The traditional use of conventional media by businesses for audience targeting has shifted with the rise of influencer marketing, notably on platforms like TikTok, posing challenges in content adaptation and technological adaptation. Albert Bandura's Social Cognitive Theory examines factors shaping purchasing behavior, particularly relevant for young professionals. A quantitative correlational study focused on young professionals engaging with TikTok and influenced by Filipino TikTok creators, revealing education level as a key determinant of purchasing behavior. Extended TikTok engagement positively correlates with increased (...) purchasing likelihood. Filipino TikTok influencers significantly impact young professionals' purchasing decisions, emphasizing the need for tailored marketing strategies targeting this demographic. Recommendations were provided for effective influencer and digital marketing strategies targeting young professionals. (shrink)

This chapter of the Handbook of Utility Theory aims at covering the connections between utility theory and social ethics. The chapter first discusses the philosophical interpretations of utility functions, then explains how social choice theory uses them to represent interpersonal comparisons of welfare in either utilitarian or non-utilitarian representations of social preferences. The chapter also contains an extensive account of John Harsanyi's formal reconstruction of utilitarianism and its developments in the later literature, especially when society faces uncertainty rather than probabilistic (...) risk. (shrink)

A critique of popular astrology. The critical examination outlines a number of serious concerns with the theory underlying astrology.

This is a chapter of a collective volume of Rawls's and Harsanyi's theories of distributive justice. It focuses on Harsanyi's important Social Aggregation Theorem and technically reconstructs it as a theorem in welfarist social choice.

La description en langue naturelle est l’artefact permettant de débuter un processus d’automatisation. La tâche principale de l’ingénieur du logiciel, c’est de combler le clivage entre langue naturelle et langue de la machine. Après avoir présenté quelques ontologies définies pour les processus d’automatisation, quelques pour et quelques contre l’emploi d’ontologies dans le génie logiciel sont présentées. Des indications pour dépasser cette simple opposition sont ensuite décrites. Des évaluations sur le réductionnisme dans les ontologies en ce qui concerne les possibles interactions (...) entre humains, machines et réalité muette terminent la présentation. (shrink)

In this talk, I’d like to focus not on external technologies like computers, smart boards, virtual experience, nor the Orgasmatron in Woody Allen’s movie Sleeper (1973), but rather on some of the possible social implications of bodily implanted devices on the future of human nature and society. In other words, I’ll leave the science underlying cyborgs to the boffins in engineering, computer science and artificial intelligence, and just focus on some conceptualizations of the word ‘cyborg’, along with possible social implications (...) and concerns surrounding cyborgization. (shrink)

L’analyse logiciste des constructions savantes a pour but de mettre à nu leurs composantes symboliques : une base de données (observations et présuppositions) et un ensemble d’opérations de réécriture exprimant le raisonnement qui relie cette base aux thèses de la construction. Les travaux inspirés de ce programme depuis une vingtaine d’années soulèvent des questions intéressantes dans les perspectives d’une épistémologie pratique maintes fois exposées. L’étude des conflits d’interprétation y tient une large place ; elle s’apparente à l’analyse des controverses scientifiques (...) mais vise moins à expliquer celles-ci, du point de vue socio-historique, qu’à mieux définir les voies choisies pour les résoudre, les éluder ou les dépasser, selon les cas. Le questionnement logiciste porte sur les conséquences intellectuelles et institutionnelles de ces choix. L’affirmation de sa pérennité procède à la fois d’un constat et d’un pari, l’un et l’autre argumentés dans cet article. (shrink)

(Back Cover:) « La pensée métaphysique renaîtra demain. Ce sont des savants qui ont le goût et le sens de la pensée conduite jusqu’au terme de ses exigences internes, et des philosophes initiés aux sciences expérimentales qui, en commun, la feront. » L’œuvre de Claude Tresmontant (1925-1997) illustre parfaitement cette recherche de la métaphysique d’un monde en devenir, qui sait écouter et se modeler sur la transformation – la métamorphose – promise à une Création finalisée. Le trait commun aux (...) exposés ici présentés sous forme définitive a été cette recherche autour d’une pensée qui renouvelle de l’intérieur la métaphysique en réalisant le vœu de Bergson qu’elle devienne « auscultatrice », que l’énigme que pose l’homme face à son origine et sa destinée ne soit pas recouverte par une pensée qui se perdrait dans la description des choses ou dans l’esprit de système, mais qui non plus n’irait se recroqueviller sur elle-même, en narrant sa propre expérience subjective sous le mode de la déréliction. Claude Tresmontant a su penser l’être en genèse, et il a cherché à renouveler la question de l’existence de Dieu, en en transformant la problématique en dialogue avec les sciences contemporaines. À ce goût de l’être dont les sciences ont renouvelé l’approche, il a également voulu infuser un « supplément d’âme », en repensant la réalité de la création et l’horizon de la cause finale, toujours à partir de la nature ultimement théologique de la réponse à la question « qu’est-ce que l’homme ? » Contributeurs : Yves Tourenne, Philippe Gagnon, Fabien Revol, Brunor, Frédéric Crouslé, Bertrand Souchard, Emmanuel Gabellieri. Table of Contents: Note Liminaire (Ph. Gagnon) - 7 En quoi la pensée de Claude Tresmontant nous stimule-t-elle encore ? Hommage et critique (Y. Tourenne) - 13 L’imbrication de la preuve de Dieu et de la cosmologie chez Tresmontant représente-t-elle une preuve ? (Ph. Gagnon) - 27 L’usage apologétique de la philosophie de Tresmontant dans les Indices pensables de Brunor (F. Revol) - 49 Réponse à Fabien Revol (Brunor) - 77 Qu’est-ce qui cloche dans la théologie de Claude Tresmontant ? (Fr. Crouslé) - 85 Les métaphysiques principales de Claude Tresmontant : la foi biblique est-elle à part de la raison philosophique grecque ? (B. Souchard) - 109 Maurice Blondel et Claude Tresmontant (E. Gabellieri) - 123 La vision informationnelle de Tresmontant, surtout en référence au problème de l’âme (Ph. Gagnon) - 133. (shrink)

