Here the concept of the human being as a “relatively isolated system” developed in Ingarden’s later phenomenology is adapted into an “aesthetics of isolation” that complements conventional environmental aesthetics. Such an aesthetics of isolation is especially relevant, given the growing “aesthetic overload” brought about by ubiquitous computing and new forms of art and aesthetic experience such as those involving virtual reality, interactive online performance art, and artificial creativity.

In this investigation of the Japanese film Kairo, I contemplate how the horrors present in the film relate to the issue of self, by examining a number of interlocking motifs. These include thematic foci on disease and technology which are more intimately and inwardly focused that the film's conclusion first appears to suggest. The true horror here, I argue, is ontological: centred on the self and its divorcing from the exterior world, especially founded in an increased use of and reliance (...) on communicative technologies. I contend that these concerns are manifested in Kairo by presenting the spread of technology as disease-like, infecting the city and the individuals who are isolated and imprisoned by their urban environment. Finally, I investigate the meanings of the apocalypse, expounding how it may be read as hopeful for the future rather than indicative of failure or doom. (shrink)

In this research, the author presents the lived experience of a graduate student and how she has overcome the feeling of isolation and challenges in distance learning. The participant of this qualitative phenomenological study is student from Visayas State University Open University (VSU-OU). This qualitative phenomenological study (Chambers, 2013) seeks to measure the in-depth experience of a distance learner from the southern Philippines and systematically analyze the culture of distance learning in order to understand the phenomenon of isolation (...) and be able to share in future studies. With in-depth personal interview, this study also allows readers to witness his personal stories which may validate others’ experiences who may not have an avenue to research about – hence phenomenological. It used the thematic qualitative approach in organizing the data presented in the study which involves analyzing themes and patterns she experienced in the phenomenon. It also mentions the respondent’s steps of overcoming isolation in distance education and avoiding quitting the study. And to do so, a network of connection among learners and university shall be present in order for a distance learner to succeed in the mode. (shrink)

Community forms a crux of human living. In the wake of pandemic like Covid-19 to avoid community transmission what is most required of a responsible community member is to follow physical distancing to curb the spread of the infectious disease and this may lead to a feeling of isolation and loneliness. But this essay speaks of isolation with a positive connotation. It talks of isolation as solitude as the Indian philosophy also speaks extensively about this sense of (...) self-contemplation and reflection to understand others as we need to know our own selves. The say speaks of isolation as understood in Sāṃkhya philosophy. This essay talks of isolated consciousness and the three gunas particularly of the sattvic predicaments that enables positive mental development in human beings which is much needed in these tested times as the present pandemic. (shrink)

We evaluate the asymptotic performance of boundedly-rational strategies in multi-armed bandit problems, where performance is measured in terms of the tendency (in the limit) to play optimal actions in either (i) isolation or (ii) networks of other learners. We show that, for many strategies commonly employed in economics, psychology, and machine learning, performance in isolation and performance in networks are essentially unrelated. Our results suggest that the appropriateness of various, common boundedly-rational strategies depends crucially upon the social context (...) (if any) in which such strategies are to be employed. (shrink)

A repository of clinically associated Staphylococcus aureus (Sa) isolates is used to semi‐automatically generate a set of application ontologies for specific subfamilies of Sa‐related disease. Each such application ontology is compatible with the Infectious Disease Ontology (IDO) and uses resources from the Open Biomedical Ontology (OBO) Foundry. The set of application ontologies forms a lattice structure beneath the IDO‐Core and IDO‐extension reference ontologies. We show how this lattice can be used to define a strategy for the construction of a new (...) taxonomy of infectious disease incorporating genetic, molecular, and clinical data. We also outline how faceted browsing and query of annotated data is supported using a lattice application ontology. (shrink)

Lilly was one of the greatest scientists and pioneers on the limits of human possibility but after his death a collective amnesia has descended and he is now almost forgotten. His Wiki is good but inevitably incomplete so here are a few missing details and viewpoints. Lilly was a generation (or more) ahead of his time. He is almost single-handedly responsible for the great interest in dolphins (which led to the Marine Mammal Protection Act in the USA and helped to (...) found the animal rights movement). In 1958 he noted that the brains of elephants and cetaceans were larger than ours, that we should not abuse them and that it was one our most important projects to communicate with them. He invented sensory isolation tanks (at NIMH in 1954) and used them extensively with and without powerful psychoactive drugs at a time when it was thought that either the brain would shut down or one would go insane if external stimuli were eliminated. He created methods for implanting electrodes in mammal brains and was planning to do it to himself. He was one of the first to make serious use of computers in bioscience research and created the hardware and software to make the first attempts to communicate with dolphins. He self experimented with dangerous physiological investigations in high altitude medicine for the military during WW2, took LSD with dolphins and movie stars, submitted himself to the rigors of various forms of yoga and of Arica training, and taught classes at Esalen. He was a computer pioneer who forsaw the rapid advances in A.I. and it's inevitable clash with humans. He was the first one to investigate the bizarre psychedelic ketamine (" vitamin K "), and his results (published in the two last chapters of his book `The Scientist`) are still the best data on the dose/effect relation of any psychedelic on one person. It cured his lifelong daily migraine headaches (see http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/UFOs/Gorightly.htm). And all this happened before most of us were born! He had courage, honesty and integrity that is rare anywhere and almost nonexistent in science. His goal was to find the ultimate truth about everything and he went about as far as anyone ever has. He had little patience with the stupid and hypocritical games one has to play to fit into monkey society. Of course the reaction of the establishment was predictable. He left the NIMH and was never given any government or academic support for the last 35 years of his life. His paper and comments at a conference on sensory deprivation were removed from the published version. He was not invited to government sponsored symposia on dolphins (he had refused to help develop them as weapons), though he clearly knew more about them than anyone in the world. He liked to live and work on the edge and few could keep up with him, as his books make clear. If you have read some of his other books it will be much easier going. He was a pioneer in consciousness research and pushed the boundaries of our understanding of who we are and what we might become. Among other things he catalogs the various states reached by drugs, meditation, and isolation, tries to determine their significance, and suggests how to use them. I very briefly review and comment on his life and work. -/- Those interested in all my writings in their most recent versions may download from this site my e-book ‘Philosophy, Human Nature and the Collapse of Civilization Michael Starks (2016)- Articles and Reviews 2006-2016’ by Michael Starks First Ed. 662p (2016). -/- All of my papers and books have now been published in revised versions both in ebooks and in printed books. -/- Talking Monkeys: Philosophy, Psychology, Science, Religion and Politics on a Doomed Planet - Articles and Reviews 2006-2017 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071HVC7YP. -/- The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle--Articles and Reviews 2006-2016 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071P1RP1B. -/- Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st century: Philosophy, Human Nature and the Collapse of Civilization - Articles and Reviews 2006-2017 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0711R5LGX -/- . (shrink)

