Results for 'realizations of functions'

946 found
Order:
  1. The Multiple Realizability of Biological Individuals.Ellen Clarke - 2013 - Journal of Philosophy 110 (8):413-435.
    Biological theory demands a clear organism concept, but at present biologists cannot agree on one. They know that counting particular units, and not counting others, allows them to generate explanatory and predictive descriptions of evolutionary processes. Yet they lack a unified theory telling them which units to count. In this paper, I offer a novel account of biological individuality, which reconciles conflicting definitions of ‘organism’ by interpreting them as describing alternative realisers of a common functional role, and then defines individual (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   62 citations  
  2. Functional Anatomy: A Taxonomic Proposal.Ingvar Johansson, Barry Smith, Katherine Dormandy [nee Munn], Kathleen Elsner, Nikoloz Tsikolia & DIrk Siebert - 2005 - Acta Biotheoretica 53 (3):153-166.
    It is argued that medical science requires a classificatory system that (a) puts functions in the taxonomic center and (b) does justice ontologically to the difference between the processes which are the realizations of functions and the objects which are their bearers. We propose formulae for constructing such a system and describe some of its benefits. The arguments are general enough to be of interest to all the life sciences.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   7 citations  
  3. Against the Necessity of Functional Roles for Conscious Experience: Reviving and Revising a Neglected Argument.Gary Bartlett - 2014 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 21 (1-2):33-53.
    While the claim that certain functional states are sufficient for conscious experience has received substantial critical attention, the claim that functional states are necessary is rarely addressed. Yet the latter claim is perhaps now more common than the former. I aim to revive and revise a neglected argument against the necessity claim, by Michael Antony. The argument involves manipulating a conscious subject's brain so as to cancel a disposition which is supposedly crucial to the realization of an experience that the (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   3 citations  
  4. A Plea for the Plurality of Function.Tony Cheng - 2016 - Review of Contemporary Philosophy 15:70-81.
    In this paper I defend a pluralistic approach in understanding function, both in biological and other contexts. Talks about function are ubiquitous and crucial in biology, and it might be the key to bridge the “manifest image” and the “scientific image” identified by Sellars (1962). However, analysis of function has proven to be extremely difficult. The major puzzle is to make sense of “time-reversed causality”: how can property P be the cause of its realizer R? For example, “pumping blood” is (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  5. Functional anatomy: A taxonomic proposal.Ingvar Johansson, Barry Smith, Katherine Munn, Nikoloz Tsikolia, Kathleen Elsner, Dominikus Ernst & Dirk Siebert - 2005 - Acta Biotheoretica 53 (3):153-166.
    It is argued that medical science requires a classificatory system that (a) puts functions in the taxonomic center and (b) does justice ontologically to the difference between the processes which are the realizations of functions and the objects which are their bearers. We propose formulae for constructing such a system and describe some of its benefits. The arguments are general enough to be of interest to all the life sciences.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   9 citations  
  6. Computation and Multiple Realizability.Marcin Miłkowski - 2016 - In Vincent C. Müller (ed.), Fundamental Issues of Artificial Intelligence. Cham: Springer. pp. 29-41.
    Multiple realizability (MR) is traditionally conceived of as the feature of computational systems, and has been used to argue for irreducibility of higher-level theories. I will show that there are several ways a computational system may be seen to display MR. These ways correspond to (at least) five ways one can conceive of the function of the physical computational system. However, they do not match common intuitions about MR. I show that MR is deeply interest-related, and for this reason, difficult (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  7. Who's afraid of multiple realizability?: Functionalism, reductionism, and connectionism.Justin Schwartz - 1992 - In John Dinsmore (ed.), The Symbolic and Connectionist Paradigms: Closing the Gap. Lawrence Erlbaum.
    Philosophers have argued that on the prevailing theory of mind, functionalism, the fact that mental states are multiply realizable or can be instantiated in a variety of different physical forms, at least in principle, shows that materialism or physical is probably false. A similar argument rejects the relevance to psychology of connectionism, which holds that mental states are embodied and and constituted by connectionist neural networks. These arguments, I argue, fall before reductios ad absurdam, proving too much -- they apply (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  8. Function, role and disposition in Basic Formal Ontology.Robert Arp & Barry Smith - 2008 - Proceedings of Bio-Ontologies Workshop, Intelligent Systems for Molecular Biology (ISMB), Toronto.
