The Protein Ontology (PRO; http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/pr) formally defines and describes taxon-specific and taxon-neutral protein-related entities in three major areas: proteins related by evolution; proteins produced from a given gene; and protein-containing complexes. PRO thus serves as a tool for referencing protein entities at any level of specificity. To enhance this ability, and to facilitate the comparison of such entities described in different resources, we developed a standardized representation of proteoforms using UniProtKB as a sequence reference and PSI-MOD as a post-translational modification (...) reference. We illustrate its use in facilitating an alignment between PRO and Reactome protein entities. We also address issues of scalability, describing our first steps into the use of text mining to identify protein-related entities, the large-scale import of proteoform information from expert curated resources, and our ability to dynamically generate PRO terms. Web views for individual terms are now more informative about closely-related terms, including for example an interactive multiple sequence alignment. Finally, we describe recent improvement in semantic utility, with PRO now represented in OWL and as a SPARQL endpoint. These developments will further support the anticipated growth of PRO and facilitate discoverability of and allow aggregation of data relating to protein entities. (shrink)

Huang-Lao is now generally regarded as a set of ideas that gained currency from the final stages of the Warring States period to well into the Han dynasty. "Huang" stands for Huangdi, the Yellow Emperor; "Lao" refers to Laozi, the "Old Master," who is traditionally regarded as the founder of Daoism. Huang-Lao is thus a combination of ideas attributed to the mythical figures of the Yellow Emperor and Laozi. What those ideas are and how they have manifested (...) themselves in Chinese history remains the subject of heated debate. (shrink)

Both Husserl and Sartre speak of quasi-presence in their descriptions of the lived experience of imagination, and for both philosophers, accounting for quasi-presence means developing an account of the hyle proper to imagination. Guided by the perspective of fulfillment, Husserl’s theory of imaginary quasi-presence goes through three stages. Having experimented first with a depiction-model and then a perception-model, Husserl’s mature theory appeals to his innovative conception of inner consciousness. This elegant account nevertheless fails to do justice to the facticity and (...) bodily involvement of our imaginary experience. Sartre’s theory of analogon, based on his conception of imaginary quasi-presence as ‘magical’ self-affection, embodies important insights on these issues. Kinesthetic sensations and feelings are the modes in which we make use of own body to possess and be possessed by the imaginary object, thus lending it a semblance of bodily presence. (shrink)

This paper primarily investigates the following questions: The first question：What is the basic structure of consciousness? I proposed that objects moving at the speed of light form the fundamental structure of consciousness. The second question:How is the unified field of the conscious self formed? The study suggests that countless particles moving at the speed of light, through quantum entanglement, form the unified field of each individual's consciousness. Each individual's unified field consists of countless particles originating from a source, which can (...) be referred to as the "soul quantum." The third question:What is the mechanism underlying the formation of different forms of imagery (images, sounds, and bodily sensations)? The study posits that when the wave-particle duality of quantum mechanics collapses, it results in different forms of imagery. (shrink)

The truth table method, natural deduction, and the truth tree method, the three validity proving methods standardly taught in an introductory logic course, are too clumsy for the battlefield of real-life. The “short truth table” test is handy at times, but it stumbles at many other times. In this paper, we set up a general method that can beat all the methods mentioned above in a contest of speed. Furthermore, the procedure can be step-by-step paraphrased in a natural language, so (...) that, unlike the other methods, a real-life logical problem can be analyzed and explained in a real-life language too. (shrink)

This study attempts to reconstruct Nietzsche’s reading of Aristotle in the 1860s and 1870s—the years before he left his career as a philologist. Against the popular view that Nietzsche read only one book by Aristotle, namely the Rhetoric, the present study hopes to show that he had direct knowledge of several of Aristotle’s main works, while much of his interest in Aristotle centred on the latter’s account of art. The particular aim of this study is to explore how Nietzsche’s reading (...) of Aristotle contributed to the formation of The Birth of Tragedy. It will show that, although Nietzsche mentions Aristotle in his first book only en passant, his theory of tragedy should be understood against the background of Aristotelian poetics, especially as interpreted by such contemporaries as Jacob Bernays, Joseph Hubert Reinkens, and Gustav Teichmüller. (shrink)

