Working memory limits are best defined in terms of the complexity of the relations that can be processed in parallel. Complexity is defined as the number of related dimensions or sources of variation. A unary relation has one argument and one source of variation; its argument can be instantiated in only one way at a time. A binary relation has two arguments, two sources of variation, and two instantiations, and so on. Dimensionality is related to the number of chunks, because (...) both attributes on dimensions and chunks are independent units of information of arbitrary size. Studies of working memory limits suggest that there is a soft limit corresponding to the parallel processing of one quaternary relation. More complex concepts are processed by or In segmentation, tasks are broken into components that do not exceed processing capacity and can be processed serially. In conceptual chunking, representations are to reduce their dimensionality and hence their processing load, but at the cost of making some relational information inaccessible. Neural net models of relational representations show that relations with more arguments have a higher computational cost that coincides with experimental findings on higher processing loads in humans. Relational complexity is related to processing load in reasoning and sentence comprehension and can distinguish between the capacities of higher species. The complexity of relations processed by children increases with age. Implications for neural net models and theories of cognition and cognitive development are discussed. (shrink)

In this book, Phillips gives an overview of the contribution of Nyaya--the classical Indian school that defends an externalist position about knowledge as well as an internalist position about justification. Nyaya literature extends almost two thousand years and comprises hundreds of texts, and in this book, Phillips presents a useful overview of the under-studied system of thought. For the philosopher rather than the scholar of Sanskrit, the book makes a whole range of Nyaya positions and arguments accessible to students of (...) epistemology who are unfamiliar with classical Indian systems. (shrink)

The core issue of our target article concerns how relational complexity should be assessed. We propose that assessments must be based on actual cognitive processes used in performing each step of a task. Complexity comparisons are important for the orderly interpretation of research findings. The links between relational complexity theory and several other formulations, as well as its implications for neural functioning, connectionist models, the roles of knowledge, and individual and developmental differences, are considered.

For serious yoga practitioners curious to know the ancient origins of the art, Stephen Phillips, a professional philosopher and sanskritist with a long-standing personal practice, lays out the philosophies of action, knowledge, and devotion as well as the processes of meditation, reasoning, and self-analysis that formed the basis of yoga in ancient and classical India and continue to shape it today. In discussing yoga's fundamental commitments, Phillips explores traditional teachings of hatha yoga, karma yoga, _bhakti_ yoga, and tantra, and shows (...) how such core concepts as self-monitoring consciousness, karma, nonharmfulness, reincarnation, and the powers of consciousness relate to modern practice. He outlines values implicit in _bhakti_ yoga and the tantric yoga of beauty and art and explains the occult psychologies of _koshas_, _skandhas_, and _chakras_. His book incorporates original translations from the early Upanishads, the _Bhagavad Gita_, the _Yoga Sutra_, the _Hatha Yoga Pradipika_, and seminal tantric writings of the tenth-century Kashmiri Shaivite, Abhinava Gupta. A glossary defining more than three hundred technical terms and an extensive bibliography offer further help to nonscholars. A remarkable exploration of yoga's conceptual legacy, _Yoga, Karma, and Rebirth_ crystallizes ideas about self and reality that unite the many incarnations of yoga. (shrink)

Often translated simply as "logic," the Sanskrit word _nyāya_ means "rule of reasoning" or "method of reasoning." Texts from the school of classical Indian philosophy that bears this name are concerned with cognition, reasoning, and the norms that govern rational debate. This translation of selections from the early school of Nyāya focuses on its foundational text, the _Nyāya-sūtra_, with excerpts from the early commentaries. It will be welcomed by specialists and non-specialists alike seeking an accessible text that both represents some (...) of the best of Indian philosophical thought and can be integrated into courses on Indian philosophy, religion, and intellectual culture. (shrink)

Recently, Jonardan Ganeri reviewed the collaborative translation of the first chapter of Gaṅgeśa's Tattvacintāmaṇi by Stephen H. Phillips and N. S. Ramanuja Tatacharya (Ganeri 2007). The review is quite favorable, and we have no desire to dispute his kind words. Ganeri does, however, put forth an argument in opposition to a fundamental line of interpretation given by Phillips and Ramanuja Tatacharya about the nature of pramāṇa, knowledge sources, as understood by Gaṅgeśa and, for that matter, Nyāya tradition. This response is (...) meant to answer the argument and reassert an understanding of pramāṇa as factive, that is, as knowledge sources that are inerrant. We argue that this is the best reading of Gaṅgeśa himself .. (shrink)