The highly contagious 2019 novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak has not only impacted health systems, economies, and governments, it has also rapidly grown into a global health crisis, which is now threatening the lives of millions of people globally. While, on one hand, medical institutions are critically attempting to find a cure, on the other hand, governments have introduced striking measures and policies to curtail the rapid spread of the disease. Although COVID-19 has achieved pandemic status and is predominantly viewed (...) as a biomedical issue, it is argued that it should also be treated as a psychological crisis. This paper also reviews the literature to examine and comment on the detrimental effects of isolation, which has been enforced as one of the primary preventative measures to manage the spread of COVID-19. This paper further outlines key recommendations that should be addressed across different levels to buffer against the known adverse effects of isolation, which is especially relevant for the current COVID-19 situation, where a large proportion of the global population is isolated, confined, and/or quarantined. (shrink)

This paper tries to do three things. First, it tries to make it plausible that correct rules of reasoning do not always preserve justification: in other words, if you begin with a justified attitude, and reason correctly from that premise, it can nevertheless happen that you’ll nevertheless arrive at an unjustified attitude. Attempts to show that such cases in fact involve following an incorrect rule of reasoning cannot be vindicated. Second, it also argues that correct rules of reasoning do not (...) even correspond to permissions of “structural rationality”: it is not always structurally permissible to base an attitude on other attitudes from which it follows by correct reasoning. Third, from these observations it tries to build a somewhat positive account of the correctness of rules of reasoning as a more sui generis notion irreducible to either justification or structural rationality. This account vindicates an important unity of theoretical and practical reasoning as well as a qualified version of the thesis that deductive logic supplies correct rules of reasoning. (shrink)

After Parmenides proposed the duality of appearance and reality, details have not been well developed because the assumption was insufficient for logical reasoning. This paper establishes a foundation with an isolated system, which contains all causes and effects within itself. This paper seeks to establish a purely logical philosophy, including reality and phenomena, good and evil, truth and fallacy. Freedom is proposed as the basis for reality. All beings in an isolated system can be classified into two sets: variable phenomena (...) and constant realities. Realities are the only reasons for phenomena, and phenomena are the only results of realities. The sum of certain realities constitutes a reality, and the sum of all realities is good. Good creates most of the phenomenal world. A reality is universalizable; a phenomenon is never universalizable. Good is the only reality which is close to universality and keeps on universalizing. Truth is the simplest knowledge about universal or approximately universal beings. The universality of a reality measures the percentage of phenomena accompanied by this reality. There are two levels of truth: truth about all realities, and truth about the good. (shrink)

In a Covid-19 world, everyone’s circumstances changed. Most of us are living and or working in quarantine or lockdown. There is evidence that lockdown itself can have serious negative psychological impact (Brooks et al., 2020). Nonetheless, strategies are being proposed which, arguably, mitigate these harms. Artmaking is one such strategy. As ‘art therapy’, it has been usefully deployed to address a wide range of mental health challenges including anxiety, depression, fatigue and post-traumatic stress (Regev & Cohen-Yatziv, 2018). Given that (...) these self-same impacts profile the mental health challenges identified in relation to pandemic isolation, art may be useful in mitigating mental health issues associated with lockdown. This paper does not address how the role art can play in the therapeutic mix for serious mental health disorders. More specifically it is focused on a narrower brief of ills – predominantly those associated with boredom and a loss of stimulation associated with the constrained circumstances of lockdown. The kind of ‘art therapy’ this paper has in mind is more accurately described as ‘art engagement’ as it concerns individuals actively engaging with art. Art engagement is taken as self-administered utilising the time-out imposed by lockdown as an opportunity to take stock and reset. I will argue that to be of optimal benefit to people in lockdown, the art engagement model should support art practices that are easily accessible to a wide range of people, and be broadly scoped regarding areas to explore. Finally, because the benefits flowing from art engagement are central to this quest, our art engagement model will need to be able to track how art enriches or impoverishes its practitioners. This paper will set up a framework for art engagement that provides an apt account of art practices suited to people in lockdown. I will examine how the resolution of two art puzzles point the way forward in developing an art engagement model. Adventitiously, understanding these puzzles will also prove useful for art making in constrained living arrangements. Managing the first of these puzzles requires a rejection of the notion that art can be determinately defined. Instead we opt for a model that privileges practices and products that enrich the lives of practitioners. The second puzzle assumes creativity relies to varying degrees on appropriation and so appropriation acts need to be included in the model. However, this comes at a cost. Appropriation disrupts any notion that art works are stable things situated forever in the realm of art. It will be shown that appropriation causes us to adopt a more expansive view about the fluidity of what counts as an artwork. This fluidity may take us into and out of the realm of what is traditionally thought of as ‘art’ entirely and leads us to abandon any dependency on art masters and art institutions in our artmaking quests. The paper will conclude by using the model described to outline three art engagement examples that demonstrate how sometimes ordinary everyday experiences can be enriched by taking an art-engaging stance even in the highly constrained environment of lockdown. (shrink)

This paper explores the relationship between isolation and philosophical thinking by exploring Wittgenstein’s own experiences of isolation and how they intersect with key themes in his philosophical work. In particular, I explore the relationship between isolation, honesty, and one of the central problems posed in Wittgenstein’s later work: the problem of dogmatism. I conclude with some observations about how Wittgenstein’s experiences of isolation might be considered to be a ‘liberatory’ experience.

