in water by studying when and why salt manifests its power of solubility. ^ And we can also account for our conscious experiences in reference to causal powers. Indeed, I argue that just as salt manifests one of its powers when it dissolves in water, so too humans manifest one of their powers when they have conscious experiences—our conscious experiences can be understood in reference to the causal powers we have, and in reference to how and why we manifest these powers. Just as importantly, if we use causal powers as a basis for a theory of consciousness, we can overcome the current opposition between extrinsic and intrinsic theories, and in doing so, open up avenues for theorizing about consciousness anew. (shrink)

Some psychologists and philosophers have argued that neuroscience is importantly relevant to our moral responsibility practices, especially to our practices of praise and blame. For consider: on an unprecedented scale, contemporary neuroscience presents us with a mechanistic account of human action. Furthermore, in uential studies – most notoriously, Libet et al. (1983) – seem to show that the brain decides to do things (so to speak) before we consciously make a decision. In light of these ndings, then – or so (...) some have argued – we ought to revise our practices of praise and blame. In the current paper, I argue that this conclusion is unwarranted. The reason is that the argument for it depends on controversial non-empirical premises, premises we need not accept. I suggest, however, that neuroscience does bear on our moral responsibility practices in one important, if less revisionary, way. In particular, neuroscience o ers a new kind of evidence for determining when agents should be held exempt from our normal moral responsibility practices. (shrink)

In the paper, we try to elucidate the procedures that need to be applied if we want to establish the consequences that occur when the sediments of meaning in images are deposited on top of each other, creating a specific pictorial epistemology. We will point out some interdisciplinary mechanisms of image analysis, such as “cultural symptomatology” and “cultural triangulation”, together with drawing a typology of cultural-historical sediments of pictorial meaning that we call appropriation. We conclude that Bredekamp’s theory of image (...) acts, as well as Mitchell’s concept of pictures as “desiring objects” and Belting’s consideration of the human body as “image media”, suggest that the interaction between a human and an image is a mirror of human’s own desire to produce a parallel world in which, as Lambert Wiesing explained, he or she does not have to participate. The image allows for different forms of participation or absence from participation in the event represented in the image. Therefore, what images “know” is a specific consequence of the fact that inanimate pictorial objects can possess memory but – unlike artificial intelligence – can activate their knowledge only in a reciprocal communicative relationship with people. (shrink)

Interpretability logic is an extension of provability logic. Veltman models and generalized Veltman models are two semantics for interpretability logic. We consider a connection between Veltman semantics and generalized Veltman semantics. We prove that for a complete image-finite generalized Veltman modelW there is a Veltman model W ′ that is bisimular to W.

Business Ethics: A European Review, EarlyView.

Since the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, the term virtual has become one of the most used in media and everyday speech. There is an increasing amount of research done on this new reality, and the results are still to be published. However, it is insufficiently known in scientific periodicals that the concept of virtual reality, enabled by information technology, has existed in the sociological literature since the 1990s when Castells introduced it to the theory of network society. Therefore, the paper's primary (...) goal is to consider basic concepts such as virtual reality, real virtuality, virtual communities, virtual sociability, and networked individualism. We will also briefly look at the forgotten classical notion of community as a fundamental form of sociability defined by the sociologist F. Tönnies, which re-enters the focus of scientific interest, without a clear and sociologically known classical definition. Starting from this framework, the paper examines the key question of whether these new virtual communities are indeed communities in the classical sense of the term or whether it is a form of networked individualism. Pojam virtualno je pojavom COVID-19 pandemije 2020., postao jedan od najkorištenijih u medijskom prostoru i u govoru svakodnevice. Sve je više i istraživanja o novoj stvarnosti, čiji rezultati se tek očekuju. Međutim, nedovoljno je poznato u domaćoj znanstvenoj periodici da koncept virtualne stvarnosti koju omogućava informacijska tehnologija, postoji u sociološkoj literaturi od devedesetih godina, kada ga u teoriju umreženog društva uvodi Castells. Stoga je glavni cilj rada prikazati i razmotriti neke osnovne pojmove kao npr. virtualna stvarnost, stvarna virtualnost, virtualne zajednice, virtualna društvenost i umreženi individualizam. Kratko ćemo se osvrnuti i na zaboravljeni klasični pojam zajednice kao temeljne forme društvenosti definirane od sociologa F. Tönniesa, koji ponovo ulazi u fokus znanstvenog interesa, bez jasne a u sociologiji poznate klasične definicije. Polazeći od tog okvira, u radu se propituje ključno pitanje, jesu li te nove virtualne zajednice uistinu zajednice u klasičnom smislu značenja pojma, ili je riječ o nekom obliku umreženog individualizma. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Seit der Entdeckung des Gilgamesch-Epos am Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts wird von der Forschung angenommen, dass dieses Epos den Inhalt der homerischen Epen beeinflusst habe. Der Beitrag legt dar, wann und auf welchem Wege der kulturelle Transfer zwischen Mesopotamien und Griechenland stattgefunden haben kann. Ferner werden mehrere Passagen aus den homerischen Epen diskutiert, in denen die Forschung eine Beeinflussung durch das Gilgamesch-Epos erkennen möchte. Gezeigt wird, dass diese Ansicht zum Teil subjektiv ist und zum Teil auf veralteten Ausgaben des (...) Gilgamesch-Epos beruht. In einem Exkurs wird zuletzt eine aktuelle These zur Datierung der Ilias analysiert. (shrink)

