One recurring criticism of the best interests standard concerns its vagueness, and thus the inadequate guidance it offers to care providers. The lack of an agreed definition of ‘best interests’, together with the fact that several suggested considerations adopted in legislation or professional guidelines for doctors do not obviously apply across different groups of persons, result in decisions being made in murky waters. In response, bioethicists have attempted to specify the best interests standard, to reduce the indeterminacy surrounding medical decisions. (...) In this paper, we discuss the bioethicists’ response in relation to the state's possible role in clarifying the best interests standard. We identify and characterise two clarificatory strategies employed by bioethicists —elaborative and enumerative—and argue that the state should adopt the latter. Beyond the practical difficulties of the former strategy, a state adoption of it would inevitably be prejudicial in a pluralistic society. Given the gravity of best interests decisions, and the delicate task of respecting citizens with different understandings of best interests, only the enumerative strategy is viable. We argue that this does not commit the state to silence in providing guidance to and supporting healthcare providers, nor does it facilitate the abuse of the vulnerable. Finally, we address two methodological worries about adopting this approach at the state level. The adoption of the enumerative strategy is not defeatist in attitude, nor does it eventually collapse into (a form of) the elaborative strategy. (shrink)

Nineteenth century Christian thought about self and relationality was stamped by the reception of Kant’s groundbreaking revision to the Cartesian cogito. For René Descartes (1596-1650), the self is a thinking thing (res cogitans), a simple substance retaining its unity and identity over time. For Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), on the other hand, consciousness is not a substance but an ongoing activity having a double constitution, or two moments: first, the original activity of consciousness, what Kant would call original apperception, and second, (...) the reflected self, the “I think” as object of reflection. Both are essential to the possibility of an awareness of a unified experience. Such an awareness is achieved only insofar as the self is capable of reflecting on its activity of thinking. As such, the possibility of self-consciousness, or the capacity to reflect on one’s own acts of thought is essential to the constitution of the self. This new model of the mind became the starting point to the thought of central 19th century figures such as Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834), J. G. Fichte (1762-1814), Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) and Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855). This chapter will explore their reception of Kant’s model of self-consciousness, the controversies surrounding its development and exposition, and the advantages of this model for theological reflection. The idea of mind as essentially capable of reflection provided an account of how the self can stand in an ontologically immediate relation to God constitutive of the self, while at the same time allowing that the self’s consciousness of itself is distinct from this original moment, so that a limited or false consciousness of self is possible. As such the task of the self is to recognize (that is, to realize in and through self-consciousness) who it most truly is, both in relation to God, and in relation to self and other. (shrink)

We have been observing how infants between 3 and 21 months react when a vibrotactile stimulation (a buzzer) is applied to different parts of their bodies. Responses included in particular movement of the stimulated body part and successful reaching for and removal of the buzzer. Overall, there is a pronounced developmental progression from general to specific movement patterns, especially in the first year. In this article we review the series of studies we conducted and then focus on possible mechanisms that (...) might explain what we observed. One possible mechanism might rely on the brain extracting “sensorimotor contingencies” linking motor actions and resulting sensory consequences. This account posits that infants are driven by intrinsic motivation that guides exploratory motor activity, at first generating random motor babbling with self-touch occurring spontaneously. Later goal-oriented motor behavior occurs, with self-touch as a possible effective tool to induce informative contingencies. We connect this sensorimotor view with a second possible account that appeals to the neuroscientific concepts of cortical maps and coordinate transformations. In this second account, the improvement of reaching precision is mediated by refinement of neuronal maps in primary sensory and motor cortices—the homunculi—as well as in frontal and parietal corti- cal regions dedicated to sensorimotor processing. We complement this theoretical account with modeling on a humanoid robot with artificial skin where we implemented reaching for tactile stimuli as well as learning the “somatosensory homunculi”. We suggest that this account can be extended to reflect the driving role of sensorimotor contingencies in human development. In our conclusion we consider possible extensions of our current experiments which take account of predictions derived from both these kinds of models. (shrink)

This volume considers challenges to forgiveness in the most difficult circumstances, such as in criminal justice contexts, when the victim is dead or when bystanders disagree, and when anger and resentment seem preferable and important. Contributing philosophers include Myisha Cherry, Jonathan Jacobs, Barrett Emerick, Alice MacLachlan, David McNaughton and Eve Garrard. Contributing psychologists include Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, Robert D. Enright and Mary Jacqueline Song, C. Ward Struthers, Joshua Guilfoyle, Careen Khoury, Elizabeth van Monsjou, Joni Sasaki, Curtis Phills, Rebecca Young, and (...) Zdravko Marjanovic. (shrink)

The giving up of the body or suicide for spiritual reasons has been dealt with by James Benn and D Max Moermane. The relationships of the dead and the living are discussed by Bryan J Cuevas, John Cliff ord Holt, and Matthew T Kapstein, while Hank Glassman, Mark Rowe, and Jason A Carbine talk about different funeral practices. With glossaries for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean characters and an elaborate index, this book is a unique peek into Buddhist practices regarding the (...) dead and deserves attention by researchers, students, and admirers of this religion. (shrink)