This paper is taken from a long section of the _Tattva-cintā-maṇi_ by Gaṅgeśa that is devoted to proving the existence of—to use an inadequate word—“God” in a somewhat minimalist sense. The _īśvara_, the “Lord,” is for Gaṅgeśa, following Nyāya predecessors, a divine agent, a self, responsible for much, not all, of the order in the world. Unseen Force, _adṛṣṭa_, which is in effect _karman_ made by human action, is also a powerful agent as well as things’ intrinsic natures. Moreover, ordinary (...) selves, atoms, ether, and universals are uncreated. But the _īśvara_ brings about just desert in reincarnation in actualizing Unseen Force, and is responsible for a broad swathe of what some see as accidental arrangements as well as the forming of the macro elements from eternal, naturally _dis_joined atoms. Thus the cosmos in its general existence and structure is viewed in Nyāya as the work of the Lord. Gaṅgeśa’s argument runs: Earth and the like [_a_ (_pakṣa_) = earth and the like (_kṣity-ādi_)] have a conscious agent as a cause [S (_sādhya_) = having an agential cause (_sakartṛkatva_) (S_a_)], _since_ they are effects [H (_sādhana_) = being an effect [(_kāryatva_) (H_a_)], like a pot [_b_ (_dṛṣṭānta_) = a pot (H_b_,S_b_)]. And so the _vyāpti_ rule is: [H → S (_vyāpti_)] Whatever is an effect has an agential cause. For earth and the like, it is reasoned that only an omniscient _īśvara_ could be that cause. The argument was a target of Buddhists who pointed to counterexamples such as growing grass. Growing grass exhibits the prover property, being-an-effect, but not the property to be proved, having-an-agential-cause. The long section is dominated by Gaṅgeśa’s rebutting this and other potential defeaters, in particular, the _upādhi_, having-a-living-body (God does not have a living body but all the agential causes with which we are familiar do), along with a counterinference (_sat-pratipakṣa_), I_a_ & (x)(Ix → ¬Sx), where I = not-produced-by-an-agent-with-a-body. (shrink)

Social impact investing is transforming the availability of private capital for nonprofits and social enterprises, but demand is not yet meeting supply. This paper analyzes the perceived barriers faced by nonprofits in engaging with SII, arguing the need to assess differences using a policy field framework. Four parameters of a subsector are conceptualized as shaping participation in SII: the scale of investment required, embeddedness in place, the need for radical innovation, and the configuration of intermediaries. Based on 25 interviews with (...) leaders of nonprofits and intermediaries in affordable housing and community economic development in Canada, the study finds that significant barriers are a lack of knowledge of the market, inadequate financial literacy, and the challenges of measuring and valuing social impacts. In addition, nonprofits report that, in spite of the inherent importance of social impact in this form of investing, they currently make limited use of evaluation and impact metrics, and perceive that intermediaries and investors, particularly in affordable housing, still put a greater emphasis on financial over social returns. (shrink)

Study of Upādhiprakaraṇa of Gaṅgeśa, 13th cent., treatise on Navya Nyāya philosophy; includes text and translataion.

Human cognition is said to be systematic: cognitive ability generalizes to structurally related behaviours. The connectionist approach to cognitive theorizing has been strongly criticized for its failure to explain systematicity. Demonstrations of generalization notwithstanding, I show that two widely used networks (feedforward and recurrent) do not support systematicity under the condition of local input/output representations. For a connectionist explanation of systematicity, these results leave two choices, either: (1) develop models capable of systematicity under local input/output representations; or (2) justify the (...) choice of similarity-based (nonlocal) component representations sufficient for systematicity. (shrink)