Rousseau argues that holding the talented in high public esteem leads the less talented to esteem their natural virtues less highly and therefore to neglect the cultivation of these virtues. D’Holbach’s response to Rousseau indicates a sense in which esteeming talent can avoid these detrimental consequences. The starting point of d’Holbach’s defense of the sciences and arts is an analysis of the impact that despotic regimes have on esteeming talent. He argues that there is not only a problem of over-valuing (...) talent but also a problem of under-valuing talent. These considerations form the background for his conception of valuing talent in the right way. The phenomenon of political deception in despotic regimes indicates a sense in which talent can be regarded as a tool for solving a pressing political problem: Genuinely estimable uses of talent are those that oppose despotism and support republican virtues. Esteeming such talent does not lead to a loss of esteem and self-esteem for ordinary people because republican virtues themselves are a source of esteem and self-esteem. Comparison with some aspects of the response of d’Holbach’s friend, Claude-Adrien Helvétius, to Rousseau will accentuate the specific strengths of d’Holbach’s argument. (shrink)

The following article begins with my recollection of the only academic conference on Zdziechowski that was organised still under the communist regime in the autumn of 1984 at the Jagiellonian University and ends with a description of the discussion on the genesis and power of evil, with the participation of Czesław Miłosz and Leszek Kołakowski, which was triggered in Poland immediately after the publication of the last edition of On Cruelty in 1993. On Cruelty was first published in 1928 in (...) the journal Przegla̧d Współczesny [Contemporary Review] in Krakow, a second time in 1938 in the volume of articles In the Face of the End, Krakow 1938, and a third – and so far last – time also in Krakow in 1993. On Cruelty, published three times but so far only in Polish, has never been thoroughly analysed or even discussed, which is why this article focuses on discussing it and related questions about the origins and nature of evil, mainly in Europe and Asia, from the earliest times to the present. Zdziechowski was particularly outraged when the cruelty he condemned was justified by religion, especially Christianity (Catholic and Protestant). From these condemnations, he described the activities of the Inquisition, the witch trials, cruelty to animals, and – in the introduction – the “psychology of cruelty.” At the same time, however, he meticulously listed the names of those political and spiritual leaders in Europe and Asia, theologians and thinkers, who, over many centuries, up to the present day, have resolutely spoken out against evil, including cruelty, within and outside the Church. A separate and important issue is Zdziechowski’s attitude to Tsarist Russia and Bolshevism, as outlined in his work On Cruelty. On the one hand, he pointed out that at least two rulers of Russia before 1917 – Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Great – had made major contributions to the history of cruelty in Europe and Asia. But Bolshevism, which Zdziechowski condemned in the strongest terms, was in his eyes not a continuation of pre-1917 Russian despotism, but emanated from the depths of Asia. (shrink)

Dans un texte désormais célèbre, Ferdinand de Saussure insiste sur l’arbitraire du signe dont il vante les qualités. Toutefois il s’avère que le symbole, signe non arbitraire, dans la mesure où il existe un rapport entre ce qui représente et ce qui est représenté, joue un rôle fondamental dans la plupart des activités humaines, qu’elles soient scientifiques, artistiques ou religieuses. C’est cette dimension symbolique, sa portée, son fonctionnement et sa signification dans des domaines aussi variés que la chimie, la théologie, (...) les mathématiques, le code de la route et bien d’autres qui est l’objet du livre La Pointure du symbole. -/- Jean-Yves Béziau, franco-suisse, est docteur en logique mathématique et docteur en philosophie. Il a poursuivi des recherches en France, au Brésil, en Suisse, aux États-Unis (UCLA et Stanford), en Pologne et développé la logique universelle. Éditeur-en-chef de la revue Logica Universalis et de la collection Studies in Universal Logic (Springer), il est actuellement professeur à l’Université Fédérale de Rio de Janeiro et membre de l’Académie brésilienne de Philosophie. SOMMAIRE -/- PRÉFACE L’arbitraire du signe face à la puissance du symbole Jean-Yves BÉZIAU La logique et la théorie de la notation (sémiotique) de Peirce (Traduit de l’anglais par Jean-Marie Chevalier) Irving H. ANELLIS Langage symbolique de Genèse 2-3 Lytta BASSET -/- Mécanique quantique : quelle réalité derrière les symboles ? Hans BECK -/- Quels langages et images pour représenter le corps humain ? Sarah CARVALLO Des jeux symboliques aux rituels collectifs. Quelques apports de la psychologie du développement à l’étude du symbolisme Fabrice CLÉMENT Les panneaux de signalisation (Traduit de l’anglais par Fabien Shang) Robert DEWAR Remarques sur l’émergence des activités symboliques Jean LASSÈGUE Les illustrations du "Songe de Poliphile" (1499). Notule sur les hiéroglyphes de Francesca Colonna Pierre-Alain MARIAUX Signes de vie Jeremy NARBY Visualising relations in society and economics. Otto Neuraths Isotype-method against the background of his economic thought Elisabeth NEMETH Algèbre et logique symboliques : arbitraire du signe et langage formel Marie-José DURAND – Amirouche MOKTEFI Les symboles mathématiques, signes du Ciel Jean-Claude PONT La mathématique : un langage mathématique ? Alain M. ROBERT. (shrink)

