Present era can be categorized due to its speed of changes. Pakistani society got affected by worst kind of terrorism and extremism in last fifteen years. The root causes of prevailing security environment in Pakistan are multifaceted, complex and are derived from structural, as well as micro-level conditions. Objective of this research is to highlight the gaps in security doctrine of Pakistan. Both qualitative and quantitative methodology in the format of Knowledge Attitude and Practice is selected. Primary question of this (...) research was to find the gaps in national internal security policy of Pakistan. This primary question is further sub divided into ten sub questions. Implementation modalities and the impediments of National Internal Security Policy 2014 are also discussed. This research finds out that national internal security policy 2014 was a vibrant document and right step in the domain of policy formulation but demanded non-pragmatic results from security operators. Majority of its drawbacks are removed in in its later version of 2018-23. Survey and questionnaire based analysis is also made part of this article along with recommendations as submitted by respondents. (shrink)

This article highlights the continuing relevance of a classic bioethical text, “Bioethics as a Discipline,” published by the Hastings Center’s cofounder Daniel Callahan in 1973. Connecting the text’s programmatic recommendations with later reflections and interventions Callahan wrote about the development of bioethics illuminates how the vision Callahan established and the reality this vision helped create were interrelated—just not in the way Callahan had hoped for. Although this portrait relies on an individual perception of the development of bioethics, it (...) might nevertheless, through its unique linkage of different bioethical temporalities, contribute to a broader reassessment of what bioethics became and why. (shrink)

Discourses of public education reform, like that exemplified within the Queensland Government's future vision document, Queensland State Education‐2010 , position schooling as a panacea to pervasive social instability and a means to achieve a new consensus. However, in unravelling the many conflicting statements that conjoin to form education policy and inform related literature , it becomes clear that education reform discourse is polyvalent . Alongside visionary statements that speak of public education as a vehicle for social justice are the (...) visionary or those reflecting neoliberal individualism and a conservative politics. In this paper, it is argued that the latter coagulate to form strategic discursive practices which work to secure dominant relations of power. Further, discussion of the characteristics needed by the ‘ideal’ future citizen of Queensland reflect efforts to ‘tame change through the making of the child’ . The casualties of this vision and the refusal to investigate the pathologies of ‘traditional’ schooling are the children who, for whatever reason, do not conform to the norm of the desired school child as an ‘ideal’ citizen‐in‐the‐making and who become relegated to alternative educational settings. (shrink)

Discourses of public education reform, like that exemplified within the Queensland Government's future vision document, Queensland State Education‐2010 (QSE‐2010), position schooling as a panacea to pervasive social instability and a means to achieve a new consensus. However, in unravelling the many conflicting statements that conjoin to form education policy and inform related literature ( ), it becomes clear that education reform discourse is polyvalent ( ). Alongside visionary statements that speak of public education as a vehicle for social justice (...) are the (re)visionary or those reflecting neoliberal individualism and a conservative politics. In this paper, it is argued that the latter coagulate to form strategic discursive practices which work to (re)secure dominant relations of power. Further, discussion of the characteristics needed by the ‘ideal’ future citizen of Queensland reflect efforts to ‘tame change through the making of the child’ (, p. 201). The casualties of this (re)vision and the refusal to investigate the pathologies of ‘traditional’ schooling are the children who, for whatever reason, do not conform to the norm of the desired school child as an ‘ideal’ citizen‐in‐the‐making and who become relegated to alternative educational settings. (shrink)

Abstract: The study aimed to identify the reality of the application of strategic agility in the Palestinian civil organizations in Gaza Strip, and the concept of strategic agility has included a number of areas which are (strategic sensitivity, clarity of vision, choice of strategic goals, rapid response, joint responsibility, taking actions, core capabilities) and the study used An analytical descriptive approach, and the questionnaire as a main tool for collecting data from the employees of the (...) associations operating in the governorates of Gaza Strip. The relative weight of the strategic agility scale reached (79.04 %), and there were statistically significant differences in the dimensions of the measure due to the gender variable in the dimensions of strategic agility (strategic sensitivity, clarity of vision, choice of strategic goals, rapid response, and taking measures) and the differences were in favor of females . While there were no statistically significant differences in my dimension (shared responsibility, core capabilities) attributable to the gender variable, there were no statistically significant differences between the mean dimensions of strategic agility due to the age group variable, the educational qualification, and the study presented a set of recommendations, the most important of which are: the necessity of seeking civil organizations In Gaza Strip, by obtaining funding from external countries in order to provide associations with self-income to face crises and give them independence in order to preserve them in order to play their role in society, the need to follow up on the strategic plan for NGOs using electronic messages where It paves the way to reach excellence and creativity in the field of work, the need to hold meetings and workshops with the local community and this helps them to define the needs of society. (shrink)

