The historical avant-gardes showed that it is in the syntactic space where the mutations of art occur, where the creative potentialities in contemporary art are played. Hence the need to accentuate the syntactic creation registers in the works of the Estridentistas. There is no creation of images, rhythms, words, atmospheres, sound orientations, planes or political-literary postures that are valid apart from the syntax effects in which the poems of Manuel Maples Arce, Germán List, Salvador Gallardo and Kyn-Taniya take place, the (...) paintings, engravings and sculptures by Fermín Revueltas, Ramón Alva de la Canal, Germán Cueto and Leopoldo Méndez, the novels and essays by Arqueles Vela, the pieces from the Estridentista period by Silvestre Revueltas, the plays by Salvador Gallardo and Germán Cueto. The syntax is the tracing of indirect paths created in each poem, installation, plastic or musical work, to show life in things; those forces, paths and paths that, when going from life to language, create a work. It is, therefore, a speed. I don't use "speed" as a metaphor. It is the speeds that interdigitate events, images, objects; those that relate and stress semantic, sound, semiotic and social forces, paths and trajectories. Velocity is the gradient of the syntax, the relationship between phenomena, the variation of the elements according to a certain direction, the trajectory medium, the semantic loads and the systems of signs: it is not necessary to think that the syntactic effects are something like general mechanisms that precede poems, plastic and musical works. A new syntactic speed detaches itself as much as it can from what is constituted and seeks to bring poetic, pictorial, musical language to its threshold of meaning, informational or communication, to its referential, rhythmic, constructive threshold. Therefore, it should not be confused with acceleration. Slowness is a speed, as in Handke's writing or in some sections of Tarr's films. (shrink)

Philosophy, it is said, has always been concerned with space and nature. Since Aristotle, even since the pre-Socratics, and up to Descartes and Leibniz at least, no one was worthy of the title of philosopher if he had not written something about meteors. And not only about meteors: observations on the movements of the Earth and changes in nature, changes of state or speed, transitions and contacts between strange elements, spatial geometrical properties, the order of coexistences - their limits - (...) and the correspondences between scales; force and matter, constructive typologies and geomorphology were an indissoluble part of the philosophical field. It is not that philosophy reflected on these external themes, but that these themes formed the fabric of the philosophical body. What happened, then, between the end of the seventeenth century and the first half of the eighteenth century? How did the themes related to space and nature become diluted and disappear from philosophical discourses? It is not a question of the split between man and nature, ancient and incommensurable, but of the separation of nature itself, modern and discontinuous, by means of which it was placed alongside the barren, the inert, as a category. -/- La filosofía, se dice, se ocupó siempre de los espacios y de la naturaleza. Desde Aristóteles, incluso desde los presocráticos, y hasta Descartes y Leibniz por lo menos, nadie era digno del título de filósofo si no había escrito algo sobre los meteoros. Y no sólo sobre los meteoros: las observaciones sobre los movimientos de la Tierra y la mudanza en la naturaleza, los cambios de estado o de velocidad, las transiciones y los contactos entre elementos extraños, las propiedades geométricas espaciales, el orden de las coexistencias —sus límites— y las correspondencias entre las escalas; la fuerza y la materia, las tipologías constructivas y la geomorfología formaban parte indisoluble del campo filosófico. No es que la filosofía reflexionase sobre esos temas externos, sino que esos temas formaban el tejido del cuerpo filosófico. ¿Qué sucedió, entonces, entre el final del siglo XVII y la primera mitad del siglo XVIII? ¿Cómo fue que los temas relacionados con el espacio y la naturaleza se diluyeron y desaparecieron de los discursos filosóficos? No se trata de la escisión entre hombre y naturaleza, antigua e inconmensurable, sino de la separación de sí de la naturaleza misma, moderna y discontinua, por medio de la cual fue puesta al lado de lo yerto, lo inerte, como una categoría. (shrink)

The potential to collect brain data more directly, with higher resolution, and in greater amounts has heightened worries about mental and brain privacy. In order to manage the risks to individuals posed by these privacy challenges, some have suggested codifying new privacy rights, including a right to “mental privacy.” In this paper, we consider these arguments and conclude that while neurotechnologies do raise significant privacy concerns, such concerns are—at least for now—no different from those raised by other well-understood data collection (...) technologies, such as gene sequencing tools and online surveillance. To better understand the privacy stakes of brain data, we suggest the use of a conceptual framework from information ethics, Helen Nissenbaum’s “contextual integrity” theory. To illustrate the importance of context, we examine neurotechnologies and the information flows they produce in three familiar contexts—healthcare and medical research, criminal justice, and consumer marketing. We argue that by emphasizing what is distinct about brain privacy issues, rather than what they share with other data privacy concerns, risks weakening broader efforts to enact more robust privacy law and policy. (shrink)

In this paper, I offer an analysis of the radical disagreement over the adequacy of string theory. The prominence of string theory despite its notorious lack of empirical support is sometimes explained as a troubling case of science gone awry, driven largely by sociological mechanisms such as groupthink (e.g. Smolin 2006). Others, such as Dawid (2013), explain the controversy by positing a methodological revolution of sorts, according to which string theorists have quietly turned to nonempirical methods of theory assessment given (...) the technological inability to directly test the theory. The appropriate response, according to Dawid, is to acknowledge this development and widen the canons of acceptable scientific methods. As I’ll argue, however, the current situation in fundamental physics does not require either of these responses. Rather, as I’ll suggest, much of the controversy stems from a failure to properly distinguish the “context of justification” from the “context of pursuit”. Both those who accuse string theorists of betraying the scientific method and those who advocate an enlarged conception of scientific methodology objectionably conflate epistemic justification with judgements of pursuit-worthiness. Once we get clear about this distinction and about the different norms governing the two contexts, the current situation in fundamental physics becomes much less puzzling. After defending this diagnosis of the controversy, I’ll show how the argument patterns that have been posited by Dawid as constituting an emergent methodological revolution in science are better off if reworked as arguments belonging to the context of pursuit. (shrink)