Synthetic biology (SynBio) covers two main areas: application engineering, exemplified by metabolic engi- neering, and the design of life from artificial building blocks. As the general public is often reluctant to embrace synthetic approaches, preferring nature to artifice, its immediate future will depend very much on the public’s reaction to the unmet needs created by the pervasive demands of sustainability. On the other hand, this reluctance should not have a negative impact on research that will now take into account the (...) existence of the multiple transitions that cells face over time. The ages of life—birth, development, maturation, senescence and death—reflect specific key transitions and have, until now, rarely been taken into account in SynBio designs. This results in a mismatch between novelty and the very long evolutionary time that led to the existing chassis [remember that this is the common term used to describe the cellular framework as seen by synthetic biologists (de Lorenzo & Danchin, 2008)]. It also implies that, in general, transitions between growth stages will be taken into account with the appro- priate embodiment of highly specific processes. This is particularly important when adapting new models to their host, whether natural or artificial. Adaptation fol- lows two stages, short-term accommodation of new entities and long-term assimilation into the cell as a whole. This requires discrimination between classes of entities. We suggest that proteins playing the essential role of Maxwell’ demons, here named Maxwell’s dis- criminators (MxDs) to refer to their original function, will permit the assimilation and accommodation of artificial constructs. As a consequence, we can foresee that class discrimination, beyond mere recognition, will be implemented in SynBio 2.0, leading to an authentic par- adigm shift (Kuhn, 1996), based on conceptions that embody information as a genuine currency of reality. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence (AI) systems are increasingly adopted to make decisions in domains such as business, education, health care, and criminal justice. However, such algorithmic decision systems can have prevalent biases against marginalized social groups and undermine social justice. Explainable artificial intelligence (XAI) is a recent development aiming to make an AI system’s decision processes less opaque and to expose its problematic biases. This paper argues against technical XAI, according to which the detection and interpretation of algorithmic bias can be handled (...) more or less independently by technical experts who specialize in XAI methods. Drawing on resources from feminist epistemology, we show why technical XAI is mistaken. Specifically, we demonstrate that the proper detection of algorithmic bias requires relevant interpretive resources, which can only be made available, in practice, by actively involving a diverse group of stakeholders. Finally, we suggest how feminist theories can help shape integrated XAI: an inclusive social-epistemic process that facilitates the amelioration of algorithmic bias. (shrink)

Herman Philipse considers “religious beliefs, faith and religion [to be] incompatible with science or reason”; he defines religion scientifically and specifically rejects religious doctrine. He describes reason “… as the whole of methods of empirical scientific research and critical discursive thinking as they have evolved in the scientific tradition and will continue to develop in the future” and he defines “… the phenomenon of conscience as a mental organ that can be scientifically explained and that makes the religious explanation superfluous (...) …”. Herman Philipse classifies science as the highest in rank, discards religion and sees philosophy, a rational view of the world, as based solely on the sciences. For his subject, Hans Achterhuis “… primarily cites biologists, ethologists and evolutionary psychologists with a philosophical interest” because “they presently have more to offer [him] than do his immediate colleagues”. Furthermore, “… it will be clear that ethologists and sociobiologists are of the opinion that the violent behaviour of human beings must be understood in part from the point of view of the evolutionary history of the sort ….. most philosophers and anthropologists are not aware of this. Their considerations suggest that violence only entered our world together with humankind”. Achterhuis’s choice is a “historic concept of violence”. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In a Buddhist treatise from around the fourth century CE there is a very remarkable story which serves as a thought experiment calling us to question the nature of self and the identity of persons. Lost in Sanskrit, the passage is fortunately preserved in a Chinese translation, the Dà zhìdù lùn. We here present the first reliable translation directly from the Classical Chinese, and discuss the philosophical significance of the story in its historical and literary context. We emphasise the (...) philosophical importance of embedding the story in two framing narratives, and demonstrate that the story taps a range of intuitions, and indeed fears, about the survival of the self which have also played a large role in the history of the topic in the West, and which continue to be of great contemporary concern. (shrink)

Radical democratic thinking is becoming intrigued by the material situatedness of its political agents and by the role of nonhuman participants in political interaction. At stake here is the displacement of narrow anthropocentrism that currently guides democratic theory and practice, and its repositioning into what we call ‘the nonhuman condition’. This Critical Exchange explores the nonhuman condition. It asks: What are the implications of decentering the human subject via a new materialist reading of radical democracy? Does this reading dilute political (...) agency? Or should this be seen, on the contrary, as an invitation for new voices and demands to enter into democratic assemblages? How might engagement with the more-than-human disrupt or extend theories of radical democracy? Hans Asenbaum and Amanda Machin discuss the human democratic subject both through radical democratic and new materialist lenses. They suggest that a new materialist decentred subject does not lose agency but further gains political responsibility in radical democracy. Jean-Paul Gagnon highlights the possibility of becoming through loss. In losing our anthropocentric arrogance—our understanding of being other and better than animal—we become more connected and discover our place in human-nonhuman assemblages. Melissa Orlie agrees that something can be gained through renouncing dominant human fantasies and presents a ‘radical democratic naturalism’. By renouncing land violence and acknowledging nature’s subjectivity, we can further nonexploitative radical democratic politics. This is where the notion of ‘tidalectic’ processes introduced by James L. Smith is helpful. Focusing on water and the Indigenous knowledges around rivers, he considers how democracy and community can be reimagined as plural, cyclical and attentive to the nonhuman with which the human is inevitably entangled. Diana Leong offers a different approach. Considering the nonhuman from the perspective of Black Studies demands an awareness to how blackness has long been constituted as non- or partially human. (shrink)