Sora from Open AI has shown exceptional performance, yet it faces scrutiny over whether its technological prowess equates to an authentic comprehension of reality. Critics contend that it lacks a foundational grasp of the world, a deficiency V-JEPA from Meta aims to amend with its joint embedding approach. This debate is vital for steering the future direction of Artificial General Intelligence(AGI). We enrich this debate by developing a theory of productive imagination that generates a coherent world model based on Kantian (...) philosophy. We identify three indispensable components in the coherent world model that enable genuine world understanding: latent representations of isolated objects, an a priori law of change across space and time, and Kantian categories. Our analysis reveals that Sora is limited because of its oversight of the a priori law of change and Kantian categories, flaws that are not rectifiable through scaling up the training. V-JEPA learns the context-dependent aspect of the a priori law of change. Yet it fails to fully comprehend Kantian categories and incorporate experience, leading us to conclude that neither system currently achieves a comprehensive world understanding. Nevertheless, each system has developed components essential to advancing an integrated AI productive imagination-understanding engine. Finally, we propose an innovative training framework for an AI productive imagination-understanding engine, centered around a joint embedding system designed to transform disordered perceptual input into a structured, coherent world model. Our philosophical analysis pinpoints critical challenges within contemporary video AI technologies and a pathway toward achieving an AI system capable of genuine world understanding, such that it can be applied for reasoning and planning in the future. (shrink)

At this stage of the COVID-19 pandemic, two policy aims are imperative: avoiding the need for a general lockdown of the population, with all its economic, social and health costs, and preventing the healthcare system from being overwhelmed by the unchecked spread of infection. Achieving these two aims requires the consideration of unpalatable measures. Julian Savulescu and James Cameron argue that mandatory isolation of the elderly is justified under these circumstances, as they are at increased risk of becoming (...) severely ill from COVID-19, and are thus likely to put disproportionate strain on limited healthcare resources. However, their arguments for this strategy are contingent on the lack of viable alternatives. We suggest that there is a possible alternative: a mandatory, centralised contact-tracing app. We argue that this strategy is ethically preferable to the selective isolation of the elderly, because it does not target members of a certain group, relying instead on the movements of each individual, and because it avoids the extended isolation of certain members of the society. Although this type of contact-tracing app has its drawbacks, we contend that this measure warrants serious consideration. (shrink)

This chapter offers phenomenological ethics of intimacy for experiences of isolation, reduced haptic relations, and periods when we must hold each other at a distance. How can we practice an ethics of intimacy from a space of separation and suspended activities involving bodily proximity and touch? By drawing on Luce Irigaray’s identification of a “caress before the caress,” I locate a queer, feminist ethics of intimacy born from the experience of undetermined desire or “erotic suspension.” The reduction and disruption (...) of touching, brought about by a crisis such as a pandemic, magnifies the experience of ethical or epistemological uncertainty surrounding haptic relations. But I argue that the experience of erotic suspension before the caress underlies all forms of being-together. One’s relationship to this moment before the caress is critical because it informs and transforms the way we are together. The disruption of our usual forms of being-together may be an opportunity for transformed ethical relations, the expansion of intimacy, and heightened sensation and pleasure. (shrink)

Purpose of the article is to identify the religious factor in the teaching of transhumanism, to determine its role in the ideology of this flow of thought and to identify the possible limits of technology interference in human nature. Theoretical basis. The methodological basis of the article is the idea of transhumanism. Originality. In the foreseeable future, robots will be able to pass the Turing test, become “electronic personalities” and gain political rights, although the question of the possibility of machine (...) consciousness and self-awareness remains open. In the face of robots, people create their assistants, evolutionary competition with which they will almost certainly lose with the initial data. For successful competition with robots, people will have to change, ceasing to be people in the classical sense. Changing the nature of man will require the emergence of a new – posthuman – anthropology. Conclusions. Against the background of scientific discoveries, technical breakthroughs and everyday improvements of the last decades, an anthropological revolution has taken shape, which made it possible to set the task of creating inhumanly intelligent creatures, as well as changing human nature, up to discussing options for artificial immortality. The history of man ends and the history of the posthuman begins. We can no longer turn off this path, however, in our power to preserve our human qualities in the posthuman future. The theme of the soul again reminded of itself, but from a different perspective – as the theme of consciousness and self-awareness. It became again relevant in connection with the development of computer and cloud technologies, artificial intelligence technologies, etc. If a machine ever becomes a "man", then can a man become a "machine"? However, even if such a hypothetical probability would turn into reality, we cannot talk about any form of individual immortality or about the continuation of existence in a different physical form. A digital copy of the soul will still remain a copy, and I see no fundamental possibility of isolating a substrate-independent mind from the human body. Immortality itself is necessary not so much for stopping someone’s fears or encouraging someone’s hopes, but for the final solution of a religious issue. However, the gods hold the keys to heaven hard and are unlikely to admit our modified descendants there. (shrink)

One of the reasons why most of us feel puzzled about the problem of abortion is that we want, and do not want, to allow to the unborn child the rights that belong to adults and children. When we think of a baby about to be born it seems absurd to think that the next few minutes or even hours could make so radical a difference to its status; yet as we go back in the life of the fetus we (...) are more and more reluctant to say that this is a human being and must be treated as such. No doubt this is the deepest source of our dilemma, but it is not the only one. For we are also confused about the general question of what we may and may not do where the interests of human beings conflict. We have strong intuitions about certain cases; saying, for instance, that it is all right to raise the level of education in our country, though statistics allow us to predict that a rise in the suicide rate will follow, while it is not all right to kill the feeble-minded to aid cancer research. It is not easy, however, to see the principles involved, and one way of throwing light on the abortion issue will be by setting up parallels involving adults or children once born. So we will be able to isolate the “equal rights” issue and should be able to make some advance... (shrink)

Objective: This main aim of the study is to explore COVID-19 pandemic problems from the perspective of public health-clinical care ethics through online mediareports in Turkey. Method: This research was designed as a descriptive and qualitative study that assesses COVID-19 through online media reports on critics between the periods of March 11, 2020 and April 2 2020 as a quantitative as number of reports and qualitative study, across Turkey. Reports were from Turkish Medical Association websites which included newspaper reports. Study (...) data were presented as statistically and qualitative data case and headlines. No ethical or ofTicial permission was sought as the study was conducted through open access internet news sites. Results: This online reports analysis retrieved about 6723 articles about the COVID-19. According to study data, information about COVID-19 were themed as follows: general deTiciencies in taking action and isolation, lack of isolation, passengers and transport vehicles not quarantined ; insufTicient diagnostic tests, decision to test after healthcare professionals become infected, lack of equipment, lack of evaluation outbreak countries [Table 2]. Conclusion and Suggestions: COVID-19 is a pandemic and is a global public health problem that concerns every individual and needs to be handled carefully. This requires a multi-faceted preparation and education. In this context, healthcare professionals should be well trained in this aspect and have all the necessary equipment throughout the process. Additionally, it should work systematically with the cooperation of all health organizations, the Ministry of Health, local governments and of course the media, in order to inform society, fairly distribute the resources and to implement the safety measures effectively. BrieTly, lack of transparency, insufTicient information, limited resources, lack of public health protection measures such as partial quarantine decision, partial implementation of the scientiTic board's re c ommenda ti on s fo r e c on omi c rea s on s, and contradiction of the explanations are revealed as serious ethical problems. (shrink)