Tradução para o português de "Uma espécie de história de minha vida" (A kind of history of my life), ou Carta a um médico (A Letter to a Physician), uma carta escrita por Hume (1711-1776), endereçada em março ou abril de 1734 a um médico não identificado (segundo Norton provavelmente John Arbuthnot ou George Cheyne), na qual Hume pede alguns conselhos para continuar com o seu trabalho filosófico. O título atual é extraído do primeiro parágrafo.A carta foi escrita em 1734, (...) um pouco antes de Hume viajar para Bristol, onde, “forçado a fazer uma rápida incursão em uma vida mais ativa”, conforme relata em sua autobiografia Minha vida, buscou empregar-se no comércio. A importância dessa carta reside no seu caráter autobiográfico e nos comentários que Hume faz sobre seu projeto filosófico. A carta foi publicada originalmente em Life and correspondence of David Hume, John Hill Burton(Ed.), Edinburgh 1846, v. 1, p. 30-39; ela foi reproduzida em The Letters of David Hume. Grey, J. Y. T. (ed.) Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1932, 2v; v.1, n.3, p. 12-18, e pode ser encontrada também em The Cambridge companion to Hume, David Fate Norton, Jacqueline Taylor (ed.) 2 ed. Cambridge University Press, 2009, p. 515-522. Para essa tradução consultamos o texto original conforme apresentado nas duas últimas edições aqui mencionadas. (shrink)

The study aimed to identify the knowledge management processes and their role in achieving competitive advantage at Al-Quds Open University. The study was based on the descriptive analytical method, and the study population consists of academic and administrative staff in each of the branches of Al-Quds Open University in (Tulkarm, Nablus and Jenin). The researchers selected a sample of the study population by the intentional non-probability method, the size of (70) employees. A questionnaire was prepared and supervised by a number (...) of specialists in order to obtain the results of the study. The study concluded that there is a positive direct relationship, that is, the higher the degree of application of knowledge management processes, the greater the degree of competitive advantage. Knowledge Technology came first with a score of 80.02% on all items. Competitive advantage came second with 81.74%. In the third place came "knowledge generation" where the total score on all paragraphs in this area (78.24%). In the fourth place, "knowledge transfer" (77.21%). "Developing and storing knowledge" came in fifth place (77.13%). "Acquisition of knowledge" came in sixth place (76.45%). Knowledge Organization ranked seventh (74.26%). The study recommended that the university should enable the employees to benefit from the experiences and expertise available to help generate knowledge. The University encourages the creation of knowledge through the system of incentives and open the way for creators to apply their creations and spread and invest in excellence and creativity. The university should design work performance levels based on the integration of knowledge and organize it according to policies that support freedom of research. The need for Palestinian universities to adopt a knowledge management approach. The need to adopt a system of incentives that rewards cognitive efforts, and give workers enough freedom to enable them to apply their knowledge. (shrink)

The study aimed to identify the relationship between correcting the deviations in the measurement of performance and achieving the objectives of control and the performance of the job at the Islamic University in the Gaza Strip. To achieve the objectives of the research, the researchers used the descriptive analytical approach to collect information. The questionnaire consisted of (20) statements distributed to three categories of employees of the Islamic University (senior management, faculty members, their assistants and members of the administrative board). (...) A random sample of 314 employees was selected and 276 responses were retrieved with a recovery rate of 88.1%. The Statistical Analysis Program (SPSS) was used to enter, process, and analyze the data. The results of the study showed a positive relationship between correcting deviations in performance measurement and achieving the control objectives represented by the functional performance in the Islamic University from the point of view of the members (senior management, faculty and their assistants, and the administrative board), where the relative weight of all the paragraphs was (74.25%). The study recommended the need to ensure that the actual performance of the planned performance is matched and decisions are taken to correct the serious deviations and take the necessary measures in terms of retraining and change in regulations, wages and bonuses and punishment of the culprit, neglect and negligence by mistake. (shrink)

Descriptive accounts of the nature of explanation in neuroscience and the global goals of such explanation have recently proliferated in the philosophy of neuroscience and with them new understandings of the experimental practices of neuroscientists have emerged. In this paper, I consider two models of such practices; one that takes them to be reductive; another that takes them to be integrative. I investigate those areas of the neuroscience of learning and memory from which the examples used to substantiate these models (...) are culled, and argue that the multiplicity of experimental protocols used in these research areas presents specific challenges for both models. In my view, these challenges have been overlooked largely because philosophers have hitherto failed to pay sufficient attention to fundamental features of experimental practice. I demonstrate that when we do pay attention to such features, evidence for reduction and integrative unity in neuroscience is simply not borne out. I end by suggesting some new directions for the philosophy of neuroscience that pertain to taking a closer look at the nature of neuroscientific experiments. (shrink)

YouTube has been implicated in the transformation of users into extremists and conspiracy theorists. The alleged mechanism for this radicalizing process is YouTube’s recommender system, which is optimized to amplify and promote clips that users are likely to watch through to the end. YouTube optimizes for watch-through for economic reasons: people who watch a video through to the end are likely to then watch the next recommended video as well, which means that more advertisements can be served to them. This (...) is a seemingly innocuous design choice, but it has a troubling side-effect. Critics of YouTube have alleged that the recommender system tends to recommend extremist content and conspiracy theories, as such videos are especially likely to capture and keep users’ attention. To date, the problem of radicalization via the YouTube recommender system has been a matter of speculation. The current study represents the first systematic, pre-registered attempt to establish whether and to what extent the recommender system tends to promote such content. We begin by contextualizing our study in the framework of technological seduction. Next, we explain our methodology. After that, we present our results, which are consistent with the radicalization hypothesis. Finally, we discuss our findings, as well as directions for future research and recommendations for users, industry, and policy-makers. (shrink)

