The contributors to _Constructing the Pluriverse_ critique the hegemony of the postcolonial Western tradition and its claims to universality by offering a set of “pluriversal” approaches to understanding the coexisting epistemologies and practices of the different worlds and problems we inhabit and encounter. Moving beyond critiques of colonialism, the contributors rethink the relationship between knowledge and power, offering new perspectives on development, democracy, and ideology while providing diverse methodologies for non-Western thought and practice that range from feminist approaches to scientific (...) research to ways of knowing expressed through West African oral traditions. In combination, these wide-ranging approaches and understandings form a new analytical toolbox for those seeking creative solutions for dismantling Westernization throughout the world. Contributors Zaid Ahmad, Manuela Boatcă, Hans-Jürgen Burchardt, Arturo Escobar, Sandra Harding, Ehsan Kashfi, Venu Mehta, Walter D. Mignolo, Ulrich Oslender, Isiaka Ouattara, Manu Samnotra, Aram Ziai. (shrink)

This book presents a selection of essays by the Indian philosopher J.L. Mehta on the topics of hermeneutics and phenomenology containing many original ...

It can seem incoherent to fully characterize fundamentality in terms of grounding, given that the fundamental is precisely that which cannot be fully characterized independently. I argue that there is no such incoherence.

Our sense of self includes awareness of our thoughts and movements, and our control over them. This feeling can be altered or lost in neuropsychiatric disorders as well as in phenomena such as “automatic writing” whereby writing is attributed to an external source. Here, we employed suggestion in highly hypnotically suggestible participants to model various experiences of automatic writing during a sentence completion task. Results showed that the induction of hypnosis, without additional suggestion, was associated with a small but significant (...) reduction of control, ownership, and awareness for writing. Targeted suggestions produced a double dissociation between thought and movement components of writing, for both feelings of control and ownership, and additionally, reduced awareness of writing. Overall, suggestion produced selective alterations in the control, ownership, and awareness of thought and motor components of writing, thus enabling key aspects of automatic writing, observed across different clinical and cultural settings, to be modelled. (shrink)

I highlight a neglected but striking phenomenological fact about our experiences: they have a pervasively spatial character. Specifically, all (or almost all) phenomenal qualities – roughly, the introspectible, philosophically puzzling properties that constitute ‘what it’s like’ to have an experience – introspectively seem instantiated in some kind of space. So, assuming a very weak charity principle about introspection, some phenomenal qualities are instantiated in space. But there is only one kind of space – the ordinary space occupied by familiar objects. (...) And the only objects appropriately located in ordinary space are outside the subject’s mind. This entails experiential externalism, the view that at least one phenomenal quality is instantiated outside the subject’s mind. Experiential externalism is incompatible with many leading theories of experience, including certain mental paint theories; some forms of representationalism; paradigmatic versions of sense-datum theory; and views on which no phenomenal qualities are instantiated. My argument is structurally similar to familiar arguments based on the ‘transparency of experience.’ However, I suggest, phenomenological intuitions about spatiality are considerably more stable than phenomenological intuitions about transparency. For many philosophers, transparency intuitions fade markedly with respect to non-standard experiences, including experiences associated with blurry or double vision. But spatiality intuitions remain robust even for these experiences. Thus, spatiality intuitions should be more dialectically effective than transparency intuitions for supporting experiential externalism. (shrink)

What I require is a convening of my culture's criteria, in order to confront them with my words and life as I pursue them and as I may pursue them; and at the same time to confront my words and life as I pursue them with the life my culture's words may imagine for me: to confront the culture with itself, along the lines it meets in me. Stanley Cavell.

