This study analyzes the metaphoric and metonymic nature ofbaş/kafa‘head’ in Turkish idiomatic expressions from a cognitive linguistic perspective. The database for the study is composed of idioms containing the two head-denoting wordsbaşandkafa. Idioms and their definitions are analyzed in terms of their figurative uses of abstract concepts, and the conceptual metaphors and metonymies are identified. Findings are examined under five categories: head as the representative of the person, the seat of mental faculties, the locus of emotions, the sign of superiority/power, (...) and the sign of value. The study proposes a cultural model in which the image schemaswhole-part,containmentandverticalityplay a key role, and reveals cross-cultural similarities and differences in the conceptualization ofhead. The study also provides further support for the embodiment thesis, and underscores the impact of cultural processes in shaping the way the body is conceptualized. (shrink)

This paper aims at providing a better understanding of the workings of political rhetoric in the discourse of Hizbollah by examining relatively underexplored socio-cognitive dimensions in production and reception of political speeches. It argues for the centrality of the macro-linguistic textual notion of hybrid genres to the understanding of the socio-cultural makeup of speaker–audience relations and dynamics. The adequateness and uniqueness of the Lebanese, and by extension, the Middle-Eastern context are more clearly evident in the overwhelming dominance of dogmatic discourses (...) which, I argue, both trigger and aid the perpetual construction and reconstruction of ideologically susceptible audiences. Elements of these discourses such as religious, political, military and even literary blend in a unique way in public, normally political, speeches to produce a type of hybrid genre which helps construct constantly shifting audience roles with varying effective power. A pragmatic–stylistic analysis of the discourse of conflict, I propose, can help provide a starting point for understanding the complexity of the rhetorical situation in the region especially in the context of continuously rising extremism. (shrink)

Fleck's Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact foregrounds claims traditionally excluded from reception, often regarded as opposed to fact, scientific claims that are increasingly seldom discussed in connection with philosophy of science save as examples of pseudoscience. I am especially concerned with scientists who question the epidemiological link between HIV and AIDS and who are thereby discounted—no matter their credentials, no matter the cogency of their arguments, no matter the sobriety of their statistics—but also with other classic examples of (...) so-called pseudoscience including homeopathy and other sciences, such as cold fusion. The pseudoscience version of the demarcation problem turns out to include some of the details that Latour articulates multifariously under a variety of species or kinds in his essay/interactive research project/monograph, ‘Biography of an Investigation’. Given the economic constraints of the current day, especially in the academy, the growing trend in almost all disc.. (shrink)

This paper looks at the metaphorical and metonymic expressions derived fromnsa, ‘hand’. I will analyse and discuss hand metaphoric and metonymic expressions in relation with the universal concept of the agility and versatility of the hand as an important aspect of the human being. The paper projects the concept of the hand in the Akan cultural system and looks at how it has expanded into compound words, idioms and proverbs. We will look at the cognitive, semantics, sociolinguistics and pragmatics ofnsa, (...) ‘hand’. The paper is discussed under the theory of conceptual metaphor as expounded by Lakoff and Johnson and followed by many scholars in the western world, Asia and Africa. (shrink)

This paper explains how recent changes in the ways we study other animals to better understand the human faculty of language are indicative of changing narratives concerning the intelligence of other animals. Uexküll’s concept of Umwelt as a species-specific model of the world is essential to understanding the semiotic abilities of all organisms, including humans. From this follows the view that human language is primarily a cognitive tool for making models of the world. This view is consistent with the basic (...) premises of cognitive linguistics. The rejection of behaviorism in linguistics represents a turning point in the history of animal studies. The resulting criticism of long-term studies with primates illustrates this shift concerning the study of wild animals within the language sciences and beyond. New insights in dog cognition and research on the processing of human language in canines are reflective of a change in focus away from anthropocentrism towards the species-specific semiotic abilities of animals in the twenty-first century. This new orientation away from comparing animal sign-systems to human language and the importance of studying intelligent wild animals in the wild instead of in captivity have lead to an important re-evaluation of our relationship with other animals and our views of their cognitive and semiotic profiles. This leads to questions such as what role non-human organisms can play in the language sciences, and what our limitations are of studying the sign systems of other animals. Recent research on the signifying abilities of wild dolphins, for instance, has identified a new set of characteristics by which to study intelligence in other species. (shrink)