    Numerous research groups are now utilizing Basic Formal Ontology as an upper-level framework to assist in the organization and integration of biomedical information. This paper provides elucidation of the three existing BFO subcategories of realizable entity, namely function, role, and disposition. It proposes one further sub-category of tendency, and considers the merits of recognizing two sub-categories of function for domain ontologies, namely, artifactual and biological function. The motivation is to help advance the coherent ontological treatment of functions, roles, and (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   22 citations  
  9. Against functional reductionism in cognitive science.Muhammad Ali Khalidi - 2005 - International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 19 (3):319 – 333.
    Functional reductionism concerning mental properties has recently been advocated by Jaegwon Kim in order to solve the problem of the 'causal exclusion' of the mental. Adopting a reductionist strategy first proposed by David Lewis, he regards psychological properties as being 'higher-order' properties functionally defined over 'lower-order' properties, which are causally efficacious. Though functional reductionism is compatible with the multiple realizability of psychological properties, it is blocked if psychological properties are subdivided or crosscut by neurophysiological properties. I argue that there is (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   8 citations  
  10. The Revenge of Moral Twin Earth.Alexios Stamatiadis-Bréhier - 2023 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy:1-17.
    In this paper I revisit an important response to the Moral Twin Earth (MTE) challenge: The Common Functional Role strategy (CFR). I argue that CFR is open to a revenge problem. MTE-cases allegedly show that two linguistic communities can be in genuine disagreement even when they are regulated by distinct families of properties. CFR provides a way to reconcile the intuition that the two communities are in genuine disagreement with the claim that the use of moral terms by both communities (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  11. Numerical point of view on Calculus for functions assuming finite, infinite, and infinitesimal values over finite, infinite, and infinitesimal domains.Yaroslav Sergeyev - 2009 - Nonlinear Analysis Series A 71 (12):e1688-e1707.
    The goal of this paper consists of developing a new (more physical and numerical in comparison with standard and non-standard analysis approaches) point of view on Calculus with functions assuming infinite and infinitesimal values. It uses recently introduced infinite and infinitesimal numbers being in accordance with the principle ‘The part is less than the whole’ observed in the physical world around us. These numbers have a strong practical advantage with respect to traditional approaches: they are representable at a new (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   5 citations  
  12. Memory consolidation, multiple realizations, and modest reductions.Jacqueline Anne Sullivan - 2008 - Philosophy of Science 75 (5):501-513.
    This article investigates several consequences of a recent trend in philosophy of mind to shift the relata of realization from mental state–physical state to function‐mechanism. It is shown, by applying both frameworks to the neuroscientific case study of memory consolidation, that, although this shift can be used to avoid the immediate antireductionist consequences of the traditional argument from multiple realizability, what is gained is a far more modest form of reductionism than recent philosophical accounts have intimated and neuroscientists themselves have (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   6 citations  
  13. On the functionalization of pluralist approaches to truth.Cory Wright - 2005 - Synthese 145 (1):1–28.
    Traditional inflationary approaches that specify the nature of truth are attractive in certain ways; yet, while many of these theories successfully explain why propositions in certain domains of discourse are true, they fail to adequately specify the nature of truth because they run up against counterexamples when attempting to generalize across all domains. One popular consequence is skepticism about the efficaciousness of inflationary approaches altogether. Yet, by recognizing that the failure to explain the truth of disparate propositions often stems from (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   22 citations  
  14. (1 other version)The metaphysics of cognitive artifacts.Richard Heersmink - 2016 - Philosophical Explorations 19 (1):78-93.
