ExcerptVictor Zaslavsky was a living legend for my Moscow circle friends, young intellectuals who lived and studied in the Soviet Union in the early 1980s. He was already an émigré, teaching at the Memorial University of Newfoundland in St. John's, Canada. One Italian journalist managed to bring to the Soviet Union his book Il Consenso Organizzato, published in 1981 in Bologna (it was later translated into English as The Neo-Stalinist State: Class, Ethnicity, and Consensus in Soviet Society). My university classmate (...) who read it in Italian remembered years later that this book had helped him to understand the nature of…. (shrink)

The present paper builds on the Rawlsian critique of utilitarianism in order to identify the moral implications of Niklas Luhmann’s social systems theory. While Luhmann aptly discerned the pervasive problems of the precarious system–environment relations throughout the modern society, he took moral communication to be person-centered and thus ill-equipped to deal with these problems. At the same time, the Rawlsian possibility of sacrificing fundamental liberties for the sake of economic gains not only exemplifies the Luhmannian precariousness of the relations of (...) the economic system to its societal environment, but also shows this precariousness to be a moral problem. Thus, from the systems-theoretic perspective, the Rawlsian idea of justice denotes the moral dimension of the capacity of the societal environment to carry the economic system. More generally, the proposed complementarity between Rawls and Luhmann allows to see the precariousness of system–environment relations, for any type of social system, as a moral problem. Two implications follow. First, the morally problematic manifestations of the precarious system–environment relations are not limited to the Rawlsian case of the discrimination of the least advantaged groups but rather include a broad range of social costs and damaging effects of business on society and nature. Second, and related, the proposed systems-theoretic perspective explicates the moral value of sustainability of the economic as well as other social systems in their environment, societal and ecological alike. (shrink)

Despite the importance of the variational principles of physics, there have been relatively few attempts to consider them for a realistic framework. In addition to the old teleological question, this paper continues the recent discussion regarding the modal involvement of the principle of least action and its relations with the Humean view of the laws of nature. The reality of possible paths in the principle of least action is examined from the perspectives of the contemporary metaphysics of modality and Leibniz's (...) concept of essences or possibles striving for existence. I elaborate a modal interpretation of the principle of least action that replaces a classical representation of a system's motion along a single history in the actual modality by simultaneous motions along an infinite set of all possible histories in the possible modality. This model is based on an intuition that deep ontological connections exist between the possible paths in the principle of least action and possible quantum histories in the Feynman path integral. I interpret the action as a physical measure of the essence of every possible history. Therefore only one actual history has the highest degree of the essence and minimal action. To address the issue of necessity, I assume that the principle of least action has a general physical necessity and lies between the laws of motion with a limited physical necessity and certain laws with a metaphysical necessity. (shrink)

The article discusses the features of the process of transformation of human consciousness and educational culture in the conditions of the modern information society in the context of digitalization. By using such concepts, the theory of postmodernism and existentialism, the authors prove the legitimacy of the explication of these theories on the processes of transformation of human consciousness and radical changes in educational culture. At the same time, the necessity of critical reflection on the processes and phenomena from the perspective (...) of the basic values of human life, such as love, moral values, creativity, is emphasized. The role of independent and systemic thinking as a condition for selfrealization is also proved. The phenomenology of modern consciousness, intertwined with the phenomena of technology, is the basis of the existential analysis of consciousness. According to the authors, it is an utmost technological and utilitarian orientation of consciousness. Consciousness today is a reflection of the technological orientation of society and this cannot but affect the educational culture, which is becoming technological. The information space modulates the independence of thinking as a support for authoritative opinions, awakening the needs for material well-being, to the detriment of the dialogic nature of thinking and the independence of thinking. (shrink)