This paper aims to contribute to the existing literature on normative cognition by providing a lineage explanation of human social norm psychology. This approach builds upon theories of goal-directed behavioral control in the reinforcement learning and control literature, arguing that this form of control defines an important class of intentional normative mental states that are instrumental in nature. I defend the view that great ape capacities for instrumental reasoning and our capacity (or family of capacities) for shared intentionality coadapted to (...) each other and argue that the evolution of this capacity has allowed the representation of social norms and the emergence of our capacity for normative guidance. (shrink)

The complex world of thought and sensitivity in the sphere of contemporary art has entailed the revision and exclusion of disciplines aimed at providing a model to explain and conceptualize reality. Art history, as one such discipline, has had many of its contributions questioned from Gombrich’s epistemological reformulation to the postmodern discourses, which extol the death of the author, the post-structuralist idea of tradition as a textual phenomenon, and the declaration of the death of history as a consequence of the (...) hybridization of disciplines and of other bran- ches of human knowledge. Nevertheless, it can be demonstrated that proposals as those by Julius von Schlosser and Giulio Carlo Argan enclose reflections and methodological aspects which can help us face the task of understanding and visualizing the mediating role of historians in the culture of sensitivity, and the art modulations that have resulted from the blows of history and that, in turn, have shaped both art and art history into what they are or can be to us today. (shrink)

The topic of fake news has received increased attention from philosophers since the term became a favorite of politicians (Habgood-Coote 2016; Dentith 2016). Notably missing from the conversation, however, is a discussion of fake news and conspiracy theory media as a market. This paper will take as its starting point the account of noxious markets put forward by Debra Satz (2010), and will argue that there is a pro tanto moral reason to restrict the market for fake news. Specifically, we (...) begin with Satz’s argument that restricting a market may be required when i) that market inhibits citizens from being able to stand in an equal relationship with one another, and ii) this problem cannot be solved without such direct restrictions. Our own argument then proceeds in three parts: first, we argue that the market for fake news fits Satz’s description of a noxious market; second, we argue against explanations of the proliferation of fake news that are couched in terms of “epistemic vice”, and likewise argue against prescribing critical thinking education as a solution to the problem; finally, we conclude that, in the absence of other solutions to mitigate the noxious effects of the fake news market, we have a pro tanto moral reason to impose restrictions on this market. At the end of the paper, we consider one proposal to regulate the fake news market, which involves making social media outlets potentially liable in civil court for damages caused by the fake news hosted on their websites. (shrink)

In this paper, I consider the relationship between Inference to the Best Explanation and Bayesianism, both of which are well-known accounts of the nature of scientific inference. In Sect. 2, I give a brief overview of Bayesianism and IBE. In Sect. 3, I argue that IBE in its most prominently defended forms is difficult to reconcile with Bayesianism because not all of the items that feature on popular lists of “explanatory virtues”—by means of which IBE ranks competing explanations—have confirmational import. (...) Rather, some of the items that feature on these lists are “informational virtues”—properties that do not make a hypothesis \ more probable than some competitor \ given evidence E, but that, roughly-speaking, give that hypothesis greater informative content. In Sect. 4, I consider as a response to my argument a recent version of compatibilism which argues that IBE can provide further normative constraints on the objectively correct probability function. I argue that this response does not succeed, owing to the difficulty of defending with any generality such further normative constraints. Lastly, in Sect. 5, I propose that IBE should be regarded, not as a theory of scientific inference, but rather as a theory of when we ought to “accept” H, where the acceptability of H is fixed by the goals of science and concerns whether H is worthy of commitment as research program. In this way, IBE and Bayesianism, as I will show, can be made compatible, and thus the Bayesian and the proponent of IBE can be friends. (shrink)

Las afirmaciones verdaderas reciben su justificación de creencias que tienen al conocimiento como base, por lo que para su formulación y comprensión se necesita asumir una posición fundacionalista. En este artículo se propone un fundacionalismo confiabilista, inspirado en Goldman, aunque con cambios importantes respecto a su teoría. A diferencia de Goldman, considero que no todas las creencias tienen que ser verdaderas, ni toda justificación de las creencias requiere de la verdad. Adicionalmente, las creencias verdaderas, expresadas mediante oraciones asertóricas, estarían fundadas (...) en creencias aún más básicas, cuya justificación proviene del uso del lenguaje. (shrink)

In this paper, I describe some strategies for teaching an introductory philosophy of science course to Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) students, with reference to my own experience teaching a philosophy of science course in the Fall of 2020. The most important strategy that I advocate is what I call the “Second Philosophy” approach, according to which instructors ought to emphasize that the problems that concern philosophers of science are not manufactured and imposed by philosophers from the outside, but (...) rather are ones that arise internally, during the practice of science itself. To justify this approach, I appeal to considerations from both educational research and the epistemology of testimony. In addition, I defend some distinctive learning goals that philosophy of science instructors ought to adopt when teaching STEM students, which include rectifying empirically well-documented shortcomings in students’ conceptions of the “scientific method” and the “nature of science.” Although my primary focus will be on teaching philosophy of science to STEM students, much of what I propose can be applied to non-philosophy majors generally. Ultimately, as I argue, a successful philosophy of science course for non-philosophy majors must be one that advances a student’s science education. The strategies that I describe and defend here are aimed at precisely that end. (shrink)

