Abstract: Those who endorse the Psychological Continuity Approach (PCA) to analyzing personal identity need to impose a non-branching constraint to get the intuitively correct result that in the case of fission, one person becomes two. With the help of Brueckner's (2005) discussion, it is shown here that the sort of non-branching clause that allows proponents of PCA to provide sufficient conditions for being the same person actually runs contrary to the very spirit of their theory. The problem is (...) first presented in connection with perdurantist versions of PCA. The difficulty is then shown to apply to endurantist versions as well. -/- . (shrink)

This paper addresses a question concerning psycho­logical continuity, i.e., which features preserve the same psychological subject over time; this is not the same question as the one concerning the necessary and sufficient conditions for personal identity. Marc Slors defends an account of psychological continuity that adds two features to Derek Parfit’s Relation R, namely narrativity and embodiment. Slors’s account is a significant improvement on Parfit’s, but still lacks an explicit acknowledgment of a third feature that I (...) call relationality. Because they are usually regarded as cases of radical discontinuity, I start my discussion from the experiences of psychological disruption undergone by victims of severe violence and trauma. As it turns out, the challenges we encounter in granting continuity to the experiences of violence and trauma victims are germane to those we encounter in granting continuity to the experiences of subjects in non-traumatic contexts. What is missing in the most popular accounts of psychological continuity is an explicit acknowledgment of the links that tie our psychological lives to other subjects. A more persuasive notion of psychological continuity is not only embodied and narrative, as is Slors’s notion, but also explicitly relational. (shrink)

Those who endorse the Psychological Continuity Approach (PCA) to analyzing personal identity need to impose a non-branching constraint to get the intuitively correct result that in the case of fission, one person becomes two. With the help of Brueckner's (2005) discussion, it is shown here that the sort of non-branching clause that allows proponents of PCA to provide sufficient conditions for being the same person actually runs contrary to the very spirit of their theory. The problem is first (...) presented in connection with perdurantist versions of PCA. The difficulty is then shown to apply to endurantist versions as well. (shrink)

Marya Schechtman has raised a series of worries for the Psychological Continuity Theory of personal identity (PCT) stemming out of what Derek Parfit called the ‘Extreme Claim’. This is roughly the claim that theories like it are unable to explain the importance we attach to personal identity. In her recent Staying Alive (2014), she presents further arguments related to this and sets out a new narrative theory, the Person Life View (PLV), which she sees as solving the problems (...) as well as bringing other advantages over the PCT. I look over some of her earlier arguments and responses to them as a way in to the new issues and theory. I argue that the problems for the PCT and advantages that the PLV brings are all merely apparent, and present no reason for giving up the former for the latter. (shrink)

The view that an account of personal identity can be provided in terms of psychological continuity has come under fire from an interesting new angle in recent years. Critics from a variety of rival positions have argued that it cannot adequately explain what makes psychological states co-personal (i.e. the states of a single person). The suggestion is that there will inevitably be examples of states that it wrongly ascribes using only the causal connections available to it. In (...) this paper, I describe three distinct attacks on the psychological continuity theory along these lines. While I acknowledge that a number of interesting issues arise, I argue that the theory can withstand all three attacks. (shrink)

A widely accepted view in the discussion of personal identity is that the notion of psychological continuity expresses a one--many or many--one relation. This belief is unfounded. A notion of psychological continuity expresses a one--many or many--one relation only if it includes, as a constituent, psychological properties whose relation with their bearers is one--many or many--one; but the relation between an indexical psychological state and its bearer when first tokened is not a one--many or (...) many--one relation. It follows that not all types of psychological continuity may take a one--many or many--one form. This conclusion casts doubt on the Lockean approach to the issue, by showing that the notion of psychological continuity Lockeans rely on may not be available. (shrink)

This paper provides an analysis of Franz Brentano’s thesis that psychology employs a distinctive method, which sets it apart from physiology. The aim of the paper is two-fold: First, I situate Brentano’s thesis (and the broader metaphysical system that underwrites it) within the context of specific debates about the nature and status of psychology, arguing that we regard him as engaging in a form of boundary work. Second, I explore the relevance of Brentano’s considerations to more recent debates about autonomy (...) on the one hand and theoretical and/or methodological integration on the other. I argue that Brentano puts his finger on the idea that an integrated research process presupposes the existence of distinct methods and approaches, and that he highlights the philosophical challenge of accounting for such distinct methods. I suggest that Brentano’s ideas offer unconventional perspectives on current debates, in particular regarding first-person methods and the investigative process in cognitive science. (shrink)

According to the Psychological-Continuity Account of What Matters, you are justified in having special concern for the well-being of a person at a future time if and only if that person will be psychologically continuous with you as you are now. On some versions of the account, the psychological continuity is required be temporally ordered, whereas, on other versions, it is allowed to be temporally unordered. In this paper, I argue that the account is implausible if (...) the psychological continuity is allowed to be temporally unordered. I also argue that, if the psychological continuity is required to be temporally ordered, it cannot plausibly be purely psychological (in the sense that the psychological continuity is not required to be caused through spatio-temporal continuity of a brain). The upshot is that no plausible version of the Psychological-Continuity Account of What Matters is purely psychological. So psychological continuity is not what matters in survival. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that standard psychological continuity theory does not account for an important feature of what is important in survival – having the property of personhood. I offer a theory that can account for this, and I explain how it avoids the implausible consequences of standard psychological continuity theory, as well as having certain other advantages over that theory.

I want to examine the implications of a metaphysical thesis which is presupposed in various objections to Rawls' theory of justice.Although their criticisms differ in many respects, they concur in employing what I shall refer to as the continuity thesis. This consists of the following claims conjointly: (1) The parties in the original position (henceforth the OP) are, and know themselves to be, fully mature persons who will be among the members of the well-ordered society (henceforth the WOS) which (...) is generated by their choice of principles of justice. (2) The OP is a conscious event among others, integrated (compatibly with the constraints on knowledge and motivation imposed on the parties) into the regular continuity of experience that comprises each of their ongoing constitutes lives. (3) The parties in the OP thus are, and regard themselves as, psychologically continuing persons, partially determined in personality and interests by prior experiences, capable of recollection and regret concerning the past, anticipation and apprehensiveness regarding the future, and so on. Although the continuity thesis as stated above is not at odds with any of the conditions that define the OP, its exegetical validity is a matter for discussion. I shall be concerned to argue that if it is indeed contained in or a consequence of Rawls' theory, then it casts into doubt the capacity of the OP to generate or justify any principles of justice at all. On the other hand, if the continuity thesis is viewed as dispensable and unnecessary to the Rawlsian enterprise, then Rawls is correct in maintaining the irrelevance of the question of personal identity to the construction of his moral theory. In this case, the contract-theoretic, instrumentalist justification for the two principles of justice (henceforth the 2PJ) needs to be supplanted by a modified conception of wide reflective equilibrium. The considerations that form the bulk of this discussion then may be understood as providing a rationale for Rawls' recent revisions in the model of justification on which his theory of justice rests, and for his increasing emphasis on us as moral mediators between the OP and the WOS. Now I want to consider the question of whether or not, given the textual evidence, anything like the continuity thesis is stated or implied by Rawls, and what problems for his theory, if any, turn on a positive or negative answer to this question. -/- . (shrink)

During the period 1870-1914 the existing discipline of psychology was transformed. British thinkers including Spencer, Lewes, and Romanes allied psychology with biology and viewed mind as a function of the organism for adapting to the environment. British and German thinkers called attention to social and cultural factors in the development of individual human minds. In Germany and the United States a tradition of psychology as a laboratory science soon developed, which was called a 'new psychology' by contrast with the old, (...) metaphysical psychology. Methodological discussion intensified. New syntheses were framed. Chairs were established and Departments founded. Although the trend toward institutional autonomy was less rapid in Britain and France, significant work was done by the likes of Galton and Binet. Even in Germany and America the purposeful transformation of the old psychology into a new, experimental science was by no means complete in 1914. And while the increase in experimentation changed the body of psychological writing, there was considerable continuity in theoretical content and non-experimental methodology between the old and new psychologies. This chapter follows the emergence of the new psychology out of the old in the national traditions of Britain, Germany, and the United States, with some reference to French, Belgian, Austrian, and Italian thinkers. While the division into national traditions is useful, the psychological literature of the second half of the nineteenth century was generally a European literature, with numerous references across national and linguistic boundaries, and it became a North Atlantic literature as psychology developed in the United States and Canada. The order of treatment, Britain, Germany, and the US, follows the center of gravity of psychological activity. The final section considers some methodological and philosophical issues from these literatures. (shrink)