“What is the structure of thought?” is as central a question as any in cognitive science. A classic answer to this question has appealed to a Language of Thought (LoT). We point to emerging research from disparate branches of the field that supports the LoT hypothesis, but also uncovers diversity in LoTs across cognitive systems, stages of development, and species. Our letter formulates open research questions for cognitive science concerning the varieties of rules and representations that underwrite various LoT-based systems (...) and how these variations can help researchers taxonomize cognitive systems. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the critical success factors and investigate the benefits that might be gained once implementing Electronic Customer Relationship Management at HEI from employee perspective. The study conducted at Al Quds Open University in Palestine and data collected from (300) employee through a questionnaire which consist of four variables. A number of statistical tools were intended for hypotheses testing and data analysis, including Spearman correlation coefficient for Validity, reliability correlation using Cronbach’s alpha, and Frequency (...) and Descriptive analysis. The overall findings of the current study show that all the features were important for staff and it was critical success factors, at the same time, websites were providing all the features discussed by the theory whereas staff showed their willingness to use those features if provided. It is also discovered that implementing Electronic Customer Relationship Management can cause staff retention, were provided efficiently and needed to be improved. Research limitations: The survey findings were based on QOU employee in Palestine, UAE and KSA branches not included in the study. (shrink)

The field of AI safety seeks to prevent or reduce the harms caused by AI systems. A simple and appealing account of what is distinctive of AI safety as a field holds that this feature is constitutive: a research project falls within the purview of AI safety just in case it aims to prevent or reduce the harms caused by AI systems. Call this appealingly simple account The Safety Conception of AI safety. Despite its simplicity and appeal, we argue that (...) The Safety Conception is in tension with at least two trends in the ways AI safety researchers and organizations think and talk about AI safety: first, a tendency to characterize the goal of AI safety research in terms of catastrophic risks from future systems; second, the increasingly popular idea that AI safety can be thought of as a branch of safety engineering. Adopting the methodology of conceptual engineering, we argue that these trends are unfortunate: when we consider what concept of AI safety it would be best to have, there are compelling reasons to think that The Safety Conception is the answer. Descriptively, The Safety Conception allows us to see how work on topics that have historically been treated as central to the field of AI safety is continuous with work on topics that have historically been treated as more marginal, like bias, misinformation, and privacy. Normatively, taking The Safety Conception seriously means approaching all efforts to prevent or mitigate harms from AI systems based on their merits rather than drawing arbitrary distinctions between them. (shrink)

In a recent letter, Dillion et. al (2023) make various suggestions regarding the idea of artificially intelligent systems, such as large language models, replacing human subjects in empirical moral psychology. We argue that human subjects are in various ways indispensable.

Against those who dismiss Kant's project in the "Religion" because it provides a Pelagian understanding of salvation, this paper offers an analysis of the deep structure of Kant's views on divine justice and grace showing them not to conflict with an authentically Christian understanding of these concepts. The first part of the paper argues that Kant's analysis of these concepts helps us to understand the necessary conditions of the Christian understanding of grace: unfolding them uncovers intrinsic relations holding between God's (...) justice and grace. Parts two and three provide an analysis of two concepts of grace used by Kant. Getting clear on their differences is the key to understanding why Kant's account is not Pelagian. (shrink)

Despite its centrality in the philosophy of cognitive science, there has been little prior philosophical work engaging with the notion of representation in contemporary NLP practice. This paper attempts to fill that lacuna: drawing on ideas from cognitive science, I introduce a framework for evaluating the representational claims made about components of neural NLP models, proposing three criteria with which to evaluate whether a component of a model represents a property and operationalising these criteria using probing classifiers, a popular analysis (...) technique in NLP (and deep learning more broadly). The project of operationalising a philosophically-informed notion of representation should be of interest to both philosophers of science and NLP practitioners. It affords philosophers a novel testing-ground for claims about the nature of representation, and helps NLPers organise the large literature on probing experiments, suggesting novel avenues for empirical research. (shrink)

Some scholars suggest that John Locke’s revisions to the chapter “Of Power” for the 1694 second edition of his Essay concerning Human Understanding may be indebted to the Cambridge Platonist, Ralph Cudworth. Their claims rest on evidence that Locke may have had access to Cudworth’s unpublished manuscript treatises on free will. In this paper, I examine an alternative suggestion – the claim that Cudworth’s daughter, Damaris Cudworth Masham, and not Cudworth himself, may have exerted an influence on Locke’s revisions. I (...) discuss the plausibility of this claim in light of the relevant historical and textual evidence. (shrink)

We investigated, experimentally, the contention that the folk view, or naïve theory, of time, amongst the population we investigated is dynamical. We found that amongst that population, ~ 70% have an extant theory of time that is more similar to a dynamical than a non-dynamical theory, and ~ 70% of those who deploy a naïve theory of time deploy a naïve theory that is more similar to a dynamical than a non-dynamical theory. Interestingly, while we found stable results across our (...) two experiments regarding the percentage of participants that have a dynamical or non-dynamical extant theory of time, we did not find such stability regarding which particular dynamical or non-dynamical theory of time they take to be most similar to our world. This suggests that there might be two extant theories in the population—a broadly dynamical one and a broadly non-dynamical one—but that those theories are sufficiently incomplete that participants do not stably choose the same dynamical theory as being most similar to our world. This suggests that while appeals to the ordinary view of time may do some work in the context of adjudicating disputes between dynamists and non-dynamists, they likely cannot do any such work adjudicating disputes between particular brands of dynamism. (shrink)