    This article looks at some of the metaphysical properties of cognitive artefacts. It first identifies and demarcates the target domain by conceptualizing this class of artefacts as a functional kind. Building on the work of Beth Preston, a pluralist notion of functional kind is developed, one that includes artefacts with proper functions and system functions. Those with proper functions have a history of cultural selection, whereas those with system functions are improvised uses of initially non-cognitive artefacts. (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   24 citations  
  15.  51
    On Functionalism's Context-Dependent Explanations of Mental States.Hong Joo Ryoo - manuscript
    This paper integrates type functionalism with the Kairetic account to develop context-specific models for explaining mental states, particularly pain, across different species and systems. By employing context-dependent mapping f_c, we ensure cohesive causal explanations while accommodating multiple realizations of mental states. The framework identifies context subsets C_i and maps them to similarity subspaces S_i, capturing the unique physiological, biochemical, and computational mechanisms underlying pain in different entities such as humans, octopi, and AI systems. This approach highlights the importance of (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  16. Functionalism and the Metaphysics of Causal Exclusion.David Yates - 2012 - Philosophers' Imprint 12:1-25.
    Given their physical realization, what causal work is left for functional properties to do? Humean solutions to the exclusion problem (e.g. overdetermination and difference-making) typically appeal to counterfactual and/or nomic relations between functional property-instances and behavioural effects, tacitly assuming that such relations suffice for causal work. Clarification of the notion of causal work, I argue, shows not only that such solutions don't work, but also reveals a novel solution to the exclusion problem based on the relations between dispositional properties at (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   7 citations  
  17. Prospectus to a Homotopic Metatheory of Language.Eric Schmid - forthcoming - Chicago: Edition Erich Schmid.
    Due to the wide scope of (in particular linear) homotopy type theory (using quantum natural language processing), a metatheory can be applied not just to theorizing the metatheory of scientific progress, but ordinary language or any public language defined by sociality/social agents as the precondition for the realizability of (general) intelligence via an inferential network from which judgement can be made. How this metatheory of science generalizes to public language is through the recent advances of quantum natural language processing, but (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  18. Kant’s World Concept of Philosophy and Cosmopolitanism.Courtney Fugate - 2019 - Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 101 (4):535-583.
    The goal of this paper is to better understand Kant’s conception of philosophy as a “world concept”, which is at the heart of the Architectonic of Pure Reason. This is pursued in two major parts. The first evaluates the textual foundation for reading Kant’s world concept of philosophy as cosmopolitanism and concludes that he most probably never himself equated philosophy as a world concept with any form of cosmopolitanism. The second major part of the paper clarifies this concept of philosophy (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   4 citations  
  19. Discourseology of Linguistic Consciousness: Neural Network Modeling of Some Structural and Semantic Relationships.Vitalii Shymko - 2021 - Psycholinguistics 29 (1):193-207.
    Objective. Study of the validity and reliability of the discourse approach for the psycholinguistic understanding of the nature, structure, and features of the linguistic consciousness functioning. -/- Materials & Methods. This paper analyzes artificial neural network models built on the corpus of texts, which were obtained in the process of experimental research of the coronavirus quarantine concept as a new category of linguistic consciousness. The methodology of feedforward artificial neural networks (multilayer perceptron) was used in order to assess the possibility (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  20. Neural Synchrony and the Causal Efficacy of Consciousness.David Yates - 2020 - Topoi 39 (5):1057-1072.
    The purpose of this paper is to address a well-known dilemma for physicalism. If mental properties are type identical to physical properties, then their causal efficacy is secure, but at the cost of ruling out mentality in creatures very different to ourselves. On the other hand, if mental properties are multiply realizable, then all kinds of creatures can instantiate them, but then they seem to be causally redundant. The causal exclusion problem depends on the widely held principle that realized properties (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   7 citations  
  21. Conscious Action/Zombie Action.Joshua Shepherd - 2016 - Noûs 50 (2):419-444.
    I argue that the neural realizers of experiences of trying are not distinct from the neural realizers of actual trying . I then ask how experiences of trying might relate to the perceptual experiences one has while acting. First, I assess recent zombie action arguments regarding conscious visual experience, and I argue that contrary to what some have claimed, conscious visual experience plays a causal role for action control in some circumstances. Second, I propose a multimodal account of the experience (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   28 citations  
  22. Space as a Semantic Unit of a Language Consciousness.Vitalii Shymko & Anzhela Babadzhanova - 2020 - Psycholinguistics 27 (1):335-350.