This paper presents positivistic, normative/theological, and strategic analyses of the application of religion to the practice of strategic leadership in business. It is argued that elements of religion can enrich several components of strategic leadership. Furthermore, it is argued that the question of whether religion ought to be applied involves the more basic question of whether there is a common basis or a meta-framework relating theological and normative analyses. Finally, because the strategic value of religion in (...) strategic leadership involves varying costs and benefits, an optimal level of integration can be established by applying a cost/benefit analysis to a framework of four ways of relating religion to the business arena based on the degree of integration. (shrink)

Little literature has looked at the role of universities promoting and supporting grassroots social innovations. This paper addresses this gap by examining how universities contribute to social innovation in Colombia. In seeking to develop a good understanding of how universities can contribute to the development of social innovation niches, we draw upon the Strategic Niche Management theory and the three areas of activity which constitute effective niche-building: social networks, expectations and visions and learning. We explore this phenomenon with the (...) Parque Científico de Innovación Social, founded by Uniminuto University in 2012, using video case study research methodology. Findings suggest the important role played by Uniminuto University influencing the current higher education system regime by enhancing the development of social innovation niches. These results have implications for advancing the debate on the role of higher education institutions in contributing to the development of social innovation processes.Poca literatura ha analizado el papel de las universidades promoviendo y apoyando las innovaciones sociales de base. Este documento aborda esta brecha al examinar cómo las universidades contribuyen a la innovación social en Colombia. Al tratar de desarrollar una buena comprensión de cómo las universidades pueden contribuir al desarrollo de nichos de innovación social, recurrimos a la teoría de Gestión Estratégica de Nichos y las tres áreas de actividad que constituyen la creación efectiva de nichos: redes sociales, expectativas y visiones y aprendizaje. Exploramos este fenómeno con el Parque Científico de Innovación Social, fundado por la Universidad de Uniminuto en 2012, utilizando la metodología de investigación de estudios de casos de video. Los hallazgos sugieren el importante papel desempeñado por la Universidad de Uniminuto que influye en el régimen actual del sistema de educación superior al mejorar el desarrollo de nichos de innovación social. Estos resultados tienen implicaciones para avanzar en el debate sobre el papel de las instituciones de educación superior en la contribución al desarrollo de los procesos de innovación social. (shrink)

The purpose of the article is to reveal the scientific approach that substantiates the impact of the creation of strategic alliances (SA) on the digital transformation of business and the development of their innovative power based on identified success factors. The aim was achieved using the following methods: abstract logic and typification (for classification of SA's success factors), generalization (to determine the peculiarities of SA's influence on their innovation development), analytical and ranking method (to determine the relationship between the (...) dynamics creating of SA and the degree of acceleration of digital transformation), expert evaluation (to determine the degree of influence of SA success factors by business areas). Implementing a business-integrated approach to understanding digital transformation will accelerate implementation of innovation and organizational change, identifies future prospects for market, customer and business relationships, highlighting the importance of researching the factors that ensure their success. An alternative vision of SA’s success factors is suggested, which are determined by the possibilities the organization of partnerships and organizational culture, integration of business sectors, compatibility of management goals, external relevance, obtaining synergies. Innovation is considered by the authors as an integration factor that reconciles all groups of SA success factors, giving them the necessary focus to solve business problems. The results of the study show that the creation of SA has a significant impact on accelerating and changes priority of digital transformation of business areas involved in strategic partnerships, and the impact of SA on the development of their innovation power is crucial. (shrink)