This book synthesizes the game-theoretic modeling of decision-making processes and an ancient moral requirement, called the Golden Rule of ethics (GR). This rule states, "Behave to others as you would like them to behave to you." The GR is one of the oldest, most widespread and specific moral requirements that appear in Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. The book constructs and justifies mathematical models of dynamic socio-economic processes and phenomena that reveal the mechanism of the GR and are based (...) on the concept of Berge equilibrium. The GR can be naturally used for resolving or balancing conflicts, and its "altruistic character" obviously excludes wars, blood-letting, and armed clashes. The previous book of the authors, The Berge Equilibrium: A Game-Theoretic Framework for the Golden Rule of Ethics, covers the static case of the GR. In this book, the dynamic case of the GR is investigated using the altruistic concept of Berge equilibrium and three factors as follows: a) a modification of N.N. Krasovskii's mathematical formalization of differential positional games (DPGs), in view of the counterexamples given by A.I. Subbotin and A.F. Kononenko; b) the method of guiding control, proposed by N.N. Krasovskii; c) the Germeier convolution of the payoff functions of different players. Additionally, the book features exercises, problems, and solution tips collected together in Appendix 1, as well as new approaches to conflict resolution as presented in Appendices 2-4. The book will be of use to undergraduate and graduate students and experts in the field of decision-making in complex control and management systems, as well as anyone interested in game theory and applications. (shrink)

The author shows that the conception of epistemological realism as a contemporary variant of epistemological realism continues the realism tradition and at the same time takes into account some constructivist ideas, giving them a new interpretation. Constructive realism can be a fruitful strategy in cognitive studies, as it gives a philosophical interpretation of the current popular approach in cognitive science: so called “4 E approach”: understanding cognition as embodied, enacted. embedded and extended. The problem of Illusion and Reality is analyzed (...) from the position of constructive realism. The relations between different surrounding worlds of different cognitive agents and the common real world is specially investigated in the context of the opposition between Realism and Relativism. (shrink)

_Care of the Self: Ancient Problematizations of Life and Contemporary Thought_, by Lívia Flachbartová, Pavol Sucharek, and Vladislav Suvák, focus on different manifestations of “taking care of the self” present in ancient and contemporary thought.

Successfully explaining and replicating the complexity and generality of human and animal learning will require the integration of a variety of learning mechanisms. Here, we introduce a computational model which integrates associative learning (AL) and reinforcement learning (RL). We contrast the integrated model with standalone AL and RL models in three simulation studies. First, a synthetic grid‐navigation task is employed to highlight performance advantages for the integrated model in an environment where the reward structure is both diverse and dynamic. The (...) second and third simulations contrast the performances of the three models in behavioral experiments, demonstrating advantages for the integrated model in accounting for behavioral data. (shrink)

Reinforcement learning (RL) models of decision-making cannot account for human decisions in the absence of prior reward or punishment. We propose a mechanism for choosing among available options based on goal-option association strengths, where association strengths between objects represent previously experienced object proximity. The proposed mechanism, Goal-Proximity Decision-making (GPD), is implemented within the ACT-R cognitive framework. GPD is found to be more efficient than RL in three maze-navigation simulations. GPD advantages over RL seem to grow as task difficulty is increased. (...) An experiment is presented where participants are asked to make choices in the absence of prior reward. GPD captures human performance in this experiment better than RL. (shrink)

The paper discusses the conception of philosophy and ethics in Seneca’s Letters, as well as in his other writings, which it sets in the broader context of ancient and modern thought. The introduction outlines the Socratic and Stoic foundations of Seneca’s ethics. The next section focuses on the interpretation of passages from the Letters that remind us that the task of philosophy is to teach human to live an active life. The paper points out that, according to Seneca, philosophy resembles (...) art more than knowledge, and Seneca adapts his language and the examples he uses to this effect. In the next section, the paper returns to delineating the relationship between theoretical and practical thought. The specificity of Seneca’s position becomes visible in the background of Aristotle’s problematization of this relationship. The last section asks how we should approach Seneca’s conception of ethics and philosophy. The analyses outlined above show that Seneca’s Letters fully express an approach to philosophy as an art of living, an approach that modern authors such as Nietzsche and Foucault consider determinative for the whole of ancient philosophy. (shrink)

Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) are popular for classifying large noisy analogue data. However, DNNs suffer from several known issues, including explainability, efficiency, catastrophic interference, and a need for high‐end computational resources. Our simulations reveal that psychologically‐inspired symbolic deep networks (SDNs) achieve similar accuracy and robustness to noise as DNNs on common ML problem sets, while addressing these issues.