RENÉ DESCARTES: UMA BIOGRAFIA -/- RENÉ DESCARTES: A BIOGRAPHY -/- Emanuel Isaque Cordeiro da Silva - CAP-UFPE, IFPE-BJ e UFRPE. E-mails: [email protected] e [email protected]. WhatsApp: (82)98143-8399. -/- -/- Nascido em 1596 em Haia, nas fronteiras de Touraine e Poitou, em uma família nobre, René Descartes vem ao mundo ao mesmo ano em que Johannes Kepler (1671-1630), em seu primeiro trabalho publicado (Mysterium cosmographicum), prova a superioridade da astronomia moderna (a de Nicolau Copérnico (1473-1543)) da astronomia antiga (a de Ptolomeu (90-168 (...) d.C.)). Ao mesmo tempo, Galileu Galilei (1564-1642), que detém a cadeira de matemática da Universidade de Pádua, funda o método experimental. As descobertas de Galileu tiveram forte impacto sobre o Colégio Real de La Fleche, realizado pelos jesuítas e onde Descartes recebeu, a partir de 1606, uma forte educação. Ele menciona, no Discurso do Método, seu “desejo extremo” em aprender, seguido, no final de seus estudos, de uma grande decepção: decepção com a filosofia ensinada, cujas controvérsias perpétuas revelam um caráter questionável, e que não pode fornecer um alicerce, em seu estado atual, para outras ciências. Também é proferido um desapontamento, mas esse desapontamento é inverso e diz respeito às matemática, capaz de fornecer esse fundamento que a filosofia não confere, mediante sua certeza e evidências, mas sobre o qual ainda não construímos nada. -/- -/- Numa Europa marcada pelo choque do tradicionalismo católico e do mercantilismo protestante, o lento declínio do poder espanhol e a luta dos Países Baixos pela sua independência, Descartes escolheu, primeiramente, após a graduação, a carreira militar. Engajado no exército do Príncipe Maurício de Nassau, ele é retirado da ociosidade da vida da guarnição pelo encontro, em 1618, de um jovem cientista holandês, Isaac Beeckman (1588-1637), que se tornou seu amigo íntimo por algum tempo. Conhecedor de todas as pesquisas científicas do momento e partidário da nova concepção “mecanicista” da natureza, Beeckman compartilhou com Descartes um entusiasmo que foi acompanhado, segundamente, da ambição de realizar a ciência universal por si mesma, mediante um método único: na noite de 10 de novembro de 1619, ele concebe em três “sonhos”, “os alicerces de uma ciência admirável”. -/- Nos anos seguintes a essa iluminação decisiva, Descartes viajou por toda a Europa, estimando, como Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592), que a demonstração de boas maneiras e costumes diferentes podem gerar muitos preconceitos. Toda sua vida, além disso, esteve vagando, isto é, foi marcada por múltiplas mudanças de residências, e a recusa de estabelecer um vínculo muito de perto com alguém. Foi na Holanda que ele, finalmente, buscará a tranquilidade que não encontrara na França ainda abalada pelas guerras religiosas, antes de ser assim pelas convulsões da Fronda. Todavia, mesmo na Holanda, ele não pôde evitar os ataques de calvinistas e polemicas teológicas que o repugnaram, como evidenciado em suas discussões com a Universidade de Utrecht entre 1643 à 1645 e a Universidade de Leiden em 1647. -/- -/- Além de sua amizade com Beeckman, outro encontro teve uma influência indubitavelmente decisiva sobre o destino de Descartes: o encontro com o cardeal de Bérulle. Fundador da congregação do Oratório (ao qual pertencem Nicolas Malebranche (1638-1715) e Jean-Baptiste Massillon (1663-1742)), o cardeal de Bérulle enxerga na nova física mecanicista, um meio de lutar contra o naturalismo resultante do Renascimento e seu paganismo latente: em uma longa entrevista com Descartes, no outono de 1647, ele fez dessa última uma obrigação de consciência para se dedicar, nesse sentido, à filosofia. -/- Em 1628, Descartes começa a escrever as Regras para a direção do espírito, um tratado inacabado e que não foi publicado durante a vida do autor. Em 1631, desenvolvera a geometria analítica que combina curvas geométricas com equações algébricas. Em 1633 escreveu O Tratado do Homem e preparava-se para publicar O Tratado do Mundo quando a notícia da condenação de Galileu Galilei pelo Santo Ofício (a Inquisição) o deixou receoso e decide, por prudência, não publicar o seu Tratado no qual a tese do movimento da Terra ao redor do Sol é apoiada. Alguns anos depois, foi divulgado em público cultivada de algumas de suas descobertas científicas: além da geometria, a dioptria (a teoria da refração da luz) e meteoros (teoria dos fenômenos atmosféricos luminosos). Esses três tratados aparecem no apêndice do Discurso do Método, e como “ensaios” desse método, em 1637. No século XIX, Victor Cousin (1792-1867) publicou pela primeira vez o Discurso sozinho, sem os ensaios. -/- Então vem a principal obra de Descartes no ramo da metafísica: as seis Meditações, aumentadas pelas objeções dos mais famosos filósofos da época (incluindo Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), Antoine Arnauld (1612-1694) e Pierre Gassendi (1592-1655)), e as respostas a essas objeções, apareceram em 1641. Ansioso para expor sua filosofia para que pudesse ser ensinada, ele também a caracteriza em forma de manual com os Princípios da Filosofia de 1644. -/- Além dos trabalhos publicados, foi por meio das cartas trocadas com personalidades do mundo erudito que Descartes encontrou a oportunidade de esclarecer vários pontos de sua filosofia. Seus principais correspondentes foram o Prade Marin Mersenne (1588-1648), o Padre Denis Mesland (1615-1672), Pierre Chanut (1601-1662), Claude Clerselier (1614-1684), Christiaan Huygens (1629-1695) e Henry More (1614-1687). A partir de 1643, Descartes sustentou, com a Princesa Isabel da Boêmia (1596-1662), uma correspondência dedicada essencialmente a questões morais, que lhe permitiu a formulação de suas ideias nesse campo: esse esforço conduziu, em 1649, ao tratado das Paixões da alma. -/- Nesse mesmo ano, 1649, a Rainha Cristina da Suécia (1626-1689) o convida para ir a Estocolmo, que ele aceitou após muita hesitação. Recebido com todas as honras, mas forçado a um modo de vida bastantemente distinto daquele que era acostumado, e submetido a um clima do qual não se adequou, ele sucumbiu a pneumonia em fevereiro de 1650. -/- Descartes deixou-nos uma espécie de autobiografia intelectual na primeira parte do Discurso do Método: em seus anos de treinamento, seus entusiasmos e suas decepções. O discurso é, também, o primeiro livro para quem busca compreender o projeto filosófico cartesiano desde sua gênese até sua realização. Existem expostos, o método claro (na segunda parte), mas também a moral (terceira parte), a metafísica (quarta parte) e finalmente a física (quinta e sexta partes). (shrink)