The article analyzes methodological and practical approaches of psychological counseling for adult clients. General psychological problems of this age group are generalized; the concept of restoration of balance between the image of the world and the image of the “I” of clients as the main internal mechanism of mental equilibrium is substantiated; the aspects of professional training of a psychologist to advisory practice with adults are considered. -/- The urgent problem of psychological counseling for adult clients is (...) to help them to solve such problems as negative behaviors, disadaptation, loss of the meaning of life, addictive behavior, depression, etc. Psychological help should be carried out in the direction of qualitative transformations of the image of the world and the image of “I”, which envisage the expansion of knowledge about the world, its positive emotional experience, the realism of ideological beliefs. The general trend in the development of the worldview is the lack of realism in the image of the world, which affects the formation of a false system of values, the development of distorted moral ideas, and as a consequence, problems of health, self-realization, professional adaptation, and behavior deviations. -/- The purpose of the article is to substantiate the methodology and methods of psychological counseling for clients of the adult age group. Specialization of practical activity of a psychologist with this age category requires special knowledge, skills, and skills from a specialist that qualitatively differ from the provision of psychological services to other age groups (children, adolescents, etc.). The success of solving the psychological problems of clients entirely depends on the introduction of the correct, in other words, “more objective”, realistic methodology of counseling. The task of the article is to describe specific aspects of advisory psychological counseling for adults. -/- Summarizing the issue of adult counseling, we note that this type of activity requires from a psychologist to continuously improve the theoretical knowledge and practical skills, as well as to rethink the life experience. The presence of only one of the components of this activity provokes unprofessionality – it often manifests as the behavior in the style of a teacher, a teacher of higher education, in which there is a somewhat superficial, authoritarian attitude to students. Consequently, effective counseling for adult clients is stimulated by professional introspection and qualification in order to avoid professional deviation. Therefore, it is advisable for a psychologist to gain experience with clients (patients) of the adult age group to practice in a counseling center under the guidance of a specialist, and if this is a medical institution – a doctor or therapist. (shrink)

Here I develop an account of our persistence that accommodates each of the following compelling intuitions: (i) that we are animals, (ii) that we existed prior to the onset of whatever psychological capacities are necessary for personhood, and we can continue to exist with the loss of those and other psychological capacities, (iii) that with suitable psychological continuity, the person goes with the brain/cerebrum in remnant person and brain/cerebrum transplant cases, and (iv) that it is possible (...) for us to survive gradual large-scale replacement of organic with inorganic parts. With the help of a couple of recent “hybrid” animalist accounts I develop an analysis of our persistence that entails (ii)–(iv) while being consistent with (i). (shrink)

Today’s organizations are operating in a highly competitive and changing environment ‎that ‎pushes them to adapt their organizational structures to such ‎environments continuously. ‎However, the ethical behavior of employees is considered a bridge to the organization’s success ‎, driven by positive beliefs. This study's purpose of examining the psychological and ethical ‎beliefs' that influence employees' behavior at the workplace through a literature review. This ‎paper uses two terms: "ethical beliefs” and “psychological beliefs.” They both ‎are different but can (...) significantly influence the behavior of employees. Positive psychological and ‎strong ethical beliefs drive ethical behaviors at the workplace, such as honesty, accountability, ‎fairness, responsibility, trust, and integrity, which lead to better performance, a productive team, and ‎positivity in the workplace. It helps to develop a professional relationship with employees, ‎effective communication, accountability, and professionalism at work. While negative ‎psychological and weak ethical beliefs drive unethical behavior, including taking credit for other ‎hard work, abuse, verbal harassment, violence, lack of ambitions and professionalism, theft, ‎corrupt practices, etc. Finally, the arguments demonstrate that some ethical beliefs are perceived ‎to be more objective and appropriate than psychological beliefs. The ethical beliefs of workers ‎considered more formal than psychological beliefs. ‎. (shrink)

Police officers are vital to maintaining security and the continuity of national functions. Thus, Police officers are more exposed to different kinds of psychological concerns. However, a female in this kind of profession, based on various studies, experienced higher levels of stress because of other factors. Further, the primary goal of this study is to investigate the psychological well-being, lived experiences, challenges, and coping mechanisms of female police officers. Employing the Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, the findings of this (...) study were: (1) Female police officers had conceptualized themselves as brave, flexible, and adaptive. And they cope with stress with positive thinking that results in healthy psychological well-being. (2) Female police officers showed dedication and engagement to serve the people. They even used their resources for the public and sacrificed most of their time in the office. (3) Female police officers' primary motivation to continue their careers is their families, and serving the public brings joy to them. (4) However, female police officers experience disrespect while working in the field, and they always have fear in their life as police officers. Moreover, they need more time to spend with their families. Furthermore, it is highly suggested to provide opportunities for enhancing quality time with their family, specifically with their children. (shrink)

This paper discusses the evolutionary origin and adaptive functions of emotions, in line with contemporary evolutionary psychology. Drawing upon Charles Darwin’s study of emotional expressions, it is argued that there is an evolutionary continuity among animals in emotional capacities, and that the differences between humans and animals are differences in degree and not in kind. The focus is on basic or primary emotions (joy, fear, sadness, anger), as it has been consistently shown that they are universal and shared among (...) many different species. Basis for this view is the neuroscientific research on brain mechanisms underlying the emotions, especially subcortical brain regions that are proven to be the evolutionary old loci of emotions, homologous across many species. These neuroscientific data provide convincing empirical evidence for the existence of emotional experiences in animals and the evolutionary continuity among species. (shrink)

Genetics and the biological sciences are the two contemporary scientific fields most readily called to mind in thinking about science and eugenics. Yet the history of another discipline, psychology, is enmeshed more intricately with eugenics than are the histories of either genetics or even the biological sciences more generally. This is true of the history of eugenics in Canada. Moreover, continuities in the roles that psychology plays in how we think about sorts of people and their ability and right to (...) parent make psychology’s eugenic past relevant to reflection on contemporary and ongoing practices and policies. (shrink)

Psychological measurement has received strong criticism throughout the history of psychological science. Nevertheless, measurements of attributes such as emotions or intelligence continue to be widely used in research and society. I address this puzzle by presenting a new causal perspective to psychological measurement. I start with assumptions that both critics and proponents of psychological measurement are likely to accept: a minimal causal condition and the observation that most psychological concepts are ill-defined or ambiguous. Based on (...) this, I argue that psychological measurement is fundamentally different from measurement in the physical sciences but can nevertheless be useful. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine the relation between Henri Poincaré’s definition of mathematical continuity and Sartre’s discussion of temporality in Being and Nothingness. Poincaré states that a series A, B, and C is continuous when A=B, B=C and A is less than C. I explicate Poincaré’s definition and examine the arguments that he uses to arrive at this definition. I argue that Poincaré’s definition is applicable to temporal series, and I show that this definition of continuity provides a (...) logical basis for Sartre’s psychological explanation of temporality. Specifically, I demonstrate that Poincaré’s definition allows the for-itself to be understood both as connected to a past and future and as distinct from itself. I conclude that the gap between two terms in a temporal series comprises the present and being-for-itself, since it is this gap that occasions the radical freedom to reshape the past into a distinct and different future. (shrink)