In this paper, we aim at explaining the relevance of thought experiments in philosophy and the history of science by describing them as particular instances of two categories of creative thinking: metaphorical reasoning and abductive cognition. As a result of this definition, we will claim that TEs hold an ignorance-preserving trait that is evidenced in both TEs inferential structure and in the process of scenario creation they presuppose. Elaborating this thesis will allow us to explain the wonder that philosophers of (...) science have consistently shown for TEs, as well as the high functionality of TEs in the creative aspects of scientific and philosophical praxis. (shrink)

Previous studies have considered different forms of economic and/or cultural appropriation between status-unequal groups, for example young, White, middle-class people cashing in on the music of urban, African-American culture. In this paper, however, we are interested in what we call ‘lateral appropriation’, the process whereby the discursive capital of one marginalized group is usurped by another similarly marginalized group. In particular, drawing illustrative data from a number of organizational websites, we examine the atheist movement's remetaphorized use of the homosexual ‘closet’ (...) and the related notion of ‘coming out’. Within the framework of critical discourse analysis, we view this particular instance of appropriation as a discursive recontextualization achieved primarily by strategically establishing certain ‘relations of equivalence’ which allow atheists to invoke a more immediately recognized identity politics. Specifically, we show how their appeals to the closet metaphor provide a cathartic vehicle for individual identity formation, activate a marginalized status, and mobilize political action. On this basis, we reflect on the consequences this lateral appropriation might have for the personal and political experiences of homosexuals in the context of a hegemonic order in which marginalized groups are bound to compete over reduced material and symbolic resources. (shrink)

The intentionality of improvisation represents surely one of the most pressing and controversial issues in contemporary action theory: how do we find the way to characterize the proper intentionality of improvisation, which is an unplanned yet intentional action? This article will address this question bringing together Merleau-Ponty’s motor intentionality and Bergson’s conception of duration. My argument will unfold in three main stages. First, I will briefly describe the traditional scheme that is used to think of intentional action in contemporary action (...) theory and discuss how the phenomenon of improvisation casts doubts on it. Second, I will outline an initial, and provisional account of improvisation by crossing the descriptions of musical improvisation provided by Jankélévitch with the testimonials of two improvisatory composers—Enrico Pieranunzi and Keith Jarrett—and reports from Charles Rosen, an American pianist and Roger Sessions, an American composer. Finally, I will refine the basic concepts and lay out a phenomenological account of improvisation, by extending and applying the phenomenological notion of motor intentionality to the examples and testimonials gathered from the observation of a specific kind of improvisatory activity—musical composition. This methodology is intended to contrast both with more standard philosophical approaches based on hypothetical examples, and with more standard laboratory-based methodologies in cognitive sciences, psychology, and experimental philosophy. Overall, this approach is intended to redress the balance of action theory—one-sided directed towards planning, as a key aspect of human agency—with an analysis of the bodily and responsive aspect of intentionality. (shrink)

Abstract: The massive redeployment hypothesis (MRH) is a theory about the functional topography of the human brain, offering a middle course between strict localization on the one hand, and holism on the other. Central to MRH is the claim that cognitive evolution proceeded in a way analogous to component reuse in software engineering, whereby existing components-originally developed to serve some specific purpose-were used for new purposes and combined to support new capacities, without disrupting their participation in existing programs. If the (...) evolution of cognition was indeed driven by such exaptation, then we should be able to make some specific empirical predictions regarding the resulting functional topography of the brain. This essay discusses three such predictions, and some of the evidence supporting them. Then, using this account as a background, the essay considers the implications of these findings for an account of the functional integration of cognitive operations. For instance, MRH suggests that in order to determine the functional role of a given brain area it is necessary to consider its participation across multiple task categories, and not just focus on one, as has been the typical practice in cognitive neuroscience. This change of methodology will motivate (even perhaps necessitate) the development of a new, domain-neutral vocabulary for characterizing the contribution of individual brain areas to larger functional complexes, and direct particular attention to the question of how these various area roles are integrated and coordinated to result in the observed cognitive effect. Finally, the details of the mix of cognitive functions a given area supports should tell us something interesting not just about the likely computational role of that area, but about the nature of and relations between the cognitive functions themselves. For instance, growing evidence of the role of “motor” areas like M1, SMA and PMC in language processing, and of “language” areas like Broca’s area in motor control, offers the possibility for significantly reconceptualizing the nature both of language and of motor control. (shrink)