The research paper elaborates on the main concepts and terminology of strategic planning in education, including all the steps of building a strategic plan with mission and vision statements. Furthermore, it analyses and compares some successful strategic planning case studies in education by identifying the strengths and some weaknesses. The final results of this inquiry serve as recommendations for positive changes and reforms in North Macedonian education. Furthermore, this research paper emphasizes the importance of the SMART (...) strategic goals for improving education, articulated via the mission and vision statements. It is quite interesting that internationally accredited educational organizations like NOVA IS of Skopje have more successful improvement plans based on shared values and goals via their mission and vision. The implementation of their strategic plans is closely monitored and evaluated. Moreover, some successful educational reforms happened in Finland, Singapore, and Victoria, Australia, and their ministries of education are dedicated and accountable to aligning their mission and vision with all public schools in these countries. On the contrary, although the Ministry of Education of North Macedonia has clearly published the mission and vision statements, there is still a huge gap in the reality of implementation of those in all public schools, and rarely any school has a shared mission and vision on their web page. Browsing around, one primary school in North Macedonia, “Jan Amos Komenski” has recently started sharing their school’s mission and vision, values, and goals with the community which is a positive change toward SMART reforms. Strategic planning affects the improvement of learning and teaching; therefore it needs to be built inclusively and wisely. (shrink)

More and more companies are developing corporate social responsibility -related programs which imply strategic and organizational changes. This article focuses on a public utility organization, the Groupe La Poste, in which CSR issues and practices are linked to its specific mission as a public service, thus defining and explicitly structuring its CSR programs. We explore the following research questions: Why did the Groupe La Poste formulate explicitly its CSR program? What is the content of this program and how it (...) is perceived by managers? To provide answers to these questions, we have developed a conceptual framework based on a literature review linking CSR to strategic and organizational change and we apply it to the Groupe La Poste. The analysis shows a progressive convergence between strategic and CSR trajectories and sheds light into how an organization can progressively integrate CSR as a central part of its strategic plan. It confirms the role of central dimensions that support the integration of CSR programs within the organization. CSR-related mission and vision aim at orienting the organization toward sustainability and responsibility. CSR-related principles and policies transpose vision and mission into commitments and guide the implementation and adoption of responsible behavior while CSR-related shared values underlie the whole program. (shrink)

ABSTRACT To bring attention to medical ethics and to enhance the quality of health care in Iran, the Ministry of Health and Medical Education has introduced a strategic plan for medical ethics at a national level. This plan was developed through the organization and running of workshops in which experts addressed important areas related to medical ethics. They analysed strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and threats, and outlined a vision, a mission and specific goals and essential activities surrounding medical (...) ethics. The current strategic plan has six main goals that will be reviewed in this paper. Some major activities that were carried out in recent years, and some future plans, will be also reviewed. (shrink)

The term ‘organizational development’ is defined in management textbooks as a ‘collection of planned change interventions built on democratic–humanistic values that seek to improve organizational effectiveness and well–being’. But we use the term in a simpler and broader sense as the evolution and development of an organization towards its highest potential. In this article we present the broad outlines of a strategic vision of organizational development based on the aims and principles of yoga. The word ‘yoga’ has now (...) become well known all over the world. But the popular conceptions of yoga conjure up images of a hatha–yogi standing upside down or a hermit in the Himalayas. The deeper psychological and pragmatic significance of yoga is not fully understood. ‘Yoga,’ says Sri Aurobindo, ‘is nothing but practical psychology’. It contributes to the psychological and spiritual development of the human organism. Yoga is the scientific, psychological process or discipline by which the inner development of the human being is triggered and can be accelerated. (shrink)

The integration of Corporate social responsibility with BusinessStrategy has been identified as a central Corporate social responsibility concept. Corporate social responsibility, it is important to understand the Key Drivers and Building Blocks that is integral to this phenomenon and which will impact the Civil Society at large. If the Indian government and private companies are serious about meeting Sustainable Development Goals, Mandated CSR has to be used as a Strategic Vehicle not only to reduce the substantial financial shortfall but (...) Corporate social responsibility as an integral part of a company’s Strategy, to help companies achieve Competitive Advantage. The paper lists down five strategic Building Blocks of Mandated CSR namely—Shared vision, Key Drivers, Dialogue, measuring impact, and Governance which provide a mental framework to think about mCSR in a novel way. The paper emphasizes the importance of Shared vision, Problem Identification, utilizing Board’s Expertise, Innovation, building network, Best Practice sharing, managing failure risk, Shareholder’s Activism, Government’s Intention, and Capacity Building. (shrink)