Consider a specific type of fission where psychological continuity takes a branching form, and one of the offshoots comes into being later than the other offshoot. Let us say that the earlier offshoot comes into being in the left branch at t, and the later offshoot comes into being in the right branch at t+1. With regard to the question how many persons are involved in this case, three answers are worth considering: (i) The original subject persists up (...) to t; a distinct person comes into being immediately after t and continues to exist in the left branch; and the third person comes into being in the right branch at t+1. (ii) The original subject persists up to the moment immediately before t+1; a distinct person comes into being at t+1 and continues to exist in the left branch; and the third person comes into being in the right branch at t+1. (iii) The original subject continues to exist in the left branch; a distinct person comes into being in the right branch at t+1. For those who hold that personal identity consists in psychological continuity of some sort, the aforementioned three options exhaust the sensible ways of understanding how one persists in delayed fission. However, I argue that complications arise for each answer. Hence, delayed fission poses a challenge for the psychological approach to personal identity. (shrink)

‘Transplant’ thought-experiments, in which the cerebrum is moved from one body to another, have featured in a number of recent discussions in the personal identity literature. Once taken as offering confirmation of some form of psychological continuity theory of identity, arguments from Marya Schechtman and Kathleen Wilkes have contended that this is not the case. Any such apparent support is due to a lack of detail in their description or a reliance on predictions that we are in no (...) position to make. I argue that the case against them rests on two serious misunderstandings of the operation of thought-experiments, and that even if they do not ultimately support a psychological continuity theory, they do major damage to that theory’s opponents. (shrink)

There is a long-standing debate in the philosophy of mind and philosophy of science regarding how best to interpret the relationship between neuroscience and psychology. It has traditionally been argued that either the two domains will evolve and change over time until they converge on a single unified account of human behaviour, or else that they will continue to work in isolation given that they identify properties and states that exist autonomously from one another (due to the multiple-realizability of (...) class='Hi'>psychological states). In this paper, I argue that progress in psychology and neuroscience is contingent on the fact that both of these positions are false. Contra the convergence position, I argue that the theories of psychology and the theories of neuroscience are scientifically valuable as representational tools precisely because they cannot be integrated into a single account. However, contra the autonomy position, I propose that the theories of psychology and neuroscience are deeply dependent on one another for further refinement and improvement. In this respect, there is an irreconcilable codependence between psychology and neuroscience that is necessary for both domains to improve and progress. The two domains are forever linked while simultaneously being unable to integrate. (shrink)

Artificial Psychology (AP) is a highly multidisciplinary field of study in psychology. AP tries to solve problems which occur when psychologists do research and need a robust analysis method. Conventional statistical approaches have deep rooted limitations. These approaches are excellent on paper but often fail to model the real world. Mind researchers have been trying to overcome this by simplifying the models being studied. This stance has not received much practical attention recently. Promoting and improving artificial intelligence helps mind researchers (...) to find a holistic model of mental models. This development achieves this goal by using multiple perspectives and multiple data sets together with interactive, and realistic models. In this book, the methodology of approximate inference in psychological research from a theoretical and practical perspective has been considered. Quantitative variable-oriented methodology and qualitative case-oriented methods are both used to explain the set-oriented methodology and this book combines the precision of quantitative methods with information from qualitative methods. This is a book that many researchers can use to expand and deepen their psychological research and is a book which can be useful to postgraduate students. The reader does not need an in-depth knowledge of mathematics or statistics because statistical and mathematical intuitions are key here and they will be learned through practice. What is important is to understand and use the new application of the methods for finding new, dynamic and realistic interpretations. This book incorporates theoretical fuzzy inference and deep machine learning algorithms in practice. This is the kind of book that we wished we had had when we were students. This book covers at least some of the most important issues in mind research including uncertainty, fuzziness, continuity, complexity and high dimensionality which are inherent to mind data. These are elements of artificial psychology. This book implements models using R software. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 28, Issue 2, pp 132 - 148 A striking feature of Thomas Hobbes’s account of political obligation is his discussion of the Fool, who thinks it reasonable to adopt a policy of selective, self-interested covenant breaking. Surprisingly, scholars have paid little attention to the potential of a psychological defense of Hobbes’s controversial claim that the Fool behaves irrationally. In this paper, I first describe Hobbes’s account of the Fool and argue that the kind of Fool most (...) worth considering is the covert, long-term Fool. Then I advance and critically assess two psychological arguments according to which the Fool’s policy of self-interested covenant breaking is prudentially irrational. The first argument holds that, taken together, the deep guilt from early-stage covenant breaking, the cumulative guilt from continued covenant breaking, and the high statistical risk of detection during high-volume covenant breaking render the Fool’s policy irrational. The second argument holds that the Fool’s policy is irrational because it puts him at risk of adopting a psychologically intolerable view of his fellow covenanters and, specifically, the extent to which they can be trusted. (shrink)

Cycling is one of the typical recreational activities, transportation, and sport among elderly adults in the Philippines. Based on the study, cycling provides many benefits to physical health, promotes well-being, contributes to improved quality of life, and is a great way for elderly adults to prevent depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues. As cycling becomes more prevalent during pandemics, the road has changed to include adding more bicycle lanes. Thus, the researchers explore the lived experiences of senior cyclists, specifically: (...) (1) to describe the experiences, (2) challenges, and (3) coping mechanisms. Correspondingly, the study used fifteen (15) participants in an Interpretative Phenomenology Analysis (IPA) procedure. The following findings are drawn from the study: (1) Most of the senior cyclists experienced life-threatening events while cycling, they experienced a high level of satisfaction and happiness, (2) Most senior cyclists are not bothered by the difficulties that others might view as a barrier to them continuing to pedal with passion. (3) Despite all the obstacles they may encounter, senior cyclists choose to get through those challenges by being understanding, patient, and calm. (shrink)

Type-identity of mental and physical events is compatible with psychological anomalism. (1) Both in action and perceiving singular causal relations, two temporally distant physical events C and E (caused by C) instantiate a COMMON mental property securing "inter-event" continuity of mental content: the mental content when the room is illuminated shows a trace of familiarity with the mental content just before flipping the switch. (2) "Inter-event" continuity is possible if there is "intra-event" continuity in individual mental (...) content: subsets of C and E capable of functioning as both causal antecedent and consequent included. (3) Intra-event continuity means not just seamless adaptation to physical by role-depriving the double-role events but also enables physical shortcuts by being already equipped with pre-causal epistemic link to future (some causally efficacious knowledge of future mental property). --- Whatever causal effect mental may ever have in the physical domain can be reproduced by purely physical events (for example causally deviant chain set off by rare quantum or cosmological events) so it must be covered by strict laws. Mental brings the cause and the effect of such strict laws temporally closer. Illuminating the room takes remarkably shorter time if there is a relevant (temporally extended) mental content involved than if it is left to rare physical phenomena. -/- . (shrink)

According to the psychological account of personal identity, our identity is based on the continuity of psychological connections, and so we do not begin to exist until these are possible, some months after conception. This entails the psychological account faces a challenge from the non-identity problem—our intuition that someone cannot be harmed by actions that are responsible for their existence, even if these actions seem clearly to cause them harm. It is usually discussed with regard to (...) preconception harms, but in the context of the psychological account, it is also applicable to prenatal harms. Inflicting prenatal injury is widely thought to be morally impermissible, but if the injury is identity-determining on the psychological account, then no-one seems to be harmed—rather, the injury is responsible for bringing them into existence. Here, I argue that identity-determining injuries can routinely occur on the psychological account, and that this undermines the account. I assess Nicola Williams’ proposal to salvage the account based on a trans-world account of personal identity, and show that it is unsuccessful. I then show that Jeff McMahan’s embodied mind account of personal identity is also susceptible. I conclude that identity-determining prenatal injuries pose a significant challenge for the psychological account and its variants, and provide a reason for supporting alternative accounts that fix personal identity at conception. (shrink)

