Background and AimsRecent studies suggest cognitive, emotional, and behavioral impairments occur in patients after SARS-CoV-2 infection. However, studies are limited to case reports or case series and, to our knowledge, few of them have control groups. This study aims to assess the prevalence of neuropsychological and neuropsychiatric impairment in patients after hospitalization.MethodsWe enrolled 29 COVID+ patients who needed hospitalization but no IC, about 20 days post-dismission, and 29 COVID− healthy matched controls. Neuropsychological and neuropsychiatric assessments were conducted via teleneuropsychology using (...) the following tests: MMSE, CPM47, RAVLT, CDT, Digit-Span Forward/Backward, Verbal fluencies; BDI-II, STAI. People with previous reported cognitive impairment and neurological or psychiatric conditions were excluded. Clinical and demographics were collected. Comparison between groups was conducted using parametric or non-parametric tests according to data distribution. Within COVID+ group, we also evaluated the correlation between the cognitive and behavioral assessment scores and clinical variables collected.ResultsAmong COVID+, 62% had at least one pathological test and significantly worst performances than COVID− in RAVLT learning, RAVLT recall, and recognition. STAI II was higher in COVID−. Chi-square on dichotomous values showed a significant difference between groups in Digit backward test.ConclusionsPatients COVID+ assessed by teleneuropsychology showed a vulnerability in some memory and executive functions. Intriguingly, anxiety was higher in the control group. Our findings therefore confirm the impact of COVID-19 on cognition even in patients who did not need IC. Follow-up is needed to evaluate the evolution of COVID-19-related cognitive deficit.Clinical Trial Registration[ClinicalTrials.gov], identifier [NCT05143320]. (shrink)

We argue that all comparative expressions in natural language obey a principle that we call Comparability: if x and y are at least as F as themselves, then either x is at least as F as y or y is at least as F as x. This principle has been widely rejected among philosophers, especially by ethicists, and its falsity has been claimed to have important normative implications. We argue that Comparability is needed to explain the goodness of several patterns (...) of inference that seem manifestly valid, that the purported failures of Comparability would have absurd consequences, and that the influential arguments against Comparability are less compelling than they may have initially seemed. (shrink)

The urban environment is increasingly engaging with artificial intelligence, a focus on the automation of urban processes, whether it be singular artefacts or city-wide systems. The impact of such technological innovation on the social dynamics of the urban environment is an ever changing and multi-faceted field of research. In this paper, the space and time defined by the autonomous vehicle is used as a window to view the way in which a shift in urban transport dynamics can impact the temporal (...) experience of an individual. Using the finite window of time created by an autonomous vehicle, a theoretical framework is put forward that seeks to show how contrasting narratives exist regarding the experience of the window of time within the autonomous vehicle. By taking a theoretical approach informed by social theory, the dissolution of barriers between separate spheres of life is explored to highlight the increased commodification of time. In focusing on both the space and time created by the autonomous vehicle this approach seeks to highlight how artificial intelligence can provide a contemporary space in the urban environment while also opening a new window of time. The cognitive dissonance observed when comparing the narratives of autonomous vehicle stakeholders and the historical shift in time use leads to a belief that technology makes the user more free in terms of time. With this paper the autonomous vehicle is shown to be an ideal space and time to view the way in which the use of such technology does not increase free-time, but further dissolves the boundaries between what is and what is not work-time. (shrink)

This paper considers how counterfactuals should be evaluated on the assumption that determinism is true. I argue against Lewis's influential view that the actual laws of nature would have been false if something had happened that never actually happened, and in favour of the competing view that history would have been different all the way back. I argue that we can do adequate justice to our ordinary practice of relying on a wide range of historical truths in evaluating counterfactuals by (...) saying that, in typical cases, history would have been only *very slightly* different until shortly before the relevant time. The paper also draws some connections between the puzzle about counterfactuals under determinism and the debate about whether determinism entails that no-one can ever do otherwise than they in fact do. (shrink)