Niklas Luhmann held a skeptical view of the role of morality in the modern society. The present paper reassesses this skepticism in view of his early work showing the regime of functional differentiation to be supported by fundamental human rights. Building on this argument, the paper advocates a more positive view of morality which is shown to be related to the sustainability of social systems in their encompassing societal and natural environment. This view is warranted by the overarching Luhmannian theme (...) of the precariousness of system–environment relations. If this view is accepted, Luhmann’s work on fundamental human rights can be read as an illustration of moral problems caused by the overexpansion tendencies of the political system. This argument is shown to connect up with the ideas of Buchanan and Rawls, as well as to fit in with the Luhmannian construct of the dilemma of structure and function. (shrink)

Twenty extremal principles of the natural sciences are reformulated to the general ontological scheme. The hypothesis is substantiated that the unique role of the principle of least action is based on its probabilistic interpretation. It is shown how most of the variational principles can be reduced to the principle of maximal probability, which is based on a realistic interpretation of Feynman’s path integral method.

The paper outlines several forms of ethical attitude to good life and good death in the Socratic literature of the fourth century BCE. A model for the Socratic discussions could be found in Herodotus’ story about the meeting between Croesus and Solon. Within their conversation, Solon shows the king of Lydia that death is a place from which the life of each man can be seen as the completed whole. In his Phaedo, Plato depicts Socrates’ last day before his death (...) in a similar spirit, as the completion of his beautiful life. However, there is no consensus regarding opinions on death among the Socratics. The final part of the paper outlines various meanings of death in the writings of the first generation of the Socratic authors, which arise from different attitudes that the individual philosophers hold regarding the soul as well as other topics. This part puts the principal emphasis on Aristippus, who is considered as the most controversial figure of the Socratic movement. Aristippus makes an interesting opposite to Plato concerning death, since he associates the philosopher’s endeavour for a good life solely with that which is here and now. (shrink)

Stakeholder scholars have long explored how stakeholder relationships differ from economic transactions. We contribute to this ongoing inquiry by developing a conceptual framework of relationality in stakeholder theory that encompasses a stakeholder-theoretic extension of Williamson's contracting schema and a new typology of stakeholder relationships. Premised on understanding relationality as the need for informal human relationships beyond formal governance, our framework locates the key difference between transaction cost economics and stakeholder theory in their treatment of informal relationships. While transaction cost economics (...) perceives informal relationships to be shaped by formal governance structures and enforced by contractual safeguards, stakeholder theory is open to the possibility that some informal relationships between stakeholders may be genuinely moral and thus irreducible to formal governance and contractual safeguards. These stakeholder relationships may lead to unique economic effects described by instrumental stakeholder theory. The difference that we identified between the two literatures shows how stakeholder theory's embrace of relationality surpasses that of transaction cost economics. (shrink)

Any complete understanding of human psychology must take into account that a brain’s actions in the world are mediated by the body it belongs to. In the process of such interaction the human being creates artificial things, structures and mechanisms, such as technology, relationships, and culture. The subjective world is not simply the interactions between neurons at different systemic levels, but the existence of mental contents, which are determined by specific features of a certain domain of reality with which a (...) cognitive agent interacts by means of her actions. It is possible to understand specific features of the subjective world with the conception of the “embodied” and “inactive” cognition. In this framework, the problems of consciousness of consciousness, free will, the possibility of “reading” another mind and constructing mental phenomena are analyzed. If cognitive studies are not used for manipulating humans, and are not means of human degradation they must take into consideration specific features of the human phenomenon: the belonging of the human being to the social world and the world of culture. The development of cognitive studies can lead humans to new levels and contribute to new interpretations of humanism. However, under certain conditions, this development can lead to the death of the human being. This paper shows that some Soviet philosophers and psychologists, during the second half of the twentieth century, anticipated the formulations and solutions of several contemporary key problems in cognitive science before these problems emerged. (shrink)

Business Ethics, the Environment &Responsibility, Volume 31, Issue 3, Page 762-776, July 2022.