In this paper, I examined whether evidence from the neuroscience of morality supports the standard models of phronesis, i.e., Jubilee and Aretai Centre Models. The standard models explain phronesis as a multifaceted construct based on interaction and coordination among functional components. I reviewed recent neuroscience studies focusing on brain networks associated with morality and their connectivity to examine the validity of the models. Simultaneously, I discussed whether the evidence helps the models address challenges, particularly those from the phronesis eliminativism. Neuroscientific (...) evidence supported the importance of brain networks, i.e., the default mode, salience, and central executive functioning networks, in moral functioning in general. The findings favorably supported the multifaceted and integrative nature of phronesis proposed by the standard models. Finally, I considered how the two models could explain the mechanisms of phronesis more integratively based on neuroscientific findings. At the end of this paper, with the evidence, I proposed several practical ideas to promote the cultivation of phronesis, e.g., the consideration of coordination among components for moral functioning and the use of moral exemplars. (shrink)

Loneliness in medicine is a serious problem not just for patients, for whom illness is intrinsically isolating, but also for physicians in the contemporary condition of medicine. We explore this problem by investigating the ideal physician-patient relationship, whose analogy with friendship has held enduring normative appeal. Drawing from Talbot Brewer and Nir Ben-Moshe, we argue that this appeal lies in a dynamic form of companionship incompatible with static models of friendship-like physician-patient relationships: a mutual refinement of embodied virtue that draws (...) both persons together. The ideal physician-patient relationship has a dialectical character that fosters each member's improvement of phenomenologically recognizing and embodying moral virtues. A key component of this dynamic is a commitment to the common goal of the patient's health, realized through joint interactivities and conversations over time. The physician's presence to the patient's suffering—understood best as an alienating phenomenological condition for the patient—orients and discloses possibilities for virtuous caregiving by structuring the meanings of the goals, conversations, and joint narrative constitutive of their relationship. Presence to suffering, paradoxically, is perhaps an important prerequisite for this dynamic partnership. These activities dialectically build an interpretive horizon of understanding through which moral goods and character refinement—in and for the other—may become revealed for both persons in their shared being-in-the-world. This analysis of suffering, mood, and revealing of (possible) moral goods has implications for addressing the modern problem of loneliness for patients and physicians, who are increasingly inhibited from building flourishing relationships with each other. (shrink)

This article explores the use of model organisms in studying the cognitive phenomenon of decision-making. Drawing on the framework of biological control to develop a skeletal conception of decision-making, we show that two core features of decision-making mechanisms can be identified by studying model organisms, such as E. coli, jellyfish, C. elegans, lamprey, and so on. First, decision mechanisms are distributed and heterarchically structured. Second, they depend heavily on chemical information processing, such as that involving neuromodulators. We end by discussing (...) the implications for studying distinctively human decision-making. (shrink)

This article reconstructs Sartre’s theory of selfhood against the background of the contemporary debate between minimal-self theories and narrative-self theories. I argue that Sartre’s theory incorporates both an emphasis on the singular first-person perspective, which is characteristic of minimal-self theories, and an emphasis on the practical intelligibility of experience, which is characteristic of narrative-self theories. The distinctiveness of the Sartrean combination of these motifs consists in its idea of the necessary ideal-relatedness of consciousness. According to Sartre, the logical structure of (...) the pre-reflective cogito requires the haunting presence of an ideal of self-coincidence, which determines for consciousness the meaning of its lived experiences. Consciousness exists as a question to itself due to this ideal-relatedness, and it answers this question by projecting its possibilities as creative and symbolic realizations of this ideal. Establishing the connection between Sartre’s theory of imagination and his theory of selfhood, I suggest that both the ideal and the possibility of consciousness are lived in the manner of the imaginary. (shrink)

This paper approaches Husserl’s analysis of time-consciousness from a mereological perspective. Taking as inspiration Bergson’s idea that pure durée is a multiplicity of interpenetration, I will show, from within Husserlian phenomenology, that the absolute flow can indeed be described as a whole of interpenetrating parts. This mereological perspective will inform my re-consideration of the much-discussed issue of Husserl’s self-criticism concerning the schema of content and apprehension. It will also reveal a fundamental similarity between Husserl’s conception of the absolute flow and (...) Sartre’s conception of lived temporality. This paper consists of four sections. Section 2 presents the basic elements of Husserl’s mereology. Section 3 introduces the difficulty encountered by Husserl’s early account of time that makes use of the schema. I will examine Barry Dainton’s criticism of Husserl’s theory of time-consciousness against the background of the older debate between Meinong and Stern, a debate that has informed Husserl’s own account. Section 4 distinguishes two common criticisms of the schema from Husserl’s own self-criticism, which is in turn divided into two steps. It is shown how the second step of this self-criticism implies the interpenetration of the absolute flow and responds to Dainton’s criticism. Finally, Sect. 5 concludes with some comparative remarks. I will show how Husserl’s notion of absolute flow, as mereologically interpreted, anticipates Sartre’s conception of consciousness as self-transcendence, as well as how it accommodates the apparently conflicting mereological intuitions of Aristotle and Bergson. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In the present study, we examined how the perceived attainability and relatability of moral exemplars predicted moral elevation and pleasantness among both adult and college student participants. Data collected from two experiments were analyzed with Bayesian multilevel modeling to explore which factors significantly predicted outcome variables at the story level. The analysis results demonstrated that the main effect of perceived relatability and the interaction effect between attainability and relatability shall be included in the best prediction model, and thus, were (...) deemed to predict the outcome variables significantly. The main effect of relatability as well as its interaction with attainability positively predicted elevation and pleasantness. We discussed educational implications of the findings in terms of how relatability may be the first point of emphasis for moral educators to focus on and attainability can then bolster the effectiveness. These relatable and attainable moral exemplars can be sources for moral elevation and pleasantness, which promote motivation to emulate moral behavior presented by the exemplars. (shrink)

Hans Kelsen's thorough critique of Eric Voegelin's "New Science of Politcs" is - in my oppinion - the best commentary on Voegelin that has been written so far.