Data involving epistemic modals suggest that some classically valid argument forms, such as _reductio_, are invalid in natural language reasoning as they lead to modal collapses. We adduce further data showing that the classical argument forms governing the existential quantifier are similarly defective, as they lead to a _de re–de dicto_ collapse. We observe a similar problem for disjunction. But if the classical argument forms for negation, disjunction and existential quantification are invalid, what are the correct forms that govern the (...) use of these items? Our diagnosis is that epistemic modals interfere with hypothetical reasoning. We present a modal first-order logic and model theory that characterizes hypothetical reasoning with epistemic modals in a principled manner. One upshot is a sound and complete natural deduction system for reasoning with epistemic modals in first-order logic. (shrink)

The study aims to identify the efficiency of the university education performance from the perspective of postgraduate and undergraduate students in international and Palestinian universities. The analytical descriptive approach was used for this purpose and the questionnaire was used as a main tool for data collection. The study community consists of: post graduate students, (23850) graduate students and (146355) undergraduate students. The sample of the study was 378 graduate students and 383 undergraduate students. The random stratified sample was used. The (...) Statistical Package of Social Sciences (SPSS) was also used for data analysis. The study reached a number of results, the most important of which are: The level of efficiency of educational performance in Palestinian and international universities from the point of view of postgraduate and undergraduate students was high. And that there are significant differences between the average views of the sample of the study on the efficiency of educational performance in Palestinian and international universities attributed to the University and to the benefit of international universities. The study concluded many recommendations, the most important of which is the necessity of continuing to develop e-learning strategies that affect the efficiency of educational performance and research commensurate with the university's position in the local and international community, which puts it on the best classification between local and international universities through e-learning. (shrink)

This paper aims to assess knowledge management maturity at HEI to determine the most effecting variables on knowledge management that enhance the total performance of the organization. This study was applied on Al-Azhar University in Gaza strip, Palestine. This paper depends on Asian productivity organization model that used to assess KM maturity. Second dimension assess high performance was developed by the authors. The controlled sample was (364). Several statistical tools were used for data analysis and hypotheses testing, including reliability Correlation (...) using Cronbach’s alpha, “ANOVA”, Simple Linear Regression and Step Wise Regression. The overall findings of the current study suggest that KMM is suitable for measuring and lead to enhance high performance. KMM assessment shows that the university maturity level is in level three. Findings also support the main hypothesis and it is subhypotheses. The most important factors effecting high performance are: Processes, KM leadership, People, KM Outcomes, Knowledge Process. Furthermore the current study is unique by the virtue of its nature, scope and way of implied investigation, as it is the first study at HEI in Palestine explores the status of KMM using the Asian productivity model. (shrink)

This paper empirically investigates one aspect of the folk concept of time by testing how the presence or absence of directedness impacts judgements about whether there is time in a world. Experiment 1 found that dynamists, showed significantly higher levels of agreement that there is time in dynamically directed worlds than in non-dynamical non-directed worlds. Comparing our results to those we describe in Latham et al., we report that while ~ 70% of dynamists say there is time in B-theory worlds, (...) only ~ 45% say there is time in C-theory worlds. Thus, while the presence of directedness makes dynamists more inclined to say there is time in a world, a substantial subpopulation of dynamists judge that there is time in non-directed worlds. By contrast, a majority of non-dynamists judged that there was time in both growing block worlds and C-theory worlds, with no significant differences between the means. Experiment 2 found that when participants are only presented with non-dynamical worlds—namely, a directed world and a non-directed world—they report significantly higher levels of agreement that there is time in B-theory worlds. However, the majority of participants still judge that there is time in C-theory worlds. We conclude that while the presence of directedness bolsters judgements that there is time, most people do not judge it to be necessary for time. (shrink)

In this article, I explain why stabilizing constructs is important to the success of the Research Domain Criteria Project and identify one measure for facilitating such stability.

Deflationists hold that it does not seem to us, in experience, as though time robustly passes. There is some recent empirical evidence that appears to support this contention. Equally, empirical evidence suggests that we naïvely represent time as dynamical. Thus deflationists are faced with an explanatory burden. If, as they maintain, the world seems to us in experience as though it is non-dynamical, then why do we represent time as dynamical? This paper takes up the challenge of investigating, on the (...) part of the deflationist, one candidate explanation. We hypothesise that people’s belief that the future is what we call deliberatively open partly explains why they represent time as dynamical. In a series of two experiments we test this hypothesis. We find no evidence that beliefs about deliberative openness explain why people represent time as dynamical. Hence there remains an explanatory burden for the deflationist to discharge. (shrink)

Empirical evidence suggests that people naïvely represent time as dynamical (i.e. as containing robust temporal passage). Yet many contemporary B-theorists deny that it seems to us, in perceptual experience, as though time robustly passes. The question then arises as to why we represent time as dynamical if we do not have perceptual experiences which represent time as dynamical. We consider two hypotheses about why this might be: the temporally aperspectival replacement hypothesis and the moving open future hypothesis. We then empirically (...) test the moving open future hypothesis. According to that hypothesis, we represent the past as objectively fixed and the future open. And we represent that this objective openness moves as events that were open become fixed, such that in doing so, we represent a privileged moving present. We found no evidence for the moving open future hypothesis, which suggests that further investigation of the temporally aperspectival replacement hypothesis is called for. Our results also shed further light on our understanding of the respects in which we represent the future to be open, which, in turn, has implications for our theorising about the open future. (shrink)