    Objective. Conceptualization of the definition of space as a semantic unit of language consciousness. -/- Materials & Methods. A structural-ontological approach is used in the work, the methodology of which has been tested and applied in order to analyze the subject matter area of psychology, psycholinguistics and other social sciences, as well as in interdisciplinary studies of complex systems. Mathematical representations of space as a set of parallel series of events (Alexandrov) were used as the initial theoretical basis of the (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  23. A Unified Explanation of Quantum Phenomena? The Case for the Peer‐to‐Peer Simulation Hypothesis as an Interdisciplinary Research Program.Marcus Arvan - 2014 - Philosophical Forum 45 (4):433-446.
    In my 2013 article, “A New Theory of Free Will”, I argued that several serious hypotheses in philosophy and modern physics jointly entail that our reality is structurally identical to a peer-to-peer (P2P) networked computer simulation. The present paper outlines how quantum phenomena emerge naturally from the computational structure of a P2P simulation. §1 explains the P2P Hypothesis. §2 then sketches how the structure of any P2P simulation realizes quantum superposition and wave-function collapse (§2.1.), quantum indeterminacy (§2.2.), wave-particle duality (§2.3.), (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   6 citations  
  24. Active Content Externalism.Holger Lyre - 2016 - Review of Philosophy and Psychology 7 (1):17-33.
    The aim of this paper is to scrutinize active externalism and its repercussions for externalism about mental content. I start from the claim that active externalism is a version of content externalism that follows from the extended cognition thesis as a thesis about cognitive vehicles. Various features of active content externalism are explored by comparison with the known forms of passive externalism – in particular with respect to the multiple realizability of the relevant external content-determining components and with respect to (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   7 citations  
  25.  46
    AISC 18 Proceedings, Extended Abstract: The computational modeling of lexical competence.Fabrizio Calzavarini & Antonio Lieto - 2018 - In Jacques Fleuriot, Dongming Wang & Jacques Calmet (eds.), Artificial Intelligence and Symbolic Computation: 13th International Conference, AISC 2018, Suzhou, China, September 16–19, 2018, Proceedings. Springer. pp. 20-22.
    In philosophy of language, a distinction has been proposed between two aspects of lexical competence, i.e. referential and inferential competence (Marconi 1997). The former accounts for the relationship of words to the world, the latter for the relationship of words among themselves. The distinction may simply be a classification of patterns of behaviour involved in ordinary use of the lexicon. Recent research in neuropsychology and neuroscience, however, suggests that the distinction might be neurally implemented, i.e., that different cognitive architectures with (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  26. Swahili conditional constructions in embodied Frames of Reference: Modeling semantics, pragmatics, and context-sensitivity in UML mental spaces.Roderick Fish - 2020 - Dissertation, Trinity Western University
    Studies of several languages, including Swahili [swa], suggest that realis (actual, realizable) and irrealis (unlikely, counterfactual) meanings vary along a scale (e.g., 0.0–1.0). T-values (True, False) and P-values (probability) account for this pattern. However, logic cannot describe or explain (a) epistemic stances toward beliefs, (b) deontic and dynamic stances toward states-of-being and actions, and (c) context-sensitivity in conditional interpretations. (a)–(b) are deictic properties (positions, distance) of ‘embodied’ Frames of Reference (FoRs)—space-time loci in which agents perceive and from which they contextually (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  27. Attention Is Amplification, Not Selection.Peter Fazekas & Bence Nanay - 2021 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 72 (1):299-324.
    We argue that recent empirical findings and theoretical models shed new light on the nature of attention. According to the resulting amplification view, attentional phenomena can be unified at the neural level as the consequence of the amplification of certain input signals of attention-independent perceptual computations. This way of identifying the core realizer of attention evades standard criticisms often raised against sub-personal accounts of attention. Moreover, this approach also reframes our thinking about the function of attention by shifting the focus (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   11 citations  
  28. Mapping dehumanization studies (Preface and Introduction of Routledge Handbook of Dehumanization).Maria Kronfeldner - 2021 - In Routledge Handbook of Dehumanization. London, New York: Routledge.