The present study aimed to examine how to improve the effectiveness of moral exemplar-applied interventions based on the pillars of the Self-Determination Theory (SDT) framework, autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Past research has mainly focused on the relatedness and attainability of moral exemplars for predicting motivation outcomes. The data for this study consisted of synthesized data sets from previous studies examining the motivational impacts of distinct moral exemplars and intervention methods. The main syntheses for these data sets used Multilevel Modeling (MLM) (...) focusing on relatability, attainability, and intervention methods, corresponding to relatedness, competence, and autonomy in the SDT, respectively, as predictors. In general, there was a significant interaction effect between the attainability or relatability, and the intervention method. Autonomous instruction methods, which support autonomy, were demonstrated to boost motivational outcomes. Implications from this study support the employment of SDT to examine the use of moral exemplars in moral education and were consistent with previous exemplar studies. (shrink)

Traditionally, the field of medicine has been devoted to safeguarding and enhancing human health. According to conventional wisdom, "Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient..."[1]. However, ground-breaking research now suggests a novel perspective: medicine can serve as a gateway to unravel the intricacies of a chaotic society and, unexpectedly, emerge as an avenue to address the most fundamental and intriguing issue of all – a Theory of Everything.

First published in 1949 expressly to introduce logical positivism to English speakers. Reichenbach, with Rudolph Carnap, founded logical positivism, a form of epistemofogy that privileged scientific over metaphysical truths.

This thesis contributes to a better conceptual understanding of how self-organized control works. I begin by analyzing the control problem and its solution space. I argue that the two prominent solutions offered by classical cognitive science (centralized control with rich commands, e.g., the Fodorian central systems) and embodied cognitive science (distributed control with simple commands, such as the subsumption architecture by Rodney Brooks) are merely two positions in a two-dimensional solution space. I outline two alternative positions: one is distributed control (...) with rich commands, defended by proponents of massive modularity hypothesis; the other is centralized control with simple commands. My goal is to develop a hybrid account that combines aspects of the second alternative position and that of the embodied cognitive science (i.e., centralized and distributed controls with simple commands). Before developing my account, I discuss the virtues and challenges of the first three. This discussion results in a set of criteria for successful neural control mechanisms. Then, I develop my account through analyzing neuroscientific models of decision-making and control with the theoretical lenses provided by formal decision and social choice theories. I contend that neural processes can be productively modeled as a collective of agents, and neural self-organization is analogous to democratic self-governance. In particular, I show that the basal ganglia, a set of subcortical structures, contribute to the production of coherent and intelligent behaviors through implementing “democratic" procedures. Unlike the Fodorian central system—which is a micro-managing “neural commander-in-chief”—the basal ganglia are a “central election commission.” They delegate control of habitual behaviors to other distributed control mechanisms. Yet, when novel problems arise, they engage and determine the result on the basis of simple information (the votes) from across the system with the principles of neurodemocracy, and control with simple commands of inhibition and disinhibition. By actively managing and taking advantage of the wisdom-of-the-crowd effect, these democratic processes enhance the intelligence and coherence of the mind’s final "collective" decisions. I end by defending this account from both philosophical and empirical criticisms and showing that it meets the criteria for successful solution. (shrink)

I explored the association between components constituting the basis for moral and optimal human functioning, i.e., moral reasoning, moral identity, empathy, and purpose, via network analysis. I employed factor scores instead of composite scores that most previous studies used for better accuracy in score estimation in this study. Then, I estimated the network structure among collected variables and centrality indicators. For additional information, the structure and indicators were compared between two groups, participants who engaged in civic activities highly versus lowly. (...) The results demonstrated significant intra- and inter-scale associations in the network. The network structure was invariant across the two groups. Despite the network invariance, I found that the global connectivity between and centrality indicators of examined factors were higher among the high civic engagement group in general. I discussed the implications of the findings in research on moral functioning based on moral psychology and virtue ethics. (shrink)

The human faculty of moral judgment is not well suited to address problems, like climate change, that are global in scope and remote in time. Advocates of ‘moral bioenhancement’ have proposed that we should investigate the use of medical technologies to make human beings more trusting and altruistic, and hence more willing to cooperate in efforts to mitigate the impacts of climate change. We survey recent accounts of the proximate and ultimate causes of human cooperation in order to assess the (...) prospects for bioenhancement. We identify a number of issues that are likely to be significant obstacles to effective bioenhancement, as well as areas for future research. (shrink)