This paper is an investigation of the general logic of "identifications", claims such as 'To be a vixen is to be a female fox', 'To be human is to be a rational animal', and 'To be just is to help one's friends and harm one's enemies', many of which are of great importance to philosophers. I advocate understanding such claims as expressing higher-order identity, and discuss a variety of different general laws which they might be thought to obey. [New version: (...) Nov. 4th, 2016]. (shrink)

Lewis's notion of a "natural" property has proved divisive: some have taken to the notion with enthusiasm, while others have been sceptical. However, it is far from obvious what the enthusiasts and the sceptics are disagreeing about. This paper attempts to articulate what is at stake in this debate.

We defend the thesis that every necessarily true proposition is always true. Since not every proposition that is always true is necessarily true, our thesis is at odds with theories of modality and time, such as those of Kit Fine and David Kaplan, which posit a fundamental symmetry between modal and tense operators. According to such theories, just as it is a contingent matter what is true at a given time, it is likewise a temporary matter what is true at (...) a given possible world; so a proposition that is now true at all worlds, and thus necessarily true, may yet at some past or future time be false in the actual world, and thus not always true. We reconstruct and criticize several lines of argument in favor of this picture, and then argue against the picture on the grounds that it is inconsistent with certain sorts of contingency in the structure of time. (shrink)

Seth Yalcin has pointed out some puzzling facts about the behaviour of epistemic modals in certain embedded contexts. For example, conditionals that begin ‘If it is raining and it might not be raining, … ’ sound unacceptable, unlike conditionals that begin ‘If it is raining and I don’t know it, … ’. These facts pose a prima facie problem for an orthodox treatment of epistemic modals as expressing propositions about the knowledge of some contextually specified individual or group. This paper (...) develops an explanation of the puzzling facts about embedding within an orthodox framework. (shrink)

David Builes presents a paradox concerning how confident you should be that any given member of an infinite collection of fair coins landed heads, conditional on the information that they were all flipped and only finitely many of them landed heads. We argue that if you should have any conditional credence at all, it should be 1/2.

We present and discuss a counterexample to the following plausible principle: if you know that a coin is fair, and for all you know it is going to be flipped, then for all you know it will land tails.

We defend three controversial claims about preference, credence, and choice. First, all agents (not just rational ones) have complete preferences. Second, all agents (again, not just rational ones) have real-valued credences in every proposition in which they are confident to any degree. Third, there is almost always some unique thing we ought to do, want, or believe.

In a recent paper, Yoaav Isaacs, Alan Hájek, and John Hawthorne argue for the rational permissibility of "credal imprecision" by appealing to certain propositions associated with non-measurable spatial regions: for example, the proposition that the pointer of a spinner will come to rest within a certain non-measurable set of points on its circumference. This paper rebuts their argument by showing that its premises lead to implausible consequences in cases where one is trying to learn, by making multiple observations, whether a (...) certain outcome is associated with a non-measurable region or a measurable one. (shrink)

Transhumanism aims to bring about radical human enhancement. In ‘Truly Human Enhancement’ Agar (2014) provides a strong argument against producing radically enhancing effects in agents. This leaves the transhumanist in a quandary—how to achieve radical enhancement whilst avoiding the problem of radically enhancing effects? This paper aims to show that transhumanism can overcome the worries of radically enhancing effects by instead pursuing radical human enhancement via incremental moderate human enhancements (Weak Transhumanism). In this sense, weak transhumanism is much like traditional (...) transhumanism in its aims, but starkly different in its execution. This version of transhumanism is weaker given the limitations brought about by having to avoid radically enhancing effects. I consider numerous objections to weak transhumanism and conclude that the account survives each one. This paper’s proposal of ‘weak transhumanism’ has the upshot of providing a way out of the ‘problem of radically enhancing effects’ for the transhumanist, but this comes at a cost—the restrictive process involved in applying multiple moderate enhancements in order to achieve radical enhancement will most likely be dissatisfying for the transhumanist, however, it is, I contend, the best option available. (shrink)

