In a reflective and richly entertaining piece from 1979, Doug Hofstadter playfully imagined a conversation between ‘Achilles’ and an anthill (the eponymous ‘Aunt Hillary’), in which he famously explored many ideas and themes related to cognition and consciousness. For Hofstadter, the anthill is able to carry on a conversation because the ants that compose it play roughly the same role that neurons play in human languaging; unfortunately, Hofstadter’s work is notably short on detail suggesting how this magic might be achieved1. (...) Conversely in this paper - finally reifying Hofstadter’s imagination - we demonstrate how populations of simple ant-like creatures can be organised to solve complex problems; problems that involve the use of forward planning and strategy. Specifically we will demonstrate that populations of such creatures can be configured to play a strategically strong - though tactically weak - game of HeX (a complex strategic game).We subsequently demonstrate how tactical play can be improved by introducing a form of forward planning instantiated via multiple populations of agents; a technique that can be compared to the dynamics of interacting populations of social insects via the concept of meta-population. In this way although, pace Hofstadter, we do not establish that a meta-population of ants could actually hold a conversation with Achilles, we do successfully introduce Aunt Hillary to the complex, seductive charms of HeX. (shrink)

An examination of determinism in the context of chaotic dynamics.

Alison Gopnik and Andrew Meltzoff have argued for a view they call the ‘theory theory’: theory change in science and children are similar. While their version of the theory theory has been criticized for depending on a number of disputed claims, we argue that there is a fundamental problem which is much more basic: the theory theory is multiply ambiguous. We show that it might be claiming that a similarity holds between theory change in children and (i) individual scientists, (ii) (...) a rational reconstruction of a Superscientist, or (iii) the scientific community. We argue that (i) is false, (ii) is non-empirical (which is problematic since the theory theory is supposed to be a bold empirical hypothesis), and (iii) is either false or doesn’t make enough sense to have a truth-value. We conclude that the theory theory is an interesting failure. Its failure points the way to a full, empirical picture of scientific development, one that marries a concern with the social dynamics of science to a psychological theory of scientific cognition. (shrink)