1. Une dispute épistémologique 1.1 Quatre itinéraires à proximité puis à distance des structuralismes 1.2 Un différend sur les « usages réglés du rationalisme » en sciences de l’homme 2. Les mots et les descriptions en sciences de l’homme 2.1 Une commune limitation du déterminisme linguistique 2.2 Un problème philosophique implicite : descriptions définies et noms propres 2.3 L’usage des descriptions définies en sciences de l’homme 2.4 Les (semi-)noms propres des sciences historiques 2.5 Le degré de généralité des concepts employés (...) et ses conséquences sur les raisonnements 3. La spécificité des raisonnements en sciences de l’homme 3.1 Quelle logique pour raisonner sur les phénomènes humains ? 3.2 Les usages d’une référence commune : la logique naturelle 3.3 Propositions et énoncés : divergences sur l’analyse des raisonnements 4. Le juste degré de formalisation du langage et des raisonnements 4.1 La formalisation des descriptions 4.2 Les modèles et la formalisation des raisonnements 4.3 Des formalisations qui s’ignorent 5. Le caractère historique des sciences de l’homme 5.1 Formaliser implique-t-il de dé-historiciser ? 5.2 Les mécanismes du changement scientifique 5.3 Pragmatique de l’intervention théorique. (shrink)

An outline of the historical development of ideas of utility and consequences in the history of ethics in the 18th century.