The study of perception and the role of the senses have recently risen to prominence in philosophy and are now a major area of study and research. However, the philosophical history of the senses remains a relatively neglected subject. Moving beyond the current philosophical canon, this outstanding collection offers a wide-ranging and diverse philosophical exploration of the senses, from the classical period to the present day. Written by a team of international contributors, it is divided into six parts: -/- Perception (...) from Non-Western Perspectives Perception in the Ancient Period Perception in the Medieval Latin/Arabic Period Perception in the Early Modern Period Perception in the Post-Kantian Period Perception in the Contemporary Period. The volume challenges conventional philosophical study of perception by covering a wide range of significant, as well as hitherto overlooked, topics, such as perceptual judgment, temporal and motion illusions, mirror and picture perception, animal senses and cross-modal integration. By investigating the history of the senses in thinkers such as Plotinus, Auriol, Berkeley and Cavendish; and considering the history of the senses in diverse philosophical traditions, including Chinese, Indian, Byzantine, Greek and Latin it brings a fresh approach to studying the history of philosophy itself. -/- Including a thorough introduction as well as introductions to each section by the editors, The Senses and the History of Philosophy is essential reading for students and researchers in the history of philosophy, perception, philosophy of mind, philosophical psychology, aesthetics and eastern and non-western philosophy. It will also be extremely useful for those in related disciplines such as psychology, religion, sociology, intellectual history and cognitive sciences. (shrink)

The present work is a translation of The Perception Chapter of Jewel of Reflection on the Truth, a foundational text by the great fourteenth-century Indian logician Gangesa Upadhyaya. The authors' introduction and running commentary to the translation provide essential theoretical and historical background, contextualization, analysis, and comparison of Nyaya and Western traditions. Includes a detailed glossary and index. Published by American Institute of Buddhist Studies (AIBS).