In the context of a crisis of confidence in executive leadership in corporate America, this paper examines the role of integrity as a mediator within strategic leadership and its impact on credibility in reputational capital. A tension can occur within strategic leadership between the elements of strategic planning and leadership vision. This tension can destroy the credibility of reputational capital unless strategic leadership is managed effectively. Integrity can be used as the glue providing for credible (...) leadership vision amid a strategic perspective oriented to competitive pressures, thereby enabling strategic leadership to contribute to a sustainable competitive advantage. A strategic leadership audit is presented as a tool by which strategic leadership and reputational capital can be managed. (shrink)

‘Methodological cosmopolitanism’ connotes a profound transformation of the sciences as forms of public reflexive social analysis on learning to live well together through building homes in the world: what may be called the ‘Beckian vision’, in memory of Ulrich Beck. This short note considers how Beck’s concept of emancipatory catastrophism may not be the most productive development of his own programme. This is precisely brought out by a methodologically cosmopolitan analysis of a key East Asian response to the global (...) risk of climate change: innovation of low-carbon cities in China. Instead, these presumptively archetypically cosmopolitan initiatives offer something of a political education regarding the irreducibly strategic power/knowledge dynamics at work – including in ongoing contestation about the very term ‘cosmopolitan’. (shrink)

Resumen. En el presente artículo se abordan lineamientos para internalizar el pensamiento estratégico en losgerentes basado en la filosofía de los Institutos Autónomos del sector público. Tomando en cuenta, que esfundamental que el pensamiento estratégico de los líderes se ocupe de la filosofía institucional para estarclaros en saber quiénes son, en qué se cree, cuáles son sus preceptos; así como, conocer los compromisos yresponsabilidades. Todo ello, basado en la misión, visión, valores, y estrategia que tienden a ser elementosintuitivos. Por lo (...) tanto, el estudio se ubico en una investigación descriptiva y la información se obtuvo através de un instrumento tipo Likert. Los resultados obtenidos evidencian en el nivel gerencial,que no cuentan en su totalidad con una filosofía de gestión, que constituya una guía para la conducción demanera efectiva de tales instituciones.Palabras Claves. Filosofía, gerencia, institutos autónomos, pensamiento estratégico, sector público.. In this paper guidelines are addressed to internalize strategic thinking in managers based on thephilosophy of autonomous institutions in the public sector. Taking into account, it is essential that thestrategic thinking of leaders to deal with the organizational culture to be clear on who they are, what youthink, what their requirements as well as, meet the commitments and responsibilities. All this is based on themission, vision, values and strategy tend to be intuitive elements. Therefore, the study was located in adescriptive and information was obtained through an instrument Likert. The results show atthe managerial level, have not entirely a management philosophy, which constitutes a guide for the conduct ofsuch institutions effectively.Keywords. Philosophy, management, strategic thinking, public sector, autonomous institutes. (shrink)

As integrators of talents, Catholic family business leaders are strategically positioned to leverage the unique differences of their workforce. Business literature currently emphasizes participatory leadership as best practice. Participatory leadership is insufficient, however, because increasing the number of voices in the decision-making process may lead to higher levels of conflict or disengagement if the voices are disregarded. This paper proposes that the Catholic Social Teaching concepts of subsidiarity and solidarity provide the guiding principles to integrate participation because together they can (...) account for all stakeholders while advancing business goals. To operationalize these principles, this paper suggests that the dispute resolution field has developed analytical frameworks to assess and reimagine current policies, procedures, and culture for dispute resolution and shared decision making. Ultimately, businesses are the training ground to prepare citizens to participate in the public square and contribute to the common good. (shrink)

There are numerous challenges posed to Roman Catholic health care institutions by recent developments in health care delivery. Some are practical, involving the acceptable limits of accommodation to and collaboration with secular networks of health care delivery. Others, quite often implicated in the first set, are explicitly theological. What does it mean to be a distinctively Roman Catholic health care institution? What are the nature and the scope of Roman Catholic institutional identity? More broadly, what is the moral relevance of (...) themes in Roman Catholic social teaching to the provision of health care? This issue of Christian Bioethics addresses these questions with a spirited exchange among its authors. They offer noticeably different perspectives on the general cogency of Roman Catholic social teaching and different strategic recommendations for Roman Catholic institutions to maintain, or recover, their distinctive presence in health care delivery. (shrink)