In this article, I will provide a critical overview of the form of non-deductive reasoning commonly known as “Inference to the Best Explanation” (IBE). Roughly speaking, according to IBE, we ought to infer the hypothesis that provides the best explanation of our evidence. In section 2, I survey some contemporary formulations of IBE and highlight some of its putative applications. In section 3, I distinguish IBE from C.S. Peirce’s notion of abduction. After underlining some of the essential elements of IBE, (...) the rest of the entry is organized around an examination of various problems that IBE confronts, along with some extant attempts to address these problems. In section 4, I consider the question of when a fact requires an explanation, since presumably IBE applies only in cases where some explanation is called for. In section 5, I consider the difficult question of how we ought to understand IBE in light of the fact that among philosophers, there is significant disagreement about what constitutes an explanation. In section 6, I consider different strategies for justifying the truth-conduciveness of the explanatory virtues, e.g., simplicity, unification, scope, etc., criteria which play an indispensable role in any given application of IBE. In section 7, I survey some of the most recent literature on IBE, much of which consists of investigations of the status of IBE from the standpoint of the Bayesian philosophy of science. (shrink)

To explain the evolutionary emergence of uniquely human skills and motivations for cooperation, Tomasello et al. (2012, in Current Anthropology 53(6):673–92) proposed the interdependence hypothesis. The key adaptive context in this account was the obligate collaborative foraging of early human adults. Hawkes (2014, in Human Nature 25(1):28–48), following Hrdy (Mothers and Others, Harvard University Press, 2009), provided an alternative account for the emergence of uniquely human cooperative skills in which the key was early human infants’ attempts to solicit care and (...) attention from adults in a cooperative breeding context. Here we attempt to reconcile these two accounts. Our composite account accepts Hrdy’s and Hawkes’s contention that the extremely early emergence of human infants’ cooperative skills suggests an important role for cooperative breeding as adaptive context, perhaps in early Homo. But our account also insists that human cooperation goes well beyond these nascent skills to include such things as the communicative and cultural conventions, norms, and institutions created by later Homo and early modern humans to deal with adult problems of social coordination. As part of this account we hypothesize how each of the main stages of human ontogeny (infancy, childhood, adolescence) was transformed during evolution both by infants’ cooperative skills “migrating up” in age and by adults’ cooperative skills “migrating down” in age. (shrink)

This thesis focuses on the evolution of human social norm psychology. More precisely, I want to show how the emergence of our distinctive capacity to follow social norms and make social normative judgments is connected to the lineage explanation of our capacity to form shared intentions, and how such capacity is related to a diverse cluster of prototypical moral judgments. I argue that in explaining the evolution of this form of normative cognition we also require an understanding of the developmental (...) trajectory of this capacity. For this purpose, the thesis is organized as follow. In the first chapter, I make some methodological remarks and provide the general overview and plan for the dissertation. In the second chapter, I explain what my explanatory target is and why it matters. On the view I am defending, shared intentional psychology gives rise to a special form of psychology that enables us to engage in social normative thinking. These norms are represented as shared intentional states. Moral psychology, in contrast, is more diverse. For moral judgments define a quite heterogeneous class of mental states—although some moral judgments may involve the representation and execution of norms, certainly not all of them do. I show that although much of our distinctive social norm psychology can be explained within the framework of shared intentionality, moral judgments cannot be unified in the same way. In the third chapter, I provide the baseline of social-cognitive capacities that serve as starting point for my lineage explanation. I argue that hominin social cognition was for a very long period of our evolutionary history essentially a matter of low-level cognitive and motivational processes. On this picture, bottom-up affective processes regulated the social lives of early hominins without requiring any special top-down mechanism of normative thinking such as a capacity for understanding and representing social norms. In the fourth chapter, I argue that human-like social norm psychology evolved as a result of the selective pressures that gave rise to shared intentionality, especially the demands that came from collective hunting. Yet collective hunting was not the whole story of the evolution of shared intentionality, for our capacity to form shared intentional mental states emerged from the interplay between the selective pressures that led to cooperative breeding in humans as well as organized, goal-oriented, collective hunting. Thus, I propose an evo-devo account of shared intentionality and its normative dimension since I argue that explaining the evolution of this particular form of normative thinking crucially depends on information about the developmental trajectory of this capacity. Finally, in the fifth chapter, I focus on how social norms are acquired and how the way we learn them gives rise to some prototypical cluster of moral judgments. Thus, this chapter returns to some of themes and arguments of the first chapter by explaining how the distinction between moral judgments and nonmoral judgments can be culturally transmitted. (shrink)

Peer competition and peer cooperation can be intuitively seen as opposing phenomena. However, depending on multiple factors, they might be complementary. In a population divided into groups, for instance, members of each group may cooperate with their peers in order to compete with neighboring groups. Alternatively, they may compete with their peers as a means of choosing the best cooperative partners and demonstrate that they are reliable cooperative partners. For instance, if subjects can choose with whom they wish to interact, (...) this may create competition to be more generous or loyal than others. (shrink)

In this paper, I critically evaluate several related, provocative claims made by proponents of data-intensive science and “Big Data” which bear on scientific methodology, especially the claim that scientists will soon no longer have any use for familiar concepts like causation and explanation. After introducing the issue, in Section 2, I elaborate on the alleged changes to scientific method that feature prominently in discussions of Big Data. In Section 3, I argue that these methodological claims are in tension with a (...) prominent account of scientific method, often called “Inference to the Best Explanation”. Later on, in Section 3, I consider an argument against IBE that will be congenial to proponents of Big Data, namely, the argument due to Roche and Sober Analysis, 73:659–668, that “explanatoriness is evidentially irrelevant.” This argument is based on Bayesianism, one of the most prominent general accounts of theory-confirmation. In Section 4, I consider some extant responses to this argument, especially that of Climenhaga Philosophy of Science, 84:359–368,. In Section 5, I argue that Roche and Sober’s argument does not show that explanatory reasoning is dispensable. In Section 6, I argue that there is good reason to think explanatory reasoning will continue to prove indispensable in scientific practice. Drawing on Cicero’s oft-neglected De Divinatione, I formulate what I call the “Ciceronian Causal-nomological Requirement”, which states, roughly, that causal-nomological knowledge is essential for relying on correlations in predictive inference. I defend a version of the CCR by appealing to the challenge of “spurious correlations,” chance correlations which we should not rely upon for predictive inference. In Section 7, I offer some concluding remarks. (shrink)