Scientific medicine has been successful by ways of an ever more detailed understanding and mastering of bodily functions and dysfunctions. Biomedical research promises new triumphs, but discontent with medical practice is all around. Since several decades this has been acknowledged and discussed. The philosophical traditions of phenomenology and hermeneutics have been proposed as promising ways to approach medical practice, by ways of a richer understanding of the meaning structures of health and illness. In 2000, Swedish philosopher Fredrik Svenaeus published a (...) book where he proposes that the phenomenological hermeneutics of Martin Heidegger and also the reflections on health and illness of Hans-Georg Gadamer offer important ways to approach the nature of medicine. In particular, Svenaeus argues that the goal of medicine is to promote and restore health, and that health ought to be seen as “homelike being-in-the-world”. Unhealth, illness, consequently should be understood as a situation where a person’s “being-in-the-world” in characterized by that lack of the rhythm, balance and “tune” of everyday living that characterizes not “being at home”. In this article, Svenaeus’ position is briefly outlined. Questions are raised whether “unhomelikeness” is to be seen as a metaphor, and, if so, if it is a fruitful such. Furthermore, I discuss whether or not a discourse on health and illness in these terms may be misleading in a situation where the ontological presuppositions of Heidegger are lost out of sight and the popular understanding of health psychology predominates. I also approach the question whether Svenaeus’ assumptions may inadvertently lead us to an unjustifiably broad understanding of the tasks of medicine. It is finally concluded that Svenaeus phenomenological and hermeneutical approach is both interesting and promising. There are, however, several questions that ought to be pursued further, and the step from philosophical analysis to everyday clinical discourse may be unexpectedly long and risky. (shrink)

This paper looks at the metaphorical and metonymic expressions derived from nsa, ‘hand’. I will analyse and discuss hand metaphoric and metonymic expressions in relation with the universal concept of the agility and versatility of the hand as an important aspect of the human being. The paper projects the concept of the hand in the Akan cultural system and looks at how it has expanded into compound words, idioms and proverbs. We will look at the cognitive, semantics, sociolinguistics and pragmatics (...) of nsa, ‘hand’. The paper is discussed under the theory of conceptual metaphor as expounded by Lakoff and Johnson and followed by many scholars in the western world, Asia and Africa. (shrink)

In this article, we draw upon the Conceptual Profile Theory to discuss the negotiation of meanings related to the energy concept in an 11th grade physics classroom. This theory is based on the heterogeneity of verbal thinking, that is, on the idea that any individual or society does not represent concepts in a single way. According to this perspective, the processes of conceptualization consist of the use of a repertoire of different socially stabilized signifiers, adjusted to the context in which (...) they occur. We start by proposing zones of a conceptual profile model for energy, each zone being characterized by its own commitments and identifiable by certain modes of talking about energy. Based on classroom evidence, we claim that teachers and students negotiate meanings that interpenetrate the domains of everyday and scientific knowledge. Being inevitable and necessary, this heterogeneity of conceptual thinking needs to be considered in teaching design in order to allow its awareness on the part of the students. We argue that students’ conceptual development goals should be considered in terms of general goals of science education, which points to the need of overcoming the encapsulation of scientific school knowledge. We show that the Conceptual Profile Theory provides a basis for science education that can promote the crossing of cultural boundaries, seeking relations between science and the spheres of everyday life. (shrink)

We argue that abduction does not work in isolation from other inference mechanisms and illustrate this through an inference scheme designed to evaluate multiple hypotheses. We use game theory to relate the abductive system to actions that produce new information. To enable evaluation of the implications of this approach we have implemented the procedures used to calculate the impact of new information in a computer model. Experiments with this model display a number of features of collective belief-revision leading to consensus-formation, (...) such as the influence of bias and prejudice. The scheme of inferential calculations invokes a Peircian concept of ‘belief’ as the propensity to choose a particular course of action. (shrink)

Although researchers have paid much attention to the journey metaphor (e.g., Forceville, 2006a, 2011a, 2011b; Forceville & Jeulink, 2011), little seems known about its role for moral political cognition. Using data from the US and UK public discourses on the Euro crisis as an example, this paper draws on Lakoff’s (1996) Moral Politics Theory, demonstrating that the journey metaphor can play a crucial role for political cognition, and especially for moral political judgment.