Despite the notions of possible worlds and substances are very important subjects of contemporary metaphysics, there are relatively few attempts to combine these in a united framework. This paper considers the metaphysical model of the origins and the evolution of possible worlds that occurs from an interaction between substances. I involve Leibniz’s doctrine of the striving possibles that every possibility of substance has its own essence and tendency towards existence. It is supposed that the activities of substances are constantly aimed (...) at using this tendency in all possible ways. Only the consistent and stable interactions between the substances give birth to stable objects in one of many worlds. Thus activity of substances changes from the possible modality of being to the actual modality of being in form of existence of the worlds. I divide substance’s possibility into two aspects—dynamic (possible or virtual history) and static (possible or potential mutual state). Thanks to the summation of virtual histories, in the possible modality of being, the maximal number of virtual histories is combined into the actual history in the actual modality. (shrink)

Sustainability is an important topic for understanding and developing our society. For scholars who want their academic contributions to have an impact, sustainability is important for our conceptual systems. Because our conceptual systems share similarities with our social systems, we may investigate their characteristics to gain insight into how both may be achieved or at least understood. Theories of the humanities as well as the social/behavioral sciences are changing very rapidly. They are fragile and few seem to have any longevity. (...) At the same time, the theoretical base does not seem to be “advancing.” They are not supporting highly effective results in the real world, so we continue to have seemingly insolvable problems such as crime, war, and poverty. This may be because academia has become inward-focused or, in Luhmann’s terminology, autonomous from the outside world. In seeking to understand how to develop more sustainable theories we found that the concept of sustainability is contested. And, in the process of comparing the sustainability of social systems to the sustainability of theories, we came to realize that neither perspective is viable. Drawing on Luhmann’s insights on the interdependence of theories and society, we came to realize that the two exist in a coevolutionary relationship. Importantly, we present an approach for measuring that evolution and suggest directions for accelerating the coevolutionary advance of society and science. (shrink)

In this paper we present stable and unstable versions of several well-known relations from mereotopology: part-of, overlap, underlap and contact. An intuitive semantics is given for the stable and unstable relations, describing them as dynamic counterparts of the base mereotopo-logical relations. Stable relations are described as ones that always hold, while unstable relations hold sometimes. A set of first-order sentences is provided to serve as axioms for the stable and unstable relations, and representation theory is developed in similar fashion to (...) Stone’s representation theory for Boolean algebras and distributive lattices. Then we present some results about the first-order predicate logic of these relations and about its quantifier-free fragment. Completeness theorems for these logics are proved, the full first-order theory is proved to be hereditary undecidable and the satisfiability problem of the quantifier-free fragment is proved to be NP-complete. (shrink)

The author analyzes the implications for the philosophy of mathematics of successive paradigm transitions in the general history of philosophy.

Business Ethics, the Environment & Responsibility, Volume 31, Issue 2, Page 536-545, April 2022.