According to a recent survey by the HR Research Institute, as the presence of artificial intelligence (AI) becomes increasingly common in the workplace, HR professionals are worried that the use of recruitment algorithms will lead to a “dehumanization” of the hiring process. Our main goals in this paper are threefold: i) to bring attention to this neglected issue, ii) to clarify what exactly this concern about dehumanization might amount to, and iii) to sketch an argument for why dehumanizing the hiring (...) process is ethically suspect. After distinguishing the use of the term “dehumanization” in this context (i.e., removing the human presence) from its more common meaning in the interdisciplinary field of dehumanization studies (i.e., conceiving of other humans as subhuman), we argue that the use of hiring algorithms may negatively impact the employee-employer relationship. We argue that there are good independent reasons to accept a substantive employee-employer relationship, as well as an applicant-employer relationship, both of which are consistent with a stakeholder theory of corporate obligations. We further argue that dehumanizing the hiring process may negatively impact these relationships because of the difference between the values of human recruiters and the values embedded in recruitment algorithms. Drawing on Nguyen’s (2021) critique of how Twitter “gamifies communication”, we argue that replacing human recruiters with algorithms imports artificial values into the hiring process. We close by briefly considering some ways to potentially mitigate the problems posed by recruitment algorithms, along with the possibility that some difficult trade-offs will need to be made. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine Cicero’s oft-neglected De Divinatione, a dialogue investigating the legitimacy of the practice of divination. First, I offer a novel analysis of the main arguments for divination given by Quintus, highlighting the fact that he employs two logically distinct argument forms. Next, I turn to the first of the main arguments against divination given by Marcus. Here I show, with the help of modern probabilistic tools, that Marcus’ skeptical response is far from the decisive, proto-naturalistic assault (...) on superstition that it is sometimes portrayed to be. Then, I offer an extended analysis of the second of the main arguments against divination given by Marcus. Inspired by Marcus’ second main argument, I formulate, explicate, and defend a substantive principle of scientific methodology that I call the “Ciceronian Causal-Nomological Requirement” (CCR). Roughly, this principle states that causal knowledge is essential for relying on correlations in predictive inference. Although I go on to argue that Marcus’ application of the CCR in his debate with Quintus is dialectically inadequate, I conclude that De Divinatione deserves its place in Cicero’s philosophical corpus, and that ultimately, its significance for the history and philosophy of science ought to be recognized. (shrink)

This capstone project aimed to develop an offline computer-based assessment (CBA) tool that uses a computer instead of a traditional paper test in evaluating student learning. This addresses the difficulties faced by teachers in administering quarterly assessments. Incorporating technology into student assessment can increase student interest because of the immediate feedback generated automatically and can help teachers improve their work performance. This capstone project employed a developmental approach and utilized a modified ADDIE (Analysis, Design, and Development) model to design the (...) tool using Microsoft PowerPoint and Excel. Ten experts in mathematics, ICT, and assessment validated the face and content validity of the developed CBA tool. Based on the panel’s evaluation, the developed offline CBA tool in Statistics and Probability has passed all the assigned criteria, such as functionality, usability, efficiency, technicality, and accessibility. Overall, the developed CBA tool is suitable for use to address assessment-related issues. (shrink)

Deep brain stimulation (DBS), a surgical procedure involving the implantation of electrodes in the brain, has rekindled the medical community’s interest in psychosurgery. Whereas many researchers argue DBS is substantially different from psychosurgery, we argue psychiatric DBS—though a much more precise and refined treatment than its predecessors—is nevertheless a form of psychosurgery, which raises both old and new ethical and legal concerns that have not been given proper attention. Learning from the ethical and regulatory failures of older forms of psychosurgery (...) can help shed light on how to address the regulatory gaps that exist currently in DBS research. To show why it is important to address the current regulatory gaps within psychiatric DBS, we draw on the motivations underlying the regulation of earlier forms of psychosurgery in the US. We begin by providing a brief history of psychosurgery and electrical brain stimulation in the US. Against this backdrop, we introduce psychiatric DBS, exploring current research and ongoing clinical trials. We then draw out the ethical and regulatory similarities between earlier forms of psychosurgery and psychiatric DBS. As we will show, the factors that motivated strict regulation of earlier psychosurgical procedures mirror concerns with psychiatric DBS today. We offer three recommendations for psychiatric DBS regulation, which echo earlier motivations for regulating psychosurgery, along with new considerations that reflect the novel technologies used in DBS. (shrink)

In this paper, we examine how the availability of massive quantities of data i.e., the “Big Data” phenomenon, contributes to the creation, spread, and harms of online misinformation. Specifically, we argue that a factor in the problem of online misinformation is the evolved human instinct to recognize patterns. While the pattern-recognition instinct is a crucial evolutionary adaptation, we argue that in the age of Big Data, these capacities have, unfortunately, rendered us vulnerable. Given the ways in which online media outlets (...) profit from the spread of misinformation by preying on this pattern-finding instinct, we conceptualize the problem that we identify as a morally objectionable form of “epistemic exploitation.” As we argue, the consumer of digital misinformation is often exploited by having her pattern-recognition instinct used against her. This exploitation is morally objectionable because it deprives her of an epistemic good to which she has a right. This epistemic good is the integrity of the pattern-recognition instinct itself which, we argue, is a capacity that allows us to participate in uniquely human goods. While our primary goal is to bring attention to this form of epistemic exploitation, we conclude by briefly evaluating some general solutions to the growing problem of online misinformation. (shrink)