The Louvre Museum is the largest of the world's art museums by its exhibition surface. These represent the Western art of the Middle Ages in 1848, those of the ancient civilizations that preceded and influenced it (Oriental, Egyptian, Greek, Etruscan and Roman), and the arts of early Christians and Islam. At the origin of the Louvre existed a castle, built by King Philip Augustus in 1190, and occupying the southwest quarter of the current Cour Carrée. In 1594, Henri IV decided (...) to unite the palace of the Louvre with the palace of the Tuileries built by Catherine de Medicis. The Cour Carrée was built by the architects Lemercier and then Le Vau, under the reign of Louis XIII and Louis XIV. The Department of Paintings currently has about 7,500 paintings (of which 3,400 are exposed), covering a period that goes from the Middle Ages to 1848 (date of the beginning of the Second Republic). By including the deposits, the collection is, with 12,660 works, the largest collection of ancient paintings in the world. With rare exceptions, the works after 1848 were transferred to the Musée d'Orsay when it was created in 1986. CONTENTS: Louvre Museum - Variety of exhibited works - The Royal Palace - The collections - - Eastern antiquities - - Arts of Islam - - Egyptian Antiquities - - Greek, Etruscan and Roman Antiquities - - Paintings - - - French school - - - Northern Schools (Flanders, Netherlands, Germany) - - - Italian School - - - Other schools Painting - Definitions - Painting genres - - The landscape - - Still life Paintings - FRANCOIS BOUCHER - - Vulcan presenting arms to Venus for Aeneas - RAPHAEL - - Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione - RUBENS - - Helena Fourment with children - LOUIS DAVID - - Madame Récamier - REMBRANDT - - Portrait of Heindrickje Stoffels - VELAZQUEZ - - Portrait of the Infanta Margarita - SIMONE MEMMI - - Jesus Christ walking on Calvary - JAN STEEN - - The Bad Company - HANS HOLBEIN - - Erasmus - CORREGGIO - - Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine - LANCRET - - Conversation - JAN VAN DER MEER (VERMEER) - - The Lacemaker - VAN DYCK - - Charles I at the Hunt - FRANÇOIS CLOUET - - Elisabeth of Austria (1554-1592), Wife of Charles IX and Queen of France (1570 - 1574) - DELACROIX - - The Barque of Dante - EL GRECO - - Saint Louis, King of France, and a page - REMBRANDT - - Pilgrims at Emmaus (The Supper at Emmaus) - GERARD DAVID - - Marriage at Cana - RAPHAEL - - Portrait of Dona Isabel de Requesens, Vice-Queen of Naples - RUBENS - - La Kermesse (The Village Fête, or Noce de village) - FRANS HALS - - The Gypsy Girl - DECAMPS - - The Sonneurs - HOLBEIN THE YOUNGER - - Anne of Cleves - P. PRUD’HON - - Psyche transported to Heaven - PHILIPPE DE CHAMPAIGNE - - Portrait of Richelieu - LANCRET - - The Autumn - L. DAVID - - Madame Seriziat - COROT - - Recollection of Mortefontaine - LEONARDO DA VINCI - - La belle ferronnière - CORREGGIO - - Venus and Cupid with a Satyr - WATTEAU - - Pilgrimage to Cythera (The Embarkation for Cythera) - NICOLAS POUSSIN - - The Inspiration of the Poet - PRUD’HON - - The Empress Josephine (1763-1814) - FRAGONARD - - The Bathers - H. RIGAUD - - Louis XIV (1638–1715) - TERBURG - - The Concert - LEOPOLD ROBERT - - The Pilgrimage to the Madonna of the Arch - LARGILLIERE - - Family Portrait - MANTEGNA - - Parnassus - MEMLING - - The Virgin and Child between St James and St Dominic - FRAGONARD - - The Music Lesson - JEAN VAN EYCK - - The Virgin of chancellor Rolin - PAOLO VERONESE - - Susannah and the Elders - FRANÇOIS BOUCHER - - Diana leaving her bath - GÉRICAULT - - The Raft of the Medusa - MURILLO - - Assumption of the Virgin - CLAUDE GELLEE (LORRAIN) - - Ulysses returning Chryseis to her father (Marine, setting sun) - INGRES - - Madame Riviere - E. MURILLO - - The Young Beggar - GREUZE - - The Broken Pitcher - PIETER DE HOOCH - - Card players in an opulent interior - POUSSIN - - Et in Arcadia ego - QUENTIN MATSYS - - The moneylender and his wife - ANDREA SOLARIO - - Madonna with the Green Cushion - TITIEN - - Woman with a Mirror - DAVID TENIERS (the Younger) - - The Works of Mercy - LEONARDO DA VINCI - - Mona Lisa (La Gioconda) - Armand Dayot . (shrink)

La querelle qui oppose la sémantique cognitive à la linguistique "orthodoxe" contemporaine: structuralisme et grammaire générative (Claude Vandeloise, ce numéro), éveille, en histoire des sciences du langage, des échos lointains mais familiers. Car, par bien des aspects, se trouve rappelée une querelle épistémologique ancienne de grande envergure, celle qui, dans l'Antiquité grecque, opposa les anomalistes aux analogistes, les anomalistes de l'école stoïcienne de Pergame aux analogistes de l'école aristotélicienne d'Alexandrie.

Nous envisagerons dans cet article la possibilité d'un abord pratique de la relation entre linguistique et psychanalyse : la modélisation linguistique des données mises au jour par la psychanalyse à partir de corpus tirés du discours courant. La validation de tels modèles d'après les critères requis par l'« approche logiciste » de J.-C. Gardin et J. Molino sera examinée sur un exemple précis que nous exposerons en détail : l'Analyse des Logiques Subjectives, modèle développé, publié et enseigné par nous depuis (...) près de vingt ans. (shrink)

The no-miracles argument and the pessimistic induction are arguably the main considerations for and against scientific realism. Recently these arguments have been accused of embodying a familiar, seductive fallacy. In each case, we are tricked by a base rate fallacy, one much-discussed in the psychological literature. In this paper we consider this accusation and use it as an explanation for why the two most prominent `wholesale' arguments in the literature seem irresolvable. Framed probabilistically, we can see very clearly why realists (...) and anti-realists have been talking past one another. We then formulate a dilemma for advocates of either argument, answer potential objections to our criticism, discuss what remains (if anything) of these two major arguments, and then speculate about a future philosophy of science freed from these two arguments. In so doing, we connect the point about base rates to the wholesale/retail distinction; we believe it hints at an answer of how to distinguish profitable from unprofitable realism debates. In short, we offer a probabilistic analysis of the feeling of ennui afflicting contemporary philosophy of science. (shrink)