There are two kinds of time-bias: near-bias and future-bias. While philosophers typically hold that near-bias is rationally impermissible, many hold that future-bias is rationally permissible. Call this normative hybridism. According to arbitrariness objections, certain patterns of preference are rationally impermissible because they are arbitrary. While arbitrariness objections have been levelled against both near-bias and future-bias, the kind of arbitrariness in question has been different. In this paper we investigate whether there are forms of arbitrariness that are common to both kinds (...) of preferences, and hence whether there are versions of the arbitrariness objection that are objections both to near-bias and future-bias. If there are, then this might go some way towards undermining normative hybridism and to defending a thorough-going time-neutralism. (shrink)

The study aimed to identify E- Learning strategies and their relation to the efficiency of research performance in foreign and Palestinian universities (University of Ottawa, Munster, Suez Canal, Al-Azhar, Islamic, Al-Aqsa). The analytical descriptive approach was used for this purpose, and relying on the questionnaire as a main tool for data collection. The study society is from the senior management, where the number of senior management in the universities in question is 206. The random stratified sample was selected and (SPSS) (...) was used for statistical data analysis. The study found a significant relationship between E- Learning strategies and the efficiency of research performance in universities. It also reached the participation of senior management in the research that develops the university performance in the Palestinian universities. The senior management indicated that they do not care to follow the policies of implementing the development of scientific research. While the senior management in foreign universities indicated that they are interested in following up the policies of implementing the development of scientific research. The study also showed that senior management in Palestinian universities does not care about providing the appropriate budget for E- Learning. The study recommended that the senior management of Palestinian universities should provide an E- Learning budget and encourage employees to continue using E- Learning strategies. The administration in the Palestinian universities should adopt and support outstanding research, and the need to encourage interest in the implementation of policies for the development of scientific research. (shrink)

People are ‘biased toward the future’: all else being equal, we typically prefer to have positive experiences in the future, and negative experiences in the past. Several explanations have been suggested for this pattern of preferences. Adjudicating among these explanations can, among other things, shed light on the rationality of future-bias: For instance, if our preferences are explained by unjustified beliefs or an illusory phenomenology, we might conclude that they are irrational. This paper investigates one hypothesis, according to which future-bias (...) is explained by our having a phenomenology that we describe, or conceive of, as being as of time robustly passing. We empirically tested this hypothesis and found no evidence in its favour. Our results present a puzzle, however, when compared with the results of an earlier study. We conclude that although robust passage phenomenology on its own probably does not explain future-bias, having this phenomenology and taking it to be veridical may contribute to future-bias. (shrink)

Before her death in 1673, Margaret Cavendish, the Duchess of Newcastle, expressed a wish that her philosophical work would experience a ‘glorious resurrection’ in future ages. During her lifetime, and for almost three centuries afterwards, her writings were destined to ‘lye still in the soft and easie Bed of Oblivion’. But more recently, Cavendish has received a measure of the fame she so desired. She is celebrated by feminists, literary theorists, and historians. There are regular conferences organised by the International (...) Margaret Cavendish Society, and there have been several biographies, as well as essay collections, journal issues, scholarly editions, and anthologies devoted to her work. In terms of studies in the history and philosophy of science, however, Cavendish has yet to achieve her resurrection in full. While there have been journal articles and book chapters, and a 2001 edition of her Observations, there have been (until now) no book-length studies of her philosophy, and there is currently no modern edition of her other major work, the Philosophical Letters. This essay-length review of Lisa Sarasohn’s The Natural Philosophy of Margaret Cavendish highlights why Cavendish should still hold interest for philosophers today. (shrink)

What role does the concept of representation play in the contexts of experimentation and explanation in cognitive neurobiology? In this article, a distinction is drawn between minimal and substantive roles for representation. It is argued by appeal to a case study that representation currently plays a role in cognitive neurobiology somewhere in between minimal and substantive and that this is problematic given the ultimate explanatory goals of cognitive neurobiological research. It is suggested that what is needed is for representation to (...) instead play a more substantive role. (shrink)

It has widely been assumed, by philosophers, that most people unambiguously have a phenomenology as of time passing, and that this is a datum that philosophical theories must accommodate. Moreover, it has been assumed that the greater the extent to which people have said phenomenology, the more likely they are to endorse a dynamical theory of time. This paper is the first to empirically test these assumptions. Surprisingly, our results do not support either assumption. One experiment instead found the reverse (...) correlation: people were more likely to report having passage phenomenology if they endorsed a non-dynamical theory of time. Given that people do not have an unambiguous phenomenology as of time passing, we conclude that this is suggestive evidence in favor of veridical non-dynamism—the view that our phenomenology is veridical, and that it does not unambiguously represent that time passes. Instead, our phenomenology veridically has some quite different content. (shrink)