The literature on Human Enhancement may indeed have reached a critical mass yet theological engagement with the subject is still thin. Human Enhancement has already been established as a key topic within research and captivating visions of the future have been allied with a depth of philosophical analysis. Some Transhumanists have pointed to a theological dimension to their position and some who have warned against enhancement might be seen as having done so from a perspective shaped by a Judeo-Christian worldview. (...) Nonetheless, in neither of these cases has theology been central to engagement with the enhancement quest.Christian theologians who have begun to open up such an engagement with Human Enhancement include Brent Waters, Robert Song and Celia Deane-Drummond. The work they have already carried out is insightful and important yet due to the scale of the possible engagement, the wealth of Christian theology which might be applied to Human Enhancement remains largely untapped. This paper explores how three key aspects of Christian theology, eschatology, love of God and love of neighbour, provide valuable tools for a theological engagement with Human Enhancement. It is proposed that such theological tools need to be applied to Human Enhancement if the debate is to be resourced with the Christian theological perspective of what it means to be human in our contemporary technological context and if society is to have the choice of maintaining its Christian foundations. (shrink)

Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we used a novel futures-oriented and participatory approach that asked what future envisioned knowledge systems might need to look like and how we might get there. Findings suggest that envisioned future systems will need (...) to be much more collaborative, open, diverse, egalitarian, and able to work with values and systemic issues. They will also need to go beyond producing knowledge about our world to generating wisdom about how to act within it. To get to envisioned systems we will need to rapidly scale methodological innovations, connect innovators, and creatively accelerate learning about working with intractable challenges. We will also need to create new funding schemes, a global knowledge commons, and challenge deeply held assumptions. To genuinely be a creative force in supporting longevity of human and non-human life on our planet, the shift in knowledge systems will probably need to be at the scale of the enlightenment and speed of the scientific and technological revolution accompanying the second World War. This will require bold and strategic action from governments, scientists, civic society and sustained transformational intent. (shrink)

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to present a case study of the creation of a Knowledge Zone in Curaçao to provide an insight into how a Knowledge Zone is established. After devising a vision, strategic alliances were formed. This created synergy and momentum, giving the project and process a life of their own.Design/methodology/approachThe project of creating a K‐Zone is based on a theoretical framework which draws upon the notion of a creative class, and how it can be (...) attracted to a specific location. It also deploys change management methodology, which describes how change is implemented. The theory states that creativity will drive the economy in the future and that societies that are able to attract the creative class will excel. It is not clear what attracts the creative class but it is believed that a certain life style, concentrations of peers and virtual and physical connectivity are essential. To create these conditions some changes must be implemented and these changes are often resisted in the beginning.FindingsKnowledge Zones can be created if there is a clear shared vision, leadership and alliances that forge synergies. The project was started in 2010 by the UNA under the presidency of Dr Miguel Goede, the Rector Magnificus of the University of the Netherlands Antilles. With the support of the Board of Supervisors, the UNA entered/sought alliances with the nearby Carmabi Research Institute and the neighbouring school for nurses, which opened a new school building within the designated zone. The UNA also provided the impetus to start a campaign to construct a new hospital that was planned for the area neighbouring the university and to start a school of medicine. But the breakthrough came when the local telecom provider, United Telecommunication Services, decided to provide the university with dedicated internet connections that were capable of the highest speed available on the island.Originality/valueThe paper contributes to a framework for understanding the creative economy of Small Islands Developing States in the Caribbean and how change can be implemented in these settings. (shrink)

This conceptual article examines the relationship between marketing and sustainability through the dual lenses of anthropocentric and ecocentric epistemology. Using the current anthropocentric epistemology and its associated dominant social paradigm, corporate ecological sustainability in commercial practice and business school research and teaching is difficult to achieve. However, adopting an ecocentric epistemology enables the development of an alternative business and marketing approach that places equal importance on nature, the planet, and ecological sustainability as the source of human and other species’ well-being, (...) as well as the source of all products and services. This article examines ecocentric, transformational business, and marketing strategies epistemologically, conceptually and practically and thereby proposes six ecocentric, transformational, strategic marketing universal premises as part of a vision of and solution to current global un-sustainability. Finally, this article outlines several opportunities for management practice and further research. (shrink)