    Maria Kronfeldner’s Preface and Introduction to the Routledge Handbook of Dehumanization maps the landscape of dehumanization studies. She starts with a brief portrayal of the history of the field. The systematically minded sections that follow guide the reader through the resulting rugged landscape represented in the Handbook’s contributions. Different realizations, levels, forms, and ontological contrasts of dehumanization are distinguished, followed by remarks on the variety of targets of dehumanization. A discussion on valence and emotional aspects is added. Causes, (...), and consequences of dehumanization, and the prospects for reducing or undoing it, are introduced. The systematic overview closes with a discussion of some important theoretical complexities that arise in studying dehumanization. After these systematic sections, the scholarly work on dehumanization gets situated in the broader intellectual landscape of debates about the ‘human’ in the humanities and social sciences. The Introduction ends with some notes on scope, limitations, and intended readership of the Handbook. (shrink)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  29. The Realization of Qualia, Persons, and Artifacts.Ben White - 2017 - Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 99 (S1):182-204.
    This article argues that standard causal and functionalist definitions of realization fail to account for the realization of entities that cannot be individuated in causal or functional terms. By modifying such definitions to require that realizers also logically suffice for any historical properties of the entities they realize, one can provide for the realization of entities whose resistance to causal/functional individuation stems from their possession of individuative historical properties. But if qualia cannot be causally or functionally individuated, then qualia can (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  30. Mad Speculation and Absolute Inhumanism: Lovecraft, Ligotti, and the Weirding of Philosophy.Ben Woodard - 2011 - Continent 1 (1):3-13.
    continent. 1.1 : 3-13. / 0/ – Introduction I want to propose, as a trajectory into the philosophically weird, an absurd theoretical claim and pursue it, or perhaps more accurately, construct it as I point to it, collecting the ground work behind me like the Perpetual Train from China Mieville's Iron Council which puts down track as it moves reclaiming it along the way. The strange trajectory is the following: Kant's critical philosophy and much of continental philosophy which has followed, (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   4 citations  
  31. Features necessary for a self-conscious robot in the light of “Consciousness Explained” by Daniel Dennett.Jakub Grad - manuscript
    Self-consciousness relates to important themes, such as sentience and personhood, and is often the cornerstone of moral theories (Warren, 1997). However, not much attention is given to future moral creatures of the earth: robots. This may be due to the unsettled status of their experience, which is why I have chosen to find the necessary features of self-consciousness in them. Philosophy of mind is also my interest which I have developed since I rejected the idea of souls and could not (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  32. Geometry for a Brain. Optimal Control in a Network of Adaptive Memristors.Ignazio Licata & Germano Resconi - 2013 - Adv. Studies Theor. Phys., (no.10):479-513.
    In the brain the relations between free neurons and the conditioned ones establish the constraints for the informational neural processes. These constraints reflect the systemenvironment state, i.e. the dynamics of homeocognitive activities. The constraints allow us to define the cost function in the phase space of free neurons so as to trace the trajectories of the possible configurations at minimal cost while respecting the constraints imposed. Since the space of the free states is a manifold or a non orthogonal space, (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  33. Synthetic fictions: turning imagined biological systems into concrete ones.Tarja Knuuttila & Rami Koskinen - 2020 - Synthese 198 (9):8233-8250.
    The recent discussion of fictional models has focused on imagination, implicitly considering fictions as something nonconcrete. We present two cases from synthetic biology that can be viewed as concrete fictions. Both minimal cells and alternative genetic systems are modal in nature: they, as well as their abstract cousins, can be used to study unactualized possibilia. We approach these synthetic constructs through Vaihinger’s notion of a semi-fiction and Goodman’s notion of semifactuality. Our study highlights the relative existence of such concrete fictions. (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   7 citations  
  34. The Organizational Account of Function is an Etiological Account of Function.Marc Artiga & Manolo Martínez - 2015 - Acta Biotheoretica 64 (2):105-117.
    The debate on the notion of function has been historically dominated by dispositional and etiological accounts, but recently a third contender has gained prominence: the organizational account. This original theory of function is intended to offer an alternative account based on the notion of self-maintaining system. However, there is a set of cases where organizational accounts seem to generate counterintuitive results. These cases involve cross-generational traits, that is, traits that do not contribute in any relevant way to the self-maintenance of (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   18 citations  