The author proposes to delineate the basic outlines of an entirely new religio-metaphysical foundation for the religious, moral, and social convictions of modern Western man—an admittedly ambitious undertaking. More specifically, he wishes to nail the lid on the coffin of "the so-called Aristotelian substantialism," by means of an "interpretational synthesis" of the thought of Whitehead and that of Heidegger. Accordingly, he argues for an organismic view of history, according to which the event of the life-death-resurrection of Christ reveals the structure (...) and hence the meaning of history and of being. Man's appropriation of this meaning is characterized in roughly Bultmannian terms, though with somewhat more stress on the role of the Church qua social institution and on the empirically factual character of the crucial events comprising the over-all Christ-event than Bultmann lays. This essay is best regarded as another instance of the current phenomenon most notably instanced by Bishop Robinson's Honest to God and the debate it has initiated.—P. C. M. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hume Studies Volume 29, Number 2, November 2003, pp. 223-266 A Diplomatic Transcription of Hume's "volunteer pamphlet" for Archibald Stewart: Political Whigs, Religious Whigs, and Jacobites M. A. BOX, DAVID HARVEY, AND MICHAEL SILVERTHORNE Many scholars interested in David Hume will have encountered his defense of the beleaguered Archibald Stewart as it appears in an appendix in John Valdimir Price's The Ironic Hume (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1965). (...) Additionally they might know of Price's discussion for The Biblioteck of 1973 of a copy with manuscript markings. A reason for revisiting this pamphlet is that the National Library of Scotland has graciously given permission to reproduce a copy (shelfmark NE.10.e.4) featuring a preface and significant markings in manuscript not in the copy that Price reproduced in his book. As Hume assumes considerable familiarity with the events to which he alludes, we have annotated the text to make it fully intelligible to readers two and half centuries after its composition. The rudimentary bibliographic facts and mysteries are as follows. Two editions survive to us, an octavo (in fours) and a rare duodecimo. Although there is no reason to regard the duodecimo as a second edition correcting or augmenting a first edition, it probably was manufactured after, and was textually derivative from, the octavo. We know nothing of the publishing of M. A. Box is Associate Professor of English, University of Alaska, Fairbanks, PO Box 755720, Fairbanks, AK 99775-5720, USA. David Harvey is at the Classics Department, University of Exeter, Queen's Building, Queen's Drive, Exeter EX4 4QH, UK. Michael Silverthorne is Associate Professor of History, McGiIl University, Stephen Leacock Building, 855 Sherbrooke St. West, Montreal H3A 2T7, Canada, e-mail: [email protected] 224 M. A. Box, David Harvey, and Michael Silverthorne the duodecimo, and doubtless that is as its producers intended. Its title page indicates, like that of the octavo, that the printing was done "for M. Cooper" in 1748, but William Strahan's ledgers register the printing in December 1747 of only the octavo in an edition of 1000 copies.1 The job is listed under bookseller Andrew Millar's account, not Mary Cooper's, probably for the reason that Cooper was a front whose role was to screen the true producers. It is possible that Millar hired someone other than Strahan to print the duodecimo, but it is also possible that someone other than Millar had it printed to mimic the octavo and take the opportunity it offered for concealment.2 A different editorial judgment is evinced in the duodecimo in that cosmetic measures are taken in it to obscure the identities of two military men ridiculed. For example, "Fowke" is rendered as "F—" and "John Cope" as "J-C-----." A digression on Mary Cooper is in order. This remarkable woman (died 1761) took over her husband Thomas's business upon his death 9 February 1743. That business had a history of "publishing" pamphlets and therefore made a plausible front for Millar, who in at least thirty-six other instances, none requiring courage, was willing to have his name appear on a title page with "M. Cooper." (This figure derives from a search by imprints using the English Short-Title Catalogue.) Until Thomas Cooper died, his name appeared on editions of John Armstrong's The Oeconomy of Love (1736 and thereafter) though only Millar's name is listed in the Stationers' Register (Foxon, English Verse A303-A311), and Mary's name is on the title page of the 1753 edition for which Strahan charged Millar (Strahan Papers, Add. MS 48800, s.v. August 1753). It was perhaps in this pattern that the second edition of Hume's heterodox Philosophical Essays (1750) would be reissued in 1751 with a new title page replacing Millar's name with Cooper's. That book was made temporarily a more alarming property by the superstitious panic of the London populace following the winter earthquakes in 1750, presaged by a bloody cloud. Within that year Bishop Thomas Sherlock caused a stir with a pastoral letter (A Letter from the Lord Bishop of London) blaming the earthquakes on several iniquities, "particularly heretical books" (Walpole, Correspondence 20... (shrink)

Benedikt Stattler was born on January 30, 1728 in Kötzting in Bavaria. In 1745 he entered the Society of Jesus, to which he remained loyal in spirit and in deed until his death, in spite of its suppression in 1773 by Clement XIV From 1760 until 1781 he taught philosophy and theology in Staubing, Solothurn, Innsbruck and Ingolstadt, where the famous J. M. Sailer, Bishop of Regensburg, was his pupil. He died in Munich in 1797. Stattler, then, lived and (...) worked at the very height of the so-called Aufklarungszeit, a fact which had the deepest repercussions on his whole career. He was a zealous man and truly apostolic. Perhaps, if anything he was over-zealous and was in fact carried much too far in his spirit of accommodation and flexibility when faced with the rationalist enemies of the Church and Christianity. He was filled with the idea that they should be met on their own ground in order to win them for the Church. And in order to do that he decided that he must break with tradition. Modern modes of thinking must be used if there is to be even the possibility of discussion with present-day thinkers, was his principle. Accordingly he brushed aside Aristotle, St. Thomas and all the Scholastics and made his own the philosophy of Christian Wolff. For him that was the only way of preserving the Christian and Catholic faith and of safeguarding Christian morality, the Christian way of life. Filled with that idea he wrote indefatigably. Many of his works, however, very early fell foul of the Roman authorities and were put on the Index of forbidden books. And in fact, as Dr. Scholz rightly points out over and over again, Stattler became a victim of the Aufklärung which he sought to Christianize and he himself became a rationalist and, in morals, and out-and-out subjectivist. (shrink)