In this article, I consider an important challenge to the popular theory of scientific inference commonly known as ‘inference to the best explanation’, one that has received scant attention.1 1 The problem is that there exists a wide array of rival models of explanation, thus leaving IBE objectionably indeterminate. First, I briefly introduce IBE. Then, I motivate the problem and offer three potential solutions, the most plausible of which is to adopt a kind of pluralism about the rival models of (...) explanation. However, I argue that how ranking explanations on this pluralistic account of IBE remains obscure and pluralism leads to contradictory results. In light of these objections, I attempt to dissolve the problem by showing why IBE does not require a ‘model’ of explanation and by giving an account of what explanation consists in within the context of IBE. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss the ways in which epistemic anxiety promotes well-being, specifically by examining the positive contributions that feelings of epistemic anxiety make toward intellectually virtuous inquiry. While the prospects for connecting the concept of epistemic anxiety to the two most prominent accounts of intellectual virtue, i.e., “virtue-reliabilism” and “virtue-responsibilism”, are promising, I primarily focus on whether the capacity for epistemic anxiety counts as an intellectual virtue in the reliabilist sense. As I argue, there is a close yet (...) unexplored connection between feelings of epistemic anxiety and the form of inference commonly known as “Inference to the Best Explanation” (IBE). Specifically, I argue that both the recognition that some fact requires an explanation—a necessary first step in applying IBE—and the subsequent motivation to employ IBE are typically facilitated by feelings of epistemic anxiety. So, provided IBE is truth-conducive the capacity for epistemic anxiety should count as an intellectual virtue in the reliabilist sense. After outlining my main argument, I address the challenge that the capacity for epistemic anxiety has the potential to be misleading. To respond to this challenge, I discuss how our recognition that a fact requires an explanation must in part be a species of practical knowledge, rather than theoretical knowledge. For the agent to skillfully distinguish between facts that require an explanation and facts that do not, she must develop the virtuous disposition to feel the appropriate amount of epistemic anxiety. Despite the many negative aspects associated with anxiety, as I conclude, being disposed to feel the appropriate amount of epistemic anxiety is ultimately good for us. (shrink)

In this critical notice, I focus my attention on the chapters that deal with the explanationist response to skepticism.

In order for students to succeed, especially in times of crisis like the Covid 19 Pandemic, they must be trained to be self-sufficient in their language studies. This research investigates using a self-access language learning strategy in an emergency virtual reading class during the covid 19 pandemics to improve language learners' Autonomy. It employed a descriptive correlational research design. The study involved 89 randomly selected language students in one University of Peru. Results of the study showed that the students can (...) utilize internet as their learning resource using devices they have. This shows that all of the students have devices to be used for their online and blended language learning. It is interesting to note the all the sampled students have access to internet for their online language learning. Hence the students have a motivated level of learning Autonomy in reading classes. As to the assessment of internet self-access reading skills of the students. This shows that the students have a favorable attitude towards using the internet in their reading lessons. It shows that the students have a fair level of technology acceptance and utilization for their language learning. Self-Access Skills in Reading was shown to be closely linked to Students' Learning Autonomy. This suggests that the relevant factors in the research have a positive correlation. This means that the students are more likely to adopt online self-access reading skills if they have a good attitude about learning Autonomy. This result shed light on the gap in addressing students' online language learning engagement in the COVID 19 era, particularly in the context of Peru. (shrink)

Contemporary action theory is generally concerned with giving theories of action ontology. In this paper, we make the novel proposal that the standard view in action theory—the Causal Theory of Action—should be recast as a “model”, akin to the models constructed and investigated by scientists. Such models often consist in fictional, hypothetical, or idealized structures, which are used to represent a target system indirectly via some resemblance relation. We argue that recasting the Causal Theory as a model can not only (...) accomplish the goals of causal theorists, but also give the theory greater flexibility in responding to common objections. (shrink)

Filósofos como Marcuse han subrayado las propiedades liberadoras del quehacer artístico. Pero si hemos de pensar el arte como el Gran Rechazo, es necesario mostrar qué rechaza el arte y con qué busca sustituirlo. Respecto a estas preguntas, existen dos respuestas antagónicas. Mientras una busca en la experiencia artística rechazar lo dado en nombre de una verdad intemporal, la otra también reniega de lo dado, pero admite el carácter provisorio de toda verdad. Aunque en apariencia sutil, esta distinción es sustancial. (...) A partir de una lectura de Platón, muestro por qué en la primera posición no hay cabida para lo humano, y por qué de ella se desprenden implicaciones totalitarias. Para caracterizar a la segunda posición, me sirvo de la concepción estética de Octavio Paz y de la propuesta escultórica de Alexander Calder. Ambas propuestas permiten conciliar la insatisfacción que palpita en el arte con la alteridad que caracteriza a lo humano. (shrink)

The philosophical conception of mechanistic explanation is grounded on a limited number of canonical examples. These examples provide an overly narrow view of contemporary scientific practice, because they do not reflect the extent to which the heuristic strategies and descriptive practices that contribute to mechanistic explanation have evolved beyond the well-known methods of decomposition, localization, and pictorial representation. Recent examples from evolutionary robotics and network approaches to biology and neuroscience demonstrate the increasingly important role played by computer simulations and mathematical (...) representations in the epistemic practices of mechanism discovery and mechanism description. These examples also indicate that the scope of mechanistic explanation must be re-examined: With new and increasingly powerful methods of discovery and description comes the possibility of describing mechanisms far more complex than traditionally assumed. (shrink)

One particular topic in the literature on Frege’s conception of sense relates to two apparently contradictory theses held by Frege: the isomorphism of thought and language on one hand and the expressibility of a thought by different sentences on the other. I will divide the paper into five sections. In (1) I introduce the problem of the tension in Frege’s thought. In (2) I discuss the main attempts to resolve the conflict between Frege’s two contradictory claims, showing what is wrong (...) with some of them. In (3), I analyze where, in Frege’s writings and discussions on sense identity, one can find grounds for two different conceptions of sense. In (4) I show how the two contradictory theses held by Frege are connected with different concerns, compelling Frege to a constant oscillation in terminology. In (5) I summarize two further reasons that prevented Frege from making the distinction between two conceptions of sense clear: (i) the antipsychologism problem and (ii) the overlap of traditions in German literature contemporary to Frege about the concept of value. I conclude with a hint for a reconstruction of the Fregean notion of ‘thought’ which resolves the contradiction between his two theses. (shrink)