“Love hurts”—as the saying goes—and a certain amount of pain and difficulty in intimate relationships is unavoidable. Sometimes it may even be beneficial, since adversity can lead to personal growth, self-discovery, and a range of other components of a life well-lived. But other times, love can be downright dangerous. It may bind a spouse to her domestic abuser, draw an unscrupulous adult toward sexual involvement with a child, put someone under the insidious spell of a cult leader, and even inspire (...) jealousy-fueled homicide. How might these perilous devotions be diminished? The ancients thought that treatments such as phlebotomy, exercise, or bloodletting could “cure” an individual of love. But modern neuroscience and emerging developments in psychopharmacology open up a range of possible interventions that might actually work. These developments raise profound moral questions about the potential uses—and misuses—of such anti-love biotechnology. In this article, we describe a number of prospective love-diminishing interventions, and offer a preliminary ethical framework for dealing with them responsibly should they arise. (shrink)

There is considerable disagreement about the epistemic value of novel predictive success, i.e. when a scientist predicts an unexpected phenomenon, experiments are conducted, and the prediction proves to be accurate. We survey the field on this question, noting both fully articulated views such as weak and strong predictivism, and more nascent views, such as pluralist reasons for the instrumental value of prediction. By examining the various reasons offered for the value of prediction across a range of inferential contexts , we (...) can see that neither weak nor strong predictivism captures all of the reasons for valuing prediction available. A third path is presented, Pluralist Instrumental Predictivism; PIP for short. (shrink)

The Homeostatic Property Cluster (HPC) account of natural kinds has become popular since it was proposed by Richard Boyd in the late 1980s. Although it is often taken as a defining natural kinds as such, it is easy enough to see that something's being a natural kind is neither necessary nor sufficient for its being an HPC. This paper argues that it is better not to understand HPCs as defining what it is to be a natural kind but instead as (...) providing the ontological realization of (some) natural kinds. (shrink)

Empathy is essential in story comprehension as it requires understanding of the emotions and intentions of the characters. We evaluated the sensitivity of an emotional perspective-taking task using Aesop’s Fables in relation to empathy. Participants (N = 301) were presented with 15 short fables and were asked to rate the intensity of the emotions they would feel (anger, sadness, disgust, fear, surprise, joy, trust, and anticipation) by adopting the perspective of one of the characters (offender, victim) or the observer’s perspective. (...) A data-driven approach revealed that participants’ responses were aligned with the characters’ intentions, suggesting successful emotional perspective-taking. Participants sympathized with the victim rather than the offender, demonstrating affective sharing processes. Further, participants with higher empathy scores exhibited stronger negative emotions from the victim’s perspective, independently of their level of distress. Our task was not influenced by gender effects. We suggest that the Aesop’s Fables task could provide an indirect instrument to study empathy. (shrink)

There are two primary arguments against scientific realism, one pertaining to underdetermination, the other to the history of science. While these arguments are usually treated as altogether distinct, P. Kyle Stanford's ‘problem of unconceived alternatives’ constitutes one kind of synthesis: I propose that Stanford's argument is best understood as a broad modus ponens underdetermination argument, into which he has inserted a unique variant of the historical pessimistic induction. After articulating three criticisms against Stanford's argument and the evidence that he offers, (...) I contend that, as it stands, Stanford's argument poses no threat to contemporary scientific realism. Nonetheless, upon identifying two useful insights present in Stanford's general strategy, I offer an alternative variant of the modus ponens underdetermination argument, one that, although historically informed by science, requires no inductive premises. I contend that this non-inductive but historically informed variant of the modus ponens clarifies and considerably strengthens the case against scientific realism. (shrink)

The problem of underdetermination is thought to hold important lessons for philosophy of science. Yet, as Kyle Stanford has recently argued, typical treatments of it offer only restatements of familiar philosophical problems. Following suggestions in Duhem and Sklar, Stanford calls for a New Induction from the history of science. It will provide proof, he thinks, of “the kind of underdetermination that the history of science reveals to be a distinctive and genuine threat to even our best scientific theories” (Stanford 2001, (...) p. S12). This paper examines Stanford’s New Induction and argues that it – like the other forms of underdetermination that he criticizes – merely recapitulates familiar philosophical conundra. (shrink)

In this issue, Ahmadi1 reports on the practice of hymenoplasty—a surgical intervention meant to restore a presumed physical marker of virginity prior to a woman's marriage. As Mehri and Sills2 have stated, these women ‘want to ensure that blood is spilled on their wedding night sheets.’ Although Ahmadi's research was carried out in Iran specifically, this surgery is becoming increasingly popular in a number of Western countries as well, especially among Muslim populations.3 What are the ethics of hymen restoration?Consider the (...) role of the physician. Two of the doctors interviewed by Ahmadi reported being in ‘a perpetual state of guilt because of the surgery's inherent aim at deceiving the groom’ and noted their ‘personal conflict’ at being involved in this deception. Yet: "None of the doctors believed that the surgery was unethical, arguing that the girl could be ‘abused’ and ‘can even die’ if she is discovered not … ". (shrink)