Although researchers have paid much attention to the journey metaphor (e.g., Forceville, 2006a, 2011a, 2011b; Forceville & Jeulink, 2011), little seems known about its role for moral political cognition. Using data from the US and UK public discourses on the Euro crisis as an example, this paper draws on Lakoff’s (1996) Moral Politics Theory, demonstrating that the journey metaphor can play a crucial role for political cognition, and especially for moral political judgment.

Metaphor has a double life. It can be described as a directional process in which a stable, familiar base domain provides inferential structure to a less clearly specified target. But metaphor is also described as a process of finding commonalities, an inherently symmetric process. In this second view, both concepts may be altered by the metaphorical comparison. Whereas most theories of metaphor capture one of these aspects, we offer a model based on structure-mapping that captures both sides of metaphor processing. (...) This predicts (a) an initial processing stage of symmetric alignment; and (b) a later directional phase in which inferences are projected to the target. To test these claims, we collected comprehensibility judgments for forward (e.g., “A rumor is a virus”) and reversed (“A virus is a rumor”) metaphors at early and late stages of processing, using a deadline procedure. We found an advantage for the forward direction late in processing, but no directional preference early in processing. Implications for metaphor theory are discussed. (shrink)

A crucial question for a process view of life is how to identify a process and how to follow it through time. The genidentity view can contribute decisively to this project. It says that the identity through time of an entity X is given by a well-identified series of continuous states of affairs. Genidentity helps address the problem of diachronic identity in the living world. This chapter describes the centrality of the concept of genidentity for David Hull and proposes an (...) extension of Hull’s view to the ubiquitous phenomenon of symbiosis. Finally, using immunology as a key example, it shows that the genidentity view suggests that the main interest of a process approach is epistemological rather than ontological and that its principal claim is one of priority, namely that processes precede and define things, and not vice versa. (shrink)

"And I Quote": Direct and Indirect Point-of-View Switches in Clusivity-Oriented Discourse The aim of this paper is to approach the notion of speech/thought representation from a pragma-cognitive perspective. The use of direct and indirect representation in political discourse allows the speaker to construe the speech situation from a perspective other than her/his own. The speaker normally occupies the focal position in relation to other discourse entities in a particular speech situation, and thus presents discourse events from her/his point of view, (...) however, on some occasions she/he allows other "voices." It is the distinction between the Speaker and the Sayer that provides means of capturing the phenomenon in question: the Speaker construes the actual/present speech situation presenting events from her/his own perspective, while in the represented speech situation the Speaker represents the words of the Sayer, i.e. the original speaker of the represented speech situation. Assuming the existence of the Sayer's consciousness separate from the Speaker's consciousness, it is clear that the Sayer's perspective is independent of the Speaker's perspective. The Speaker may employ a series of shifts occurring in spatio-temporal and axiological dimensions of the actual speech situation leading either to a full switch or to an apparent switch to the Sayer's perspective. In both cases, the distance between the Speaker and a particular discourse entity may be reduced or increased to indicate its inclusionary or exclusionary status, as well as to include the entity in or exclude it from the "us" group. The data analysed and samples used for illustrative purposes have been selected from a corpus of 35 speeches delivered by Barack Obama between 10th February 2007, i.e. the announcement of his candidacy for the presidency of the USA, and 4th November 2008, i.e. the day of the election. The transcripts of the speeches have been downloaded from the official Obama's website "Organizing for America". (shrink)