Here, I consider the recent application of phylogenetic methods in historical linguistics. After a preliminary survey of one such method, i.e. cladistic parsimony, I respond to two common criticisms of cultural phylogenies: that cultural artifacts cannot be modeled as tree-like because of borrowing across lineages, and that the mechanism of cultural change differs radically from that of biological evolution. I argue that while perhaps remains true for certain cultural artifacts, the nature of language may be such as to side-step this (...) objection. Moreover, I explore the possibility that cladistic parsimony can be justified even if is true by appealing to the inference pattern known among philosophers as ‘Inference to the Best Explanation’. (shrink)

On the basis of historical and textual evidence, this paper claims that after his Tractatus, Wittgenstein was actually influenced by Einstein's theory of relativity and, the similarity of Einstein's relativity theory helps to illuminate some aspects of Wittgenstein's work. These claims find support in remarkable quotations where Wittgenstein speaks approvingly of Einstein's relativity theory and in the way these quotations are embedded in Wittgenstein's texts. The profound connection between Wittgenstein and relativity theory concerns not only Wittgenstein's “verificationist” phase , but (...) also Wittgenstein's later philosophy centred on the theme of rule‐following. (shrink)

In the last two decades, a robust consensus has emerged among philosophers of science, whereby political, ethical, or social values must play some role in scientific inquiry, and that the ‘value-free ideal’ is thus a misguided conception of science. However, the question of how to distinguish, in a principled way, which values may legitimately influence science remains. This question, which has been dubbed the ‘new demarcation problem,’ has until recently received comparatively less attention from philosophers of science. In this paper, (...) I appeal to Rawls’s theory of justice (1971) on the basis of which I defend a Rawlsian solution to the new demarcation problem. As I argue, the Rawlsian solution places plausible constraints on which values ought to influence scientific inquiry, and, moreover, can be fruitfully applied to concrete cases to determine how the conflicting interests of stakeholders should be balanced. After considering and responding to the objection that Rawls’s theory of justice applies only to the “basic structure” of society, I compare the Rawlsian solution to some other approaches to the new demarcation problem, especially those that emphasize democratic criteria. (shrink)

Este artículo busca responder a la siguiente pregunta: ¿Qué tipo de relación sostiene la Ciencia de la lógica con la tradición metafísica? Hay en ello un doble motivo de reflexión: por un lado, se trata de distinguir los sentidos de la crítica y los de la transformación científica de la metafísica tanto en Kant como en Hegel, y, por otro lado, de concebir el inicio [Anfang] y el principio [Prinzip] de la Lógica como dos modos de relación que permitirían hacer (...) tal distinción aunque únicamente de manera introductoria. El inicio de esta Lógica es así el primer fin de un círculo que vuelve a abrirse; anverso del límite, o estudio lógico de reverso fenomenológico; unidad de un carácter genitivo doble ‒de la Ciencia de la conciencia y del Concepto de la Ciencia‒, que hace del saber puro el fin del inicio fenomenológico, y al mismo tiempo el inicio de su propia exposición. Inicio inmanente al desarrollo de la Ciencia y que es por lo tanto un momento de saber-puro-ser. Es, dicho en breve, el inicio de una Lógica pura, objetiva y subjetiva, ya liberada de la oposición en sí/concepto, y que al ser el desarrollo del pensar objetivo se constituye en el “sistema de la razón pura”. (shrink)

Lezama, and later Deleuze, discovered that the baroque does not refer to an essence, but to an operative function. That operative function is the fold, which "curls and multiplies", as Lezama writes, and proliferates to infinity. We all know the examples with which Lezama placed his concept of the American baroque: the poems of Domínguez Camargo, those of Sor Juana, the architectures of the Kondori Indian, the baptismal fonts of Aleijadinho, "ornamented like accordions, with spiraloid leaves that ascend"; the chapel (...) of the Rosary, in Puebla, omamentada "without truce or free spatial parenthesis". This is how the fold operates, it is like a leprosy or a lichen -in the past, certain lichens were called leprosy-: it infests by enveloping and developing, it proliferates by setting in motion the fold-unfold pair. Lezama does not seek to reconfigure the sequences of history, but to superimpose other cycles on them, create gaps and vanishing points in chronological and causal narratives, divert the emphasis placed on cultures and redirect it to imaginary eras, until the meaning comes from a series of scales established in the historical. The eras would be ordered according to their potentiality to create images; thus it would be possible to establish the points where the image was imposed as history. The Carolingian imaginary era, for example, forged a link between the prodigies, the marvelous islands, the battles against the Saracens and theocratic reason. How are these scales established and how do they operate? How do counterpoint, images and links work? (shrink)

Cualquier propuesta de alternativa a la democracia representativa, sea para mejorarla, sea para sustituirla por otro tipo de forma política, debería de tomar en cuenta dos tipos de restricciones para que la alternativa en cuestión tenga mayores probabilidades de éxito. Al primer grupo de restricciones los llamaremos factores limitantes de la conducta humana, mientras que al segundo grupo los llamaremos funciones impropias de esa forma política, es decir, las funciones que no debería tener. Tanto los factores limitantes de la conducta (...) humana como las funciones impropias de una forma política son restricciones sobre lo que realmente, es decir, no utópicamente, podríamos hacer para mejorar a la democracia y en general a la gobernabilidad de las sociedades. Esas restricciones, que a continuación señalaré, constituyen los argumentos que me llevan a plantear la siguiente tesis: la democracia representativa puede y debe ser mejorada al reducir su alcance económico, político y social, pero continúa siendo una mejor opción de gobierno que cualquier alternativa, incluyendo la demarquía. (shrink)

An essay that seeks to show how modern thinking could never create an affirmative concept of difference. The dispute between Buffon, De Pauw, from the European shore, and Clavijero, from the American one, shows how the Natural History device was built.