According to a tradition stemming from Quine and Putnam, we have the same broadly inductive reason for believing in numbers as we have for believing in electrons: certain theories that entail that there are numbers are better, qua explanations of our evidence, than any theories that do not. This paper investigates how modal theories of the form ‘Possibly, the concrete world is just as it in fact is and T’ and ‘Necessarily, if standard mathematics is true and the concrete world (...) is just as it in fact is, then T’ bear on this claim. It concludes that, while analogies with theories that attempt to eliminate unobservable concrete entities provide good reason to regard theories of the former sort as explanatorily bad, this reason does not apply to theories of the latter sort. (shrink)

In this paper I attempt two things. First, I argue that one can coherently imagine different communities using languages structurally similar to English, but in which the meanings of the quantifiers vary, so that the answers to ontological questions, such as ‘Under what circumstances do some things compose something?’, are different. Second, I argue that nevertheless, one can make sense of the idea that of the various possible assignments of meanings to the quantifiers, one is especially fundamental, so that there (...) is still room for genuine debate as regards the answers to ontological questions construed in the fundamental way. My attempt to explain what is distinctive about the fundamental senses of the quantifiers involves a generalisation of the idea that claims of existence are never analytic.<br>. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: 1 A Question about Composition 2 Some Answers 3 How Shall We Decide? 4 Common Sense and Unrestricted Composition 5 Common Sense and Compositional Nihilism 6 Compositional Nihilism and the Self 7 The Appeal to Science 8 Problem or Pseudoproblem? What To Do?

Even if non-cognitivists about some subject-matter can meet Geach’s challenge to explain how there can be valid implications involving sentences which express non-cognitive attitudes, they face a further problem. I argue that a non-cognitivist cannot explain how, given a valid argument whose conclusion expresses a belief and at least one of whose premises expresses a non-cognitive attitude, it could be reasonable to infer the conclusion from the premises.

Most meanings we express belong to large families of variant meanings, among which it would be implausible to suppose that some are much more apt for being expressed than others. This abundance of candidate meanings creates pressure to think that the proposition attributing any particular meaning to an expression is modally plastic: its truth depends very sensitively on the exact microphysical state of the world. However, such plasticity seems to threaten ordinary counterfactuals whose consequents contain speech reports, since it is (...) hard to see how we could reasonably be confident in a counterfactual whose consequent can be true only if a certain very finely tuned microphysical configuration obtains. This essay develops the foregoing puzzle and explores several possible solutions. (shrink)

At the outset of an ethnographic inquiry, we navigated national and international resources to search for theoretical and practical guidance on obtaining parents and children’s informed consent/assent. While much theoretical guidance debating ethical issues to children’s participation in research was found, a paucity of published papers offering practical guidance on assent processes and/or visual representations of child assent forms and information sheets was discovered. The purpose of this article is to describe our experiences, both theoretically and practically, of negotiating the (...) process of obtaining informed consent and assent with parents and children for a non-therapeutic qualitative research study. We hope this article instigates a platform for others to explicate their experience and contributes to the construction of a coherent body of knowledge which will clearly delineate important elements that must be considered when negotiating children’s agreement to participate in research. (shrink)

I explicate and defend the claim that, fundamentally speaking, there are no numbers, sets, properties or relations. The clarification consists in some remarks on the relevant sense of ‘fundamentally speaking’ and the contrasting sense of ‘superficially speaking’. The defence consists in an attempt to rebut two arguments for the existence of such entities. The first is a version of the indispensability argument, which purports to show that certain mathematical entities are required for good scientific explanations. The second is a speculative (...) reconstruction of Armstrong's version of the One Over Many argument, which purports to show that properties and relations are required for good philosophical explanations, e.g. of what it is for one thing to be a duplicate of another. (shrink)