Wittgenstein formulates the paradox of gestalt switches thus: ‘What is incomprehensible is that nothing, and yet everything has changed, after all. That is the only way to put it’. In the course of isolating what I take to be the best of the various solutions to the paradox explored by Wittgenstein, the following claims are defended: (a) A significant strand in Wittgenstein’s own formulation of, and solution to, the paradox can best be understood as a response to three specific claims (...) made by the Gestalt psychologist Kohler. (b) The most promising avenue Wittgenstein explored in his many attempts to resolve the paradox gives perceptual attention a constitutive role in the solution (c) This role is best elaborated, partially, by appeal to information processing theories of attention. (d) There are good reasons to think that the kind of solution to the paradox this yields would have been welcomed by Wittgenstein. (shrink)

The correlation between dialogue and religion, both as conceptual apparatuses and as current practices, has had a long history. The purpose of this essay is to isolate one such instance – the “critical dialogue” taking place amongst scholars of religions – which involves also the dialogue scholars establish with their field of study and/or a given religious tradition. Following a brief clarification of terminology used, I will proceed to discuss concrete examples of critical dialogue within the Study of Religions and (...) how this might be enhanced. Finally, I will draw some partial conclusions which might pave the way for this critical dialogue to improve and continue. (shrink)

Work on causation in psychopathology often emphasizes variation in the causes but variation in what is to be explained further complicates matters. Focusing on the protean nature of psychopathology, this chapter explores different ways that classificatory variation is generated. For example, choices about what features of disorders to foreground and background can produce variation. The chapter also examines, from the perspective of scientific conventionalism, how classificatory decisions made at choice points partly constitute what is classified, but not in the sense (...) of making it up. In contrast to the view that conventions are neither true nor false and thus isolated from the domain of facts, the chapter argues that scientific conventions are implemented to promote the discovery of facts. Scientific conventions must also answer to conceptual and factual constraints. The chapter concludes by looking at how classificatory choices can produce different versions of a psychiatric which may also result in variations in causal models across those versions. In agreement with ideas articulated by Putnam, the chapter argues that we cannot divide the language of psychopathology into a part that describes disorders as they are in themselves and a part that contains our conceptual contributions to what we know about disorders. (shrink)

Toleration classically denotes a relation between two agents that is characterised by three components: objection, power, and acceptance overriding the objection. Against recent claims that classical toleration is not applicable in liberal democracies and that toleration must therefore either be understood purely attitudinally or purely politically, we argue that the components of classical toleration are crucial elements of contemporary cases of minority accommodation. The concept of toleration is applicable to, and is an important element of descriptions of such cases, provided (...) that one views them as wholes, rather than as sets of isolated relations. We explain this by showing how certain cases of toleration are multi-dimensional and how the descriptive concept of toleration might be understood intersectionally. We exemplify this by drawing on case studies of mosque controversies in Germany and Denmark. Finally, we propose that intersectionality is not only relevant to the descriptive concept of toleration but also captures an important aspect of normative theories of toleration. We illustrate this by discussing ideals of respect-based toleration, which we also apply to the case studies. (shrink)

The physical sciences, as generally understood, are disciplines concerned with the characteristics and behavior of physical objects and states. What is evident about the current condition of consciousness is that: 1) It has no identified physical states; 2) There is no generally accepted vocabulary of its functioning, or its participant entities; and 3) No ‘normal science’ operative structure upon which a community of scientists agree. The reasons are that consciousness is a prescientific concept persisting because there is no adequate physicalist (...) theory to replace it, and because biology operates in a way ‘invisible’ to assumed mental processes and vocabulary. What is required is a plausible theory built on a biophysical base. A theory is being developed: it is termed the _theory of brain-sign_. Brain-sign replaces consciousness as an evolved neural operation in which brains communicate with each other in the collective action of organisms, so addressing the limitations of being an isolated individual. It depends upon neural signification, in this case of the organisms’ immediate _causal orientation_ towards the world. Thus, multiple organisms are linked as one biophysical operation. Signs are biologically ubiquitous and inherently physical. Organisms are not subjective agents with transcendent powers acting in a perceivable world, but evolved organic objects with the ability to cooperate as one overarching biological process. It is anticipated this theoretical operation and vocabulary will explain brain function, which mind fails to do. It accounts for science from both its neural origins and its communal nature. ER -. (shrink)

The objective of this case study concentrated on examining the learning gap, going through some components of the transformation process, and coming up with some ways for aiding students who were experiencing lost learning. A qualitative research design was utilized by the researchers to understand and solve the cases related to Mathematics learning difficulties. Creswell (2008) asserts that qualitative research can be used to discover and comprehend the significance that certain people or groups assign to social or human issues. The (...) researchers used purposive sampling to determine 15 student participants to understand the cases of learning loss and prescribe better interventions to the students. To solve the problems associated with loss of learning experienced by the learners after remote learning, a case study will be utilized as the strategy of inquiry since it fits the situation that is to focus the said key cases, discuss some transforming process, and develop interventions. After analyzing the interviews, researchers identified three common themes across the three cases which serve to clarify the learners' experiences after the post-remote learning: the learners' learning experiences during remote learning, factors that caused learning loss in Mathematics, and learners' coping strategies. In a deeper analysis, the impact of distance learning on students during the pandemic goes beyond just the difficulties in learning and understanding lessons which resulted in difficulty in learning math during in-person classes. The lack of in-person interaction with classmates and teachers also contributes to a sense of isolation and boredom, negatively affecting students' overall well-being and mental health. (shrink)

Many philosophers of music, especially within the analytic tradition, are essentialists with respect to musical experience. That is, they view their goal as that of isolating the essential set of features constitutive of the experience of music, qua music. Toward this end, they eliminate every element that would appear to be unnecessary for one to experience music as such. In doing so, they limit their analysis to the experience of a silent, motionless individual who listens with rapt attention to the (...) sounds produced by either musicians a on stage, a stereo, or a portable device. This approach is illustrated in recent work by Nick Zangwill. Drawing on essentialist assumptions, Zangwill concludes that properly musical experience is effectively disembodied and radically private. While this seems plausible when we consider the essentialists’ paradigm case, Zangwill’s conclusion seems odd once we consider the wide variety of ways that people experience music. One’s body and social situation seem ineluctably enmeshed within the experience of, e.g., hot jazz played in a nightclub, where listeners bob their heads and dance to the music, cheer on the musicians, and socialize with their fellow concertgoers. The question this paper aims to answer is: should we consider this and similar experiences of music properly “musical”? I maintain that we should. Far from the world of pure music that Zangwill and others relegate properly musical experience, I conclude that our musical experiences are fully enmeshed within the somatic, affective, and interpersonal dimensions of human life. (shrink)