In his 2009 article “Self-Representationalism and Phenomenology,” Uriah Kriegel argues for self-representationalism about phenomenal consciousness primarily on phenomenological grounds. Kriegel’s argument can naturally be cast more broadly as an argument for higher-order representationalism. I examine this broadened version of Kriegel’s argument in detail and show that it is unsuccessful for two reasons. First, Kriegel’s argument (in its strongest form) relies on an inference to the best explanation from the claim that all experiences of normal adult human beings are accompanied by (...) peripheral awareness of those very experiences to the claim that all experiences are accompanied by peripheral awareness of those very experiences. This inference is inadequately defended, for the explanandum may also be given a straightforward evolutionary explanation. Second, contra Kriegel, I argue that phenomenological investigation does not support the thesis that we are always peripherally aware of our experiences. Instead, it delivers no verdict on this thesis. Kriegel’s phenomenological mistake may be explained via a highly diluted version of the famous transparency thesis about experience. (shrink)

The common law system is a legal system that values precedent, or previous court decisions, in the resolution of current cases. As the availability of legal documents in digital form has increased, it has become more difficult for legal professionals to manually identify relevant past cases due to the vast amount of data. Researchers have developed automated systems for determining the similarity between legal documents to address this issue. Our research explores various representations of a legal document and discusses a (...) novel paragraph filtering process to identify key paragraphs using legal citation information to remove unnecessary text paragraphs without disturbing the concept of the legal document. State-of-the-art techniques like TF-IDF, BERT, Legal Bert, Doc2Vec, and Legal-longformer are used for the performance analysis of the proposed approach with document comparison. It has been shown that a model trained on the proposed filtered paragraphs can achieve better results than a model trained on the complete text and can also shorten the document by over 40%. The proposed filtering strategy could be helpful for models like BERT, where the maximum token length is fixed. (shrink)

Journal of Human Values, Volume 28, Issue 1, Page 29-43, January 2022. The COVID-19 crisis has revealed a need for rethinking approaches to education and livelihoods. Education in its present dispensation does not provide equitable access to children from marginalized segments of the population. It also suffers from deficits in the areas of social and emotional skills, over-emphasis on the three Rs, language used as a medium of instruction, and excessive competition for scoring marks, among others. There is very low (...) uptake of vocational education. The National Education Policy 2020 tries to address some of these issues and plans on closer integration of vocational education with the school framework. High unemployment rates of educated youth, along with underemployment due to skill mismatch, show poor school-to-work transition and underscore the importance of TVET for youth in the future. Skill already exists in the economy in informal knowledge systems which are largely undocumented and thus not acknowledged in the formal system. These need to be combined with Western-centric knowledge systems so that the imbalance between formally educated/trained workers and informally trained workers is redressed. There is also a need to bring back the joy of learning, as Tagore’s experimentation with education has demonstrated. (shrink)

Shedding light on a fundamental tension in liberal theory, Liberalism and Empire reaches beyond post-colonial studies to revise our conception of the grand liberal tradition and the conception of experience with which it is associated.

Consider two deeply appealing thoughts: first, that we experience external particulars, and second, that what it’s like to have an experience – the phenomenal character of an experience – is somehow independent of external particulars. The first thought is readily captured by phenomenal particularism, the view that external particulars are sometimes part of the phenomenal character of experience. The second thought is readily captured by phenomenal generalism, the view that external particulars are never part of phenomenal character. -/- Here I (...) show that a novel version of phenomenal generalism can capture both thoughts in a satisfying fashion. Along the way, I reveal severe problems facing phenomenal particularism and also shed light on the mental kinds under which experiences fall. (shrink)

This paper is about Gandhi's critique of politics, of which his ambivalence towards democracy was a part. I argue that for Gandhi the ground of moral action is fearlessness, while that of political reason is security and self-defense. Gandhi sees the context of moral action in the mundane fabric of everyday life, in places such as the family and the village. For that reason he does not believe that moral action requires being supplemented by the particular kind of unity which (...) politics and the state call for and necessitate. (shrink)

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Volume 104, Issue 1, Page 209-231, January 2022.