What can contemporary machine learning (ML) models do? Given the proliferation of ML models in society, answering this question matters to a variety of stakeholders, both public and private. The evaluation of models' capabilities is rapidly emerging as a key subfield of modern ML, buoyed by regulatory attention and government grants. Despite this, the notion of an ML model possessing a capability has not been interrogated: what are we saying when we say that a model is able to do something? (...) And what sorts of evidence bear upon this question? -/- In this paper, we aim to answer these questions, using the capabilities of large language models (LLMs) as a running example. Drawing on the large philosophical literature on abilities, we develop an account of ML models' capabilities which can be usefully applied to the nascent science of model evaluation. Our core proposal is a conditional analysis of model abilities (CAMA): crudely, a machine learning model has a capability to X just when it would reliably succeed at doing X if it 'tried'. The main contribution of the paper is making this proposal precise in the context of ML, resulting in an operationalisation of CAMA applicable to LLMs. We then put CAMA to work, showing that it can help make sense of various features of ML model evaluation practice, as well as suggest procedures for performing fair inter-model comparisons. (shrink)

The past decade has witnessed a growing awareness of conceptual and methodological hurdles within psychology and neuroscience that must be addressed for taxonomic and explanatory progress in understanding psychological functions to be possible. In this paper, I evaluate several recent knowledge-building initiatives aimed at overcoming these obstacles. I argue that while each initiative offers important insights about how to facilitate taxonomic and explanatory progress in psychology and neuroscience, only a “coordinated pluralism” that incorporates positive aspects of each initiative will have (...) the potential for success. (shrink)

In this paper I will introduce a new compatibilist account of free action: indirect conscious control compatibilism, or just indirect compatibilism for short. On this account, actions are free either when they are caused by compatibilist‐friendly conscious psychological processes, or else by sub‐personal level processes influenced in particular ways by compatibilist‐friendly conscious psychological processes. This view is motivated by a problem faced by a certain family of compatibilist views, which I call conscious control views. These views hold that we act (...) freely when we act in a way that is caused by certain conscious psychological processes. One problem for such views is that current neuroscience suggests that most of our actions are not caused by such processes. Instead, many of the actions we typically suppose are free are caused by sub‐personal level processes and hence would count as not free according to contemporary conscious control views. I argue, contra these views, that many actions caused by these sub‐personal level processes are indirectly free. Further, most of the actions we ordinarily judge to be free are free in this indirect manner. (shrink)

Every account of moral responsibility has conditions that distinguish between the consequences, actions, or traits that warrant praise or blame and those that do not. One intuitive condition is that praiseworthiness and blameworthiness cannot be affected by luck, that is, by factors beyond the agent’s control. Several philosophers build their accounts of moral responsibility on this luck-free condition, and we may call their views Luck-Free Moral Responsibility (LFMR). I offer moral and metaphysical arguments against LFMR. First, I maintain that considerations (...) of fairness that often motivate LFMR do not require its adoption. Second, I contend that LFMR has counterintuitive implications for the nature and scope of praiseworthiness and blameworthiness and that LFMR is vulnerable to a reductio ad absurdum. Third, I state some common reasons for thinking that LFMR’s commitment to true counterfactuals of libertarian freedom is problematic, and I argue that if there are no such true counterfactuals and if LFMR is true, a person is praiseworthy and blameworthy at most for a tiny fraction of her actions. Fourth, I argue that proponents of LFMR cannot escape this skeptical cost by appealing to a different kind of counterfactual of freedom. Fifth, I develop an anti-skeptical motivation to affirm the idea that luck can affect moral responsibility. (shrink)

The Morris water maze has been put forward in the philosophy of neuroscience as an example of an experimental arrangement that may be used to delineate the cognitive faculty of spatial memory (e.g., Craver and Darden, Theory and method in the neurosciences, University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, 2001; Craver, Explaining the brain: Mechanisms and the mosaic unity of neuroscience, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2007). However, in the experimental and review literature on the water maze throughout the history of its use, (...) we encounter numerous responses to the question of “what” phenomenon it circumscribes ranging from cognitive functions (e.g., “spatial learning”, “spatial navigation”), to representational changes (e.g., “cognitive map formation”) to terms that appear to refer exclusively to observable changes in behavior (e.g., “water maze performance”). To date philosophical analyses of the water maze have not been directed at sorting out what phenomenon the device delineates nor the sources of the different answers to the question of what. I undertake both of these tasks in this paper. I begin with an analysis of Morris’s first published research study using the water maze and demonstrate that he emerged from it with an experimental learning paradigm that at best circumscribed a discrete set of observable changes in behavior. However, it delineated neither a discrete set of representational changes nor a discrete cognitive function. I cite this in combination with a reductionist-oriented research agenda in cellular and molecular neurobiology dating back to the 1980s as two sources of the lack of consistency across the history of the experimental and review literature as to what is under study in the water maze. (shrink)

In this chapter I investigate the kinds of changes that psychiatric kinds undergo when they become explanatory targets of areas of sciences that are not “mature” and are in the early stages of discovering mechanisms. The two areas of science that are the targets of my analysis are cognitive neuroscience and cognitive neurobiology.