The last two decades have produced unprecedented successes in the fields of artificial intelligence and machine learning (ML), due almost entirely to advances in deep neural networks (DNNs). Deep hierarchical memory networks are not a novel concept in cognitive science and can be traced back more than a half century to Simon's early work on discrimination nets for simulating human expertise. The major difference between DNNs and the deep memory nets meant for explaining human cognition is that the latter are (...) symbolic networks meant to model the dynamics of human memory and learning. Cognition-inspired symbolic deep networks (SDNs) address several known issues with DNNs, including (1) learning efficiency, where a much larger number of training examples are required for DNNs than would be expected for a human; (2) catastrophic interference, where what is learned by a DNN gets unlearned when a new problem is presented; and (3) explainability, where there is no way to explain what is learned by a DNN. This paper explores whether SDNs can achieve similar classification accuracy performance to DNNs across several popular ML datasets and discusses the strengths and weaknesses of each approach. Simulations reveal that (1) SDNs provide similar accuracy to DNNs in most cases, (2) SDNs are far more efficient than DNNs, (3) SDNs are as robust as DNNs to irrelevant/noisy attributes in the data, and (4) SDNs are far more robust to catastrophic interference than DNNs. We conclude that SDNs offer a promising path toward human-level accuracy and efficiency in category learning. More generally, ML frameworks could stand to benefit from cognitively inspired approaches, borrowing more features and functionality from models meant to simulate and explain human learning. (shrink)

This article analyzes facts related to the development of modern communication and information technologies and cognitive sciences that call into question the traditions of European culture and philosophy in their understanding of subjectivity: the recognition of the role of consciousness in the performance of activity, the notion of the “Self” as the center of consciousness and decision-making authority, the availability of free will, the idea of human autonomy, and the existence of a private world. The author argues for the need (...) for understanding the phenomenon of consciousness, the Self, and human autonomy in light of modern scientific data, and shows that the human being is impossible without the existence of an autonomous subjective world. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe paper deals with Jan Patočka’s and Michel Foucault’s influential interpretations of the ancient Greek approach to care. At first sight, it might seem that Foucault’s care of the self is opposed to Patočka’s care of the soul. On closer reading, however, it becomes clear that the two interpretations lead to similar conclusions, as exemplified by the way the two authors interpret Plato’s Laches: both of them see it in relation to the issue of how to live one’s life. Further (...) on, the paper deals with the development of Patočka’s understanding of care of the self and his approach to the philosophy of history. It is revealed that Foucault’s approach to history is opposed to Patočka’s on a number of issues. Despite their diverging opinions, however, the two authors problematize the ancient Greek care of the self as an important issue in Western culture, emphasizing the therapeutic role of contemporary philosophy along the way. (shrink)

The framework of a simple opposition realism – anti-realism is not enough to analyze the views on the reality of unobservable objects of quantum theory. First, it is necessary to distinguish between realism in relation to the theory and realism in relation to the theory’s objects. Secondly, realism in relation to classical objects can be combined, both with realism and with anti-realism in relation to quantum objects. Third, the concept of “existence” and “to exist objectively” can have different meanings. To (...) take into account these factors, the article describes three approaches: classical realism, quantum anti-realism, and quantum realism. I show that the debate around quantum reality has intensified in recent decades due to a series of new quantum experiments. The current stage of the debate is caused by the second quantum revolution relating to the transfer and processing of quantum information. Classical realism and old versions of quantum anti-realism have become insufficiently effective to explain the results of a series of experiments. Proponents of quantum realism, in turn, refer to the possibility of using the wave function to manipulate quantum objects before their measurement. In conclusion, I assume that not only theoretical discussions but also experiments and new technologies can have a major impact on the seemingly purely philosophical debate about reality. (shrink)

In this paper we treat humorous situations as a series of events underpinned by topoi, principles of reasoning recognised within a socio-cultural community. We claim that humorous effect in jokes and other discourse is often created by the juxtaposition of topoi evoked. A prerequisite for this is that there is a shift where the interpreter of the discourse updates their information state with regard to a second topos being evoked. This view of humour is consistent with an incremental analysis of (...) dialogue, and we therefore argue that interaction is central both for humour creation and interpretation. We point out some different ways in which topoi are juxtaposed in humorous dialogues as well as in jokes published in social media or in joke books, and take jokes from the coronavirus pandemic as an example because this makes lots of new topoi available and therefore offers the opportunity of creating novel jokes based on the juxtaposition of the new and existing topoi. We explore how the mechanisms of inference in dialogue can be applied to humour through the four elements from our title: old, new, borrowed and taboo. (shrink)