Here I advance a unified account of the structure of the epistemic normativity of assertion, action, and belief. According to my Teleological Account, all of these are epistemically successful just in case they fulfill the primary aim of knowledgeability, an aim which in turn generates a host of secondary epistemic norms. The central features of the Teleological Account are these: it is compact in its reliance on a single central explanatory posit, knowledge-centered in its insistence that knowledge sets the fundamental (...) epistemic norm, and yet fiercely pluralistic in its acknowledgment of the legitimacy and value of a rich range of epistemic norms distinct from knowledge. Largely in virtue of this pluralist character, I argue, the Teleological Account is far superior to extant knowledge-centered accounts. (shrink)

Small unmanned aerial systems (sUAS) are used more regularly and widely in disaster response. Like other personnel involved in disaster response, the sUAS pilots work for long periods, experience extreme stress and fatigue. They often arrive at the disaster fatigued (due to long drives to get there). However, unlike other personnel in this domain, there is little research on the effects of fatigue on sUAS pilots. Our experiences with a series of three real-world deployments highlight the challenges of conducting human (...) factors research during disaster response and recovery. We specifically present lessons learned from having participant researchers embedded in three disasters with the sUAS pilot teams. These lessons result in a set of feasible and non-interruptive methods and metrics for conducting human factors research during field events. Preliminary results and recommended next steps are presented. (shrink)

According to phenomenal particularism, external particulars are sometimes part of the phenomenal character of experience. Mehta criticizes this view, and French and Gomes :451–460, 2016) have attempted to show that phenomenal particularists have the resources to respond to Mehta’s criticisms. We argue that French and Gomes have failed to appreciate the force of Mehta’s original arguments. When properly interpreted, Mehta’s arguments provide a strong case in favor of phenomenal generalism, the view that external particulars are never (...) part of phenomenal character. (shrink)

What grounds facts of the form? One promising answer is: facts of the form. A different promising answer is: x itself. Isaac Wilhelm has recently argued that the second answer is superior to the first. In this paper, I rebut his argument.

Representationalism is, roughly, the view that experiencing is to be analyzed wholly in terms of representing. But what sorts of properties are represented in experience? According to a prominent form of representationalism, objective representationalism, experiences represent only objective (i.e. suitably mind-independent) properties. I explore subjective representationalism, the view that experiences represent at least some subjective (i.e. suitably mind-dependent) properties. Subjective representationalists, but not objective representationalists, can accommodate cases of illusion-free phenomenal inversion. Moreover, subjective representationalism captures the so-called transparency of experience, (...) as it is standardly articulated, just as well as objective representationalism. (shrink)

Meditation refers to a family of self-regulation practices that focuses on training attention and awareness to foster psycho-emotional well-being and to develop specific capacities such as calmness, clarity, and concentration. We report a prospective convenience-controlled study in which we analyzed the effect of two components of Preksha Dhyāna – buzzing bee sound meditation and color meditation on healthy college students. Mahapran and leśya dhyāna are two Preksha Dhyāna practices that are based on sound and green color, respectively. The study population (...) represents a suitable target as college students experience different stress factors during the school year. This study measures the individual and combined effects of two techniques, on short-term memory, attention, and affect, in novice meditators. We used a battery of cognitive, performance, and compared results with baseline and control values. We found improved cognition, especially attention, short-term memory, and affect in terms of positivity and reduced negativity. Overall, the two techniques produced variable benefits and subjects showed improved scores over baseline for short-term memory, cognitive function, and overall wellbeing. Further studies are required to understand underlying mechanisms for the observed differences between the two techniques and to elucidate mechanisms underlying the more pronounced and global benefits observed with the combined techniques. These results underscore a need to examine individual components of meditation practices in order to individualize treatment approaches for attention disorders in young adults.Clinical Trail Registration:ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03779269. (shrink)