Philosophers have long noted, and empirical psychology has lately confirmed, that most people are “biased toward the future”: we prefer to have positive experiences in the future, and negative experiences in the past. At least two explanations have been offered for this bias: belief in temporal passage and the practical irrelevance of the past resulting from our inability to influence past events. We set out to test the latter explanation. In a large survey, we find that participants exhibit significantly less (...) future bias when asked to consider scenarios where they can affect their own past experiences. This supports the “practical irrelevance” explanation of future bias. It also suggests that future bias is not an inflexible preference hardwired by evolution, but results from a more general disposition to “accept the things we cannot change”. However, participants still exhibited substantial future bias in scenarios in which they could affect the past, leaving room for complementary explanations. Beyond the main finding, our results also indicate that future bias is stake-sensitive and that participants endorse the normative correctness of their future-biased preferences and choices. In combination, these results shed light on philosophical debates over the rationality of future bias, suggesting that it may be a rational response to empirical realities rather than a brute, arational disposition. (shrink)

The research aims to identify the trends of Palestinian higher educational institutions in Gaza Strip as learning organizations from the perspective of senior management in the Palestinian universities in Gaza Strip. The researchers used descriptive analytical approach and used the questionnaire as a tool for information gathering. The questionnaires were distributed to senior management in the Palestinian universities. The study population reached (344) employees in senior management is dispersed over (3) Palestinian universities. A stratified random sample of (182) employees from (...) the Palestinian universities was selected and the recovery rate was (69.2%). Statistical analysis (SPSS) program was used for analysis and processing the data. The study found the following results: There is an agreement about: the importance of the focus of "organizational structure" with an average approval, the importance of "technological infrastructure" axis with high approval, and the importance of "strategic" with an average approval. The results concluded that the study sample agree on the importance of "organizational dimension" highly. The results showed that the sample believe that the "strategic leadership" level in the universities got medium-approval. There is a fair level agreement about the axis of interest "teams / committees". There is an agreement about the importance of the "human dimension" moderately. The results showed that the sample is highly agreed about the importance of focus of the "knowledge management", and the focus of the "continuing education". They agreed weakly to somewhat about the importance of the focus of "scientific research", moderately agree about the importance of the center of "institutional culture", agree moderately on the importance of "cognitive dimension". The results showed that the sample largely agree on the importance of the focus of "strategic partnerships and alliances". They agree highly on the axis "keep up with the labor market" and on the focus of the importance of "technology incubators". The results showed that the sample moderately agree about the importance of the theme on "consulting and training", the importance of the focus of "social responsibility", and the focus of the "Community dimension". The study found a group of recommendations including: there is a need to provide suitable environment that achieve learning organizations. There is a need to develop the technological infrastructure (hardware, software, networks, databases, and human skills) because of the great advantages that they offer. The universities need to adopt knowledge management in the academic and administrative departments because knowledge is the core of the work of these departments. The establishment of technology incubators in universities to adopt outstanding university research projects, to protect, to supports, and to market them; furthermore, to develop the capabilities and skills of employees in the field of information technology. (shrink)

This paper offers a critique of an account of explanatory integration that claims that explanations of cognitive capacities by functional analyses and mechanistic explanations can be seamlessly integrated. It is shown that achieving such explanatory integration requires that the terms designating cognitive capacities in the two forms of explanation are stable but that experimental practice in the mind-brain sciences currently is not directed at achieving such stability. A positive proposal for changing experimental practice so as to promote such stability is (...) put forward and its implications for explanatory integration are briefly considered. (shrink)

Many scholars point to the close association between early modern science and the rise of rational arguments in favour of the existence of witches. For some commentators, it is a poor reflection on science that its methods so easily lent themselves to the unjust persecution of innocent men and women. In this paper, I examine a debate about witches between a woman philosopher, Margaret Cavendish , and a fellow of the Royal Society, Joseph Glanvill . I argue that Cavendish is (...) the voice of reason in this exchange—not because she supports the modern-day view that witches do not exist, but because she shows that Glanvill’s arguments about witches betray his own scientific principles. Cavendish’s responses to Glanvill suggest that, when applied consistently, the principles of early modern science could in fact promote a healthy scepticism toward the existence of witches. (shrink)

The manufacturing industry is evolving rapidly, becoming more complex, more interconnected, and more geographically distributed. Competitive pressure and diversity of consumer demand are driving manufacturing companies to rely more and more on improved knowledge management practices. As a result, multiple software systems are being created to support the integration of data across the product life cycle. Unfortunately, these systems manifest a low degree of interoperability, and this creates problems, for instance when different enterprises or different branches of an enterprise interact. (...) Common ontologies (consensus-based controlled vocabularies) have proved themselves in various domains as a valuable tool for solving such problems. In this paper, we present a consensus-based Additive Manufacturing Ontology (AMO) and illustrate its application in promoting re-usability in the field of dentistry product manufacturing. (shrink)

Crime is a serious social problem, but its causes are not exclusively social. There is growing consensus that explaining and preventing it requires interdisciplinary research efforts. Indeed, the landscape of contemporary criminology includes a variety of theoretical models that incorporate psychological, biological and sociological factors. These multi-disciplinary approaches, however, have yet to radically advance scientific understandings of crime and shed light on how to manage it. In this paper, using conceptual tools on offer in the philosophy of science in combination (...) with theoretical work represented in this special volume of Psychology, Crime and Law, I provide some perspective on why explanatory progress in criminology has remained elusive and evaluate some positive proposals for attaining it. -/- . (shrink)

Our folk epistemology says that if someone knows that P and tells you that P, then, given the absence of defeaters, if you believe what they tell you, you will come to know that P as well. A speaker's knowledge that P is then, for the most part, enough for a hearer to come to know that P. But there are counterexamples to this principle: testimonial knowledge does not always transfer from the speaker to the hearer. Why should that be (...) so? Because testimonial knowledge arises through the flow of information--from conclusive grounds--from the speaker through the speaker's assertion to the hearer's state of comprehension as of the speaker's assertion. A speaker's belief can be based on conclusive grounds, but the speaker's assertion may fail to provide conclusive grounds to the hearer. Then the hearer won't acquire knowledge, even from a knowledgeable speaker. Knowledge from testimony then works more like knowledge through perception. But wait, you say, that can't be so because testimony involves free will but perception does not. The essay ends with a broadly Hume inspired reply to this objection. (shrink)