Systems of logico-probabilistic (LP) reasoning characterize inference from conditional assertions interpreted as expressing high conditional probabilities. In the present article, we investigate four prominent LP systems (namely, systems O, P, Z, and QC) by means of computer simulations. The results reported here extend our previous work in this area, and evaluate the four systems in terms of the expected utility of the dispositions to act that derive from the conclusions that the systems license. In addition to conforming to the dominant (...) paradigm for assessing the rationality of actions and decisions, our present evaluation complements our previous work, since our previous evaluation may have been too severe in its assessment of inferences to false and uninformative conclusions. In the end, our new results provide additional support for the conclusion that (of the four systems considered) inference by system Z offers the best balance of error avoidance and inferential power. Our new results also suggest that improved performance could be achieved by a modest strengthening of system Z. (shrink)

In this paper I engage interdisciplinary conversation on inaction as the dominant response to climate change, and develop an analysis of the specific phenomenon of complacency through a critical-feminist lens. I suggest that Chris Cuomo's discussion of the “insufficiency” problem and Susan Sherwin's call for a “public ethics” jointly point toward particularly promising harm-reduction strategies. I draw upon and extend their work by arguing that extant philosophical accounts of complacency are inadequate to the task of sorting out what it means (...) to be complacent on climate change. I offer a sketch for an alternative account, which I take to be a start in the direction of mapping out a diverse array of “motivational vices” that need to be named, grappled with, and remedied. (shrink)

Philip Kitcher develops the Galilean Strategy to defend realism against its many opponents. I explore the structure of the Galilean Strategy and consider it specifically as an instrument against constructive empiricism. Kitcher claims that the Galilean Strategy underwrites an inference from success to truth. We should resist that conclusion, I argue, but the Galilean Strategy should lead us by other routes to believe in many things about which the empiricist would rather remain agnostic. 1 Target: empiricism 2 The Galilean Strategy (...) 3 Strengthening the argument 4 Success and truth 5 Conclusion. (shrink)

I argue that an analogy between pains and sounds suggests a way to give an objective account of pain which fits well with a naïve perceptualist account of feeling pain. According to the proposed metaphysical account, pains are relational physical events with shared qualitative nature, each of which is constituted by tissue damage and the activation of nociceptors. I proceed to show that the metaphysical proposal is compatible with platitudes about pains being animate, private, and self-intimating states.

The perception of reality by biosystems is based on different, and in certain respects more effective, principles than those utilized by the more formal procedures of science. As a result, what appears as random pattern to the scientific method can be meaningful pattern to a living organism. The existence of this complementary perception of reality makes possible in principle effective use by organisms of the direct interconnections between spatially separated objects shown to exist in the work of J. S. Bell.

In this paper I will discuss a recent attempt of justifying democracy and its authority. It pertains to recently published papers by Niko Kolodny, which complement each other and taken together practically assume a form of a monograph. It could be said that Kolodny's approach is a non-standard one given that he avoids typical ways of justifying democracy. Namely, when a justification of democracy is concerned, Kolodny maintains that it is necessary to offer a kind of an independent justification. It (...) is not so much that he insists that the usual approaches are wrong as much as that an independent justification is necessary in order to discern what it is that gives them their significance. Kolodny's independent justification of democracy is based on the idea of social equality. In this paper I will try to reconstruct and critically assess Kolodny's approach by paying special attention to the question of democratic authority. (shrink)

It has been common wisdom for centuries that scientific inference cannot be deductive; if it is inference at all, it must be a distinctive kind of inductive inference. According to demonstrative theories of induction, however, important scientific inferences are not inductive in the sense of requiring ampliative inference rules at all. Rather, they are deductive inferences with sufficiently strong premises. General considerations about inferences suffice to show that there is no difference in justification between an inference construed demonstratively or ampliatively. (...) The inductive risk may be shouldered by premises or rules, but it cannot be shirked. Demonstrative theories of induction might, nevertheless, better describe scientific practice. And there may be good methodological reasons for constructing our inferences one way rather than the other. By exploring the limits of these possible advantages, I argue that scientific inference is neither of essence deductive nor of essence inductive. (shrink)

Philosophers often focus on topics such as death and old age, and much less on other stages of life. The British-American philosopher Kienan Setiya (2017) has recently taken on the topic of middle age from a philosophical perspective and offered suggestions for dealing with the angst often associated with mid-age. His suggestions are based on both his own experiences and practical thoughts based on his readings of other philosophers during their mid-life periods. My own contribution is to describe his thoughts (...) and add a few observations of my own. (shrink)

In this thesis, I propose and defend a theory according to which committing oneself to knowing the proposition expressed counts as an assertion of that proposition. A consequence of this view is the knowledge account of assertion, according to which one asserts that p correctly only if one knows that p. In support of this approach, I offer a strategy of identifying an assertion’s “normative consequences”, types of act that normally take place as a result of one’s making an assertion (...) incorrectly. I outline two such phenomena: retraction and disavowal of knowledge. In continuation, I put the theory to test and critically examine four sets of objections against it, arguing that it can convincingly defuse them. Finally, I discuss two related issues: I maintain that by performing “aesthetic assertions” one also normally performs a non-assertoric speech act of recommendation, and argue for the possibility of “non-linguistic assertions”, whose content is expressed by gestures in appropriate contexts. (shrink)