The text addresses conceptions of human selfhood and humankind as developed by two major nineteenth-century German-speaking historians, Johann Gustav Droysen and Jacob Burckhardt. It aims at ascertaining to what extent the historical anthropologies proposed by both authors can be considered to be humanistic. We will attempt to provide an answer to this question while locating and discussing both humanistic and anti-humanistic features in their texts. Humanism is understood here as a perspective that emerged within the framework of the philosophy of (...) the Enlightenment, for example, in Immanuel Kant's ethics and in Friedrich Niethammer's pedagogy. On the one hand, we will define Droysen's and Burckhardt's anthropologies as humanistic, stressing their intellectual connection to the universalistic notions of humankind and human nature developed in the late eighteenth-century. On the other, we will relativize this predicament by exploring their main anti-humanistic traits, i.e. nationalism, with regard to Droysen, and aestheticism, in the case of Burckhardt. (shrink)

Editors van Ditmarsch, Hendriks and Verbrugge of this special issue of topiCS on lying describe some recent trends in research on lying from a multidisciplinary perspective, including logic, philosophy, linguistics, psychology, cognitive science, behavioral economics, and artificial intelligence. Furthermore, they outline the seven contributions to this special issue.

_Wittgenstein_ presents a concise, comprehensive, and systematic treatment of Ludwig Wittgenstein's thought from his early work, _Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus,_ to the posthumous publication of _On Certainty_, notes written just prior to his death. A substantial scholarly addition to our understanding of one of the most original and influential thinkers of the twentieth century, by renowned Wittgenstein scholar, Hans Sluga Proposes an original new interpretation of Wittgenstein's work Written to also be accessible to readers unfamiliar with Wittgenstein's thought Includes discussion of the (...) social and political background and contemporary relevance of Wittgenstein's thoughts. (shrink)

The issue of how to identify the liability of subjects after a traffic accident takes place remains a puzzle regarding the SAE classification system. The SAE system is not good at dealing with the problem of responsibility evaluation; therefore, building a new classification system for self-driving cars from the perspective of the subject's liability is a possible way to solve this problem. This new system divides automated driving into three levels: i) assisted driving based on the will of drivers, ii) (...) automated driving based on the will of the manufacturers, and iii) fully automated driving based on social will. The corresponding responsible subjects for level one, level two, and level three are the drivers, the manufacturers, and society, respectively. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine why moral exemplars are useful and even necessary in moral education despite several critiques from researchers and educators. To support my point, I review recent AI research demonstrating that exemplar-based learning is superior to rule-based learning in model performance in training neural networks, such as large language models. I particularly focus on why education aiming at promoting the development of multifaceted moral functioning can be done effectively by using exemplars, which is similar to exemplar-based learning (...) in AI model training. Furthermore, I discuss the potential limitations and issues related to exemplar-applied moral education with findings from recent studies in AI research raising concerns about model biases and toxic outcomes. I attempt to propose ways to address the concerns regarding employing moral exemplars as well. As remedies, I suggest that autonomy-supporting deliberative and reflective learning processes should be utilized. Furthermore, based on the discussion, I examine how macroscopic socio-cultural aspects influence the effectiveness of exemplar-applied moral education. Suggestions for moral educators and future directions for research in moral education are briefly discussed. (shrink)

Recent philosophy has seen a resurgence of the realist view of sensible qualities such as colour. The view holds that experienced qualities are properties of the objects in the physical environment, not mentally instantiated properties like qualia or merely intentional, illusory ones. Some suggest that this move rids us of the explanatory gap between physical properties and the qualitative features of consciousness. Others say it just relocates the problem of qualities to physical objects in the environment, given that such qualities (...) cannot be derived from the non-qualitative properties of objects, and it does not resolve the problem of consciousness either. I argue that such an outcome is welcome: if the physical world is full of explanatory gaps, then the mind–body explanatory gap is not so special. Moreover, the explanatory gaps regarding qualities of objects are less puzzling than the brain-qualia gap. In order to counter the usual worries concerning realism about objective qualities, I introduce ‘imperfect realism’ as an alternative to colour pluralism and complex reductionism, which accommodates realism in the face of widespread perceptual error. I conclude with a discussion of how this ‘multiple-gaps view’ sits better with a naturalistic framework compared to the Galilean-Cartesian account of qualities. (shrink)

In response to its current crisis, scholars call for the revitalisation of democracy through democratic innovations. While they make ample use of life metaphors describing democracy as a living organism, no comprehensive understanding of ‘life’ has been established within democratic theory. The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement articulates the urgency of refocusing on life and its meaning through radical democratic practice. This article employs a grounded theory approach, enriched with participatory methods, to develop a radical democratic concept of life in (...) conversation with BLM. It conceptualises life as the existence of a perspective that constantly transforms through its fundamental interconnectedness. Building on this concept, the article outlines four principles of a living democracy that go beyond the revitalisation discourse. A living democracy (1) safeguards the existence of all humans and nonhumans, (2) nurtures a diversity of perspectives, (3) fosters social and planetary connectivity, and (4) enables self- and collective transformation. (shrink)