I offer examples of what Catholic liturgical law regards as liturgical abuses. I provide examples of practices that are not formal abuses but raise questions of clericalism, noting that clericalism has contributed to the Catholic sex abuse crisis. I discuss (a) recourse to the tabernacle for distribution of Communion at Mass; (b) reserving one chalice at Mass for the exclusive use of the presider; (c) the installation Mass of Archbishop Nelson Pérez of Philadelphia; and (d) a Mass in Buffalo in (...) the wake of the resignation of then-Bishop Richard Malone. The paper concludes with reflections on what it means to offer worship to God that is necessarily imperfect. (shrink)

Psychology may have to get seriously political as human aims in living and selfhood itself are increasingly influenced in a deleterious manner by the vicissitudes of living in a neoliberal political economy and one-sided “enterprise culture” (Martin & McLellan, 2013; Sugarman, 2015). This article reviews recent writings of several social critics, including Jackson Lears (2015), Sebastion Junger (2015), Philip Blond (2010), and Christopher Lasch (1995), who richly flesh out the picture of this detrimental state of affairs. We note that many (...) of these critics have little to say about credible alternatives to neoliberalism. The article then seeks to identify resources within theoretical and philosophical psychology, including hermeneutic philosophy and interpretive social science, for helping to overcome neoliberalism. They might help clarify and nurture a renewed democratic populism or engaged democratic politics and contribute to gaining what Lasch termed a much-needed “wisdom of limits” in today’s society. (shrink)

This paper proposes that we should think of epistemic agents as having, as one of their intellectual activities, a gatekeeping task: To decide in light of various criteria which ideas they should consider and which not to consider. When this task is performed with excellence, it is conducive to the acquisition of epistemic goods such as truth and knowledge, and the reduction of falsehoods. Accordingly, it is a worthy contender for being an intellectual virtue. Although gatekeeping may strike one simply (...) as the virtue of open- mindedness, I argue that it is not; gatekeeping does not favor a characteristic disposition to be willing to consider novel or opposing ideas. In fact, being told that an agent is excellent at gatekeeping reveals nothing about how frequently she considers or refuses to consider ideas. This paper will introduce and motivate the notion of gatekeeping, and offer some preliminary arguments in support of its candidacy as an intellectual virtue. (shrink)

Open peer commentary on the article “Second-Order Science: Logic, Strategies, Methods” by Stuart A. Umpleby. Upshot: The evaluation of what we knew is an urgent and evolving issue. The issues discussed by Umpleby have been raised earlier, particularly in the social sciences. Arguably, in some quarters they are exaggerated. But an awareness of observer effects is of great importance and is greatly enhanced by second-order cybernetics applied more widely as second-order science.

Considering the lack of substantive scientific or theoretical studies about ethics in small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Latin America, this paper examines the context of an existent paradox, based upon the perspective of experts and academicians of Latin America and the Caribbean. These countries live different realities, due to their respective European cultural influences, as well as to racial and economic issues. Such facts impact the size and characteristics of their industries. On the other hand, the SMEs face (...) more similarities in the region, so they will be treated as a group in the discussion of ethics and corporate social responsibility (CSR) in Latin American SMEs. As this topic has not been sufficiently investigated in this geographic area, the objective of this exploratory study is to offer a contribution for future research. It raises the main dilemmas and intends to explain how legislation and common practices enable and perhaps lead SMEs to choose unethical strategies to survive and compete in the market. These enterprises are growing in number and in job creation, but do not participate in the Gross National Product in the same proportion. Informality, tax evasion and corruption are gradually caused or erode morality in business, but can contribute to corporate social responsibility in the region. The paper tries to show positive and negative aspects of apparently unethical practices and discusses challenging ways to solve complex problems that are common in most Latin America. (shrink)