At root, the systematicity debate over classical versus connectionist explanations for cognitive architecture turns on quantifying the degree to which human cognition is systematic. We introduce into the debate recent psychological data that provides strong support for the purely structure-based generalizations claimed by Fodor and Pylyshyn (1988). We then show, via simulation, that two widely used connectionist models (feedforward and simple recurrent networks) do not capture the same degree of generalization as human subjects. However, we show that this limitation is (...) overcome by tensor networks that support relational processing. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:There's Nothing Wrong with Raw Perception:A Response to Chakrabarti's Attack on Nyāya's Nirvikalpaka PratyakṣaStephen H. PhillipsIn the lead article of the fiftieth anniversary issue of Philosophy East and West (January 2000), Arindam Chakrabarti elaborates seven reasons why Nyāya should jettison "indeterminate perception" and view all perception as determinate, that is to say, as having an entity (a) as qualified by a qualifier (F) as object (Fa). In his notes, (...) Chakrabarti invites a reply "so that," as he says, "I may know why immaculate perception is needed by Nyāya after all." The following is a response that shows not so much why indeterminate perception is needed by Nyāya but why it is identified as a causal factor necessary to the arising of some (not all) determinate perception defined as "perception of an entity as qualified." Here I follow Gaṅgeśa Upādhyāya, the fourteenth-century founder (with the help of a few less well known predecessors and contemporaries) of "New Logic," Navya Nyāya. Gaṅgeśa devotes an entire section (about one eighteenth) of the perception chapter of his monumental Tattvacintāmaṇi (Jewel of Reflection about Epistemology) to nirvikalpaka pratyaksṣa,1 and he is a chief target of Chakrabarti's chastisement.2Now, first of all, I want to follow Gaṅgeśa's ground rules. The Naiyāyika is not concerned with strategies about how to look good in debates (with Buddhists or anyone else). His attitude is truth-seeking, not eristic, and thus no reply will be given to Chakrabarti's agonizing about how best to show ourselves in controversies with (in particular, Buddhist) adversaries (and Wilfrid Sellars). Gaṅgeśa's reflections are vāda—and the section is rightly titled nirvikalpaka-vāda, vāda being "inquiries among friends"—directed to uncovering real causal factors, not to winning a debate or countering sophisms. Deception, or counter-deception, is sometimes appropriate—for instance, to protect a student or other judge from fallacies advanced by people of bad character. But not here. So I will lay out Gaṅgeśa's argument for identifying nirvikalpaka pratyaksṣa, and then run through Chakrabarti's list of reasons for rejecting it with an eye to the objection's salience to Gaṅgeśa's project. In other words, Chakrabarti's objections will be taken up with an eye to the truth as it appears to a Naiyāyika, not with an eye to how our team should best present itself to outsiders. I have little to say about Chakrabarti's complaints about appearances—in fact, I find them delightful. Don't let him fool you. There's no greater Naiyāyika enthusiast than Chakrabarti himself, and he knows how to distill a controversy to show the wisdom [End Page 104] of Nyāya in contrast to revealing a deficiency, as he appears to be doing here. He does this to make us think broadly about Nyāya in a contemporary context. And at the end I join him in making some very general comments about Nyāya's realism. First, Gaṅgeśa's argument and a rebuttal of Chakrabarti's seven reasons from Gaṅgeśa's point of view.There is no direct, apperceptive evidence for nirvikalpaka pratyaksṣa; rather, it is posited by force of the following inference as the first step of a two-step argument. "The perceptual cognition, 'A cow' (for example), is generated by a cognition of the qualifier, since it is a cognition of an entity as qualified (by that qualifier appearing), like an inference." The second step takes a person's first perception of an individual (Bessie, let us say) as a cow (i.e., as having some such property) as the perceptual cognition figuring as the inference's subject (or pakṣa) such that the cognizer's memory not informed by previous cow experience could not possibly provide the qualifier, cowhood. The qualifier has to be available, and the best candidate seems to be its perception in the raw, a qualifier (cowhood), that is to say, not (as some are wont to misinterpret the point... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Perceiving Particulars Blindly:Remarks on a Nyāya-Buddhist ControversyStephen H. PhillipsIntroductionThe discussion by Mark Siderits in this issue—"Perceiving Particulars"—and two pieces by Monima Chadha—the first her article "Perceptual Cognition: A Nyāya-Kantian Approach" (Chadha 2001) and the second her reply to Siderits in this issue—have taught me much.1 I have little to add beyond agreeing on the whole with Siderits and making a few tweaks concerning Nyāya. Chadha astutely captures the insight (...) of Gaṅgeśa, the fourteenth-century Naiyāyika cited by her (and by Siderits): indeterminate perception does not have a "particular as such" as its object (viṣaya), but only, as she says, a non-particular individual such as a universal or another qualifier that is in principle recurrent (recurrent out in the world), perceivable [End Page 389] again, and thus expressible by a (repeatable) word. Nevertheless, the holism of Wilfred Sellars and Kant and the attack on the "given" are not in the spirit of the Nyāya approach to epistemology, which is thoroughly externalist, as Siderits suggests. In several places (one presented below), Gaṅgeśa shows us controversy within Nyāya about indeterminate perception, including a rival Naiyāyika opinion that bare particulars are indeterminately grasped. This is not his own view, which is that positing indeterminate perception of qualifiers and not also of qualificanda is all that we need. But all in all the issue is not such a big deal, since perception does generate determinate knowledge of particulars, although these are always at least barely clothed.The notion of a "bare particular"—that is, the qualificandum thought about as distinct from all of its qualifiers—is an abstraction from what we directly perceive. We know it only by inference (specifically, by an inference of the sāmānyato dṘṣṭa type). Indeterminate perception is also known only by inference. Even in Navya Nyāya, the big deal is what is known determinately in perception, which is the principal way we know anything (the jyeṣṭa pramāṇa). And, clearly, determinate perceptual awareness is often of a particular—"The pot is blue" and "That's a pot," for instance. The particular known—indeed, the bare particular—is an intrinsic part of the viṣayatā, "intentionality," which is the relation between the knowing cognition and the world known.2Contrary to what Chadha says in her first article, "seeing as" does not require mental construction, according to Nyāya. The property bearer (dharmin = viśeṣya, "qualificandum") is grasped by the sense organ and is known directly in determinate perception as well as the qualifier and the qualificative relation. In two subtypes of perceptual awareness, (a) recurrent experience and (b) the recognition of something perceived previously, Chadha is right: the mind is operative, responsive to the firing of saṃskāra, "memory impressions," and fusing previous perceptual data into a current perceiving: (a) "A cow," "Another," "Another," and (b) "This is that Devadatta (I saw yesterday)." But hardly all cases of determinate perception require the mind (in Chadha's sense). The object known is minimally a complex of a property bearer (the particular as such), property, and an ontological relation tying them up, a-inherence-pothood (where "a" designates the pot as bare particular, "the subject of qualification"); the determinate perception, "That's a pot," makes that particular as qualified known.So, you say, I am agreeing with Chadha, whose argument is directed against the particular as such being known (either determinately or indeterminately) in perception. Yes, but the point is that the particular is known in perception; the particular-as-such is known in perception, although it would be fantasy to think it even possible that we could ever see her, this property bearer, well, not so much bare as disembodied. A rough analogy is seeing a door. We say we "see the door" when we see only one side of it, not the back. We see the thing as a door without grasping everything about the door that its being a door entails.Indeterminate perception of qualifiers is a controversial posit that does various work for Gaṅgeśa and other... (shrink)