  35. A Modal Theory of Function.Bence Nanay - 2010 - Journal of Philosophy 107 (8):412-431.
    The function of a trait token is usually defined in terms of some properties of other (past, present, future) tokens of the same trait type. I argue that this strategy is problematic, as trait types are (at least partly) individuated by their functional properties, which would lead to circularity. In order to avoid this problem, I suggest a way to define the function of a trait token in terms of the properties of the very same trait token. To able to (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   56 citations  
  36. Re-organizing organizational accounts of function.Marc Artiga - 2011 - Applied ontology 6 (2):105-124.
    In this paper I discuss a recent theory on functions called Organizational Account. This theory seeks to provide a new definition of function that overcomes the distinction between etiological and dispositional accounts and that could be used in biology as well as in technology. I present a definition of function that I think captures the intuitions of Organizational Accounts and consider several objections.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   12 citations  
  37. Two Forms of Functional Reductionism in Physics.Lorenzo Lorenzetti - 2024 - Synthese 203 (2).
    Functional reductionism characterises inter-theoretic reduction as the recovery of the upper-level behaviour described by the reduced theory in terms of the lower-level reducing theory. For instance, finding a statistical mechanical realiser that plays the functional role of thermodynamic entropy allows for establishing a reductive link between thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. This view constitutes a unique approach to reduction that enjoys a number of positive features, but has received limited attention in the philosophy of science. -/- This paper aims to clarify (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  38. There Are No Ahistorical Theories of Function.Justin Garson - 2019 - Philosophy of Science 86 (5):1146-1156.
    Theories of function are conventionally divided up into historical and ahistorical ones. Proponents of ahistorical theories often cite the ahistoricity of their accounts as a major virtue. Here, I argue that none of the mainstream “ahistorical” accounts are actually ahistorical. All of them embed, implicitly or explicitly, an appeal to history. In Boorse’s goal-contribution account, history is latent in the idea of statistical-typicality. In the propensity theory, history is implicit in the idea of a species’ natural habitat. In the causal (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   18 citations  
  39. Proper Functionalism and the Organizational Theory of Functions.Peter J. Graham - 2023 - In Luis R. G. Oliveira (ed.), Externalism about Knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 249-276.
    Proper functionalism explicates epistemic warrant in terms of the function and normal functioning of the belief-forming process. There are two standard substantive views of the sources of functions in the literature in epistemology: God (intelligent design) or Mother Nature (evolution by natural selection). Both appear to confront the Swampman objection: couldn’t there be a mind with warranted beliefs neither designed by God nor the product of evolution by natural selection? Is there another substantive view that avoids the Swampman objection? (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  40. The Policy of Functional Integration of the Product Planning Team as a Strategy for the Development of the Pharmaceutical Industry in Palestine.Samer M. Arqawi, Amal A. Al Hila, Samy S. Abu-Naser & Mazen J. Al Shobaki - 2019 - International Journal of Academic Accounting, Finance and Management Research (IJAAFMR) 3 (1):61-69.
    This study presented the policy of functional integration of the product planning team as a strategy for the development of the pharmaceutical industry in Palestine. The study population consists of all the workers in companies operating in the field of medicine in Palestine, which are (5) companies producing in the West Bank only for pharmaceuticals used by these companies, which are (296) employees, and was used a simple random sample to choose the sample and size (87) employees of the study (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  41. The iterative conception of function and the iterative conception of set.Tim Button - 2023 - In Carolin Antos, Neil Barton & Giorgio Venturi (eds.), The Palgrave Companion to the Philosophy of Set Theory. Palgrave.
    Hilary Putnam once suggested that “the actual existence of sets as ‘intangible objects’ suffers… from a generalization of a problem first pointed out by Paul Benacerraf… are sets a kind of function or are functions a sort of set?” Sadly, he did not elaborate; my aim, here, is to do so on his behalf. There are well-known methods for treating sets as functions and functions as sets. But these do not raise any obvious philosophical or foundational puzzles. (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  42. A Generalized Selected Effects Theory of Function.Justin Garson - 2017 - Philosophy of Science 84 (3):523-543.