This essay is a study on national self-determination and justice from the differing perspectives of John Rawls and Rabindranath Tagore. Both thinkers have addressed the problem of conflict caused by national loyalties. Influenced by Immanuel Kant’s philosophy of cosmopolitanism, John Rawls articulates the “Law of People” that suggests that mutual consent consists in economic interdependence among nations and tolerance for cultural diversity under monitored conditions of the international relations. Such an arrangement is not inclusive as it excludes the subaltern perspectives (...) and reinforces the hierarchies between East and West. Tagore offers post-colonial versions of nationalism and cosmopolitanism that call for a creative and spiritual unity of nations through cultural exchange where each is equal in dialogue. The essay makes a case for Tagore’s cosmopolitanism being more inclusive than Rawls, yet, limited in its accommodation of the “other” as Tagore’s creative unity domesticates this “other” on the basis of spiritual familiarity. The essay also critiques Martha Nussbaum’s cosmopolitanism that suggests reconciliation of both. It makes a case for a paradoxical understanding of hospitality, friendship and otherness theorized by Jacques Derrida as the basis of self-determination and global justice. (shrink)

Our actions and decisions are regularly influenced by the social environment around us. Can social cues be leveraged to induce curiosity and affect subsequent behavior? Across two experiments, we show that curiosity is contagious: The social environment can influence people's curiosity about the answers to scientific questions. Participants were presented with everyday questions about science from a popular on‐line forum, and these were shown with a high or low number of up‐votes as a social cue to popularity. Participants indicated their (...) curiosity about the answers, and they were given an opportunity to reveal a subset of those answers. Participants reported greater curiosity about the answers to questions when the questions were presented with a high (vs. low) number of up‐votes, and they were also more likely to choose to reveal the answers to questions with a high (vs. low) number of up‐votes. These effects were partially mediated by surprise and by the inferred usefulness of knowledge, with a more dramatic effect of low up‐votes in reducing curiosity than of high up‐votes in boosting curiosity. Taken together, these results highlight the important role social information plays in shaping our curiosity. (shrink)

I assume that there exists a general phenomenon, the phenomenon of the explanatory gap, surrounding consciousness, normativity, intentionality, and more. Explanatory gaps are often thought to foreclose reductive possibilities wherever they appear. In response, reductivists who grant the existence of these gaps have offered countless local solutions. But typically such reductivist responses have had a serious shortcoming: because they appeal to essentially domain-specific features, they cannot be fully generalized, and in this sense these responses have been not just local but (...) parochial. Here I do better. Taking for granted that the explanatory gap is a genuine phenomenon, I offer a fully general diagnosis that unifies these previously fragmented reductivist responses. (shrink)

Derek Allan presented a paper at the 2016 OSSA Conference at the University of Windsor; I provided comments on that paper. These are brief notes on my comments.

Terror and its cognates have come to signify the darkest excesses of contemporary and 20th-century political life. These include aggressive claims to purity; murderous manifestations of programmatic and religious self-certainty; paranoid and devastating responses to threats to national security; and more generally, an intensity of instrumental forms of thinking and acting that give to individuals, groups, and states a broad warrant for deploying violence as a means to their purposefulness. Hannah Arendt reflected deeply on the implications of such high-minded and (...) bellicose purposefulness. This chapter focuses on how Arendt also associated terror with something utterly commonplace, whose reach and provenance extended well beyond the 20th century—namely, in the political attempt to address ubiquitous social questions. (shrink)

From Kabir to Krishnamurti is a far cry. For, they are separated one from the other by over five centuries. But quantitative measurement of this distance has a qualitative aspect which cannot be measured in any time-scale. Two great seers lived in two completely different worlds-with no comparison between the two. And yet they expressed their thoughts and experience not only in a similar language but almost in identical terms. In these two streams of thought represented by Kabir and Krishnaji, (...) the authors note a fascinating parallelism. These streams run parallel to each other-and yet they meet from time to time-at the intersections between the two approaches to life. J. Krishnamurti and Sant Kabir focuses on these meeting points between the two approaches to life. The book also presents the intersections between the writings and sayings of Kabir and Krishnaji. (shrink)