In this paper I offer a defence of a Russellian analysis of the referential uses of incomplete (mis)descriptions, in a contextual setting. With regard to the debate between a unificationist and an ambiguity approach to the formal treatment of definite descriptions (introduction), I will support the former against the latter. In 1. I explain what I mean by "essentially" incomplete descriptions: incomplete descriptions are context dependent descriptions. In 2. I examine one of the best versions of the unificationist “explicit” approach (...) given by Buchanan and Ostertag. I then show that this proposal seems unable to treat the normal uses of misdescriptions. I then accept the challenge of treating misdescriptions as a key to solving the problem of context dependent descriptions. In 3. I briefly discuss Michael Devitt’s and Joseph Almog’s treatments of referential descriptions, showing that they find it difficult to explain misdescriptions. In 4. I suggest an alternative approach to DD as contextuals, under a normative epistemic stance. Definite descriptions express (i) what a speaker should have in mind in using certain words in a certain context and (ii) what a normal speaker is justified in saying in a context, given a common basic knowledge of the lexicon. In 5. I define a procedure running on contextual parameters (partiality, perspective and approximation) as a means of representing the role of pragmatics as a filter for semantic interpretation. In 6. I defend my procedural approach against possible objections concerning the problem of the boundaries between semantics and pragmatics, relying on the distinction between semantics and theory of meaning. (shrink)

Heyes’ book is an essential addition to the literature on human uniqueness. Her main claim is that the key human cognitive capacities are products of cultural rather than genetic evolution. Among these distinctively human capacities are causal understanding, episodic memory, imitation, mindreading, and normative thinking. According to Heyes, they emerged not by genetic mutation but by innovations in cognitive development. She calls these mechanisms ‘cognitive gadgets.’ This is perhaps one of the best and most comprehensive views of human cognitive evolution (...) advanced in recent years. (shrink)

The project of growing meat artificially represents for some the next best thing to humanity. If successful, it could be the solution to several problems, such as feed- ing a growing global population while reducing the environmental impact of raising animals for food and, of course, reducing the amount and degree of animal cruelty and suffering that is involved in animal farming. In this paper, I argue that the issue of the morality of such a project has been framed only (...) in terms of the best conse- quences for the environment, animals, and humans, or in terms of deontic princi- ples. I argue that to appreciate how deep and difficult this issue is, it is necessary to consider it in terms of a virtue-oriented approach. Such an approach will reveal aspects that are not apparent, not contemplated by typical approaches, but are essen- tial to our understanding of the morality of lab-grown meat. As I argue, evaluating the issue from a virtue-oriented perspective suggests that the project of in vitro meat should not be supported because it stems from unvirtuous motivations. (shrink)

Many moral philosophers have criticized intensive animal farming because it can be harmful to the environment, it causes pain and misery to a large number of animals, and furthermore eating meat and animal-based products can be unhealthful. The issue of industrially farmed animals has become one of the most pressing ethical questions of our time. On the one hand, utilitarians have argued that we should become vegetarians or vegans because the practices of raising animals for food are immoral since they (...) minimize the overall happiness. Deontologists, on the other hand, have argued that the practices of raising animals for food are immoral because animals have certain rights and we have duties toward them. Some virtue ethicists remain unconvinced of deontic and consequentialist arguments against the exploitation of animals and suggest that a virtue-based approach is better equipped to show what is immoral about raising and using animals for food, and what is virtuous about ethical veganism. (shrink)

In this book, Michael Tomasello proposes an overarching theoretical framework that organizes the research that he and his colleagues at the Department of Developmental and Comparative Psychology of the Max Planck Institute in Leipzig have carried out for the past 20 years. The book is recommended for students and academics working on the evolution of human cognition, especially those interested in the intersection between evolutionary developmental biology and developmental psychology.

The Whorfian hypothesis has received support from recent findings in psychology, linguistics, and anthropology. This evidence has been interpreted as supporting the view that language modulates all stages of perception and cognition, in accordance with Whorf’s original proposal. In light of a much broader body of evidence on time perception, I propose to evaluate these findings with respect to their scope. When assessed collectively, the entire body of evidence on time perception shows that the Whorfian hypothesis has a limited scope (...) and that it does not affect early stages of time perception. In particular, all the available evidence shows that the scope of language modulation is limited in the case of time perception, and that the most important mechanisms for time perception are cognitive clocks and simultaneity windows, which we use to perceive the temporal properties of events. Language modulation has distorting effects, but only at later stages of processing or with respect to specific categorization tasks. The paper explains what is the role of these effects in the context of all the available evidence on time cognition and perception. (shrink)

The year 2021 marked the commemoration of the centenary of the appearance of the stridentist movement and the literary avant-garde in Mexico. Stridentism broke into the public con- sciousness with the publication of the leaflet Actual No 1 on the main thoroughfares of Mexico City, convulsing the cultural en- vironment of the early 1920s and bringing together diverse young artists to undertake a literary renewal. This facsimile edition of Actual No 3, the final issue of Manuel Maples Arce’s magazine, which (...) appeared a hundred years ago this year and which until very recently was practically unknown, seeks to bring to the pub- lic something that is at once a singular avant-garde object and a magazine that expressed, at a very early stage, the cosmopolitan, iconoclastic, youthful character of stridentism and its time. "Stridentist Neo-object Actual No 3" is a essay that shows that from foundationless things and objects without gravitation to recomposed neo-objects emerges one of the lengthiest, rup- tured, polyhedric mutations in all fields of knowledge. The historical avant-gardes worked precisely in the turning of the tide on auratic objects that led to the appearance of neo-objects or recomposed objects. In their approach to objects, they tried var- ious operations: they deepened the depresentification of “natural” or “given” things, seeking—in some cases—dematerialization, the simultaneity of planes, the breakdown of logical links, while in others they the sought the primacy of the concept. They created multidimensional neo-objects shot through with events, on the scales of spaces, from the juxtaposed to the dislocated, the simultaneous contiguous to the dispersed, and the close to the distant. They criticized objects and materials they saw as bourgeois, auratic, and linked to ancient traditions and techniques. They created new syntactic velocities through which they interdigitated technical objects newly fashioned by human sensibility. (shrink)