In general, a given object could have been different in certain respects. For example, the Great Pyramid could have been somewhat shorter or taller; the Mona Lisa could have had a somewhat different pattern of colours; an ordinary table could have been made of a somewhat different quantity of wood. But there seem to be limits. It would be odd to suppose that the Great Pyramid could have been thimble-sized; that the Mona Lisa could have had the pattern of colours (...) that actually characterizes The Scream; or that the table could have been made of the very quantity of wood that in fact made some other table. However, there are puzzling arguments that purport to show that so long as an object is capable of being somewhat different in some respect, it is capable of being radically different in that respect. These arguments rely on two tempting thoughts: first, that an object’s capacity for moderate variation is a non-contingent matter, and second, that what is possibly possible is simply possible. This book systematically investigates competing strategies for resolving these puzzles, and defends one of them. Along the way it engages with foundational questions about the metaphysics of modality. (shrink)

This paper investigates the form a modal realist analysis of possibility and necessity should take. It concludes that according to the best version of modal realism, the notion of a world plays no role in the analysis of modal claims. All contingent claims contain some de re element; the effect of modal operators on these elements is described by a counterpart theory which takes the same form whether the de re reference is to a world or to something else. This (...) fully general counterpart theory can validate orthodox modal logic, including the logic of 'actually'. (shrink)

This paper is a response to Theodore Sider's book, Writing the Book of the World. It raises some puzzles about Sider's favoured methodology for finding out about naturalness (or 'structure').

Argues for the "thirder" solution to the Sleeping Beauty puzzle. The argument turns on an analogy with a variant case, in which a coin-toss on Monday night determines whether one's memories of Monday are permanently erased, or merely suspended in such a way that they will return some time after one wakes up on Tuesday.

This paper defends the claim that although ‘Superman is Clark Kent and some people who believe that Superman flies do not believe that Clark Kent flies’ is a logically inconsistent sentence, we can still utter this sentence, while speaking literally, without asserting anything false. The key idea is that the context-sensitivity of attitude reports can be - and often is - resolved in different ways within a single sentence.

This paper is an investigation of the general logic of "identifications", claims such as 'To be a vixen is to be a female fox', 'To be human is to be a rational animal', and 'To be just is to help one's friends and harm one's enemies', many of which are of great importance to philosophers. I advocate understanding such claims as expressing higher-order identity, and discuss a variety of different general laws which they might be thought to obey. [New version: (...) Nov. 4th, 2016]. (shrink)

In this article, I offer a reading of City of God 19.6 that is consonant with Augustine’s message to real judges. Often read as a suggestion that torture and execution are judicially necessary, I argue that 19.6 actually calls such necessities into question, though this is not its primary purpose; first and foremost, 19.6 is an indictment of Stoic apatheia. Situating 19.6 within Augustine’s larger polemic against the Stoics, I find that it presents the Stoic judge as a man who (...) lacks fellow feeling, and therefore, has only a parodic happiness, costly to himself and those judges. A new look at Augustine’s letters to judges confirms this reading, and shows that, for Augustine, the man of humanitas is the true model for the good judge, not the man of apatheia. (shrink)

Suppose a sentence of the following form is true in a certain context: ‘Necessarily, whenever one believes that the F is uniquely F if anything is, and x is the F, one believes that x is uniquely F if anything is’. I argue that almost always, in such a case, the sentences that result when both occurrences of ‘believes’ are replaced with ‘has justification to believe’, ‘knows’, or ‘knows a priori’ will also be true in the same context. I also (...) argue that many sentences of the relevant form are true in ordinary contexts, and conclude that a priori knowledge of contingent de re propositions is a common and unmysterious phenomenon. However, because of the pervasive context-sensitivity of propositional attitude ascriptions, the question what it is possible to know a priori concerning a given object will have very different answers in different contexts. (shrink)