The Pragmatics of Multi-Verb Sequences: The Case of the Verb Go This paper is an empirical investigation into the nature of multi-verb sequences in English. Multi-verb sequences such as V-to-VP and V-and-VP present a natural construction type of investigating recurring patterns of event sequences as conceived situations. This paper focuses on the image-schematic properties of both the go-to-VP construction and the go-and-VP construction to which previous accounts have paid little attention, and it demonstrates that the interpretation of the image-schemas has (...) enhanced research. The go-to-VP and the go-and-VP constructions require different image schemas. With respect to the go-to-VP construction, the SOURCE-PATH-GOAL schema plays an important role; sometimes a compound image schema of that type are necessary. Specifically, the image-schematic properties of the first verb go are incorporated into the event structure of the second verb to allow the speaker to construe the event denoted by the second verb in accordance with the image-schematic meaning of the first verb go. Consequently, this paper offers a pragmatic and cognitive account of the two constructions respectively. Some results in a data-driven analysis in this paper also reinforce selected convincing explanations. (shrink)

Fundamental to spatial knowledge in all species are the representations underlying object recognition, object search, and navigation through space. But what sets humans apart from other species is our ability to express spatial experience through language. This target article explores the language ofobjectsandplaces, asking what geometric properties are preserved in the representations underlying object nouns and spatial prepositions in English. Evidence from these two aspects of language suggests there are significant differences in the geometric richness with which objects and places (...) are encoded. When an object is named (i.e., with count nouns), detailed geometric properties – principally the object's shape (axes, solid and hollow volumes, surfaces, and parts) – are represented. In contrast, when an object plays the role of either “figure” (located object) or “ground” (reference object) in a locational expression, only very coarse geometric object properties are represented, primarily the main axes. In addition, the spatial functions encoded by spatial prepositions tend to be nonmetric and relatively coarse, for example, “containment,” “contact,” “relative distance,” and “relative direction.” These properties are representative of other languages as well. The striking differences in the way language encodes objects versus places lead us to suggest two explanations: First, there is a tendency for languages to level out geometric detail from both object and place representations. Second, a nonlinguistic disparity between the representations of “what” and “where” underlies how language represents objects and places. The language of objects and places converges with and enriches our understanding of corresponding spatial representations. (shrink)

Chomskyian claims of a genetically hard-wired and cognitively autonomous “universal grammar” are being promoted by generative linguistics as facts about language to the present day. The related doctrine of an evolutionary discontinuity in language emergence, however, is based on misconceptions about the notions of homology and preadaptation. The obvious lack of equivalence between symbolic communicative capacities in existing nonhuman primates and human language does not preclude common roots. Normal and disordered language development is strongly influenced by the genome, but there (...) is no evidence for the existence of specific genes underlying “universal grammar.” In the mature brain, stages of language processing can be distinguished and “first-pass” syntactic analyses appear to precede semantic decoding. However, this partial seriality – as well as behavioral and clinical dissociations between lexical and functional categories – can be best described, not in terms of serially activated and discrete modules, but in terms of classes of cell assemblies that differ in their distributional properties. Whereas cell assemblies involved in semantic interpretation (“content word” assemblies) are widely distributed and are generally less vulnerable to focal lesion, those involved in structural decoding (functor assemblies) are primarily distributed within the left perisylvian cortices and are selectively vulnerable to left perisylvian lesion. These distributional differences are explained in terms of the perceptuomotor components involved in the acquisition of relevant representations. The emerging “motivated” or “toposemantic” brain regional specificity can only be accommodated with “soft” and maturational versions of modularity. The failure to reproduce double dissociations in current connectionist models is due to overly simple neuroscientific assumptions, notably that of overall equipotentiality. Linguistic models should not be expected to be “implemented” in the brain, but need to be constrained by neuroscientific evidence on how biological brains function. (shrink)

Contrary to Müller's claims, and in support of modular theories, genetic factors play a substantial and significant role in language. The finding that some children with specific language impairment (SLI) have nonlinguistic impairments may reflect improper diagnosis of SLI or impairments that are secondary to linguistic impairments. Thus, such findings do not argue against the modularity thesis. The lexical/functional distinction appears to be innate and specifically linguistic and could be instantiated in either symbolic or connectionist systems.