This book is the first philosophy of religion anthology to offer a broad survey of classical and contemporary, Western and non-Western readings. This book includes the standard topics for traditional philosophy of religion courses, as well as ample material for courses incorporating a more global approach. The text also provides abundant pedagogical support for both instructors and stiudents new to the study of non-Western philosophies of religion. It includes such features as an introductory chapter on world religions, introductions to each (...) reading, study questions, glossary, pronunciation guide, and suggested readings. --. (shrink)

Selected as Outstanding Academic Book by Choice magazine.

One of the hallmarks of human cognition is the capacity to generalize over arbitrary constituents. Recently, Marcus (1998, 1998a, b; Cognition 66, p. 153; Cognitive Psychology 37, p. 243) argued that this capacity, called universal generalization (universality), is not supported by Connectionist models. Instead, universality is best explained by Classical symbol systems, with Connectionism as its implementation. Here it is argued that universality is also a problem for Classicism in that the syntax-sensitive rules that are supposed to provide causal explanations (...) of mental processes are either too strict, precluding possible generalizations; or too lax, providing no information as to the appropriate alternative. Consequently, universality is not explained by a Classical theory. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:There's Nothing Wrong with Raw Perception:A Response to Chakrabarti's Attack on Nyāya's Nirvikalpaka PratyakṣaStephen H. PhillipsIn the lead article of the fiftieth anniversary issue of Philosophy East and West (January 2000), Arindam Chakrabarti elaborates seven reasons why Nyāya should jettison "indeterminate perception" and view all perception as determinate, that is to say, as having an entity (a) as qualified by a qualifier (F) as object (Fa). In his notes, (...) Chakrabarti invites a reply "so that," as he says, "I may know why immaculate perception is needed by Nyāya after all." The following is a response that shows not so much why indeterminate perception is needed by Nyāya but why it is identified as a causal factor necessary to the arising of some (not all) determinate perception defined as "perception of an entity as qualified." Here I follow Gaṅgeśa Upādhyāya, the fourteenth-century founder (with the help of a few less well known predecessors and contemporaries) of "New Logic," Navya Nyāya. Gaṅgeśa devotes an entire section (about one eighteenth) of the perception chapter of his monumental Tattvacintāmaṇi (Jewel of Reflection about Epistemology) to nirvikalpaka pratyaksṣa,1 and he is a chief target of Chakrabarti's chastisement.2Now, first of all, I want to follow Gaṅgeśa's ground rules. The Naiyāyika is not concerned with strategies about how to look good in debates (with Buddhists or anyone else). His attitude is truth-seeking, not eristic, and thus no reply will be given to Chakrabarti's agonizing about how best to show ourselves in controversies with (in particular, Buddhist) adversaries (and Wilfrid Sellars). Gaṅgeśa's reflections are vāda—and the section is rightly titled nirvikalpaka-vāda, vāda being "inquiries among friends"—directed to uncovering real causal factors, not to winning a debate or countering sophisms. Deception, or counter-deception, is sometimes appropriate—for instance, to protect a student or other judge from fallacies advanced by people of bad character. But not here. So I will lay out Gaṅgeśa's argument for identifying nirvikalpaka pratyaksṣa, and then run through Chakrabarti's list of reasons for rejecting it with an eye to the objection's salience to Gaṅgeśa's project. In other words, Chakrabarti's objections will be taken up with an eye to the truth as it appears to a Naiyāyika, not with an eye to how our team should best present itself to outsiders. I have little to say about Chakrabarti's complaints about appearances—in fact, I find them delightful. Don't let him fool you. There's no greater Naiyāyika enthusiast than Chakrabarti himself, and he knows how to distill a controversy to show the wisdom [End Page 104] of Nyāya in contrast to revealing a deficiency, as he appears to be doing here. He does this to make us think broadly about Nyāya in a contemporary context. And at the end I join him in making some very general comments about Nyāya's realism. First, Gaṅgeśa's argument and a rebuttal of Chakrabarti's seven reasons from Gaṅgeśa's point of view.There is no direct, apperceptive evidence for nirvikalpaka pratyaksṣa; rather, it is posited by force of the following inference as the first step of a two-step argument. "The perceptual cognition, 'A cow' (for example), is generated by a cognition of the qualifier, since it is a cognition of an entity as qualified (by that qualifier appearing), like an inference." The second step takes a person's first perception of an individual (Bessie, let us say) as a cow (i.e., as having some such property) as the perceptual cognition figuring as the inference's subject (or pakṣa) such that the cognizer's memory not informed by previous cow experience could not possibly provide the qualifier, cowhood. The qualifier has to be available, and the best candidate seems to be its perception in the raw, a qualifier (cowhood), that is to say, not (as some are wont to misinterpret the point... (shrink)