In a series of articles, Jacob Beck proposed that a variety of texture segmentation phenomena occurs due to emergent features that arise from “links” between elements with appropriate local properties, such as alignment, orientation, and proximity. His findings and ideas guided theoretical and computational models, and some of his demonstrations became textbook knowledge about visual perception. We build on this work in two ways. First, we provide a modern replication of a classic texture segmentation study using a much larger sample (...) size. Overall, the replication agrees with Beck’s original findings, although there are some quantitative differences. Second, we show how to apply a quantitative model of visual cortex to Beck’s experiment and demonstrate that the model can explain many aspects of Beck’s findings. Key to the model’s success is cognitive control of connections between individual elements (akin to Beck’s “links” between elements) and a selection mechanism that makes it easy to identify how well elements within a region connect and how well different regions are disconnected. Overall, the model supports Beck’s claim that local properties can facilitate patterns of connections between stimulus elements and that some connection patterns allow an observer to easily distinguish textures. (shrink)

In this book Gerald Vision argues for a new causal theory, one that engages provocatively with direct realism and makes no use of a now discredited subjectivism.

In Veritas, Gerald Vision defends the correspondence theory of truth -- the theory that truth has a direct relationship to reality -- against recent attacks, and critically examines its most influential alternatives. The correspondence theory, if successful, explains one way in which we are cognitively connected to the world; thus, it is claimed, truth -- while relevant to semantics, epistemology, and other studies -- also has significant metaphysical consequences. Although the correspondence theory is widely held today, Vision points (...) to an emerging orthodoxy in philosophy that claims that truth as such carries no significant weight in philosophical explanations. He devotes much of the book to a criticism of that outlook and to a less vulnerable formulation of the correspondence theory.Vision defends the correspondence theory by both presenting evidence for correspondence and examining the claims made by such alternative theories as deflationism, minimalism, and pluralism. The techniques of the argument are thoroughly analytic, but the problem confronted is broadly humanistic. The question examined -- how we, as thinking beings, are connected to and manage to cope in a world that was not designed for our comfort or convenience -- is more likely to be raised by continentalists, but is approached here with the tools of clarity and precision more highly prized in analytic philosophy. The book seeks to avoid both the obscurantism that infects much continental thought and the overly technical concerns and methodology that limit the interest of much work in analytic philosophy. It thus provides a rigorous but largely nontechnical treatment of the topic that will be of interest not only to readers familiar with philosophy but also to those with a background in literary theory and linguistics. (shrink)

The primary focus of this article is a reading of Venus Hottentot 2000, a performance-text that reperforms the hyperbolization of Black female sexuality. In using the corporeality of the Black body as a strategic site of postcolonial resignification, this performance is moreover an interrogation of the colonial gaze that has fetishized the Black body. In foregrounding Venus Hottentot 2000 as a point of departure for exploration, the article proceeds by delving broadly into the representational history of the ‘Hottentot’ female. (...) Furthermore, to facilitate an understanding of the constitutive power of the colonial gaze and the possibilities of subverting and displacing that gaze from that of a postcolonial diasporic aesthetic practice, the article frames the postcolonial feminist reading of Venus Hottentot 2000 via an investigation of the processes by which the ‘Hottentot’ female has been festishized and scopically objectified within colonial discourse - processes whereby the ‘Hottentot’ female became a signifier of Black female sexuality. The article concludes by reading this performance as an example of a postcolonial ‘cultural war of positioning’, which offers moreover a contemporary rescripting of Black subjectivity. (shrink)

In virtue of its form [‘I am here’] must be true on any occasion on which [it is] asserted, and yet the proposition it expresses on each occasion [is] contingent. Intuitively, [‘I am here now’] is deeply, and in some sense universally, true. One need only understand the meaning of [it] to know that it cannot be uttered falsely. The sentence ‘I am here’ has the peculiar property that whenever I utter it, it is bound to be true. Even if (...) I am lost and do not know where I am, I can bravely say ‘I am here’, and know that I am expressing a truth. (shrink)