One of the central problems in the philosophy of action is to spell out the distinction between action and what merely happens, e.g., a wink versus an eye twitch. This essay proposes a theory of action offering an account of this distinction. The central claim of the theory is that action is movement that is controlled by the mover, where movement is understood capaciously and control is characterized by a trio of conditions consisting of an aim condition, a modal condition, (...) and an explanatory condition. Importantly, being controlled is shown to be a determinable property of movements, and its determination dimensions are isolated. Paired with the claim that action is movement that is controlled by the mover, this account of control as a determinable illuminates the diversity within the category of action. (shrink)

This paper discusses opposite philosophical approaches to the body and its position in the ethical discussion; in particular, the perception of the body's capability of achieving ethical excellence. One of the viewpoints in question advocates for the body-spirit duality and the spiritual superiority over mere physical existence. According to this view, the spirit can either achieve its fulfillment apart from the physical word or guide the latter to its maximum accomplishment. Conversely, the alternative perspective posits that the notion of excellence (...) and its practice can only be conceived and put in motion by living beings in a dynamic relationship among themselves. Implicated in the former is the diminishment of the body in relation to its counterpart and its subsequent mortification and (not rarely) annihilation. Implicated in the latter is the elevation of living beings and the understanding of them being the sole performers of virtuous conduct. (shrink)

A central question that arises when interpreting the U.S. Constitution is which theory of interpretation is the best? In his recent book, “How to Interpret the Constitution,” Cass Sunstein reviews various theories of constitutional interpretation currently in vogue and then offers what he believes would be the best approach going forward. In this Article, I want to take up a more basic question presupposed by the very idea of a theory of interpretation. That is, whether it is even possible to (...) arrive at more than a provisional understanding of what would be the best interpretation in any given area of study, including constitutional law. That said, I do believe some of the interpretations suggested by Cass Sunstein and elsewhere by myself and others to be more persuasive than most others, even if only partially so. For, as Sunstein himself points out, no theory seems perfect to figure out the Constitution’s meaning in every possible world in which we could imagine it to exist. So, we best just focus on our own world or what we take to matter in our world. In keeping with this idea, I plan to begin by looking first at how we might interpret the world around us based on our past experiences by considering a somewhat imaginative recent experience of my own. Next, I consider some recent studies in the neurosciences and a previous but highly influential article by the philosopher Donald Davidson concerning conceptual schemes and whether we could ever hope to make any sense of a scheme radically different from our own. Here it should be pointed out that I will use the word “scheme” when referring to a very broad system of thought for which there may not be much outside, versus when I use the word “framework,” as referencing something far narrower than a whole system of thought, even if what is referenced might purport to be a significant part of a still larger system. My goal is to eventually adopt John Rawls’ public reason method to separate out non-workable systems of thought as might be part of a particular religious or philosophical tradition that cannot be easily tied to any other system of thought easily imagined within a pluralistic society. I plan to do this by relating how Rawls’ public reason might allow for the creation of a moral interpretation of the Constitution adopting the moral theory of Alan Gewirth. The latter I adopt because its grounding does not presuppose any prior moral or religious framework. I then apply that interpretative method to five cases Sunstein believes are fixed points in our current constitutional understanding. In short, I plan to isolate out an area of human rights where even very different understandings of the world might be able to meet, while acknowledging that there will still be other areas that simply evade any common connection. I hope what I offer here to be of help for a theory of constitutional interpretation that focuses on morality, without having to compete with various religious frameworks going forward. (shrink)

The topic of this article is the ontology of practical reasons. We draw a critical comparison between two views. According to the first, practical reasons are states of affairs; according to the second, they are propositions. We first isolate and spell out in detail certain objections to the second view that can be found only in embryonic form in the literature – in particular, in the work of Jonathan Dancy. Next, we sketch possible ways in which one might respond to (...) each one of these objections. A careful evaluation of these complaints and responses, we argue, shows that the first view is not as obviously compelling as it is thought by Dancy. Indeed, it turns out that the view that practical reasons are propositions is by no means unworkable and in fact, at least under certain assumptions, explicit considerations can be made in favour of a propositional construal of reasons. (shrink)

The central issue here concerns whether Being as explored by Martin Heidegger in Being and Time is constituted spatiotemporally. As such this project has two interlinked objectives. One objective is to supply conceptually plausible answers to Heidegger’s unanswered questions regarding the temporality of Being, which he raised at the very end of Being and Time. In response I argue that each individual human being is constituted as a Space-Time-Event-Motion (STEM) containment-field embodied entity. Heidegger situates Dasein (...) (human existence) in a temporal stream moving towards the nothingness of death but all the while separating being and time as two distinct phenomena rather than coexistent. I demonstrate why this was a crucial error in Heidegger’s thinking. The second objective deals with the sense of authentic being developed by Heidegger. The spatiotemporal nature of one’s life for Heidegger is understood from the standpoint of Being-in-the-world, as an engaged participant, coexistent with the world, so that contextually it is through this engagement in recognition of this facticity or thrownness that one comes to recognise one’s own authentic self. Somewhat problematic is the coexistent phenomenological recognition that one does not live in isolation and as such one may question what of the contingent, constraining and influencing factors that shape one’s sense of self particularly against the backdrop of self-other relations. This project is situated methodologically within Process Philosophy, and it is from this perspective that draws attention to the role of human agency in which individuals are spatiotemporally construed in terms of Space-Time-Event-Motion (STEM) entities. (shrink)

Introduction: the objective of this investigation is to analyses the advances of understanding in the epigenetic processes and to extract conclusions concerning the information-based evolution from the perspective of the Informational Model of Consciousness (IMC). Analysis of epigenetic mechanisms: it is shown that the study of the epigenetic mechanisms are of increasing interest not only to discover the responsible mechanisms of some diseases, but also to observe the acquisition and transmission mechanisms of some traits to the next generation/ transgenerations, without (...) affecting the DNA sequences. These advances were especially supported by the spectacular progresses in the high technological tools like digital microfluidic techniques and semiconductor-based detection systems, allowing to apply sequencing methods of DNA and to observe its structural modifications. The specific typical steps of the epigenetic mechanisms are analysed, showing that these mechanisms could be fully described in terms of information, as signal transmission agents embodying or disembodying information in three different stages and under specific conditions, including especially the signal persistence as a main conditional epigenetic factor. Results concerning the information-assisted evolution from the perspective of IMC: the epigenetic mechanisms are discussed as a function of each component of the informational system of the organism, consisting in memory, decisional operability, emotional reactivity, metabolic driving processes, genetic transmission, genetic info-generator and the info-connection explaining the special extra-power properties of the mind. It is shown that the epigenetic mechanisms could be related to the specific functions of each informational component, mainly exhibiting five levels of integration of information as matter-related information, culminating with the stable integration in the procreation cells and transmission to the next generation. The results were extended to explain the transgenerational adaptive processes of isolated population groups. Conclusion: the epigenetic mechanisms discussed within IMC allow to understand the transgenerational adaptation as an information-assisted proces. (shrink)