The belief that syntax is an innate, autonomous, species-specific module is highly questionable. Syntax demonstrates the mosaic nature of evolutionary change, in that it made use of (and led to the enhancement of) numerous preexisting neurocognitive features. It is best understood as an emergent characteristic of the explosion of semantic complexity that occurred during hominid evolution.

Müller's target article aims to summarize approaches to the question of how language elements (phonemes, morphemes, etc.) and rules are laid down in the brain. However, it suffers from being too vague about basic assumptions and empirical predictions of neurobiological models, and the empirical evidence available to test the models is not appropriately evaluated. (1) In a neuroscientific model of language, different cortical localizations of words can only be based on biological principles. These need to be made explicit. (2) Evidence (...) for and against word class differences could be evaluated more rigorously. (3) All (and only) humans are able to learn languages with complex syntactic structures; it is, therefore, not appropriate to deny innateness and universality of syntactic principles. The real question appears to be the following: Which neurobiological principles are the linguistic principles based on? (shrink)

The concepts of the innateness, universality, species-specificity, and autonomy of the human language capacity have had an extreme impact on the psycholinguistic debate for over thirty years. These concepts are evaluated from several neurobiological perspectives, with an emphasis on the emergence of language and its decay due to brain lesion and progressive brain disease.Evidence of perceptuomotor homologies and preadaptations for human language in nonhuman primates suggests a gradual emergence of language during hominid evolution. Regarding ontogeny, the innate component of language (...) capacity is likely to be polygenic and shared with other developmental domains. Dissociations between verbal and nonverbal development are probably rooted in the perceptuomotor specializations of neural substrates rather than the autonomy of a grammar module. Aphasiologicaldata often assumed to suggest modular linguistic subsystems can be accounted for in terms of a neurofunctional model incorporating perceptuomotor-based regional specializationsand distributivity of representations. Thus, dissociations between grammatical functors and content words are due to different conditions of acquisition and resulting differences in neural representation. Human brains are characterized by multifactorial interindividual variability, and strict universality of functional organization is biologically unrealistic.A theoretical alternative is proposed according to which (1) linguistic specialization of brain areas is due to epigenetic and probabilistic maturational events, not to genetic ”hard-wiring,” and (2) linguistic knowledge is neurally represented in distributed cell assemblies whose topography reflects the perceptuomotor modalities involved in the acquisition and use of a given item of knowledge. (shrink)

What is the nature of number systems and arithmetic that we use in science for quantification, analysis, and modeling? I argue that number concepts and arithmetic are neither hardwired in the brain, nor do they exist out there in the universe. Innate subitizing and early cognitive preconditions for number— which we share with many other species—cannot provide the foundations for the precision, richness, and range of number concepts and simple arithmetic, let alone that of more complex mathematical concepts. Numbers and (...) arithmetic, and mathematics in general, have unique features—precision, objectivity, rigor, generalizability, stability, symbolizability, and applicability to the real world—that must be accounted for. They are sophisticated concepts that developed culturally only in recent human history. I suggest that numbers and arithmetic are realized through precise combinations of non-mathematical everyday cognitive mechanisms that make human imagination and abstraction possible. One such mechanism, conceptual metaphor, is a neurally instantiated inference-preserving cross-domain mapping that allows the conceptualization of abstract entities in terms of grounded bodily experience. I analyze how the inferential organization of the properties and “laws” of arithmetic emerge metaphorically from everyday meaningful actions. Numbers and arithmetic are thus—outside of natural selection—the product of the biologically constrained interaction of individuals with the appropriate cultural and historical phenotypic variation supported by language, writing systems, and education. (shrink)