In recent years, there have been many attempts at defining learning as a social phenomenon as opposed to an individual and primarily psychological matter. The move towards understanding learning as social processes has also altered the concept of knowledge as a well-defined element stored in books, brains, CD-Roms, disks, videos or on the Internet. Instead, knowledge has been perceived as a social and context related construction. The roots of the social angle within theories on learning and knowledge are much (...) older than the current literature suggests. This paper illustrates how these theories can be traced back to pragmatism as a philosophy and foundation for an educational approach introduced by the American, John Dewey, more than one hundred years ago. The paper also suggests that Dewey avoids some pitfalls that have come with the new theories, particularly the strong division between individual vs. social and school vs. everyday life learning. (shrink)

There are two currently popular but quite different ways of answering the question of what constitutes personal identity: the one is usually called the psychological continuity theory (or Psychological View) and the other the narrative theory.1 Despite their differences, they do both claim to be providing an account—the correct account—of what makes someone the same person over time. Marya Schechtman has presented an important argument in this journal (Schechtman 2005) for a version of the narrative view (the (...) ‘Self-Understanding View’) over the psychological one, an argument which has received an overwhelmingly positive response from commentators (Gillett 2005; Heinemaa 2005; Phillips 2006). I wish to argue that .. (shrink)

In this paper I examine the concept of cross-temporal personal identity (diachronicity). This particular form of identity has vexed theorists for centuries -- e.g.,how can a person maintain a belief in the sameness of self over time in the face of continual psychological and physical change? I first discuss various forms of the sameness relation and the criteria that justify their application. I then examine philosophical and psychological treatments of personal diachronicity(for example,Locke's psychological connectedness theory; the role (...) of episodic memory) and find each lacking on logical grounds, empirical grounds, or both. I conclude that to achieve a successful resolution of the issue of the self as a temporal continuant we need to draw a sharp distinction between the feeling of the sameness of one's self and the evidence marshaled in support of that feeling. (shrink)

In this paper, I attempt to trace the broader contours of a putative Leibnizian psychology by adopting the rather unusual, and perhaps historically dubious, strategy of outlining the continuities between Leibniz’s discussion of the soul and the much more detailed and systematic psychological writings of his German successor, Christian Wolff.

I propose to take a more proximate and micro-contextual approach to the history of cultural psychology, by focusing on the 1960s. In this historical snapshot, Jerome Bruner emerges as a consummate experimental scientist, organizer of scientific knowledge, and entrepreneur in education. Looking ahead, his work continued to evolve: from perceptual readiness and values in perception (1950s) to thinking and educational psychology (1960s). Then came developmental psychology and spiral curriculum (1970s), language as social interaction (1980s), the narrative turn to meaning (1990s), (...) and legal psychology (2000s). His scientific biography resembles a prism, refracting myriad persons and cultures in which he moved. Within that context it is possible to trace several pathways to cultural psychology. (shrink)

This study used a structural equation modelling approach to assess the association between employee work- life policies, psychological empowerment, and academic staff job commitment in universities in Cross River State, Nigeria. Three null hypotheses were formulated to guide the study following a descriptive survey research design. Multistage sampling procedure was adopted in the selection of 315 academic staff from two universities in the study area. “Work-Life Policies, Psychological Empowerment and Job Commitment Questionnaire (WPPEJCQ)” was used as the instrument (...) for data collection. The construct validity of the instrument was ascertained through an Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) using the Principal Component Analysis (PCA). The Kaiser-Meyer-Ohlin of .894 and the Bartlett coefficient of 7795.820 were obtained. Several fit indices of Confirmatory Factor Analysis were used to accept the model such as RMSEA=.031, TLI=.969, CFI=.971 and many others. The null hypotheses were all tested using Path analysis. Findings revealed, among others, that there is a significant effect of work-life policies on the affective (β=.774,t=21.636,p<.05), continuance (β=.450,t=8.932,p<.05), and normative (β=490,t=9.967,p<.05) dimensions of academic staff commitment; furthermore, psychological empowerment has a significant effect on the affective (β=.795,t=23.199,p<.05), continuance (β=.501,t=10.261,p<.05) and normative (β = .520, t = 10.795, p< .05) dimensions of staff commitment; and there is a significant composite effect of work-life policies and psychological empowerment on the affective, continuance, and normative commitment levels of academic staff in universities. Based on these findings, conclusions and recommendations were made. (shrink)

The way that George Kelly treats moving from an act of love to an act of hate, via his formulation of the construct of hostility, may indicate how far apart Kelly’s model and embodied intersubjective approaches stand concerning the issue of the fundamental integrity of experiencing. All feeling and emotion for Kelly expresses an awareness of the relative ongoing success or failure in relating new events to one’s outlook. But his definition of hostility stands out from his account of guilt, (...) anxiety, fear and threat in that it consists of a two-stage process. -/- Kelly defines hostility as “the continued effort to extort validational evidence in favor of a type of social prediction which has already proved itself a failure.” -/- Notice that this definition combines awareness of a validational event(invalidation) with a response to that event(extortion of evidence). Furthermore, as we will see, the way in which the first step is understood determines the sense of the second step, and vice versa. The crucial importance of interpretation in fathoming what Kelly meant by hostility can be demonstrated in the following questions: -/- How far-reaching did he mean his definition to be? Is hostility the same thing as anger, and if so, is there such a thing as healthy, adaptive, anger, or do all forms of anger extort evidence? And what about subtle forms of affective perturbation like irritation and annoyance? Are these also forms of hostility? (shrink)

Much recent work in philosophy of memory discusses the question whether episodic remembering is continuous with imagining. This paper contributes to the debate between continuists and discontinuists by considering a previously neglected source of evidence for continuism: the linguistic properties of overt memory and imagination reports (e.g. sentences of the form 'x remembers/imagines p'). I argue that the distribution and truth-conditional contribution of episodic uses of the English verb 'remember' is surprisingly similar to that of the verb 'imagine' – even (...) when compared to the distribution of other experiential attitude verbs like 'see', 'hallucinate', or 'dream'. This holds despite the presence of some remarkable truth-conditional differences between 'remember' and 'imagine'. I show how these differences can be explained by a continuist account of remembering on which remembering is past-directed, referential, and accurate experiential imagining. (shrink)

The problem of personal identity contains various questions and issues, but the main issue is persistence; how can one person remain the same over time? Modern philosophers have proposed various solutions to this problem; however, none are without problems. David Hume rejected the notion of personal identity as fictitious and posited a theory that personal identity is merely a bundle of perceptions which does not remain the same over time. Hume’s approach to personal identity is flawed, and Derek Parfit pushed (...) back against Hume’s complete rejection of personal identity through his argument of psychological continuity; a continuous chain of overlapping cognitive connections between beliefs, preferences, memories, and other characteristics can meet the criterion of identity. However, Parfit falls short in only acknowledging mental features as the essential property of personal identity; physical features such as age, race, sex, etc. have a significant impact on one’s understanding of themselves. Through a combination of Hume’s bundle theory and Parfit’s psychological continuity, an understanding of what personal identity is and how it is able to remain constant over time can be reached. In this paper, I argue that personal identity is a bundle of mental and physical features that persists through time through psychological continuity. (shrink)

In the prospectus for his later work pronounced in 1952, Merleau-Ponty announced that his move beyond the phenomenological to the ontological level of analysis is motivated by issues of sociality, notably communication with others.' I propose to interrogate this priority attributed by the author to this interpersonal bond in his reflections on corporeality in general, marking a departure from The Structure of Behavior and The Phenomenology of Perception, which privileged the starting point of consciousness and the body proper. My interest (...) lies particularly in exposing the psychological sources of Merleau-Ponty's thinking about the primacy of sociality. Referring to his lectures on Child Psychology and Pedagogy, which he delivered as Professor at the Sorbonne in Paris in 1949-52,2 I will develop the contention that the developmental psychology of child sociality significantly informed his understanding of relations between self and other laid out in the later texts, and henceforth informed also his conception of the flesh. Specifically, the psychological hypotheses about the anonymous and fusional form initially taken by human sociality appears to play a determining role in his conception of interpersonal life formulated on the ontological plane. I will then point to the internal tensions involved in the theory of sociality based on the thesis of anonymity and disclose an alternative theoretical account, which has the merit of preserving the advantages of the anonymity thesis while avoiding its drawbacks; it also facilitates continued dialogue between Merleau-Ponty's philosophy and recent developmental psychology. (shrink)