“There is a long tradition in Latin American debates that is not well known in Europe and the United States…” (p. 89). This sentence, almost read in passing in the middle of the book in relation to two different conceptions of the nation, can be said to summarize the main spirit behind Biglieri and Cadahia’s populist actualization of Mariátegui’s classic, Seven Interpretative Essays on Peruvian Reality (1928). In this case, the book we have in our hands is difficult to define (...) or classify. Clearly, it is not a purely “academic” enterprise –as the very authors disclaim in the first lines of their Introduction (p. xxii). It has no full presumption of “objectivity” or “neutrality” because it takes a self-reflected partisan point of view. Conversely, it is not a “manifesto” either, since it engages deeply in theoretical debates after rigorously reviewing the existing literature. Perhaps the best way to define these Essays on Populism is finding rescue in Althusser’s notion of “theoretical intervention”, and Biglieri and Cadahia develop a total of seven placing “populism” in relation to different conjunctures: its own methodology (empirical or ontological), the Left/Right imaginary, neoliberal fascism, (plebeian) Republicanism, (inter)nationalism and feminism. However, the result is not a concatenation of isolated “papers”, but a constellation illuminated by a similar light, which I take it to be no other than the laudable attempt to bring to the fore a series of militant experiences, philosophical theses and heated debates with Latin American autonomists and Spanish republicans which are not always well known in the English-speaking literature, despite they have the power to dislocate the question around populism. (shrink)

During the eighteenth century, German philosophers wrote on a broad range of topics in moral philosophy: from meta-ethical issues such as the nature of obligation, to elaborate systems of normative ethics (often in the form of a doctrine of duties to self, others, and God), to topics in applied ethics such as the permissibility of the death penalty and censorship. Moral philosophy was also intimately related to the modern natural law tradition at the time, as well as to discussions taking (...) place in theology and psychology, to name only a few other disciplines. As a result, it is often hard to isolate eighteenth-century German moral philosophy without addressing a whole host of other philosophical subjects. There are nonetheless certain central topics that were discussed by nearly every major figure of the period and which therefore serve as a window into how German philosophers approached moral philosophy during the eighteenth century. In this chapter I illustrate that one such topic is the principle of morality; namely what philosophers took to be the supreme norm at the foundation of judging actions to be morally good or evil. As we will see, although several figures approached this principle in a broadly similar way by identifying “perfection” as the central concept at work, they differ considerably with respect to important details. Furthermore, certain common threads reveal themselves: philosophers differ not only with respect to the content of the principle, but also with respect to the way in which it can be derived, how particular duties can in turn be derived from the supreme principle, and how the principle can be formulated. I begin by outlining Christian Wolff’s influential principle of perfection (Section 1), followed by a consideration of Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten’s subtle revision of this principle (Section 2) and Christian August Crusius’s theological alternative (Section 3). I then briefly consider the impact that the reception of eighteenth-century British philosophy had on German moral philosophy during the second half of the eighteenth century (Section 4), before considering Moses Mendelssohn’s and Immanuel Kant’s answers to the 1763 Prize Essay Question (Section 5) and Johann August Eberhard’s unique mixture of rationalism and empiricism from the early 1780s (Section 6). I conclude (Section 7) with a brief discussion of Kant’s approach to the principle of morality and the principle of happiness proposed against it by his early empiricist critics. (shrink)

• Aggregates of previously isolated cells of Hydra are capable, under suitable solvant conditions, of regeneration forming complete animals. In a first stage, ecto- and endodermal cells sort out, producing the bilayered hollow structure characteristic of Hydra tissue; thereafter, heads are formed (even if the original cell preparation contained no head cells), eventually leading to the separation of normal animals with head, body column and foot. Hydra appears to be the highest type of organism that allows for regeneration of the (...) entire structure from random cell aggregates. The system is particularly useful for studying cell interactions, tissue polarity, pattern formation, and cell differentiation. (shrink)

The definition of nanoeconomics can relate to different levels and areas of economic life. First of all, this is the nanolevel of the economic system. As a human economy, nanoeconomics provides for the allocation of an individual factor within the framework of a socio-economic phenomenon. The nanoeconomic aspect is central to the definition of inclusion. So, the inclusion of a person, as the main subject of nanoeconomics, to the formation and stabilization of economic systems is the initial one in the (...) integration of an individual in relation to production processes and economic development. A person is involved in academic and social life by making decisions about their own business and integrating it into the sectoral and national economic space. It is proved that its indicators are the conditions for clustering the economic system. The study carried out a cluster analysis of the innovation system in a country with an economy in transition. In addition, the study outlined that inclusive phenomena in the economy are close to integration and are the opposite of segregation and isolation. It is noted that different institutions of integration can be used to form objective conditions for the development of babyeconomics. Public decisions of inclusion involve the use of Arrow's impossibility theorem. The research results can be used: – the individualistic functions of inclusion should be used in the formation of the babyeconomics, the human economy and the economy of nanotechnology; – states of inclusion must be created at all levels of the economic system; – a person and wealth are an individualistic aspect of an inclusive economy, because national wealth consists of individual wealth. Nanoeconomics is just beginning to be included in the systemic processes of inclusive economic phenomena, especially in countries with economies in transition. (shrink)

In this paper, we take the approach of the lexicon makers: We contemplate human language instead of trying to resist its forces. Basically, some sigmatoids seem to have been created to be free of boundaries: We fence them as we please when we apply them to our assertions, but they are quite vague in the lexicon. We here identify at least two types of such sigmatoids: The synthetisers and the specifiers. The former would originate from our capacity of isolating common (...) features of objects that, in principle, have no possible intersection. The latter would originate from our attempt of describing the 3D World by means of 2D entities. We conclude that the intrinsic vagueness of these sigmatoids is something not only acceptable, but either pleasant or necessary. (shrink)