Kierkegaard's Either-Or is a book about the choice between aesthetic, ethical, and religious approaches to life. I show that Either-Or also contains a proposal for philosophy of science, and in particular, about the ideal epistemic state for human beings. Whereas the Cartesian-Hegelian tradition conceived of the ideal state as one of detached deliberation -- i.e. "seeing the world as it is in itself" -- Kierkegaard envisions the ideal state as the achievement of equilibrium between the "spectator" and "actor" aspects of (...) the human being. Kierkegaard's proposal thus sets the stage for Niels Bohr's "epistemological lesson of quantum mechanics". (shrink)

Each many-sorted theory can be converted to an unsorted theory. But this conversion procedure is not uniquely determined, leading to a dilemma: which unsorted theory captures the content of the corresponding many-sorted theory?

In ‘What Makes Killing Wrong?’ Sinnott-Armstrong and Miller make the bold claim that killing in itself is not wrong, what is wrong is totally-disabling. In ‘After-Birth Abortion: Why Should the Baby Live?’ Giubilini and Minerva argue for allowing infanticide. Both papers challenge the stigma commonly associated with killing, and emphasize that killing is not wrong at some margins of life. In this paper, we first generalize the above claims to the thesis that there is nothing morally wrong with killing per (...) se, so long as it is instant and unannounced. Then, from the perspective of social evolution, we explain why people refrain from killing others, the general guideline being that it is unadvisable to kill someone with whom you associate a Second Person Perspective (SPP). Finally, drawing from a seminal paper of Press and Dyson on the Iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma, we stress that an SPP without an SP (Second Person), or the other way around, can both lead to unwelcome results. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Spinoza and the Theory of Organism HANS JONAS I CARTESIANDUALISMlanded speculation on the nature of life in an impasse: intelligible as, on principles of mechanics, the correlation of structure and function became within the res extensa, that of structure-plus-function with feeling or experience (modes of the res cogitans) was lost in the bifurcation, and thereby the fact of life itself became unintelligible at the same time that the explanation (...) of its bodily performance seemed to be assured. The impasse became manifest in Occasionalism : its tour de force of an extraneous, divine "synchronization" of the outer and the inner world (the latter denied to animals) not only suffered from its extreme artificiality, the common failing of such ad hoc constructions, but even at so high a cost failed to accomplish its theoretical purpose by its own terms. For the animal machine, like any machine, raises beyond the question of the "how" that of the "what for" of its functioning---of the purpose for which it had thus been constructed by its maker.1 Its performance, however devoid of immanent teleology, must serve an end, and that end must be someone's end. This end may (directly) be itself, as indeed Descartes had implied when declaring self-preservation to be the effect of the functioning of the organic automaton. In that case the existence as such of the machine would be its end--either terminally, or in turn to benefit something else. In the former case, the machine would have to be more than a machine, for a mere machine cannot enioy its existence. But since, by the rigorous conception of the res extensa, it cannot be more than a machine, its function and/or existence must serve something other than itself. Automata in Descartes ' time were mainly for entertainment (rather than work). But the raison d'etre of the living kingdom could not well be seen in God's indulging his mechanical abilities or in the amusement of celestial spectators--especially since mere complexity of arrangement does not create new quality and thus add something to the unrelieved sameness of the simple substratum that might enrich the spectrum of being. For quality, beyond the primitive determinations of the extended per se, is the subjective creature of sensation, the confused representation of quantity in a mind; and thus organisms cannot harbor it because as mere machines they lack mentality, and pure spirits cannot because they lack sensuality, or the privilege of confusion and thereby of illusion with its possible enjoyment. And as to their intellectual enjoyment, even that, deprived of the thrill of discovery by the same token, would pale in the contemplation of what to sufficiently large The concept of "machine," adopted for its strict confinementto efficientcause, is still a finalisticconcept,even thoughthe final cause is no longer internal to the entity, as a mode of its own operation,but external to it as antecedent design. [43] 44 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY intellects is nothing but the ever-repeated exemplification of the same few, elementary (and ultimately trivial) truths. There remained, then, the time-honored--Stoic as well as Christian--idea that plants and animals are for the benefit of Man. Indeed, since the existence of a living world is the necessary condition for the existence of any of its members, the self-justifying nature of at least one such member (= species) would justify the existence of the whole. In Stoicism, Man provided this end by his possession of reason, which makes him the culmination of a terrestrial scale of being that is also self-justifying throughout all its grades (the end as the best of many that are good in degrees) ; in Christianity, by his possession of an immortal soul, which makes him the sole imago Dei in creation (the end as the sole issue at stake) ; and Cartesian dualism radicalized this latter position by making man even the sole possessor of inwardness or "soul" of any kind, thus the only one of whom "end" can meaningfully be predicated as he alone can entertain ends. All other life then, the product of physical necessity, can be considered his means. However, this traditional idea, in its anthropocentric vanity never a... (shrink)