Patients with serious illnesses or injuries may decide to quit their medical treatment if they think paying the fees will put their families into destitution. Without treatment, it is likely that fatal outcomes will soon follow. We call this phenomenon “near-suicide”. This study attempted to explore this phenomenon by examining how the seriousness of the patient’s illness or injury and the subjective evaluation of the patient’s and family’s financial situation after paying treatment fees affect the final decision on the treatment (...) process. Bayesian Mindsponge Framework (BMF) analytics were employed to analyze a dataset of 1042 Vietnamese patients. We found that the more serious the illnesses or injuries of patients were, the more likely they were to choose to quit treatment if they perceived that paying the treatment fees heavily affected their families’ financial status. Particularly, only one in four patients with the most serious health issues who thought that continuing the treatment would push themselves and their families into destitution would decide to continue the treatment. Considering the information-filtering mechanism using subjective cost–benefit judgments, these patients likely chose the financial well-being and future of their family members over their individual suffering and inevitable death. Our study also demonstrates that mindsponge-based reasoning and BMF analytics can be effective in designing and processing health data for studying extreme psychosocial phenomena. Moreover, we suggest that policymakers implement and adjust their policies (e.g., health insurance) following scientific evidence to mitigate patients’ likelihood of making “near-suicide” decisions and improve social equality in the healthcare system. (shrink)

The present paper deals thus with some fundamental agreements and disagreements between Peirce and James, on crucial issues such as perception and consciousness. When Peirce first read the Principles, he was sketching his theory of the categories, testing its applications in many fields of knowledge, and many investigations were launched, concerning indexicals, diagrams, growth and development. James's utterances led Peirce to make his own views clearer on a wide range of topics that go to the heart of the foundations of (...) psychology and that involve the relationship between perception and logic, between consciousness and the categories, between abstraction and the 'stream of thought'. The idea is to show that Peirce detected important discoveries and insights in the Principles, but felt that James could not make proper use of them because of logical confusions, and also because of his "clandestine" metaphysics. The point in this essay is thus not to look for remains of psychologism in Peirce's writings,13 but to look at Peirce's comments about James's psychology in an attempt to identify where and why Peirce amended James's views. Since the project to provide some insight on Peirce's extensive reading ofJames's Principles of Psycho/.ogy would deserve a full volume, I shall focus here on three occasions where Peirce explicidy commented on Jarnes's Principles. In the first section, I shall consider bis assessment of James's chapter on space, which was published as a series of articles in 1887, in Mind. I shall then turn to the 1891 review of the Principles in The Nation for important complements on perception as inference. In the third section, I shall deal with Peirce's manuscript "Questions on James's Principles"(Rl099). These "Questions" reveal a deep interest in psychological problems and suggest different ways along which Peirce's new advances in the field of the categories, of continuity, and abstraction could provide a proper basis for the philosophy of mind. (shrink)

Groups have committed historical wrongs (e.g., genocide, slavery). We investigated why people blame current groups who were not involved in the original historical wrong for the actions of their predecessors who committed these wrongs and are no longer alive. Current models of individual and group blame overlook the dimension of time and therefore have difficulty explaining this phenomenon using their existing criteria like causality, intentionality, or preventability. We hypothesized that factors that help psychologically bridge the past and present, like perceiving (...) higher (a) connectedness between past and present perpetrator groups, (b) continued privilege of perpetrator groups, (c) continued harm of victim groups, and (d) unfulfilled forward obligations of perpetrator groups would facilitate higher blame judgments against current groups for the past. In two repeated-measures surveys using real events (N1 = 518, N2 = 495) and two conjoint experiments using hypothetical events (N3 = 598, N4 = 605), we find correlational and causal evidence for our hypotheses. These factors link present groups to their past and cause more historical blame and support for compensation policies. This work brings the dimension of time into theories of blame, uncovers overlooked criteria for blame judgments, and questions the assumptions of existing blame models. Additionally, it helps us understand the psychological processes undergirding intergroup relations and historical narratives mired in historical conflict. Our work provides psychological insight into the debates on intergenerational justice by suggesting methods people can use to ameliorate the psychological legacies of historical wrongs and atrocities. (shrink)

In my view all behavior is an expression of our evolved psychology and so intimately connected to religion, morals and ethics, if one knows how to look at them. -/- Many will find it strange that I spend little time discussing the topics common to most discussions of religion, but in my view it is essential to first understand the generalities of behavior and this necessitates a good understanding of biology and psychology which are mostly noticeable by their absence in (...) works on religion, politics, history, morals and ethics, etc. In my view most such efforts have no grasp at all of the operation of System 2, the slow cortical functions of the brain which can be equated to linguistic behavior or the mind, and which I call the Descriptive Psychology of Higher Order Thought and which I regard as the province of philosophy in the narrow sense. -/- It is my contention that the table of intentionality (rationality, mind, thought, language, personality etc.) that features prominently here describes more or less accurately, or at least serves as an heuristic for, how we think and behave, and so it encompasses not merely philosophy and psychology, but everything else (religion, history, literature, mathematics, politics etc.). Note especially that intentionality and rationality as I (along with Searle, Wittgenstein and others) view it, includes both conscious deliberative System 2 and unconscious automated System 1 actions or reflexes. -/- This collection of articles was written over the last 10 years and revised to bring them up to date (2019). All the articles are about human behavior (as are all articles by anyone about anything), and so about the limitations of having a recent monkey ancestry (8 million years or much less depending on viewpoint) and manifest words and deeds within the framework of our innate psychology as presented in the table of intentionality. As famous evolutionist Richard Leakey says, it is critical to keep in mind not that we evolved from apes, but that in every important way, we are apes. If everyone was given a real understanding of this (i.e., of human ecology and psychology to actually give them some control over themselves), maybe civilization would have a chance. As things are however the leaders of society have no more grasp of things than their constituents and so collapse into anarchy is inevitable is spite of the near universal views that religion, politics or technology can save us. See my Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st Century 5th ed (2019), for a detailed exposition of this view. -/- It is critical to understand why we behave as we do and so I start with a brief review of the logical structure of rationality, which provides some heuristics for the description of language (mind, rationality, personality) and gives some suggestions as to how this relates to the evolution of social behavior. This centers around the two writers I have found the most important in this regard, Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle, whose ideas I combine and extend within the dual system (two systems of thought) framework that has proven so useful in recent thinking and reasoning research. As I note, there is in my view essentially complete overlap between philosophy, in the strict sense of the enduring questions that concern the academic discipline, and the descriptive psychology of higher order thought (behavior). Once one has grasped Wittgenstein’s insight that there is only the issue of how the language game is to be played, one determines the Conditions of Satisfaction (what makes a statement true or satisfied etc.) and that is the end of the discussion. No neurophysiology, no metaphysics, no postmodernism, no theology. -/- Along with many, I see it as the basic religious or moral issue of our times that America and the world are in the process of collapse from excessive population growth, most of it for the last century, and now all of it, due to 3rd world people. Consumption of resources and the addition of 3 billion more ca. 2100 will collapse industrial civilization and bring about starvation, disease, violence and war on a staggering scale. The earth loses at least 1% of its topsoil every year, so as it nears 2100, most of its food growing capacity will be gone. Billions will die and nuclear war is all but certain. In America, this is being hugely accelerated by massive immigration and immigrant reproduction, combined with abuses made possible by democracy. Depraved human nature inexorably turns the dream of democracy and diversity into a nightmare of crime and poverty. China will continue to overwhelm America and the world, as long as it maintains the dictatorship which limits selfishness and permits long term planning. The root cause of collapse is the inability of our innate psychology to adapt to the modern world, which leads people to treat unrelated persons as though they had common interests (which I suggest may be regarded as an unrecognized -- but the commonest and most serious-- psychological problem -- Inclusive Fitness Disorder). This, plus ignorance of basic biology and psychology, leads to the social engineering delusions of the partially educated who control democratic societies. Few understand that if you help one person you harm someone else—there is no free lunch and every single item anyone consumes destroys the earth beyond repair. Consequently, social policies everywhere are unsustainable and one by one all societies without stringent controls on selfishness will collapse into anarchy or dictatorship. Without dramatic and immediate changes, there is no hope for preventing the collapse of America, or any country that follows a democratic system, especially now that the Neomarxist Third World Supremacists are taking control of the USA and other Western Democracies, and helping the Seven Sociopaths who run China to succeed in their plan to eliminate peace and freedom and religion worldwide. Hence my concluding essays. Of course, it is an easily defensible point of view that Artificial Intelligence (aka Artificial Stupidity or Artificial Sociopathy) researchers are even more evil than the Democrats and the CCP, and I make brief comments on this as well. -/- Several articles touch on The One Big Happy Family Delusion, i.e., that we are genetically selected for cooperation with everyone, and that the euphonious ideals of Democracy, Diversity, Equality and Religion will lead us into utopia, if we just manage things correctly (the possibility of politics). Again, the No Free Lunch Principle ought to warn us it cannot be true, and we see throughout history and all over the contemporary world, that without strict controls, selfishness and stupidity gain the upper hand and soon destroy any nation that embraces these delusions. In addition, the monkey mind steeply discounts the future, and so we cooperate in selling our descendant’s heritage for temporary comforts, greatly exacerbating the problems. -/- I describe versions of this delusion (i.e., that we are basically ‘friendly’ if just given a chance) as it appears in some recent books on sociology/biology/economics. Even Sapolsky’s otherwise excellent “Behave” (2017) embraces leftist politics and group selection and gives space to a discussion of whether humans are innately violent. I end with two essays on the great tragedy playing out in America and the world, which can be seen as a direct result of our evolved psychology manifested as the inexorable machinations of System 1. Our psychology, eminently adaptive and eugenic on the plains of Africa from ca. 6 million years ago, when we split from chimpanzees, to ca. 50,000 years ago, when many of our ancestors left Africa (i.e., in the EEA or Environment of Evolutionary Adaptation), is now maladaptive and dysgenic and the source of our Suicidal Utopian Delusions. So, like all discussions of behavior (theology, philosophy, psychology, sociology, biology, anthropology, politics, law, literature, history, economics, soccer strategies, business meetings, etc.), this book is about evolutionary strategies, selfish genes and inclusive fitness (kin selection, natural selection), though of course few grasp this, regardless of whether they are academics or peasants, atheists or fundamentalists. (shrink)

