This paper extends earlier work by its authors on formal aspects of the processes of contracting a theory to eliminate a proposition and revising a theory to introduce a proposition. In the course of the earlier work, Gardenfors developed general postulates of a more or less equational nature for such processes, whilst Alchourron and Makinson studied the particular case of contraction functions that are maximal, in the sense of yielding a maximal subset of the theory (or alternatively, of one of (...) its axiomatic bases), that fails to imply the proposition being eliminated. In the present paper, the authors study a broader class, including contraction functions that may be less than maximal. Specifically, they investigate "partial meet contraction functions", which are defined to yield the intersection of some nonempty family of maximal subsets of the theory that fail to imply the proposition being eliminated. Basic properties of these functions are established: it is shown in particular that they satisfy the Gardenfors postulates, and moreover that they are sufficiently general to provide a representation theorem for those postulates. Some special classes of partial meet contraction functions, notably those that are "relational" and "transitively relational", are studied in detail, and their connections with certain "supplementary postulates" of Gardenfors investigated, with a further representation theorem established. (shrink)

What are 'emotions'? This book offers a balanced survey of facts and theory.

One of science's greatest intellects examines how people and animals display fear, anger, and pleasure. Darwin based this 1872 study on his personal observations, which anticipated later findings in neuroscience. Abounding in anecdotes and literary quotations, the book is illustrated with 21 figures and seven photographic plates. Its direct approach, accessible to professionals and amateurs alike, continues to inspire and inform modern research in psychology.

Emotions imply a revision of our beliefs inasmuch as they are triggered by a discrepancy between our expectancies and new situations. I will study the converse relation: how emotions, particularly recurrent emotions that reappear in similar situations in the long term, are incentives to revise not only our beliefs but also the order of priorities between their related desires. Understanding how affects can revise both beliefs—under their committing aspect—and the order of desires, implies seeing the dynamics of affects as interacting (...) with external dynamics and the order of priorities as a weak one (“pseudo-distance”; Schlechta, 2004). These philosophical considerations shed new light on the diversity of emotions, on their different temporalities, and on the paradox of emotional sharing. (shrink)

In this work the distinguished physical chemist and philosopher, Michael Polanyi, demonstrates that the scientist's personal participation in his knowledge, in both its discovery and its validation, is an indispensable part of science itself. Even in the exact sciences, "knowing" is an art, of which the skill of the knower, guided by his personal commitment and his passionate sense of increasing contact with reality, is a logically necessary part. In the biological and social sciences this becomes even more evident. The (...) tendency to make knowledge impersonal in our culture has split fact from value, science from humanity. Polanyi wishes to substitute for the objective, impersonal ideal of scientific detachment an alternative ideal which gives attention to the personal involvement of the knower in all acts of understanding. His book should help to restore science to its rightful place in an integrated culture, as part of the whole person's continuing endeavor to make sense of the totality of his experience. In honor of this work and his The Study of Man Polanyi was presented with the Lecomte de Noüy Award for 1959. (shrink)

This chapter provides an overview of the issues involved in recent debates about the epistemological relevance of emotions. We first survey some key issues in epistemology and the theory of emotions that inform various assessments of emotions’ potential significance in epistemology. We then distinguish five epistemic functions that have been claimed for emotions: motivational force, salience and relevance, access to facts and beliefs, non-propositional contributions to knowledge and understanding, and epistemic efficiency. We identify two core issues in the discussions about (...) such epistemic functions of emotions: First, even though it is plausible that emotions are involved in epistemic processes, it may be doubted whether they really matter for the normative question of what counts as knowledge or justified belief. Second, some of the epistemic functions claimed for emotions in general may only be attributed to some specifically epistemic emotions, which have been present all along in traditional epistemology, albeit under different labels such as ‘intuitions’. (shrink)

In this paper we integrate claims and findings concerning the social functions of emotions at the individual, dyadic, group, and cultural levels of analysis. Across levels of analysis theorists assume that emotions solve problems important to social relationships in the context of ongoing interactions. Theorists diverge, however, in their assumptions about the origins, defining characteristics, and consequences of emotions, and in their preferred forms of data. We illustrate the differences and compatibilities among these levels of analysis for the specific case (...) of embarrassment. We close by suggesting research strategies that incorporate a social-functional perspective. (shrink)

Based on the belief that computational modeling (thinking in terms of representation and computations) can help to clarify controversial issues in emotion theory, this article examines emotional experience from the perspective of the Computational Belief–Desire Theory of Emotion (CBDTE), a computational explication of the belief–desire theory of emotion. It is argued that CBDTE provides plausible answers to central explanatory challenges posed by emotional experience, including: the phenomenal quality,intensity and object-directedness of emotional experience, the function of emotional experience and its relation (...) to cognition and motivation, and the relation between emotional experience and emotion. In addition, CBDTE avoids most objections that have been raised against cognitive theories of emotion. A remaining objection, that beliefs are not necessary for the emotions covered by CBDTE, is rejected as empirically unsupported. (shrink)

Drawing from religion and the human sciences, particularly psychology after Freud, the author attempts to demonstrate that the fear of death is man's central ...