I motivate and briefly sketch a linguistic theory of vagueness, on which the notion of indeterminacy is understood in terms of the conventions of language: a sentence is indeterminate iff the conventions of language either forbid asserting it and forbid asserting its negation, under the circumstances, or permit asserting either. I then consider an objection that purports to show that if this theory (or, as far as I can see, any other theory of vagueness that deserved the label "linguistic" were (...) true, there would be no such thing as indeterminacy. I respond to this objection by arguing on independent grounds against its main premise, the widely-accepted claim that if it is indeterminate whether P, no human being knows whether P. I defend an alternative view according to which, when it is indeterminate whether P, it is often also indeterminate whether we know that P. (shrink)

Timothy Williamson has shown that the B axiom for 'definitely' (α → Δ¬Δ¬α) guarantees that if a sentence is second-order vague in a Kripke model, it is nth order vague for every n. More recently, Anna Mahtani has argued that Williamson's epistemicist theory of vagueness does not support the B axiom, and conjectured that if we consider models in which the “radius of accessibility” varies between different points, we will be able to find sentences that are nth-order vague but (n+1)th-order (...) precise, for any n. This paper bolsters Mahtani's argument, shows her conjecture to be true, and shows that imposing certain further natural constraints on "variable radius" models does not change the situation. (shrink)

Presupposing that most predicates do not correspond directly to genuine relations, I argue that all genuine relations are symmetric. My main argument depends on the premise that there are no brute necessities, interpreted so as to require logical and metaphysical necessity to coincide for sentences composed entirely of logical vocabulary and primitive predicates. Given this premise, any set of purportedly primitive predicates by which one might hope to express the facts about non-symmetric relations order their relata will generate an objectionable (...) multiplication of possibilities. In the final section I give a different argument, based on the weaker premise that brute necessities should not be multiplied without necessity. (shrink)

We attempt to extend the nominalistic project initiated in Hartry Field's Science Without Numbers to modern physical theories based in differential geometry.

An examination of Smith’s Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres and The Theory of Moral Sentiments as complementary to one another and as refinements in earlier eighteenth-century revisions of rhetorical theory and moral philosophy. Smith’s scientific approach to language, rhetoric, and moral thinking emphasizes the improvement of the individual by exposure to stimulating works of art, literature, and spoken language, and encourages individuals to produce such works in order to provide examples to their fellows. Smith’s emphasis upon history in all (...) his works provides an example of his theory and practice of perspicuity and mutually beneficial social exchanges past and present. Smith’s recommendations to the historian, later seen as exemplary, led Dugald Stewart to refer to Smith’s histories and those of his contemporaries as speculative and conjectural vehicles for advancing the science of man. (shrink)

While many scholars have explored the Ciceronian roots of Augustine’s thought, the influence of De Finibus on De ciuitate dei has, as yet, remained unexamined. Dismissed by Testard as abstract and scholastic, De Finibus has long remained in the shadow of Cicero’s other work of moral philosophy, Tusculanae Dispuationes. This article reconsiders the nature of De Finibus and demonstrates its importance for De ciuitate dei. It begins by arguing that the dialogue is actually a meta-commentary on philosophic dogmatism, showing how (...) each of the schools that Cicero’s interlocutors represent—i.e., the Epicureans, Stoics, and Peripatetics—claim certainty about the Wise Man’s happiness. At the heart of the dialogue’s drama is Cicero’s skepticism about this claim. This article then shows how Augustine picks up on Cicero’s explanation as to why the adherents of these schools cling so tightly to their belief in the Wise Man’s happiness. Echoing Cicero, Augustine suggests that the reason for this belief is therapeutic. Going beyond Cicero, however, he diagnoses it as a symptom of pride, arguing that what the philosophers really need is not a model of self-sufficient virtue, but a Mediator. The article ends by briefly considering how Cicero might respond to Augustine’s position. (shrink)