Because it is unclear how a nonconscious stimulus is cognitively processed, there is uncertainty concerning variables that modulate the processing. In this context recent findings of a set of neuroimaging experiments are important. These findings suggest that conscious and nonconscious stimuli activate same areas of the brain during performance of a similar task. Further, different areas are activated when a task is performed with or without awareness of processing. It appears that the neural network involved in cognitive processing depends on (...) the awareness of processing rather than awareness of perception. Since conscious and nonconscious cognitive processing use separate neural networks, each processing is modulated by different variables. Attention modulates most conscious cognitive processing and most, but not all, nonconscious processing is attention dependent. Nonconscious tasks that require attentional resources, with or without conscious awareness, are processed using the attention dependent system. Further, because attention dependent and attention independent tasks are processed by separate neural networks, the cognitive processing and modulating variables can be understood better if cognitive tasks are defined as attention dependent or attention independent, rather than conscious or nonconscious. (shrink)

Dombrowski and Murdoch offer versions of the ontological argument which aim to avoid two types of objection – those concerned with the nature of the divine, and those concerned with the move from an abstract concept to a mind-independent reality. For both, the nature of the concept of God/Good entails its instantiation, and both supply a supporting argument from experience. It is only Murdoch who successfully negotiates the transition from an abstract concept to the instantiation of that concept, however, and (...) this is achieved by means of an ontological argument from moral experience which, in a reversal of the Kantian doctrine, depends ultimately on a form of the cosmological argument. (shrink)

Given the importance of theoretical wisdom in Aristotle’s account of the human good, it is striking that contemporary virtue ethicists have been virtually silent about this intellectual virtue and what contribution it makes – or could make – toward human flourishing. In this paper, I examine, and respond to, two main worries that account for theoretical wisdom’s current marginality. Along the way, I sketch a neo-Aristotelian conception of theoretical wisdom, and argue that this intellectual virtue is more central to the (...) concerns of contemporary virtue ethicists than it has perhaps so far seemed. (shrink)

This paper sets mathematics among the sciences, despite not being empirical, because it studies relations of various sorts, like the sciences. Each empirical science studies the relations among objects, which relations determining which science. The mathematical science studies relations as such, regardless of what those relations may be or be among, how relations themselves are related. This places it at the extreme among the sciences with no objects of its own (A Subject with no Object, by J.P. Burgess and G. (...) Rosen). Examples are discussed. The historical development of written mathematics from algorithms on clay tablets to theorems with proofs is said to show that application of algorithms to specific problems and theorems to scientific objects is like allegorical interpretation. Mathematics fits into the modern scientific context because the sciences, beginning with Galileo, have been constructed in imitation of mathematics. Viewing mathematics this way does not solve any ontological problems, but it does show how mathematics avoids them. Epistemological problems, insuperable for object realism, are simplified. For example, we have access to relations among any objects that we can consider objectively, first physical objects and then mathematical objects of greater and greater abstraction. (shrink)

This paper will argue that the order and the unity of St. Thomas Aquinas’s five ways can be elucidated through a consideration of St. Thomas’s appropriation of an Avicennian insight that he used to order and unify the wisdom of the Aristotelian and Abrahamic philosophical traditions towards the existence of God. I will begin with a central aporia from Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Aristotle says that the science of first philosophy has three different theoretical vectors: ontology, aitiology, and theology. But how can (...) all three be united into a single Aristotelian science? In his Metaphysics of the Healing, Avicenna resolved the impasse by taking the ontological vector as the subject of metaphysics. He then integrated the question of the four first causes into the penultimate stage of his demonstration for the existence of God, thereby placing aitiological and theological questions among the ultimate concerns of a unified Aristotelian metaphysics. In the five ways, St. Thomas integrated Avicenna’s Aristotelian search for the first four causes into the last four of his five ways, by showing that each of the four aitiological orders terminate in an ultimate first cause that we call God. Finally, by appending the proof from the Physics to the beginning of the five ways, St. Thomas was able to show that the ultimate aim of both natural philosophy and metaphysics is the divine first principle, which is the beginning and subject of sacra doctrina. (shrink)

The phenomenon of self-love elicits conflicting reactions. Some believe it is the key to happiness, while others are skeptical. This essay defines self-love as wholehearted concern for one's well-being, argues that it does not imply selfishness, arrogance, or vanity, discusses reasons to value self-love, and describes ways Logic-Based Therapy can be used to help people love themselves.

Contemporary research offers a more compelling account on the complex emotion of envy than the traditional view of envy as simply something bad. This essay explains how Logic-Based Therapy can use this account to coach individuals struggling with negative species of envy. Given that jealousy and envy are often equated, the essay differentiates the two; explains the conditions that make the four species of envy possible; identifies cardinal fallacies associated with negative species of envy; proposes counteractive virtues, and describes ways (...) to help people struggling with negative species of envy acquire these virtues. (shrink)

A con-reason is a reason which plays a role in motivating and explaining an agent's behaviour, but which the agent takes to count against the course of action taken. Most accounts of motivating reasons in the philosophy of action do not allow such things to exist. In this essay, I pursue two aims. First, I argue that, whatever metaphysical story we tell about the relation between motivating reasons and action, con- reasons need to be acknowledged, as they play an explanatory (...) role not played by pro- reasons. Second, I respond to an argument recently developed by David-Hillel Ruben to the effect that a causal theory of action – still known as ‘the standard story’ – cannot account for con- reasons. His argument attempts to show that a fundamental principle of the causal theory cannot be reconciled with the role con- reasons play in a certain kind of imagined case. I first argue that a causal theorist is not, in fact, committed to the problematic. (shrink)