    I present and defend the generalized selected effects theory (GSE) of function. According to GSE, the function of a trait consists in the activity that contributed to its bearer’s differential reproduction, or differential retention, within a population. Unlike the traditional selected effects (SE) theory, it does not require that the functional trait helped its bearer reproduce; differential retention is enough. Although the core theory has been presented previously, I go significantly beyond those presentations by providing a new argument for GSE (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   43 citations  
  43. The Modal Theory of Function Is Not about Functions.Marc Artiga - 2014 - Philosophy of Science 81 (4):580-591.
    In a series of papers, Bence Nanay has recently put forward and defended a new theory of function, which he calls the ‘Modal Theory of Function’. In this article, I critically address this theory and argue that it fails to fulfill some key desiderata that a satisfactory theory of function must comply with. As a result, I conclude that, whatever property Nanay’s notion of function refers to, it is not the property having the function that is standardly attributed in science.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   6 citations  
  44. The senses of functions in the logic of sense and denotation.Kevin C. Klement - 2010 - Bulletin of Symbolic Logic 16 (2):153-188.
    This paper discusses certain problems arising within the treatment of the senses of functions in Alonzo Church's Logic of Sense and Denotation. Church understands such senses themselves to be "sense-functions," functions from sense to sense. However, the conditions he lays out under which a sense-function is to be regarded as a sense presenting another function as denotation allow for certain undesirable results given certain unusual or "deviant" sense-functions. Certain absurdities result, e.g., an argument can be found (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   4 citations  
  45. Capabilities.Eric Merrell, David Limbaugh, Peter Koch & Barry Smith - manuscript
    We propose a definition of capability as a class intermediate between function and disposition as the latter are defined in Basic Formal Ontology (BFO). A disposition inheres in a material entity and is realized in a certain kind of process. An example is the disposition of a glass to break when struck, which is realized when it shatters. A function is a disposition which is (simply put) the rationale for the existence of its bearer. To say for example that a (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  46. Populations of Neurons and Rocks? Against a Generalization of the Selected Effects Theory of Functions.Jakob Roloff - 2023 - Kriterion – Journal of Philosophy 37 (2-4):69-87.
    Millikan’s (1984. Language, Thought, and Other Biological Categories: New Foundations for Realism. MIT Press) selected effects theory of functions states that functions are effects for which the ancestors of a trait were selected for. As the function is an effect a thing’s ancestors produced, only things that are reproductions in some sense can have functions. Against this reproduction requirement, Garson (2019. What Biological Functions Are and Why They Matter. Cambridge University Press) argues that not only processes (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  47. Landscapes and Bandits: A Unified Model of Functional and Demographic Diversity.Alice C. W. Huang - forthcoming - Philosophy of Science.
    Two types of formal models - landscape search tasks and two-armed bandit models - are often used to study the effects that various social factors have on epistemic performance. I argue that they can be understood within a single framework. In this unified framework, I develop a model that may be used to understand the effects of functional and demographic diversity and their interaction. Using the unified model, I find that the benefit of demographic diversity is most pronounced in a (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  48. On the ontology of functions.Stefano Borgo, Riichiro Mizoguchi & Barry Smith - 2011 - Applied ontology 6 (2):99-104.
    This special issue of Applied Ontology is devoted to the foundation, the comparison and the application of functional theories in all areas, with particular attention to the biological and engineering domains. It includes theoretical and technical contributions related to the description, characterization, and application of functions.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   4 citations  
  49. Working memory is not a natural kind and cannot explain central cognition.Javier Gomez-Lavin - 2020 - Review of Philosophy and Psychology 12 (2):199-225.
    Working memory is a foundational construct of cognitive psychology, where it is thought to be a capacity that enables us to keep information in mind and to use that information to support goal directed behavior. Philosophers have recently employed working memory to explain central cognitive processes, from consciousness to reasoning. In this paper, I show that working memory cannot meet even a minimal account of natural kindhood, as the functions of maintenance and manipulation of information that tie working memory (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   3 citations  
  50. The Ontology of Processes and Functions: A Study of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health.Anand Kumar & Barry Smith - 2005 - In Barry Smith, Anand Kumar & Thomas Bittner (eds.), Basic Formal Ontology for bioinformatics. IFOMIS Reports.
    The International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health provides a classification of human bodily functions, which, while exhibiting non-conformance to many formal ontological principles, provides an insight into which basic functions such a classification should include. Its evaluation is an important first step towards such an adequate ontology of this domain. Presented at the 13th Annual North American WHO Collaborating Center Conference on the ICF, 2007.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
1 — 50 / 946