In the literature on expert trust, it is often assumed that track records are the gold standard for evaluating expertise, and the difficulty of expert identification arises from either the lack of access to track records, or the inability to assess them. I show, using a computational model, that even in an idealized environment where agents have a God’s eye view on track records, they may fail to identify experts. Under plausible conditions, selecting testimony based on track records ends up (...) reducing overall accuracy, and preventing the community from identifying the real experts. (shrink)

Two types of formal models - landscape search tasks and two-armed bandit models - are often used to study the effects that various social factors have on epistemic performance. I argue that they can be understood within a single framework. In this unified framework, I develop a model that may be used to understand the effects of functional and demographic diversity and their interaction. Using the unified model, I find that the benefit of demographic diversity is most pronounced in a (...) functionally homogeneous group, and decreases with the increase of functional diversity. (shrink)

The project of grounding necessity in essence often goes together with the model of essence that assimilates the constitutive essence of an object to the definition of it. The paper argues that if the grounding project is to succeed, the definitional model must be questioned. Like any object whatever, a concrete individual is necessarily identical to that individual. It is argued that this necessity can have an essential ground only if the primitive identity property of it or its thisness is (...) essential to it, and the thisness is in its constitutive essence while not in the definition of it. A concrete individual is in essence partly definable but not fully explainable, for the definition of it forms a crucial part of its constitutive essence, but the constitutive essence includes something fundamental beyond definition or explanation. The definitional model must give way to a model of essence that accommodates this. (shrink)

It is standard to think that in Spinoza’s system, all things are necessary and in no sense contingent. However, in his classic book, Spinoza’s Metaphysics, published in 1969, Edwin Curley argues based on the proposition 28 of the first part of the Ethics that Spinoza endorses necessitarianism of only a modest kind, according to which when it comes to finite modes, there is a sense in which they are contingent. In this paper, I revisit Curley’s argument. Commentators have responded to (...) Curley’s argument, showing that Spinoza’s remarks on infinite modes entail that finite modes can in no sense be contingent. But this alone falls short of dispelling Curley’s misgivings about the standard interpretation, for it remains unexplained why Curley is wrong in thinking that the proposition 28 supports his moderate necessitarian interpretation. In defense of the standard interpretation, I bolster the usual response to Curley in greater detail than has been done in the literature and explain why, pace Curley, the proposition 28 plays no evidential role in support of Curley’s interpretation. (shrink)

Although some previous studies have investigated the relationship between moral foundations and moral judgment development, the methods used have not been able to fully explore the relationship. In the present study, we used Bayesian Model Averaging (BMA) in order to address the limitations in traditional regression methods that have been used previously. Results showed consistency with previous findings that binding foundations are negatively correlated with post-conventional moral reasoning and positively correlated with maintaining norms and personal interest schemas. In addition to (...) previous studies, our results showed a positive correlation for individualizing foundations and post-conventional moral reasoning. Implications are discussed as well as a detailed explanation of the novel BMA method in order to allow others in the field of moral education to be able to use it in their own studies. (shrink)

The Handbook of Metaphysics and Ontology reflects the conviction that the history of metaphysics and current work in metaphysics and ontology can each throw valuable light on the other. Thus it is designed to serve both äs a means of making more widely accessible the results of recent scholarship in the history of philosophy, and also äs a unique work of reference in reladon to the metaphysical themes at the centre of much current debate in analyüc philosophy. The work contains (...) more man 450 shorter articies on specific themes and methods in metaphysics and ontology, together with biographical essays summarizing the thinking of the most important philosophers within the traditions dealt with. In addition, it contains about 20 longer survey arücles mapping out both historically and systemadcally the main areas of metaphysics and ontology. AU contributions have been speciaüy commissioned for this project from leading authorities in their respective fields. A special feature of the work is the pardcular attention that is paid to topics and issues of relevance to contemporary philosophical debates. The work includes also a series of arücles on the logical and mathematical tools of metaphysics and on the applications of metaphysical ideas within linguisdcs, psychology, cognitive science, and mathemadcs. (shrink)

This study investigated the impact of collaborative learning on mathematics achievement and attitudes in sixth-grade students, comparing it to traditional didactic teaching. A quasi-experimental research design was utilized in which sixth-grade students were randomly assigned to either control or experimental groups. Pre- and post-tests assessed mathematics achievement using curriculum-aligned tests. In addition, attitudes toward mathematics were measured using the ‘attitude towards mathematics’ inventory developed by Tapai and Marsh in 2004. Both groups exhibited similar pre-test levels. The experimental group received collaborative (...) learning, while the control group received traditional teaching. Post-tests after a 12-week intervention showed significant improvements in the experimental group’s mathematics achievement, regardless of initial achievement levels. Positive changes in attitudes toward mathematics were also observed in the experimental group, with some progress in the control group. Collaborative learning appears promising for enhancing mathematics achievement and nurturing positive attitudes in elementary students. (shrink)