Purpose – A key cybernetics concept, information transmitted in a system, was quantified by Shannon. It quickly gained prominence, inspiring a version by Harvard psychologists Garner and Hake for “absolute identification” experiments. There, human subjects “categorize” sensory stimuli, affording “information transmitted” in perception. The Garner-Hake formulation has been in continuous use for 62 years, exerting enormous influence. But some experienced theorists and reviewers have criticized it as uninformative. They could not explain why, and were ignored. Here, the “why” is answered. (...) The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach – A key Shannon data-organizing tool is the confusion matrix. Its columns and rows are, respectively, labeled by “symbol sent” (event) and “symbol received” (outcome), such that matrix entries represent how often outcomes actually corresponded to events. Garner and Hake made their own version of the matrix, which deserves scrutiny, and is minutely examined here. Findings – The Garner-Hake confusion-matrix columns represent “stimulus categories”, ranges of some physical stimulus attribute (usually intensity), and its rows represent “response categories” of the subject’s identification of the attribute. The matrix entries thus show how often an identification empirically corresponds to an intensity, such that “outcomes” and “events” differ in kind (unlike Shannon’s). Obtaining a true “information transmitted” therefore requires stimulus categorizations to be converted to hypothetical evoking stimuli, achievable (in principle) by relating categorization to sensation to intensity. But those relations are actually unknown, perhaps unknowable. Originality/value – The author achieves an important understanding: why “absolute identification” experiments do not illuminate sensory processes. (shrink)

Insights into the nondual relationship of organism and environment and their processual nature have resulted in numerous efforts at understanding human behavior and motivation from a holistic and contextual perspective. Meadian social theory, cultural historical activity theory (CHAT), ecological psychology, and some interpretations of complexity theory persist in relating human activity to the wider and more scientifically valid view that a process metaphysics suggests. I would like to articulate a concept from ecological psychology – that of the affordance, and relate (...) it to aspects of phenomenology and neuroscience such that interpretations of the self, cognition, and the brain are understood as similar to interpretations of molar behaviors exhibited in social processes. Experience with meditation as a method of joining normal reflective consciousness with ‘awareness’ is described and suggested as a useful tool in coming to better understand the nondual nature of the body. (shrink)