Many recent AI systems take inspiration from biological episodic memory. Here, we ask how these ‘episodic-inspired’ AI systems might inform our understanding of biological episodic memory. We discuss work showing that these systems implement some key features of episodic memory whilst differing in important respects, and appear to enjoy behavioural advantages in the domains of strategic decision-making, fast learning, navigation, exploration and acting over temporal distance. We propose that these systems could be used to evaluate competing theories of episodic memory’s (...) operations and function. However, further work is needed to validate them as models of episodic memory and isolate the contributions of their memory systems to their behaviour. More immediately, we propose that these systems have a role to play in directing episodic memory research by highlighting novel or neglected hypotheses as pursuit-worthy. In this vein, we propose that the evidence reviewed here highlights two pursuit-worthy hypotheses about episodic memory’s function: that it plays a role in planning that is independent of future-oriented simulation, and that it is adaptive in virtue of its contributions to fast learning in novel, sparse-reward environments. (shrink)

The empirical study of belief is emerging at a rapid clip, uniting work from all corners of cognitive science. Reliance on belief in understanding and predicting behavior is widespread. Examples can be found, inter alia, in the placebo, attribution theory, theory of mind, and comparative psychological literatures. Research on belief also provides evidence for robust generalizations, including about how we fix, store, and change our beliefs. Evidence supports the existence of a Spinozan system of belief fixation: one that is automatic (...) and independent of belief rejection. Independent research supports the existence of a system of fragmented belief storage: one that relies on large numbers of causally isolated, context-sensitive stores of belief in memory. Finally, empirical and observational data support at least two systems of belief change. One system adheres, mostly, to epistemological norms of updating; the other, the psychological immune system, functions to guard our most centrally held beliefs from potential inconsistency with newly formed beliefs. Refining our under- standing of these systems can shed light on pressing real-world issues, such as how fake news, propaganda, and brainwashing exploit our psychology of belief, and how best to construct our modern informational world. (shrink)

Although few linguists currently embrace the empirical paradigm, there are increasing calls for the development of tools for studying language that resemble those in exact sciences. This trend can be observed even in top mainstream linguistic journals, such as the Journal of Pragmatics, as exemplified by Xiang (2017). Today, however, linguists who adapt the methodologies from more advanced sciences face isolation from the mainstream linguistic community. This is because the majority of linguists in philological and philosophical departments remain convinced (...) that the object of their studies is fundamentally different from those studied by physicists. Therefore, they argue that linguistic methodology cannot resemble that used in empirical sciences. As a result, linguistics is often seen as requiring interpretation rather than an explanation, and evaluation of linguistic research is based on acceptance within the scholarly community rather than empirical testing. (shrink)

This paper explores the cosmology of St Maximus the Confessor and its relevance for contemporary ethics. It takes as it’s starting point two papers on Maximus’ cosmology and environmental ethics (Bordeianu, 2009; Munteanu, 2010) and from there argues that we can not consider environmental ethics in isolation from other ethical issues. This, as both Ware and Keselopoulos have also pointed out, is because the environmental crisis is actually a crisis in the human heart and in human attitudes toward everything (...) about us. The paper goes through some key areas in Maximus’ cosmology according to his own formula of creation – movement – rest and considers at each stage the implications of this theology for the way the human should be living and treating other beings. The main sources for this exploration are Ambiguum 7, Ambiguum 41, and The Mystagogia with especial focus on the doctrine of the logoi and the divisions of nature. The paper concludes that Bordeianu and Munteanu are right to consider Maximus’ theology to be of ecological relevance, but that this relevance comes from the radical ethical statement being made about human activity. Maximus’ theology points the human toward becoming in the likeness of Christ who unites heaven and earth through love. The love of Christ when considered in an ethical context stands as a formidable challenge to current attitudes and institutions that advocate the exploitation and destruction of human or non-human creation. (shrink)

While there is good reason to think that Mendelssohn's Morgenstunden targets some of the key claims of Kant’s first Critique, this criticism has yet to be considered in the appropriate context or presented in all of its systematic detail. I show that far from being an isolated assault, Mendelssohn’s attack in the Morgenstunden is a continuation and development of his earlier criticism of Kant’s idealism as presented in the Inaugural Dissertation. I also show that Mendelssohn’s objection was more influential (...) on Kant than has previously been suspected; not only did Kant respond to it in a brief review and a set of remarks published along with a disciple’s examination of Mendelssohn’s text but, as I will suggest, Kant’s Refutation of Idealism is intended (at least in part) to undermine the Cartesian starting-point Mendelssohn had presumed throughout his campaign against Kantian idealism. (shrink)

Acoustic pollution is one of the main pollutants nowadays but it is not considered of great importance in the construction field, despite some studies showing that most of acoustic pollution is produced by buildings under construction and roads with high traffic. The aim of the paper is to compare the noise levels at different time of the day in two different buildings which have different characteristics and different construction materials. The goal is to understand how well sound isolated civil buildings (...) are and how engineers have calculated the noise levels based on the specific area. The buildings are located at “Zogu Zi”, Tirana, Albania. The case study area is an area that consistently harvests noise from heavy traffic. The impact of the noise and the sound insulation materials in the wellbeing of the inhabitance is going to be analyzed too. The aim of this paper is displaying a comparative study on the actual noise levels generated by this area. It indicates the acoustic properties of the current building materials followed by a more suitable soundproof insulation. (shrink)

The emerging field of synthetic biology aims to engineer novel biological entities. The envisioned future bio-based economy builds largely on “cell factories”: organisms that have been metabolically engineered to sustainably produce substances for human ends. In this paper, we argue that synthetic biology’s goal of creating efficient production vessels for industrial applications implies a set of ontological assumptions according to which living organisms are machines. Traditionally, a machine is understood as a technological, isolated and controllable production unit consisting of parts. (...) But modified organisms, or hybrids, require us to think beyond the machine paradigm and its associated dichotomies between artificial and natural, organisms and artefacts. We ask: How may we conceptualise hybrids beyond limiting ontological categories? Our main claim is that the hybrids created by synthetic biology should be considered not as machines but as metabolic systems. We shall show how the philosophical account of metabolism can inform an ontology of hybrids that moves beyond what we call the “machine ontology”, considering that metabolism enables thinking beyond the dominant dichotomies and allows us to understand and design lifeforms in a bio-based economy. Thus, the aim of this paper is twofold: first, to develop the philosophical ontology of hybrids, and second, to move synthetic biology beyond the problematically limiting view of hybrids. (shrink)