This article examines the impact of law and policy changes enacted in times of crisis on asylum seekers, and considers the extent to which considerations of vulnerability have played a part in the various approaches of governments. What emerges is a shift towards further exclusion, and a widening divide between how states approach citizens versus others. The result is enhanced vulnerability, and an environment in which the utility of the vulnerability concept to provide the necessary levels of support and protection (...) is tested. By looking at how vulnerability is used by states, and contrasting this use with how the concept is often used by other community actors, the article asks what role the concept of vulnerability might play in the effects of crises on vulnerable groups and the priorities and actions of states. (shrink)

The great Advaita Vedāntin Śaṅkara puts forth a mystic parallelism thesis that is identified and examined here: mystical and sensory experiences are epistemically parallel. Among the conclusions drawn are that the Advaita metaphysics precludes successful defense of a Brahman-centered philosophy on the basis of such a thesis because Advaita precludes a story about how the experience of its Brahman could arise. Thus Śaṅkara needs "scripture" (śruti) to secure important parts of his view. A truly mystical Vedānta, in contrast, would not.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reply to Vaidya, Guhe, and Williams on the Bloomsbury Translation of the Tattva-cintā-maṇi of GaṅgeśaStephen Phillips (bio)More or less happy with the reviews, I would like mainly, in response, to identify advances made in the study of Gaṅgeśa. Anand Vaidya articulates a clearer overview of Gaṅgeśa's theory of knowledge; Eberhard Guhe shows a better way to render the notion of vyāpti, "pervasion," which is central in the theory of (...) inference as a knowledge source; and Michael Williams, too, shows need for improvement on that score as well as for elaboration of matters taken up by classical commentators that are given short shrift in my running comments. For example, whereas long discussions are provoked by Gaṅgeśa's definition of "knowledge," pramā, major points in the purvapakṣa in the section on proving the existence of an īśvara, a "Lord," seem, as Williams says, "threadbare."Vaidya, following Burge (2003), introduces a distinction between entitlement and justification: entitlement is the kind of unreflective epistemic warrant delivered by Gaṅgeśa's pramāṇa, "knowledge sources," working automatically in our everyday lives, whereas justification requires self-conscious certification, prāmāṇya-jñapti. Thereby splitting the horns of a dilemma posed by internalist accounts of knowledge in opposition to externalist ones, Burge and Vaidya are able to incorporate the most [End Page 519] attractive features of each approach. The entitlement/justification distinction cashes out, I may add, to Vaidya's elucidation, Nyāya's deeply held doctrine of parataḥ-prāmāṇya, "certification by another," against the view of "intrinsic certification," svataḥ-prāmāṇya, of Prabhākara and others. As Williams notes, Prābhākara positions, for which Gaṅgeśa sometimes shows sympathy, may have led him to presume that an anubhava—"awareness" or "presentational experience" in my translation, "fresh news" in Matilal's snappy rendering—is an episode of knowledge, pramā, "unless one knows otherwise," bādhakam vinā.On reflection, one sees that such a presentation (it could be perceptual, inferential, analogical, or testimonial) has been produced by a pramāṇa, or, in abnormal cases, not, and so by a "pramāṇa-pretender," a pramāṇaābhāsa, as in seeing a mirage. Again, an anubhava is not just any old cognition or "thought" (pace Das 2021, p. 162); it is defined as nonrecollective. Unlike a deliverance of a genuine pramāṇa, some instances may, on examination, prove to be a-pramā, "non-knowledge," but are, nevertheless, at the animal level, sufficient to provoke and guide action that would not be unhesitating were there doubt in any way. A thirsty Maya, in Vaidya's example, would naturally move in the direction of the water she "sees." But she would hesitate were she to learn from her friend about the unreliability of water-perception in the current circumstances. At the reflective level, where she is unsure whether the anubhava she apperceives is pramā or apramā, her action, including speech (implying assertability), is altered.So far so good in Vaidya's reconstruction. But Gaṅgeśa does not himself pronounce on the question of whether, after learning about the defeater, Maya would still be entitled to her perceptual belief that there is water in the distance. In the volumes under review, I assumed that she would not be "justified" and indeed that she would no longer have the belief (if we may speak about "beliefs"). The defeater grasped at the reflective level would mean not only that she could not certify the perceptual deliverance but also that there would be no knowledge. Clearly, she can't certify it, and thus, as Vaidya reasons, loses the right to assert. But maybe he's correct that, according to Gaṅgeśa's sensibilities, she does not lose the perceptual knowledge. She would remain entitled to her belief.Personally, I think this is wrong, but Vaidya's understanding does have the merit of explaining why some later Naiyāyikas apparently took absurd positions on epistemic luck (Bhattacharya 1996, p. ix). I think that Maya would lose her entitlement, too, but what if, after being informed of the unreliability of water-perception... (shrink)