When we participate in political debate or protests, we are judged by how we look, which clothes we wear, by our skin colour, gender and body language. This results in exclusions and limits our freedom of expression. The Politics of Becoming explores radical democratic acts of disidentification to counter this problem. Anonymity in masked protest, graffiti, and online de-bate interrupts our everyday identities. This allows us to live our multiple selves. In the digital age, anonymity becomes an inherent part of (...) everyday communication. Through our smart devices we express our selves differently. As cyborgs, our identities are disrupted and reassembled. We curate self-representations on social media, create avatars, share selfies and choose the skin colour of our emojis. The Politics of Becoming encourages us to engage in a revolution of the self. Democratic pluralism is not only a matter of institutional design but also about how we express our identities. Inner revolutions change our personal realities and plant a seed for democratic futures. (shrink)

The Defining Issues Test (DIT) has been widely used in psychological experiments to assess one’s developmental level of moral reasoning in terms of postconventional reasoning. However, there have been concerns regarding whether the tool is biased across people with different genders and political and religious views. To address the limitations, in the present study, I tested the validity of the brief version of the test, that is, the behavioral DIT, in terms of the measurement invariance and differential item functioning (DIF). (...) I could not find any significant non-invariance at the test level or any item demonstrating practically significant DIF at the item level. The findings indicate that neither the test nor any of its items showed a significant bias toward any particular group. As a result, the collected validity evidence supports the use of test scores across different groups, enabling researchers who intend to examine participants’ moral reasoning development across heterogeneous groups to draw conclusions based on the scores. (shrink)

In this new edition, a hypothesis is put forward for the first time to unify the Big Bang theory and the evolutionary theory by showing both events following the same set of fundamental interrelationships. As the evolution of life is a part of the evolutions of the universe, these two events express many fundamental similarities (this is self-similarity, which means a part of the system is similar to the whole system). Based on the same principle, the evolution of multicellular organisms, (...) social evolution, development of the human body, and human technological development are all a part of the evolution of life. Thus, they all follow the same set of rules that all life follows and, at the fundamental level, the interrelationships that the Big Bang follows. Therefore, all of these events follow the fundamental interrelationships and express fundamental similarities. In other words, all these events are the specific expressions of those fundamental interrelationships – the fundamental mechanism that governs everything in the universe. -/- Upon these interrelationships, new approaches to study social development and technological development are employed. By using the knowledge of the medical sciences, including the structures (anatomy and histology), functions (physiology) and development (embryology) of a human body; knowledge of the evolution of life; and the concept of fundamental interrelationships, we can see the future beyond the horizon. Using the nerve system in parallel as a model, we can comprehensively understand the development of the information revolution. Based upon parallel interrelationships, we can see that the transformation of society due to individuals’ power increase brought by new technologies bears great similarities with the transformation from the solid state of ice to the liquid state of water due the individual molecules’ kinetic energy increase. -/- As the fundamental interrelationships govern social evolution, all events in human civilisation are simply specific expressions of those rules in which significant social events not only changed the course of civilisation but left so many unanswered mysteries: how did the Greeks build such brilliant civilisations; why did the Scientific Revolution originate from the West rather than the East such as in China; why did the Chinese society remain in feudalism for such a long time while the Western society had evolved into a higher level – industrialization and modern society; why did the Chinese civilisation fall from its ancient glory in the modern time but rapidly re-rise again to a super power in the last few decades? All these mysteries remain unanswered because of the lack of fundamental laws of physics and evolutionary biology used in the traditional methodologies of social science. As the fundamental laws of physics are the fundamental mechanism for everything and these mysteries are a part of the evolution of life, the fundamental laws of physics and evolutionary biology are used in tackling these unanswered issues. For example, upon parallel relationship, Chinese civilisation is compared with the transition from unicellular organisms to multicellular organisms. From how unicellular organisms aggregate and evolve new rules to organise themselves, we can much better understand how human individuals aggregate to form societies and evolve new cultures to organise themselves in social evolution. Furthermore, transformation from the solid state of ice to the liquid state of water is used to analyze Chinese social evolution. With these approaches the mysteries in Chinese civilisation have been answered. -/- Ultimately, all these discussions in this book have demonstrated that the Interrelationships Model has unified social science with natural science, and furthermore, science with philosophy. This is an important attempt in answering the most fundamental and intriguing question of all – the Theory of Everything. -/- Currently, this book is for FREE download. (shrink)

Some stories of moral exemplars motivate us to emulate their admirable attitudes and behaviors, but why do some exemplars motivate us more than others? We systematically studied how motivation to emulate is influenced by the similarity between a reader and an exemplar in social or cultural background (Relatability) and how personally costly or demanding the exemplar’s actions are (Attainability). Study 1 found that university students reported more inspiration and related feelings after reading true stories about the good deeds of a (...) recent fellow alum, compared to a famous moral exemplar from decades past. Study 2A developed a battery of short moral exemplar stories that more systematically varied Relatability and Attainability, along with a set of non-moral exemplar stories for comparison. Studies 2B and 2C examined the path from the story type to relatively low stakes altruism (donating to charity and intentions to volunteer) through perceived attainability and relatability, as well as elevation and pleasantness. Together, our studies suggest that it is primarily the relatability of the moral exemplars, not the attainability of their actions, that inspires more prosocial motivation, at least regarding acts that help others at a relatively low cost to oneself. (shrink)