A frequent objection to the fine-tuning argument has been that although certain necessary conditions for life were admittedly exceedingly improbable, still, the many possible alternative sets of conditions were all equally improbable, so that no special significance is to be attached to the realization of the conditions of life. Some authors, however, have rejected this objection as fallacious. The object of this paper is to state the objection to the fine-tuning argument in a more telling form than has been done (...) hitherto, and to meet the charge of fallacy. (shrink)

Purpose: Yerkish is an artificial language created in 1971 for the specific purpose of exploring the linguistic potential of nonhuman primates. The aim of this paper is to remind the research community of some important issues and concepts related to Yerkish that seem to have been forgotten or appear to be distorted. These are, particularly, its success, its promising aspects for future research and last but not least that it was Ernst von Glasersfeld who invented Yerkish: he coined the term (...) “lexigrams,” created the first 120 of them and designed the grammar that regulated their combination. Design: The first part of this paper begins with a short outline of the context in which the Yerkish language originated: the original LANA project. It continues by presenting the language itself in more detail: first, its design, focusing on its “lexigrams” and its “correlational” grammar, and then its use by the chimpanzee Lana in formulating sentences. The second part gives a brief introduction to the foundation of Yerkish in Silvio Ceccato’s Operational Methodology, particularly his idea of the correlational structure of thought and concludes with the main insights that can be derived from the Yerkish experiment seen in the light of Operational Methodology. Findings: Lana’s success in language learning and the success of Yerkish during the past decades are probably due to the characteristics of Yerkish, particularly its foundation in operational methodology. The operation of correlation could be what constitutes thinking in a chimpanzee and an attentional system could be what delivers the mental content that correlation assembles into triads and networks. Research implications: Since no other assessment or explanation of Lana’s performances has considered these foundational issues, a new research project or program should validate the above-mentioned hypotheses, particularly the correlational structure of chimpanzee thinking. (shrink)

O texto busca refletir criticamente sobre alguns fenômenos sociais contemporâneos, fortemente imbricados, notadamente as tendências contemporâneas de entrincheiramento e achatamento do eu; o reforço da iconomania e da compulsiva produção de avatares de si, em meio a bolhas narcísicas digitais, franqueadas pelas recentes tecnologias de informação e comunicação; e a virtual destruição da intimidade e da privacidade, diante da emergência de panópticos digitais e da vigilância algorítmica. Para tanto, toma-se como ponto de partida proposições apresentadas por Christopher Lasch em sua (...) obra _The Minimal Self: Psychic Survival in Troubled Times_, publicada originalmente em 1984, em particular a própria noção de mínimo eu, as quais são, então, entretecidas com argumentos de Christophe Dejours, Günther Anders, Theodor Adorno, Hebert Marcuse, Jonathan Crary, entre outros. Em acréscimo, busca-se salientar a ancoragem desses processos à hodierna dinâmica de acumulação de capital, a partir da crítica da economia política, perspectiva que atravessa todo o texto, bem como assinalar a atualidade do pensamento de Lasch. (shrink)

In the Dialogues Hume attaches great importance to an objection to the design argument which states, negatively, that from phenomena which embody evil as well as good there can be no analogical inference to the morally perfect deity of traditional theism and, positively, that the proper conclusion as regards moral character is an indifferent designer. The first section of this paper sets out Hume's points, and the next three offer an updating of Hume's objection which will apply to Swinburne's Bayesian (...) form of the design argument. The final section concludes that Hume's objection, suitably developed, holds against most of the main theistic arguments, even in their Bayesian form. (shrink)