This book reformulates the sociological subdiscipline known as the sociology of knowledge. Knowledge is presented as more than ideology, including as well false consciousness, propaganda, science and art.

Le present volume rassemble plusieurs etudes qu' Alfred Schutz avait consacrees a diverses questions qui gravitent autour d'un probleme philosophique majeur: celui de la socialite. La plupart de ces etudes ont Me publiees ailleurs, mais elles etaient dispersees et d'un acces parfois difficile. Tel quel, l'ouvrage que nous presentons n' est que la premiere partie d'un ensemble dans lequell'auteur se proposait de faire reunir par son disciple et ami Maurice Natanson les nombreux essais qu'il avait ecrits depuis son arrivee aux (...) Etats-Unis au debut de la demiere guerre. La mort l'empecha de voir realiser ce projet. 11 nous a semble que la pUblication successive de cet ensemble, dans la fidelite aux indications laissees par l'auteur, etait Ie plus bel hommage que nous pussions rendre a ce penseur qui fut notre ami et meritait sans nul doute de tenir dans Ie courant phenomenologique une place de premier plan que faillirent lui refuser les circonstances dramatiques de sa vie, jointes a sa trop grande modestie per­ sonnelle. II me faudrait ici parler de l'homme, evoquer sa finesse d'esprit, son ironie penetrante, sa serenite et son courage dans l' exil, l' event ail tres vaste de ses preoccupations, Ie don de jeu­ nesse et de sympathie grftce auquel il entreprit a quarante ans d'assimiler avec bonheur une culture nouvelle, pour y exceller bientOt. (shrink)

This first volume contains discussions of the brain, methods for analyzing behavior, thought, consciousness, attention, association, time, and memory.

The general aim of this article is to consider whether various affective phenomena – feelings like the feeling of knowing, of familiarity, of certainty, etc., but also phenomena like curiosity, interest, surprise and trust – which have been labelled “epistemic emotions” in fact constitute a unified kind, i.e., the kind of the so-called “epistemic emotions”. Obviously, for an affective phenomenon to belong to the kind of the epistemic emotions, it has to meet two conditions: it has to qualify, first, as (...) an emotion, and, second, as an epistemic one. The paper is structured accordingly. The first part is devoted to the question whether the aforementioned affective phenomena really are emotions, while the second part bears on their hypothetical common epistemicity. (shrink)

Following the thematic divisions of the first three volumes of Alfred Schutz's Collected Papers into The Problem of Social Reality, Studies in Social Theory and Phenomenological Philosophy, this fourth volume contains drafts of unfinished writings, drafts of published writings, translations of essays previously published in German, and some largely unpublished correspondence. The drafts of published writings contain important material omitted from the published versions, and the unfinished writings offer important insights into Schutz's otherwise unpublished ideas about economic and political theory (...) as well as the theory of law and the state. In addition, a large group contains Schutz's reflections on problems in phenomenological philosophy, including music, which both supplement and add new dimensions to his published thought. All together, the writings in this volume cover Schutz's last 15 years in Europe as well as manuscripts written after his arrival in the USA in 1939. Audience: Students and scholars of phenomenology, social theory and the human sciences in general. (shrink)

We argue that emotion cannot only be conceived of as a short-lived and intrapersonal phenomenon. Rather, based on five theoretical arguments, we propose that the social sharing of an emotional experience forms an integral part of the emotional processes. A series of six studies investigated different aspects of this hypothesis. Study 1 showed that an overwhelming majority of people reported sharing their emotional experiences and that the memories of these experiences tended to come back spontaneously to their consciousness. No difference (...) was found among emotions. Using a different procedure, Studies 2 and 3 replicated these findings in two different populations. In addition, these studies provided indications that women share their experiences with a wider array of individuals than do men. The first three studies did not find any differences among emotions, but they did not include shame. It could be argued that people are less inclined to socially share shame experiences which are typically elicited by breaking social rules. Study 4 specifically investigated this hypothesis. No differences among shame and other emotions were found except for the delay of the first sharing of the experience. Study 5 constituted a first investigation of whether the social sharing of emotion is also a significant process in now Western cultures. A comparison between Dutch and Surinamese people failed to reveal any significant difference. Based on the findings of the first five studies, a correlational model was designed in Study 6. It tested the interrelationships among disruptiveness of the emotion, social sharing, mental rumination, and recovery from the emotion disruption. A coherent pattern of findings emerged, showing that social sharing can be conceived as a bi-dimensional concept defined by features of amount and delay of sharing. In addition, both social sharing and mental rumination varied according to the disruptiveness of the emotion. Surprisingly, however, recovery could not be related to social sharing, mental rumination, or to the time elapsed since the episode. (shrink)

This review demonstrates that an individualist view of emotion and regulation is untenable. First, I question the plausibility of a developmental shift away from social interdependency in emotion regulation. Second, I show that there are multiple reasons for emotional experiences in adults to elicit a process of social sharing of emotion, and I review the supporting evidence. Third, I look at effects that emotion sharing entails at the interpersonal and at the collective levels. Fourth, I examine the contribution of emotional (...) sharing to emotion regulation together with the relevant empirical evidence. Finally, the various functions that the social sharing of emotion fulfills are reviewed and the relevance of the social sharing of emotion for emotion scientists is discussed. (shrink)

Aspects of Schema Theory J. M. Mandler. obligatory. Other researchers have also found a good deal of overlap in the items generated by their subjects for common event sequences, including studies in which very young children are asked to ...