Classical Indian views of the self and person range from maximal to minimal conceptions, from a view of everyone's true self as the supreme being, infinite, immortal, self‐existent, self‐aware, and intrinsically blissful, to a view of the person as nothing more than the living human body that ceases to be at death. (“Consciousness is an adventitious attribute of the body, like the intoxicating power of fermented grain.”) Every major school and subschool takes a stance on what a self is and (...) how it is known; a rich diversity of opinion and argument marks this area of classical Indian thought. (shrink)

With the emergence of service provisioning environments and new networking capabilities, antagonistic businesses have been able to collaborate securely by sharing information in order to have a beneficial result for all. This collaboration has sometimes been imposed by state legislation and sometimes been desirable by the firms themselves so as to resolve frequently occurring abnormalities. In any case, as information exchange takes place between antagonistic firms, security and privacy issues arise. In the context of this paper, a collaborative environment has (...) been analyzed for enterprises that set out in the banking sector. A Grid-based Anti-Money Laundering (AML) system has been developed in an effort to take advantage of the Grid infrastructure, supporting the secure and trustful exchange of information between financial institutions and ensuring the confidentiality of the data transferred and the authentication of the users to whom they are available. Special emphasis is put on security mechanisms for supporting identity and privacy management as well as in Service Level Agreements (SLA) enforcement for enabling a trust enforcement platform in a collaboration business model. (shrink)

In the second edition of this groundbreaking text in non-Western philosophy, sixteen experts introduce some of the great philosophical traditions in the world. The essays unveil exciting, sophisticated philosophical traditions that are too often neglected in the western world. The contributors include the leading scholars in their fields, but they write for students coming to these concepts for the first time. Building on revisions and updates to the original, this new edition also considers three philosophical traditions for the first time—Jewish, (...) Buddhist, and South Pacific philosophy. (shrink)

An obituary notice outlining the main aspects of Charles Hartshorne's life, career, and thought.