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) is a developing technology. New generations of DBS technology are already in the pipeline, yet this particular fact has been largely ignored among ethicists interested in DBS. Focusing only on ethical concerns raised by the current DBS technology is, albeit necessary, not sufficient. Since current bioethical concerns raised by a specific technology could be quite different from the concerns it will raise a couple of years ahead, an ethical analysis should be sensitive to such alterations, or (...) it could end up with results that soon become dated. The goal of this analysis is to address these changing bioethical concerns, to think ahead on upcoming and future DBS concerns both in terms of a changing technology and changing moral attitudes. By employing the distinction between inherent and noninherent bioethical concerns we identify and make explicit the particular limits and potentials for change within each category, respectively, including how present and upcoming bioethical concerns regarding DBS emerge and become obsolete. Many of the currently identified ethical problems with DBS, such as stimulation-induced mania, are a result of suboptimal technology. These challenges could be addressed by technical advances, while for instance perceptions of an altered body image caused by the mere awareness of having an implant may not. Other concerns will not emerge until the technology has become sophisticated enough for new uses to be realized, such as concerns on DBS for enhancement purposes. As a part of the present analysis, concerns regarding authenticity are used as an example. (shrink)

This paper lays out a novel proposal about the metaphysical foundations of (non-relativistic) quantum mechanics, which has some elements in common with Everett's “Many Worlds” interpretation and some elements in common with Bohm's ”Pilot Wave” interpretation. The view agrees with the Everettians that the quantum wavefunction can be interpreted be interpreted as a <em>complete</em> description of the world in fundamental terms. But it holds that this truth of this description suffices for the existence of an <em>uncountable</em> plurality of “worlds” of (...) ordinary, non-fundamental objects, where each such “world” corresponds to a mapping of points of time to points of configuration space that obeys that Bohmian “Guidance Equation”. (shrink)

Region R Question: How many objects — entities, things — are contained in R? Ignore the empty space. Our question might better be put, 'How many material objects does R contain?' Let's stipulate that A, B and C are metaphysical atoms: absolutely simple entities with no parts whatsoever besides themselves. So you don't have to worry about counting a particle's top half and bottom half as different objects. Perhaps they are 'point-particles', with no length, width or breadth. Perhaps they are (...) extended in space without possessing spatial parts (if that is possible). Never mind. We stipulate that A, B and C are perfectly simple. We also stipulate that they are connected as follows. A and B are stuck together in such a way that when a force is applied to one of them, they move together 'as a unit'. Moreover, the two of them together exhibit behavior that neither would exhibit on its own — Perhaps they emit a certain sound, or glow in the dark — whereas C is.. (shrink)

Background:Ethical competence in nursing practice helps clinical nurses to think critically, analyse issues, make ethical decisions, solve ethical problems and behave ethically in their daily work. Thus, ethical competence contributes to the promotion of high-quality care. However, studies on ethical competence in Malawi are scanty.Objectives:The aim of this study was to explore ethical competence among clinical nurses in selected hospitals in Malawi.Methodology:A cross-sectional survey was conducted in four selected hospitals in Malawi with a sample of 271 clinical nurses. Data were (...) collected using self-administered questionnaires, which included a Moral Competence Scale for Home Care Nurses. Descriptive statistics and logistic regression were computed for the dataset using STATA version 12.0.Ethical consideration:The study protocol complied with all ethical requirements and was approved by the College of Medicine Research Ethics Committee under the University of Malawi.Results:The clinical nurses in Malawi are ethically competent. However, there is a significantly high number (p 0.05). Three determinants of high ethical competence level (strong will, judgement skills and recognition of discrepancy of intention) were identified through a reduced model after stepwise logistic regression analysis. Furthermore, results show that indicators of ethical competence include caring, confidentiality and observance of nurses dressing code. The study has also confirmed that the Moral Competence Scale for Home Care Nurses is a reliable tool to assess ethical competence in low-resource settings.Conclusion:The majority of nurses who completed the survey had low ethical competence. However, clinical nurses with high ethical competence level are required to competently manage complex ethical challenges in health facilities. Strategies for enhancing ethical competence such as continuing ethics education, establishment of ethics committees and provision of supportive supervision are recommended to enable nurses in Malawi attain a high level of ethical competence. (shrink)