What explains the distinctive features of human behavior? In this book, Stewart-Williams aims to answer this ambitious question. This book is an engaging addition to the already long list of recent attempts to provide an evolutionary explanation of human uniqueness. It is organized into six chapters, plus two appendices. These chapters address several key topics in evolutionary theory, sex differences and sexual behavior, altruism, and cultural evolution, albeit with varying degrees of detail and depth. These topics include sexual selection, kin (...) selection, Hamilton’s rule, reciprocal altruism, costly signaling theory, group selection, gene-centered views of evolution, inclusive fitness, proximate and ultimate evolutionary explanations, inbreeding avoidance, the Westermarck effect, jealousy, sperm competition, mating and parenting effort, cumulative cultural evolution, imitation and learning biases, evolutionary mismatch theories, and more. (shrink)

In this paper, I will discuss a well-known oscillation in Frege’s conception of sense. My point is only partially concerned with his two different criteria of sense identity, and touches upon a more specific point: what happens if we apply Frege’s intuitive criterion for the difference of thoughts to logically equivalent sentences? I will try to make a schematic argument here that will preempt any endeavor to make Frege more coherent than he really is. In sections A and B, I (...) will present two alternative Fregean ways to treat the sense of logically equivalent sentences. Frege really oscillated between two alternative conceptions of sense, and his inability to detect the contrast between the two alternative conceptions is partly due to his strong conception of rationality. To apply the criterion of difference of thoughts to logical matters, we may also use a weak notion of rationality, or at least a notion of rationality of human agents, with limited computational resources. The distinctions towards which Frege was striving are better understood nowadays from the point of view of the treatment of limited rationality, which imposes itself even in logical matters. (shrink)

In this article I will begin by discussing recent criticism, by Mauro Antonelli and Werner Sauer, of the ontological interpretation of Franz Brentano’s concept of intentionality, as formulated by i.a. Roderick Chisholm. I will then outline some apparent inconsistencies of the positions advocated by Antonelli and Sauer with Brentano’s formulations of his theory in several works and lectures. This new evaluation of (unpublished) sources will then lead to a sketch of a new approach to Brentano’s theory of intentionality. Specifically, it (...) will be argued that the notion of “intentional object” is inherently and un- avoidably ambiguous in every act of external perception, due to the fact that we can only have improper intentions directed at the external world. (shrink)

Si no me falla la memoria, fue el dibujante Álvaro Barrios quien afirmó que el trabajo del artista contemporáneo colombiano se desarrolla según una agenda de trabajo. Si miramos algunos fenómenos del arte último en Colombia, podemos señalar que su agenda está determinada por el intento de comprensión de los procesos de la violencia en el país, a partir de una amplia gama de aproximaciones al concepto de memoria que ha tenido resonancia en las disciplinas humanísticas, las investigaciones académicas, el (...) uso político del concepto por parte de la legislación estatal, y una gran diversidad de eventos artísticos. Desde el ámbito del arte, exposiciones como Destierro y reparación (2008), Tapices de Mampuján (2010), La guerra que no hemos visto (2009) o La piel de la memoria (2011), han discutido sobre la violencia en Colombia desde la aproximación a los procesos de comprensión de la memoria y nuestro pasado reciente. Así, la imbricación de violencia y memoria se manifiesta en la visión del pasado y en los efectos que este puede desplegar sobre el presente, en tanto se ha considerado, incluso, a la memoria como una instancia de reconciliación social. (shrink)

Some metaphysicians believe that metaphysical modality is explainable by the essences of objects. In §II, I spell out the definitional view of essence, and in §III, a working notion of metaphysical explanation. Then, in §IV, I consider and reject five natural ways to explain necessity by essence: in terms of the principle that essential properties can't change, in terms of the supposed obviousness of the necessity of essential truth, in terms of the logical necessity of definitions, in terms of Fine's (...) logic of essence, and in terms of the theory of real definitions. I will conclude that the present evidence favours rejecting the hypothesis that modality is explainable by essence. (shrink)

Frente al interés por construir un discurso que dé cuenta del momento particular del arte contemporáneo, y que, además, pueda esclarecer y proponer diversas respuestas frente a los productos artísticos que se realizan en la difícil circunstancia actual, se han dirigido diferentes propuestas disciplinares que presentan análisis de la obra de arte y la experiencia que surge en su comprensión. La situación, que a veces se caracteriza por la impotencia de la teoría, la historia y la crítica del arte al (...) ocuparse del arte más reciente, proviene, entre otras razones, de un hecho evidente: nunca estas disciplinas habían tenido que entenderse con tal abundancia de prácticas, fenómenos artísticos, y declaraciones artísticas. Asimismo, las complejas formas vividas por el sistema internacional del arte ha planteado a la comprensión de estos fenómenos una serie de retos de fuerte impacto en la misma actividad de los artistas. Y uno de esos retos ha sido examinar la forma material, los soportes y lenguajes artísticos de obra de arte. (shrink)

Marcus William Hunt argues that when co-parents disagree over whether to raise their child (or children) as a vegan, they should reach a compromise as a gift given by one parent to the other out of respect for his or her authority. Josh Millburn contends that Hunt’s proposal of parental compromise over veganism is unacceptable on the ground that it overlooks respect for animal rights, which bars compromising. However, he contemplates the possibility of parental compromise over ‘unusual eating,’ of animal-based (...) foods obtained without the violation of animal rights. I argue for zero parental compromise, rejecting a rights-oriented approach, and propose a policy that an ethical vegan parent and a non-vegan co-parent should follow to determine how to raise their children. (shrink)