This collection of articles was written over the last 10 years and edited to bring them up to date (2017). The copyright page has the date of the edition and new editions will be noted there as I edit old articles or add new ones. All the articles are about human behavior (as are all articles by anyone about anything), and so about the limitations of having a recent monkey ancestry (8 million years or much less depending on viewpoint) and (...) manifest words and deeds within the framework of our innate psychology as presented in the table of intentionality. As famous evolutionist Richard Leakey says, it is critical to keep in mind not that we evolved from apes, but that in every important way, we are apes. If everyone was given a real understanding of this (i.e., of human ecology and psychology to actually give them some control over themselves), maybe civilization would have a chance. As things are however the leaders of society have no more grasp of things than their constituents and so collapse into anarchy is inevitable. The first group of articles attempts to give some insight into how we behave that is reasonably free of the theoretical delusions that are universal. In the next group, I show how these insights apply by reviewing some books in philosophy and psychology. Next I review books on science and religion and finally provide reviews and articles showing how understanding of both science and philosophy gives insight into the tragic delusions destroying the world. People believe that society can be saved by science, religion and politics, so I provide some suggestions as to why this is unlikely via short articles and reviews of recent books by well-known writers. It is critical to understand why we behave as we do and so the first section presents articles that try to describe (not explain as Wittgenstein insisted) behavior. I start with a brief review of the logical structure of rationality, which provides some heuristics for the description of language (mind, rationality, personality) and gives some suggestions as to how this relates to the evolution of social behavior. This centers around the two writers I have found the most important in this regard, Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle, whose ideas I combine and extend within the dual system (two ii systems of thought) framework that has proven so useful in recent thinking and reasoning research. As I note, there is in my view essentially complete overlap between philosophy, in the strict sense of the enduring questions that concern the academic discipline, and the descriptive psychology of higher order thought (behavior). Once one has grasped Wittgenstein’s insight that there is only the issue of how the language game is to be played, one determines the Conditions of Satisfaction (what makes a statement true or satisfied etc.) and that is the end of the discussion. Since philosophical problems are the result of our innate psychology, or as Wittgenstein put it, due to the lack of perspicuity of language, they run throughout human discourse and behavior, so there is endless need for philosophical analysis, not only in the ‘human sciences’ of philosophy, sociology, anthropology, political science, psychology, history, literature, religion, etc., but in the ‘hard sciences’ of physics, mathematics, and biology. It is universal to mix the language game questions with the real scientific ones as to what the empirical facts are. Scientism is ever present and the master has laid it before us long ago, i.e., Wittgenstein (hereafter W) beginning with the Blue and Brown Books in the early 1930’s. "Philosophers constantly see the method of science before their eyes and are irresistibly tempted to ask and answer questions in the way science does. This tendency is the real source of metaphysics and leads the philosopher into complete darkness." (BBB p18) The key to everything about us is biology, and it is obliviousness to it that leads millions of smart educated people like Obama, Chomsky, Clinton and the Pope to espouse suicidal utopian ideals that inexorably lead straight to Hell on Earth. As W noted, it is what is always before our eyes that is the hardest to see. We live in the world of conscious deliberative linguistic System 2, but it is unconscious, automatic reflexive System 1 that rules. This is the source of the universal blindness described by Searle’s The Phenomenological Illusion (TPI), Pinker’s Blank Slate and Tooby and Cosmides’ Standard Social Science Model. The astute may wonder why we cannot see System 1 at work, but it is clearly counterproductive for an animal to be thinking about or second guessing every action, and in any case, there is no time for the slow, massively integrated System 2 to be involved in the constant stream of split second ‘decisions’ we must make. As W noted, our ‘thoughts’ (T1 or the ‘thoughts’ of System 1) must lead directly to actions. iii It is my contention that the table of intentionality (rationality, mind, thought, language, personality etc.) that features prominently here describes more or less accurately, or at least serves as an heuristic for, how we think and behave, and so it encompasses not merely philosophy and psychology, but everything else (history, literature, mathematics, politics etc.). Note especially that intentionality and rationality as I (along with Searle, Wittgenstein and others) view it, includes both conscious deliberative System 2 and unconscious automated System 1 actions or reflexes. Thus, all the articles, like all behavior, are intimately connected if one knows how to look at them. As I note, The Phenomenological Illusion (oblivion to our automated System 1) is universal and extends not merely throughout philosophy but throughout life. I am sure that Chomsky, Obama, Zuckerberg and the Pope would be incredulous if told that they suffer from the same problem as Hegel, Husserl and Heidegger, (or that that they differ only in degree from drug and sex addicts in being motivated by stimulation of their frontal cortices by the delivery of dopamine (and over 100 other chemicals) via the ventral tegmentum and the nucleus accumbens), but it’s clearly true. While the phenomenologists only wasted a lot of people’s time, they are wasting the earth and their descendant’s futures. Many of the articles describe the ‘digital delusions’, which confuse the language games of System 2 with the automatisms of System 1, and so cannot distinguish biological machines (i.e., people) from other kinds of machines (i.e., computers). The ‘reductionist’ claim is that one can ‘explain’ behavior at a ‘lower’ level, but what actually happens is that one does not explain human behavior but a ‘stand in’ for it. Hence the title of Searle’s classic review of Dennett’s book (“Consciousness Explained”)— “Consciousness Explained Away”. In most contexts ‘reduction’ of higher level emergent behavior to brain functions, biochemistry, or physics is incoherent. Also for ‘reduction’ of chemistry or physics, the path is blocked by chaos and uncertainty. Anything can be ‘represented’ by equations, but when they ‘represent’ higher order behavior, it is not clear (and cannot be made clear) what the ‘results’ mean. Reductionist metaphysics is a joke, but most scientists and philosophers lack the appropriate sense of humor. Other digital delusions are that we will be saved from the pure evil (selfishness) of System 1 by computers/AI/robotics/ nanotech/genetic engineering created by System 2. The No Free Lunch principal tells us there will be serious and possibly fatal consequences. The adventurous may regard this principle as a higher order emergent expression of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Hi-tech enthusiasts hugely underestimate the problems iv resulting from unrestrained motherhood, and of course it is neither profitable nor politically correct (and now with third world supremacism dominant, not even possible) to be honest about it. The last section describes various versions of the ‘altruism delusion’ that we are selected for cooperation, and that the euphonious ideals of Democracy, Diversity and Equality will lead us into utopia, if we just manage things correctly (the possibility of politics). Again, the No Free Lunch Principle ought to warn us it cannot be true, and we see throughout history and all over the contemporary world, that without strict controls, selfishness and stupidity gain the upper hand and soon destroy any nation that embraces it. In addition, the monkey mind steeply discounts the future, and so we cooperate in selling our descendant’s heritage for temporary comforts, greatly exacerbating the problems. I describe versions of this delusion (i.e., that we are basically ‘friendly’ if just given a chance) as it appears in some recent books on sociology/biology/economics. I end with an essay on the great tragedy playing out in America and the world, which can be seen as a direct result of our evolved psychology manifested as the inexorable machinations of System 1. Our psychology, eminently adaptive and eugenic on the plains of Africa from ca. 6 million years ago, when we split from chimpanzees, to ca. 50,000 years ago, when many of our ancestors left Africa (i.e., in the EEA or Environment of Evolutionary Adaptation), is now maladaptive and dysgenic and the source of our Suicidal Utopian Delusions. So, like all discussions of behavior (philosophy, psychology, sociology, biology, anthropology, politics, law, literature, history, economics, soccer strategies, business meetings, etc.), this book is about evolutionary strategies, selfish genes and inclusive fitness (kin selection). Many accept the delusion that we are selected for cooperation with people generally (group selection or altruism) and not just our immediate relatives (kin selection or inclusive fitness), so I spend some time in the essays of the last section demolishing this fantasy. One thing rarely mentioned by the group selectionists is the fact that, even were ‘group selection’ possible, selfishness is at least as likely (probably far more likely in most contexts) to be group selected for as altruism. Just try to find examples of true altruism in nature –the fact that we can’t (which we know is not possible if we understand evolution) tells us that its apparent presence in humans is an artefact of modern life concealing the facts, and that it can no more be selected for than the tendency to suicide (which in fact it is). One does not really need science or mathematics to grasp this – it is crushingly obvious that an v organism cannot be selected for behavior that decreases the frequency of its own genes in the next generation. One might also benefit from considering a phenomenon never (in my experience) mentioned by group selectionists -- cancer. No group has as much in common as the (originally) genetically identical cells in our own bodies-a 100 trillion cell clone-- but we are all born with thousands and perhaps millions of cells that have already taken the first step on the path to cancer and generate millions to billions of cancer cells in our life. If we did not die of other things first, we (and perhaps all multicellular organisms) would all die of cancer. Only a massive and hugely complex mechanism built into our genome that represses or derepresses trillions of genes in trillions of cells, and kills and creates billions of cells a second, keeps the majority of us alive long enough to reproduce. One might take this to imply that a just, democratic and enduring society for any kind of entity on any planet in any universe is only a dream, and that no being or power could make it otherwise. It is not only ‘the laws’ of physics that are universal and inescapable, or perhaps we should say that inclusive fitness is a law of physics. The great mystic Osho said that the separation of God and Heaven from Earth and Humankind was the most evil idea that ever entered the Human mind. In the 20th century an even more evil notion arose—that humans are born with rights, rather than having to earn privileges. Thus, every day the population increases by 200,000, who must be provided with resources to grow and space to live, and who soon produce another 200,000 etc. And one almost never hears it noted that what they receive must be taken from those already alive. Their lives diminish those already here in both major obvious and countless subtle ways. Every new baby destroys the earth from the moment of conception. There cannot be human rights without human wrongs. It cannot be more obvious, but one will never see the streets full of protesters against motherhood. America and the world are in the process of collapse from excessive population growth, most of it for the last century and now all of it due to 3rd world people. Consumption of resources and the addition of 4 billion more ca. 2100 will collapse industrial civilization and bring about starvation, disease, violence and war on a staggering scale. The earth loses about 2% of it’s topsoil every year, so as it nears 2100, most of it’s food growing capacity will be gone. Billions will die and nuclear war is all but certain. In America, this is being hugely accelerated by massive immigration and immigrant reproduction, combined with abuses made possible by democracy. Depraved human nature inexorably turns the dream of democracy and diversity into a vi nightmare of crime and poverty. China will continue to overwhelm America and the world, as long as it maintains the dictatorship which limits selfishness. The root cause of collapse is the inability of our innate psychology to adapt to the modern world, which leads people to treat unrelated persons as though they had common interests. This, plus ignorance of basic biology and psychology, leads to the social engineering delusions of the partially educated who control democratic societies. Few understand that if you help one person you harm someone else—there is no free lunch and every single item anyone consumes destroys the earth beyond repair. Consequently, social policies everywhere are unsustainable and one by one all societies without stringent controls on selfishness will collapse into anarchy or dictatorship. Without dramatic and immediate changes, there is no hope for preventing the collapse of America, or any country that follows a democratic system. The popular notions supported by the Democratic Party and Third World Supremacists are that Democracy, Diversity, Equality and Social Justice will produce a Utopia in America and the world, but it is clear as crystal that they unavoidably foster selfishness and divisiveness and are producing collapse. Hence my concluding essay “Suicide by Democracy”. The most basic facts, almost never mentioned, are that there are not enough resources in America or the world to lift a significant percentage of the poor out of poverty and keep them there. Even the attempt to do this is already bankrupting America and destroying the world. The earth’s capacity to produce food decreases daily, as does our genetic quality. And now, as always, by far the greatest enemy of the poor is other poor and not the rich. -/- My writings are available as paperbacks and Kindles on Amazon. -/- Talking Monkeys: Philosophy, Psychology, Science, Religion and Politics on a Doomed Planet - Articles and Reviews 2006-2017 (2017) ASIN B071HVC7YP. -/- The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle--Articles and Reviews 2006-2016 (2017) ASIN B071P1RP1B. -/- Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st century: Philosophy, Human Nature and the Collapse of Civilization - Articles and Reviews 2006-2017 (2017) 2nd printing with corrections (Feb 2018) ASIN B0711R5LGX -/- Suicide by Democracy: an Obituary for America and the World (2018) ASIN B07CQVWV9C -/- . (shrink)