Patients in a minimally conscious state (MCS) fall into a different diagnostic category than patients in the more familiar vegetative states (VS). Not only are MCS patients conscious in some sense, they have a higher chance for recovery than VS patients. Because of these differences, we ostensibly have reason to provide MCS patients with care that goes beyond what we provide to patients with some VS patients. But how to justify this differential treatment? I argue we can’t justify it solely (...) by looking to MCS patients’ actual levels of consciousness. We must look also to the ways in which these patients are potentially conscious. Specifically, I argue that certain sensible and well-regarded policy recommendations cannot be justified by looking solely to patients’ actual levels of consciousness, but that they can be justified by looking to patients’ potential for consciousness. Insofar then as we have prima facie reason to follow the recommendations, we also have prima facie reason to view the potential for consciousness as morally salient. If that is true, however, several important implications follow: first, if the potential for consciousness is morally salient, this translates into actual and pressing obligations to patients with disorders of consciousness generally. Second, if the potential for consciousness is morally salient, this has implications that go beyond our obligations to patients with disorders of consciousness. Indeed, if the potential for consciousness is morally salient, this adds an important layer of complexity to the normative landscape, a layer we may not have sufficiently noticed before. (shrink)

U radu ću pokušati ukazati na moguće doprinose razmatranja metafora kao načela spoznaje raspravi o konceptualnim temeljima krize u medicini. Stoga ću u prvom dijelu rada dati sažeti prikaz temeljnih postavki kognitivne teorije metafore u djelu Georgea Lakoffa i Marka Johnsona koje će poslužiti kao smjernice u propitivanju metafora zdravlja i bolesti. U drugom dijelu u razmatranje ću uzeti primjere metafora vezanih uz pojmove zdravlja i bolesti uvriježenih kako u svakodnevnom govoru tako i u znanstvenim i stručnim medicinskim diskursima. Pokušat (...) ću ukazati na koji način one utječu na poimanje zdravlja i bolesti te usmjeruju djelovanje unutar medicinske prakse, u kojoj se kriza medicine najjasnije očituje u vidu dehumaniziranog karaktera odnosa između aktera te prakse. Također će biti riječi i o nekonvencionalnim, alternativnim metaforama i njihovim potencijalima za uspostavu drukčijih, humanijih pojmova i principa prema kojima bi se medicinska praksa mogla ravnati. U konačnici ću ponuditi jedan takav prijedlog koji proizlazi iz temeljnih postavki kognitivne teorije metafora.In this paper I will attempt to point out possible contributions of considering metaphors as principles of cognition to the discussion on conceptual grounds of crisis in medicine. Hence the first part will be a brief review of the basic features of cognitive theory of metaphor in the works of Georg Lakoff and Mark Johnson, which will serve as guidelines in examining metaphors of health and illness. The second part will deal with conventional metaphors associated with the notions of illness and health in everyday speech as well as in scientific and professional medical discourses. I will try to indicate the ways in which these metaphors influence notions of health and illness, thus directing actions in medical practice, which is the place where the crisis of medicine is most clearly manifested in the form of dehumanised character of relationship between medical practice participants. Unconventional, alternative metaphors and their potential for establishing different, more humane notions and principles which could guide medical practice will also be discussed. Finally, I will offer one such proposal which follows the basic ideas of cognitive theory of metaphor. (shrink)

An important part of our Theory of Mind—the ability to reason about other people's unobservable mental states—is the ability to attribute false beliefs to others. We investigated whether processing these false beliefs, as well as similar but nonmental representations, is reliant on language. Participants watched videos in which a protagonist hides a gift and either takes a photo of it or writes a text about its location before a second person inadvertently moves the present to a different location, thereby rendering (...) the belief and either the photo or text false. At the same time, participants performed either a concurrent verbal interference task (rehearsing strings of digits) or a visual interference task (remembering a visual pattern). Results showed that performance on false belief trials did not decline under verbal interference relative to visual interference. We interpret these findings as further support for the view that language does not form an essential part of the process of reasoning online (“in the moment”) about false beliefs. (shrink)

Autor analizira nacin na koji se argument prvog okupatora, koji je izvorno artikulisan kao argument u prilog privatnog vlasnistva, u medjunarodnim sporovima koristi kao razlog za dobijanje politicke kontrole nad nekom teritorijom. Autor zakljucuje da se u slucaju spora oko Kosova tim argumentom danas moze zahtevati podela suvereniteta na osnovu podele kosovske teritorije.