This paper aims to identify computerized management information systems resources and their relationship to the development of performance in the Electricity Distribution Company in Gaza. This research used two dimensions. The first dimension is computerized management information systems and the second dimension the Development of Performance. The control sample was (063). (360) questioners were distributed and (306) were retrieved back with a percentage of (85%). Several statistical tools were used for data analysis and hypotheses testing, including reliability correlation using Cronbach’s (...) alpha, “ANOVA”, Simple Linear Regression and Step Wise Regression. The overall findings of the current study suggested the presence of a statistically significant relationship between resources (physical, software, and human and organizational) for the computerized management information systems and the development of performance in the Electricity Distribution Company in Gaza. The study recommended the following: The need to strengthen the company's management interest in the potential of computerized management information systems and using them in the computerization of all the company's activities. And the need to involve workers and users in the design of computerized management information systems and assessment and development process. And strengthen the relationship between users and information systems personnel in the department responsible for the system. And it is essential that the company is developing the infrastructure for information technology in general, and computerized management information systems, in particular for the development of performance. And increase interest in providing resources (physical, software, and human and organizational) for the computerized management information systems. The current study is unique by the virtue of its nature, scope and way of implied investigation, as it is the first study at Electricity Distribution Company in Gaza resources explores the status of Computerized management information systems and their relationship to the development of performance in the Electricity Distribution Company in Gaza increasing interest in Computerized management information systems through continuity, keeping pace with technological means and modern techniques. (shrink)

Optogenetic techniques are described as “revolutionary” for the unprecedented causal control they allow neuroscientists to exert over neural activity in awake behaving animals. In this paper, I demonstrate by means of a case study that optogenetic techniques will only illuminate causal links between the brain and behavior to the extent that their error characteristics are known and, further, that determining these error characteristics requires comparison of optogenetic techniques with techniques having well known error characteristics and consideration of the broader neural (...) and behavioral context in which the targets of optogenetic interventions are situated. (shrink)

Many manipulation arguments against compatibilism rely on the claim that manipulation is relevantly similar to determinism. But we argue that manipulation is nothing like determinism in one relevant respect. Determinism is a "universal" phenomenon: its scope includes every feature of the universe. But manipulation arguments feature cases where an agent is the only manipulated individual in her universe. Call manipulation whose scope includes at least one but not all agents "existential manipulation." Our responsibility practices are impacted in different ways by (...) universal and existential phenomena. And this is a relevant difference, especially on Strawsonian approaches to moral responsibility, which take facts about our responsibility practices to be deeply connected to the nature of responsibility itself. We argue that Strawsonian accounts of moral responsibility are immune to manipulation arguments, and no attempt to modify the scope of manipulation or determinism featured in these arguments will help incompatibilists secure their desired conclusion. (shrink)

This paper combines both an exegetical and philosophical approach to the treatment of miracles in the Markan gospel. Using key insights developed by biblical scholars bearing on the problem of Mark’s treatment of miracles as a basis, I conclude that for the author of Mark, miracles are effects, and as such, signs and symbols of what occurs in the moral and spiritual order. I argue that Mark connects miracles with faith in Jesus, a faith qualified through a grasp of the (...) proper exercise of human power in the kingdom of God. The last section of the paper explores the ontological conditions for the possibility of miracles as they are portrayed in this gospel; there I argue that the best candidate for a theory that squares with Mark’s understanding of miracle is a different one from that found in the contemporary philosophical literature on miracles. (shrink)

Abstract: The study aimed to determine the strategic flexibility and its relationship to the level of quality of services provided, from the viewpoint of the internal beneficiary in non-governmental hospitals in Gaza Strip. The study relied on the descriptive and analytical approach, and the questionnaire was designed as a tool to collect data and consisted of (39) items, and the researchers used the comprehensive survey method, and the number of the study population was (536) individuals, where (434) questionnaires were retrieved, (...) and the recovery rate was (80.97%). The study revealed many results, the most important of which were: the existence of a moderate degree of approval by the study sample individuals on strategic flexibility, as it was evident through the area of strategic flexibility as a whole having a relative weight (60.44%). The study is on the quality of services, as it became clear through the field of service quality obtaining a relative weight (79.90%). The results of the study revealed a statistically significant relationship between strategic flexibility and the quality of services in non-governmental hospitals in Gaza Strip, with a correlation coefficient of 0.490. The study reached many recommendations, the most important of which were: the need to work on appointing young people and those with potentials, because jobs are vacant in the hospitals under study, and the need to seek the help of an administrative staff with scientific and practical qualifications, and to work on updating information systems, archiving and networks through which data and information are transferred between departments And the creation of mechanisms by which stored information can be used to enhance the decision-making process, and an effective system to receive patients' complaints in a manner that ensures rapid response and treatment, to achieve continuous communication between patients and the hospital management, and to notify patients of dealing with the complaints they submit, and work to provide all Medical and health specialties in the hospitals under study, by making use of the medical delegations that visit Gaza Strip, involving them in the treatment processes, bringing in doctors and specialists from abroad, updating the standards related to measuring the services provided to patients on an ongoing basis, based on the suggestions and complaints of patients, and developing facilities in hospitals As well as updating the medical devices and equipment used in hospitals periodically. (shrink)