According to the mental continuity claim (MCC), human mental faculties are physical and beneficial to human survival, so they must have evolved gradually from ancestral forms and we should expect to see their precursors across species. Materialism of mind coupled with Darwin’s evolutionary theory leads directly to such claims and even today arguments for animal mental properties are often presented with the MCC as a premise. However, the MCC has been often challenged among contemporary scholars. It is usually argued (...) that only humans use language and that language as such has no precursors in the animal kingdom. Moreover, language is quite often understood as a necessary tool for having representations and forming beliefs. As a consequence, by lacking language animals could not have developed representational systems or beliefs. In response to these worries, we aim to mount a limited defense of the MCC as an empirical hypothesis. First, we will provide a short historical overview of the origins of the MCC and examine some of the motives behind traditional arguments for and against it. Second, we will focus on one particular question, namely whether language as such is necessary for having beliefs. Our goal is to show that there is little reason to think language is necessary for belief. In doing so, we will challenge a view of belief that is widely accepted by those working in animal cognition, namely representational belief, and we will argue that if belief is non-representational, then different research questions and methods are required. We will conclude with an argument that to study the evolution of belief across species, it is essential to begin the study of subjects in their social and ecological environment rather than in contexts that are not ecologically valid along the social and ecological dimensions. Thus, rather than serving as a premise in an argument 3 in favor of animal minds, the MCC can only be defended by empirical investigation, but importantly, empirical investigation of the right sort.. (shrink)

In “Flourish,” Martin Seligman maintained that the elements of well-being consist of “PERMA: positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment.” Although the question of what constitutes human flourishing or psychological well-being has remained a topic of continued debate among scholars, it has recently been argued in the literature that a paradigmatic or prototypical case of human psychological well-being would largely manifest most or all of the aforementioned PERMA factors. Further, in “A Neuroscientific Perspective on Music Therapy,” Stefan Koelsch (...) also suggested that “Music therapy can have effects that improve the psychological and physiological health of individuals,” so it seems plausible that engaging in practices of music can positively contribute to one living a more optimally flourishing life with greater psychological well-being. However, recent studies on music practice and participation have not yet been reviewed and integrated under the PERMA framework from positive psychology to further explore and explicate this possibility. This article therefore contributes to extant work by reviewing recent research on psychological well-being and music to offer support for the claim that music practice and participation can positively contribute to one living a flourishing life by positively influencing their emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment. (shrink)

The concept of empiricism evokes both a historical tradition and a set of philosophical theses. The theses are usually understood to have been developed by Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. But these figures did not use the term “empiricism,” and they did not see themselves as united by a shared epistemology into one school of thought. My dissertation analyzes the debate that elevated the concept of empiricism (and of an empiricist tradition) to prominence in English-language philosophy. -/- In the 1870s and (...) ’80s a lively debate about psychology emerged. Neo-Kantian idealists criticized the very idea that the mind can be studied scientifically. A group of philosopher-psychologists responded, often in Mind. They were among the first to call themselves “empiricists,” arguing that psychology could provide a scientific basis for philosophical progress. Idealists held that empirical psychology depended on premises developed by Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. These premises were allegedly absurd because they rendered ideas of extension, as well as other ideas crucial to natural science, unreal. Those who wanted to advance psychology towards becoming a legitimate science were forced to engage these philosophical attacks, while at the same time to develop empirical theories that could successfully explain some characteristics of experience. I show how James’s theory of space perception accomplished both tasks. -/- In developing this theory, James found he had to reject the Lockean notion that reality is associated with passively-registered sensations. James also abandoned Berkeley and Hume’s claim that ideas are ultimately derived from atomic sensations. Instead, James presented experimental evidence that sensation is a continuous stream. The mind must actively parse this stream if it is to gain a coherent representation of its environment. I argue that James’s stream-of-thought thesis served as a presupposition of his entire psychology. The thesis showed how the labor of investigating the mind could be divided between philosophers and scientists, and in a manner sensitive to the concerns of both. The stream thesis also provided a scientific basis for a new philosophical empiricism that, I argue, has a hidden legacy in the history of analytic philosophy. (shrink)

The nature of human mind is a key subject for philosophy and for psychology. It is agreed that many of its characteristics and performances have been built during the last 7 million years of our primate evolution. That period began with what is called the pan-homo split, the divergence in primate evolution from the Last Common Ancestor (LCAncestor) we share with chimpanzees. The mental specificities that differentiate us from our chimpanzee cousins have been built up during that time. As consequence, (...) philosophical and psychological investigations relative to the nature of human mind should analyze that period. But this has been done only in a limited way so far. On part because the recent discipline of Evolutionary Psychology covers only a limited segment of that period and also because Husserl, the founding father of Phenomenology, took the position to not address a possible evolutionary nature of human mind (the “proscription of anthropology in Phenomenology”) [1]. We would like here to recall these limitations and introduce possible openings (this is a continuation of an already presented approach [18] [4]). Evolutionary Psychology is interested in the life and social habits of our hunter-gatherer ancestors in order to highlight mental states that were pertinent for them but do not fit with our today lives. The pre-human period considered by Evolutionary Psychology is the Pleistocene which began 2.5 million years ago. At about that time our homo-habilis ancestors were already significantly more evolved and more performant than the LCAncestor we share with chimpanzees (larger brain size, fabrication of stone tools, hands capable of precision grip, …). This means that at the beginning of the Pleistocene our ancestors were already well advanced in their evolution toward today humans. This shows that the build up of our human characteristics and specificities began before the Pleistocene, and neglecting the pre-Pleistocene time puts at risk of missing some root causes of our human specificities. This brings to consider that Evolutionary Psychology should take into account the pre-human period beginning at the pan-homo split, not only at the Pleistocene. Regarding philosophy, the proscription of anthropology in Phenomenology is currently challenged with some interest in Evolutionary Psychology [9] [8]. To avoid the risk of limiting human evolution to Pleistocene Phenomenology should explicitly plan to use anthropology on the whole evolutionary period beginning at pan-homo split. In such a perspective some help could come from an existing evolutionary scenario starting at pan-homo split and introducing a nature of self-consciousness associated to anxiety management [4]. The scenario introduces an Evolutionary Engine based on primate intersubjectivity which could have led our ancestors to build a representation of their own entity, thus leading to a natural build up of self-consciousness. Part of the scenario is also about identifications with suffering conspecifics which may have been the source of a huge anxiety, not taken into account so far and leading to an Evolutionary Anxiety intertwined with the nature of self-consciousness. It is shown that a synergy between the evolution of self-consciousness and anxiety management happened before Pleistocene, making pre-Pleistocene a key period for understanding the nature of our human minds. Overall, the scenario proposes a rationale for the pan-homo split, a tentative explanation of the divergence in pre-human primate evolution. It is also recalled that the concept of Evolutionary Anxiety makes available an entry point to the nature of human evil [14]. We present the above points and use the proposed evolutionary scenario for a reading of human evolution from last common ancestor to today humas. Continuations are introduced. (shrink)