Biosemiotics belongs to a class of approaches that provide mental models of life since it applies some semiotic concepts in the explanation of natural phenomena. Such approaches are typically open to anthropomorphic errors. Usually, the main source of such errors is the excessive vagueness of the semiotic concepts used. If the goal of biosemiotics is to be accepted as a science and not as a priori metaphysics, it needs both an appropriate source of the semiotic concepts and a reliable method (...) of adjusting them for biosemiotic use. Charles S. Peirce’s philosophy offers a plausible candidate for both these needs. Biosemioticians have adopted not only Peirce’s semiotic concepts but also a number of metaphysical ones. It is shown that the application of Peirce’s basic semiotic conceptions of sign and sign-process (semiosis) at the substantial level of biosemiotics requires the acceptance of certain metaphysical conceptions, i.e. Tychism and Synechism. Peirce’s method of pragmaticism is of great relevance to biosemiotics: 1. Independently of whether Peirce’s concepts are used or even applicable at the substantial level of biosemiotics, Peirce’s method remains valuable in making biosemiotics and especially in adjusting its basic concepts. 2. If Peircean semeiotic or metaphysics is applied at the substantial level of biosemiotics, pragmaticism is valuable in clarifying the meaning and reference of the applied Peircean concepts. As a consequence, some restrictions for the application of Peirce in biosemiotics are considered and the distinction of Peirce’s philosophy from the 19th century idealistic Naturphilosophie is emphasized. (shrink)

Instead of presuming the ‘observer’ as given, we are (re)sensing the observer and are thereby offering an ‘open order cybernetics’ (OOC). We are first of all concerned about our acquisition and use of language as the precondition for any meaningful statement. This self-reflexive point of departure distinguishes our project from philosophers who are presuming ‘something’ (‘closure’, ‘selforganization’, ‘self ’, ‘auto-poiesis’, ‘senses’, ‘objects’, ‘subjects’, ‘language’, ‘nervous systems’ etc.) in the first place without being aware of their presumptions i.e. that they are (...) able to already talk meaningfully about ‘something’. We are undertaking a self-reflexive loop towards our already undertaken ‘meaningful’ actions, reflecting inside our concepts on our concepts, trying to find out how our concepts about ‘something’ have come into existence. We are reflecting on our concepts through this ongoing open investigation. We are sketching the ramifications of such a self-reflexive loop for epistemology as well as for the main research areas within cognitive science (i.e. language acquisition, perception, consciousness). We are also pointing towards virtual reality in combination with the arts as an awareness aid, helping us in our self-reflexive endeavours. (shrink)

This volume reflects the development and theoretical foundation of a new paradigm for critical thinking based on inquiry. The field of critical thinking, as manifested in the Informal Logic movement, developed primarily as a response to the inadequacies of formalism to represent actual argumentative practice and to provide useful argumentative skills to students. Because of this, the primary focus of the field has been on informal arguments rather than formal reasoning. Yet the formalist history of the field is still evident (...) in its emphasis, with respect to both theory and pedagogy, on the structure and evaluation of individual, de-contextualized arguments. It is our view that such a view of critical thinking is excessively narrow and limited, failing to provide an understanding of argumentation as largely a matter of comparative evaluation of a variety of contending positions and arguments with the goal of reaching a reasoned judgment on an issue. As a consequence, traditional critical thinking instruction is problematic in failing to provide the reasoning skills that students need in order to accomplish this goal. Instead, the goal of critical thinking instruction has been seen largely as a defensive one: of learning to not fall prey to invalid, inadequate, or fallacious arguments. (shrink)

This volume focuses on dialogue and argumentation in contexts which are marked by truculence and discord. The contributors include well known argumentation scholars who discuss the issues this raises from the point of view of a variety of disciplines and points of view. The authors seek to address theoretically challenging issues in a way that is relevant to both the theory and the practice of argument. The collection brings together selected essays from the 2006 11th Wake Forest University Biennial Argumentation (...) Conference held at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Florida and the 2012 14th Wake Forest University Biennial Argumentation Conference held at Casa Artom in Venice, Italy. (shrink)

A study of the interactions between mathematics and cognitive science, carried out within a historical perspective, is important for a better understanding of mathematics education in the present. This is evident when analysing the contribution made by the epistemological theories of Ernst Mach. On the basis of such theories, a didactic method was developed, which was used in the teaching of mathematics in Austria at the beginning of the twentieth century and applied to different subjects ranging from simple operations in (...) arithmetic to calculus. Besides the relevance of this method—also named the “Jacob method” after Josef Jacob who proposed it—to teaching practice, it could also be considered interesting in a wider context with reference to the mind-body problem. In particular, the importance that Jacob gives to “muscular activity” in the process of forming and elaborating mathematical concepts, derived from Mach, resounds in the current debate on embodied cognition, where cognitive processes are understood not as expressions of an abstract and merely computational mind but as based on our physicality as human beings, equipped not just with a brain but also a body. This model has been applied to mathematics in the “theory of embodied mathematics”, the objective of which is to study, with the methods and apparatus of embodied cognitive science, the cognitive mechanisms used in the human creation and conceptualisation of mathematics. The present article shows that the “Jacob method” may be considered a historical example of didactical application of analogous ideas. (shrink)