Beyond the grasp of our understanding lie enigmatic forces, whose presence is felt and measured, yet their origins remain elusive and mysterious. Despite our inability to fathom them, we cannot refute their existence. This article discusses the possibility of the existence of 33 million gods or more in Hinduism, which is often associated with polytheism. The article cites literature that explores how energy can be transformed from one form to another, and how special shapes can be used to efficiently isolate (...) energy. The article also discusses the use of mantras and how they generate certain frequencies that can help in various aspects of life. The article proposes a model that suggests that the energy generated by people, which is converted into sound energy, can be conserved in an isolated room and can act as a reservoir of energy. It is argued that this energy can be the basis for the existence of many gods in Hindu mythology, and that the architecture of temples and the use of mantras can contribute to the conservation and concentration of this energy. (shrink)

A fresh and original presentation that is easy and affordable for students, instructors, and general readers to use. This well-written, insightful history of philosophy is basic enough to be understood by those with no prior experience with philosophy but sophisticated enough to inform further those with some knowledge of philosophy. -/- Based on the author’s 20-plus years of teaching philosophy and learning what works for students, How We Are and How We Got Here is designed to connect with students to (...) help them understand philosophy and why it matters to them, regardless of their major. Its straightforward conversational presentation of philosophy includes readers in philosophy’s long conversation. Its chronological presentation places philosophers in their historical context, showing how philosophy is an ongoing interaction with society seeking practical knowledge useful to us in everyday life. -/- Key Features that fill multiple gaps in existing textbooks: -/- * Shows students how innovations in philosophy have interacted with and changed history, leading to how we are today. * Presents philosophy as a vital part of our lives, not as a set of isolated theoretical problems, avoiding the disconnected and fragmented silo approach of most textbooks. * Avoids the sink-or-swim approach of anthologies that plunges students into a hodgepodge of disjoint readings without adequate guidance. * Does not duplicate material covered in other introductory courses of ethics and logic but focuses on the rest of philosophy. * Focuses on explaining the ideas of the philosophers, allowing instructors to choose, at their option, primary texts from the plentifully available royalty-free sources. * Extensively covers vital areas of philosophy ignored by most textbooks, including pragmatism, phenomenology, social and political philosophy, postmodernism, feminist philosophy, and philosophy of race. * Always remains engaging and accessible to the reader. Neither dumbs down the material nor over complicates it. * Provides clear and direct text unencumbered by bells and whistles and other extraneous materials. -/- How We Are and How We Got Here provides students of all backgrounds with a clear and whole understanding of philosophy and its role in history and society, making the 2,400-year history of Western philosophy vital and relevant to today. It shows that philosophy is not a cold analytical academic procedure but exciting and alive, and reveals how we are all philosophers. (shrink)

Various authors have recently expressed doubts about the public relevance of philosophy. These doubts target both academic philosophy in general and particular subfields of philosophy. This paper investigates whether these doubts are justified through two tests in which the lack of public relevance of a philosophical paper is operationalized as the degree to which that paper is isolated. Both tests suggest that academic philosophy in general is more isolated from the broader public than it should be, and confirm the hypothesis (...) that some subfields of philosophy are more isolated than others. We argue that this lack of public relevance is caused by the incentive structure of academic philosophy and discuss a range of individual-level and incentive-level solutions. (shrink)

In the presently unfolding deepfake era, previously unrelated algorithmic superintelligence possibility claims cannot be scientifically analyzed in isolation anymore due to the connected inevitable epistemic interactions that have already commenced. For instance, deep-learning (DL) related algorithmic supremacy claims may intrinsically compete with both neuro-symbolic (NS) algorithmic and further quantum (Q) algorithmic superintelligence achievement claims. Concurrently, a variety of experimental combinations of DL, NS and Q directions are conceivable. While research on these three illustrative variants did not yet offer any (...) clear mutually applicable scientific definition of a purported supremacy level framed as goal, the currently most robust scientific evaluation frameworks would i.a. require a joint testing against pre-existing non-algorithmic supremacy baselines such as e.g. conscious supremacy and cellular supremacy. This autodidactic paper explains why, for scientific reasons, all algorithmic superintelligence achievement claims in the deepfake era can be condensed and subjected to a joint scientific evaluation framework comprising multiple successive civilization-level tasks of epistemic tunneling (ET). In light of this elusive requirement, recent claims of science automation are spurious and misleading. It is vital not to misapprehend algorithmic epistemic dark matter (EDM) mining and epistemic dark energy (EDE) generation as paradigm-shifting ET events. (shrink)

What is the metaphysical nature of perceptual experience? What evidence does experience provide us with? These questions are typically addressed in isolation. In order to make progress in answering both questions, perceptual experience needs to be studied in an integrated manner. I develop a unified account of the phenomenological and epistemological role of perceptual experience, by arguing that sensory states provide perceptual evidence due to their metaphysical structure. More specifically, I argue that sensory states are individuated by the perceptual (...) capacities employed and that there is an asymmetric dependence between their employment in perception and their employment in hallucination and illusion. Due to this asymmetric dependence, sensory states provide us with evidence. (shrink)

Philosophy in the 20th century began and ended with an obsession with the problems of consciousness. But the specific problems discussed at each end of the century were very different, and reflection on how these differences developed will illuminate not just our understanding of the history of philosophy of consciousness, but also our understanding of consciousness itself. An interest in the problems of consciousness can be found in at least three movements in early 20th century philosophy: in the discussions of (...) perception and realism by G.E. Moore and Bertrand Russell; in the related discussions of realism and pragmatism in America, in the period between William James and C.I. Lewis; and in the phenomenological movement started by Edmund Husserl. Two common themes in all these movements are: (i) that consciousness is a central or defining feature of the mind, and (ii) consciousness and thought (or intentionality) are interrelated phenomena not to be discussed in isolation from one another. The problem of consciousness in those days was the problem of the nature of our access to the mind-independent world. (shrink)

Recent epistemology of modality has seen a growing trend towards metaphysics-first approaches. Contrastingly, this paper offers a more philosophically modest account of justifying modal claims, focusing on the practices of scientific modal inferences. Two ways of making such inferences are identified and analyzed: actualist-manipulationist modality and relative modality. In AM, what is observed to be or not to be the case in actuality or under manipulations, allows us to make modal inferences. AM-based inferences are fallible, but the same holds for (...) practically all empirical inquiry. In RM, modal inferences are evaluated relative to what is kept fixed in a system, like a theory or a model. RM-based inferences are more certain but framework-dependent. While elements from both AM and RM can be found in some existing accounts of modality, it is worth highlighting them in their own right and isolating their features for closer scrutiny. This helps to establish their relevant epistemologies that are free from some strong philosophical assumptions often attached to them in the literature. We close by showing how combining these two routes amounts to a view that accounts for a rich variety of modal inferences in science. (shrink)