Les émotions ont un rôle important dans nos interactions sociales. Sans émotions, nous avons du mal à faire des choix. Quand notre environnement déçoit nos attentes de manière répétée, nos émotions nous signalent qu'il serait rationnel de changer nos attentes, c'est-à-dire de procéder à des révisions. Le partage des émotions, qui est la clé de notre sentiment d'appartenance à une communauté, nous amène à révéler nos valeurs, parce qu'il permet de résister face à un monde décevant. Si même une fois (...) révisées nos croyances, nos émotions se maintiennent, elles manifestent alors des attentes bien enracinées, qui sont nos valeurs réelles. Pour étudier les valeurs collectives, il faut donc étudier les émotions, la manière dont elles incitent à des révisions, et comment leur partage collectif renforce nos résistances. La rationalité morale s'appuie sur les émotions. Celles-ci sont sensibles aux détails des situations, et cette rationalité dépend des contextes, si bien qu'elle propose des arguments qui restent révisables quand le contexte change. Ne résistent à toute révision que nos sentiments d'injustice. L'originalité de ce livre est donc d'étudier les émotions et les valeurs, individuelles et collectives, dans la dynamique de leurs changements, de leurs révisions et de leurs résistances, et d'utiliser ce lien entre émotions et révisions pour mieux définir la spécificité d'une rationalité morale. (shrink)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1902 Excerpt:...earth. r' = radius of moon, or other body. P = moon's horizontal parallax = earth's angular semidiameter as seen from the moon. f = moon's angular semidiameter. Now = P (in circular measure), r'-r = r (in circular measure);.'. r: r':: P: P', or (radius of earth): (radios of (...) moon):: (moon's parallax): (moon's semidiameter). Examples. 1. Taking the moon's horizontal parallax as 57', and its angular diameter as 32', find its radius in miles, assuming the earth's radius to be 4000 miles. Here moon's semidiameter = 16';.-. 4000::: 57': 16';.-. r = 400 16 = 1123 miles. 2. The sun's horizontal parallax being 8"8, and his angular diameter 32V find his diameter in miles. ' Am. 872,727 miles. 3. The synodic period of Venus being 584 days, find the angle gained in each minute of time on the earth round the sun as centre. Am. l"-54 per minute. 4. Find the angular velocity with which Venus crosses the sun's disc, assuming the distances of Venus and the earth from the sun are as 7 to 10, as given by Bode's Law. Since (fig. 50) S V: VA:: 7: 3. But Srhas a relative angular velocity round the sun of l"-54 per minute (see Example 3); therefore, the relative angular velocity of A V round A is greater than this in the ratio of 7: 3, which gives an approximate result of 3"-6 per minute, the true rate being about 4" per minute. Annual ParaUax. 95. We have already seen that no displacement of the observer due to a change of position on the earth's surface could apparently affect the direction of a fixed star. However, as the earth in its annual motion describes an orbit of about 92 million miles radius round the sun, the different positions in space from which an observer views the fixed stars from time to time throughout the year must be separated... (shrink)

This study used urban legends to examine the effects of a cognitive bias for content which evokes higher levels of emotion on cumulative recall. As with previous research into content biases, a linear transmission chain design was used. One-hundred and twenty participants, aged 16–52, were asked to read and then recall urban legends that provoked both high levels and low levels of emotion and were both positively and negatively valenced. The product of this recall was presented to the next participant (...) in a chain of three generations. A significant effect of emotion level on transmission fidelity was found with high emotion legends being recalled with significantly greater accuracy than low emotion legends. The emotional valence of a legend was found not to have any effect on cumulative recall; thus emotional biases in recall go beyond disgust and can incorporate other emotions such as amusement, interest and surprise. This study is the first to examine an emotion bias in cultural transmission as a general phenomenon without focusing on the emotion of disgust. (shrink)

Three experimental studies are reported in which we tested the prediction that negative emotion elicits the social sharing of the emotional experience. In two experiments, participants arrived at the laboratory with a friend and then viewed one of three film excerpts (nonemotional, moderate emotion, or intense emotion) alone. Afterwards, the participants who saw the film had an opportunity to interact with the friend and their conversation was recorded. In both experiments participants who had seen the intense emotion excerpt engaged in (...) significantly more social sharing than did participants in the other two conditions. A third experiment extended the investigation to social sharing in everyday life and replicated the previous results. Nonemotional explanations of the effects observed were also ruled out. Results are discussed in the context of the relation between emotional intensity and amount of social sharing. (shrink)