The evidence of blindsight is occasionally used to argue that we can see things, and thus have perceptual belief, without the distinctive visual awareness accompanying normal sight; thereby displacing phenomenality as a component of the concept of vision. I maintain that arguments to this end typically rely on misconceptions about blindsight and almost always ignore associated visual (or visuomotor) pathologies relevant to the lessons of such cases. More specifically, I conclude, first, that the phenomena very likely do not result (...) from dissociations within a single system, but from the interaction of evolutionarily distinct, if interacting, systems; second, that a closer study of spared motor abilities indicates that verbal responses of patients result not from degraded vision but from proprioception; and, finally, above chance verbal responses, being forced guesses, are not tentative beliefs and cannot become beliefs just by training patients to have more confidence in their responses. (shrink)

A broad, though not unanimous, consensus among commentators is that the later Wittgenstein subscribes to a redundancy conception of truth. I reject that interpretation. No doubt much depends on what is meant by a redundancy theory. But once even mildly plausible versions of that view are isolated a review of the relevant texts shows that the evidence for that interpretation collapses. Moreover, the redundancy interpretation is at odds with guiding prescriptions in the post‐1932 corpus. Wittgenstein doesn’t hold that truth can (...) be defined or characterized thinly, as redundancy theorists propose, but that it isn’t susceptible to any such generic treatment. (shrink)

A broad, though not unanimous, consensus among commentators is that the later Wittgenstein subscribes to a redundancy conception of truth. I reject that interpretation. No doubt much depends on what is meant by a redundancy theory. But once even mildly plausible versions of that view are isolated a review of the relevant texts shows that the evidence for that interpretation collapses. Moreover, the redundancy interpretation is at odds with guiding prescriptions in the post‐1932 corpus. Wittgenstein doesn’t hold that truth can (...) be defined or characterized thinly, as redundancy theorists propose, but that it isn’t susceptible to any such generic treatment. (shrink)

In " Re-Emergence" he explores the question of conscious properties arising from brute, unthinking matter, making the case that there is no equally plausible non-emergent alternative.

I INTRODUCTION - THE TOPIC EXPLAINED 1 GENERAL DIFFERENCES From its inception to the present, philosophy may be viewed as a series of struggles between ...

In specifying the sensory evidence for perceptual belief, thinkers have either chosen a common perceptual idiom or have invented one of their own as a starting-point for their enquiries. It is becoming clearer that the choice harbours crucial, often disputable, assumptions. I compare two sorts of constructions, a variety of propositional ones and an objectual one, and I argue that the objectual idiom is indispensable in order to explain how a perceptual belief can arise out of what is not already (...) a belief. This has implications not only for the question of how belief is generated from perceptual evidence, but also for various other controversies. I discuss two of these implications: the character of inferences from evidence, and basic belief. (shrink)

From the popular view that the property of truth adds nothing not already inherent in its bearers it has been inferred that classical theories of truth are thereby refuted. Taking as representative a version of deflationism based on a certain way of interpreting the Tarskian schema convention T–and popularly called "disquotational"–I argue that the view is beset by fatal difficulties. These include: an unavoidable awkwardness in handling indexicals; an inability to accept anything more than a too anemic notion of a (...) truth condition, leaving it defenseless against clearly inadequate alternatives; and an incapacity to show that its characteristic biconditional can support any acceptable dependency claims (made evident by replacing the biconditional with 'because'). Finally, were there no predicate on the order of 'is true', this would not annihilate the property of being true or the current grounds for philosophical inquiries about it. This is an important clue to why deflationary approaches in general are dead ends. (shrink)

Emergentism is generally viewed as a non‐materialist alternative to physicalism, although the exceptionally tolerant may count it as consistent with their physicalism. It disarms the threat of Causal Exclusion. The popular conception of explored emergentism is played off against two forms, including physical states and tokens of conscious states (c‐states). Emergentism competes not only with physicalism, but also with panpsychism. Panpsychism is the view that all matter has a conscious aspect. Panpsychism (and its various forms) suffers from several problems. This (...) chapter summarizes a few of the major ones. It scratches the surface of the issues separating emergentism and physicalism, on the one hand, and emergentism and panpsychism, on the other. However, perhaps enough has been divulged to show that emergentism is a live option, a serious candidate when trying to discover a c‐state's place in concrete reality. (shrink)