Counterinference is one of five kinds of pseudo-prover (similar to fallacy in Western logic) recognized in the Nyaaya school. Typically in counterinference while one side seeks to prove the thesis that a probandum belongs to an inferential subject because an inferential mark pervaded by the probandum belongs to that subject, an opponent challenges that by arguing that the probandum does not belong to the inferential subject because another inferential mark pervaded by absence (negation) of the probandum belongs to that subject. (...) A common example is: sound is eternal, since it is audible and audibility is pervaded by eternality (i.e. all that is audible is eternal, like sound-ness, the common property of all sound particulars); but sound is non-eternal, since it is originated (by clapping hands, etc.) and all that is originated is non-eternal, like a pot, etc. Critics from other philosophical schools have objected that counterinference is not an additional kind of pseudo-prover. Since it is impossible for an inferential subject both to have and not to have a probandum, either at least one of the inferential marks does not belong to the inferential subject (the fallacy of being unestablished) or at least one of the inferential marks lacks pervasion (the fallacy of deviation) and, accordingly, counterinference should be subsumed under those fallacies. Nyaaya philosophers have responded by pointing out that the formal structure of counterinference is different from that of the other fallacies: in counterinference we have two different inferential marks but not in the other candidates. The epistemic result of counterinference is also different from that of the other fallacies mentioned, it is argued further. Moreover, it is contended (against a Nyaaya faction) that the epistemic result is not doubt as specifically understood in Nyaaya but desire to know the truth about the chosen inferential mark and the probandum. Accordingly, counterinference may be explained as that which provides the ground for inquiring what is the truth about the original inferential mark and its probandum due to presentation of an inferential assimilation (paraamarsha) that contradicts the original inferential assimilation. The discussion yields also a broader normative principle that contradiction or counterproof provides the epistemic ground for further inquiry even if there is proof. The selection is from the Tattva-cintaa-maNi, the canonical Navya-Nyaaya work of GaMgesha (14th century CE?). The selection is from a large work and presupposes some things explained elsewhere in the text. Further, though written with great precision the work paradoxically belongs to the old Indian philosophical oral tradition in which a beginner is expected to read it with the help of additional information supplied by an expert. Hence paying close attention to what is implied in the context and supplementing certain ideas is necessary for interpretation and understanding. (shrink)

The work of three present-day Sankritist-philosophers, _God and the World's Arrangement_ allows readers to engage directly with writings of the classical Indian philosophers Śaṅkara and Vācaspati, as well as some of their most acute critics, on the question of whether the existence of a creator God can be known by reason alone. Carefully selected and annotated with the needs of students foremost in mind, these new translations will be of interest to anyone wishing to see up close a newly set (...) gem of our philosophical inheritance from global antiquity. (shrink)

Cowan's review shows that a short-term memory limit of four items is consistent with a wide range of phenomena in the field. However, he does not explain that limit, whereas an existing theory does offer an explanation for capacity limitations. Furthermore, processing capacity limits cannot be reduced to storage limits as Cowan claims.

We propose that the missing link from nonhuman to human cognition lies with our ability to form, modify, and re-form dynamic bindings between internal representations of world-states. This capacity goes beyond dynamic feature binding in perception and involves a new conception of working memory. We propose two tests for structured knowledge that might alleviate the impasse in empirical research in nonhuman animal cognition.

ABSTRACT In this paper we report the development of a scale measuring Christian ethical beliefs. Three studies refined the Christian Ethical Beliefs Scale from 63 expert-generated potential items. Studies 1 and 3 sampled undergraduate students at private, Christian colleges, and Study 2 utilized a diverse, online sample. Participants responded to an electronic survey of Likert scale items and demographic questions. Following careful assessment of reliability and validity, we present a 20-item scale divided across five factors: Divine Moral Authority, Privacy of (...) Faith, Moral Individualism, Cognition Essential to Personhood, and Value of all Human Beings. This brief scale offers a new way to measure ethical beliefs in religious or nonreligious populations. (shrink)

In this survey study of 4735 US adults, respondents of all demographic and political affiliations agreed with prioritizing COVID-19 vaccine access for health care workers, adults of any age with serious comorbid conditions, frontline workers (eg, teachers and grocery workers), and Black, Hispanic, Native American, and other communities that have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19. Older adult respondents were less likely than younger respondents to list healthy people older than 65 years as 1 of their top 4 priority groups. These (...) findings suggest that the US public agrees with the high-priority groups proposed by the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine but appears to disagree with approaches advanced by others that prioritize older adults but not essential workers or disproportionately affected communities. (shrink)

Analogy by priming learned transformations of (causally) related objects fails to explain an important class of inference involving abstract source-target relations. This class of analogical inference extends to ad hoc relationships, precluding the possibility of having learned them as object transformations. Rather, objects may be placed into momentarily corresponding, symbolic, source-target relationships just to complete an analogy.