A few purported counterexamples to the Adams thesis have cropped up in the literature in the last few decades. I propose a theory that accounts for them, in a way that makes the connections between indicative conditionals and counterfactuals clearer.

Drawing on insights from contemporary studies on conceptual metaphor and multimodal metaphor, the present study proposes a tentative analysis of multimodal metaphorical argument from the perspective of the extended theory of pragma-dialectics. A case, Liqun Commercial, is presented as an illustration. This commercial proves to use a conceptual metaphor, life is a journey, that underlies a multimodal metaphorical argument. The conceptual metaphor is highly acceptable in the cultural context of the Chinese target audience. Due to the restrictions imposed by the (...) institutional context, the commercial tries to convince the audience by using implicit argumentative means. In this endeavor, multimodal metaphorical argument is used to enhance the commercial’s effectiveness by foregrounding through framing the aspects the protagonist desires to show and by using a strategy to evade sanctions for ignoring institutional constraints. (shrink)

Prompted by what is seen as a missing analysis in the discussions about passion and affect in education, this essay attempts to clarify and provide a context for understanding the contribution of Foucault in the discourse of passion. In particular, the author traces the politics of passion in Foucault's work. A ‘politics of passion’ is the analysis that challenges the cultural and historical emotional rules with respect to what passion is, how it is expressed, who gets to express it and (...) under what circumstances. It is argued that a discussion of Foucault's ideas on passion provides a way of sharpening and clarifying his politics on affect, particularly what is relevant to individual and collective emotional control in education. (shrink)

Over the past century or so, questions concerning the word ‘meaning’ have been understandably prominent in the field of the philosophy of language. There is, however, a historical aspect to the debate that is of especial interest to literary critics – the fact that verbs and expressions of meaning have been applied to different kinds of things in a number of languages spanning the western literary tradition. I shall introduce the topic by focussing on the Latin expressionsibi uelleand on how (...) Roman authors exploited its ambiguities for the purposes of humour (§§ I and II). I shall then move on to a discussion of a later Latin phrase familiar from the pages of the Virgilian commentator Servius,hoc uult dicere, and argue that the assumptions we have about expressions of meaning may lead us to adopt a particular interpretation of it (§§ III and IV). In the final part of the paper (§§ V, VI and VII) I shall proceed to a discussion of why it is important for modern literary critics to pay attention to how they use verbs such as ‘to mean’: I argue that the different functions of the verb facilitate a personification of the text that allows us to equivocate about the role of the author. (shrink)

Following the theory of conceptual metaphor in cognitive linguistics, this paper studies a predominant conceptual metaphor in the understanding of the heart in ancient Chinese philosophy: THE HEART IS THE RULER OF THE BODY. The most important conceptual mapping of this metaphor consists in the perceived correspondence between the mental power of the heart and the political power of the ruler. The Chinese heart is traditionally regarded as the organ of thinking and reasoning, as well as feeling. As such, it (...) is conceptualized as the central faculty of cognition. This cultural conceptualization differs fundamentally from the Western dualism that upholds the reason-emotion dichotomy, as represented by the binary contrast between mind and heart in particular, and mind and body in general. It is found that the HEART AS RULER metaphor has a mirror image, namely THE RULER IS THE HEART OF THE COUNTRY. The ruler as the "heart" of the country leads his nation while guided by his own heart as the "ruler" of his body. It is argued that the two-way metaphorical mappings are based on the overarching beliefs of ancient Chinese philosophy in the unity and correspondence between the microcosm of man and the macrocosm of universe. It is suggested that the conceptualization of the heart in ancient Chinese philosophy, which is basically metaphorical in nature, is still spread widely across Chinese culture today. (shrink)