Proceeding from a set of conditions that an adequate notion of a non-mathematical function should satisfy, we examine some of the most influential of these notions, including Cummins-functions, to conclude that the teleosemantic notion of a non-mathematical proper function, suggested originally by Ruth Millikan, best satisfies the proposed conditions. In particular, this notion allows us to talk consistently about organisms having some functions while Operating, at the same time, dysfunctionally. In addition, we show that the teleosemantic notion of relational and (...) adaptive proper functions can be applied to singular events being part of developments in evolution and learning processes. We conclude that it is in this framework, rather than on the basis of the so-called theory of memes, that an application of the teleosemantic notion of a proper function to social areas can be seriously considered. (shrink)

Abramsky, S., Domain theory in logical form, Annals of Pure and Applied Logic 51 1–77. The mathematical framework of Stone duality is used to synthesise a number of hitherto separate developments in theoretical computer science.• Domain theory, the mathematical theory of computation introduced by Scott as a foundation for detonational semantics• The theory of concurrency and systems behaviour developed by Milner, Hennesy based on operational semantics.• Logics of programsStone duality provides a junction between semantics and logics . Moreover, the underlying (...) logic is geometric, which can be computationally interpreted as the logic of observable properties—i.e., properties which can be determined to hold of a process on the basis of a finite amount of information about its execution.These ideas lead to the following programme. A metalanguage is introduced, comprising• types = universes of discourse for various computational situations;• terms = PROGRAMS = syntactic intensions for models or points. A standard denotational interpretation of the metalanguage is given, assigning domains to types and domain elements to terms. The metalanguage is also given a logical interpretation, in which types are interpreted as propositional theories and terms are interpreted via a program logic, which axiomatises the properties they satisfy. The two interpretations are related by showing that they are Stone duals of each other. Hence, semantics and logic are guaranteed to be in harmony with each other, and in fact each determines the other up to isomorphism. This opens the way to a whole range of applications. Given a denotational description of a computational situation in our metalanguage, we can turn the handle to obtain a logic for that situation. (shrink)

We use a simple relational framework to develop the key notions and results on hidden variables and non-locality. The extensive literature on these topics in the foundations of quantum mechanics is couched in terms of probabilistic models, and properties such as locality and no-signalling are formulated probabilistically. We show that to a remarkable extent, the main structure of the theory, through the major No-Go theorems and beyond, survives intact under the replacement of probability distributions by mere relations.

The concept of “self-awareness” ( svasaṃvedana ) enters Buddhist epistemological discourse in the Pramāṇasamuccaya and - vṛtti by Dignāga (ca. 480–540), the founder of the Buddhist logico-epistemological tradition. Though some of the key passages have already been dealt with in various publications, no attempt has been made to comprehensively examine all of them as a whole. A close reading is here proposed to make up for this deficit. In connection with a particularly difficult passage (PS(V) 1.8cd-10) that presents the means (...) of valid cognition and its result ( pramāṇa/pramāṇaphala ), a new interpretation is suggested, inspired by the commentary of Jinendrabuddhi. This interpretation highlights an aspect of selfawareness that has hitherto not been claimed for Dignāga: self-awareness offers essentially subjective access to one’s own mental states and factors. (shrink)

Recently, the debate on human enhancement has shifted from familiar topics like cognitive enhancement and mood enhancement to a new and – to no one's surprise – controversial subject, namely moral enhancement. Some proponents from the transhumanist camp allude to the ‘urgent need’ of improving the moral conduct of humankind in the face of ever growing technological progress and the substantial dangers entailed in this enterprise. Other thinkers express more sceptical views about this proposal. As the debate has revealed so (...) far, there is no shared opinion among philosophers about the meaning, prospects, and ethical evaluation of moral enhancement. In this article I will address several conceptual and practical problems of this issue, in order to encourage discussion about the prospects of moral enhancement in the future. My assumption is that for the short term, there is little chance of arriving at an agreement on the proper understanding of morality and the appropriateness of one single ethical theory; apart from this, there are further philosophical puzzles loosely referred to in the debate which add to theoretical confusion; and even if these conceptual problems could be solved, there are still practical problems to be smoothed out if moral enhancement is ever to gain relevance apart from merely theoretical interest. My tentative conclusion, therefore, will be that moral enhancement is not very likely to be made sense of – let alone realized – in the medium-term future. (shrink)

Looking times and gaze behavior indicate that infants can predict the goal state of an observed simple action event (e.g., object‐directed grasping) already in the first year of life. The present paper mainly focuses on infants’ predictive gaze‐shifts toward the goal of an ongoing action. For this, infants need to generate a forward model of the to‐be‐obtained goal state and to disengage their gaze from the moving agent at a time when information about the action event is still incomplete. By (...) about 6 months of age, infants show goal‐predictive gaze‐shifts, but mainly for familiar actions that they can perform themselves (e.g., grasping) and for familiar agents (e.g., a human hand). Therefore, some theoretical models have highlighted close relations between infants’ ability for action‐goal prediction and their motor development and/or emerging action experience. Recent research indicates that infants can also predict action goals of familiar simple actions performed by non‐human agents (e.g., object‐directed grasping by a mechanical claw) when these agents display agency cues, such as self‐propelled movement, equifinality of goal approach, or production of a salient action effect. This paper provides a review on relevant findings and theoretical models, and proposes that the impacts of action experience and of agency cues can be explained from an action‐event perspective. In particular, infants’ goal‐predictive gaze‐shifts are seen as resulting from an interplay between bottom‐up processing of perceptual information and top‐down influences exerted by event schemata that store information about previously executed or observed actions. (shrink)

Les programmes d’éducation inclusive (IE) visent à intégrer les enfants handicapés dans les écoles ordinaires en leur offrant une éducation de qualité dans un environnement sans obstacles. Si l’éducation inclusive fait désormais partie intégrante du programme de développement mondial, de nombreuses questions subsistent à propos de la meilleure façon de mettre en œuvre ces programmes d’éducation inclusive, compte tenu des contextes et des défis différents qui se présentent dans les pays en développement. “One Class for All” est un programme d’éducation (...) informelle financé par Light for the World, une ONG internationale, et mis en œuvre par 14 organisations partenaires éthiopiennes. Les auteurs de cet article ont utilisé un modèle d’évaluation descriptive de la mise en œuvre combinant des éléments qualitatifs et quantitatifs pour évaluer l’étendue, la qualité et la satisfaction des programmes d’éducation informelle mis en œuvre par un échantillon de partenaires de Light for the World. Les données utilisées comprenaient des données de suivi de la mise en œuvre de routine, une enquête auprès de tous les partenaires de mise en œuvre, des entretiens avec des informateurs clés et des observations structurées des écoles et des participants dans les écoles de l’échantillon en Éthiopie. L’évaluation a principalement indiqué la nécessité de plans de développement plus structurés pour chaque école et d’un programme de formation des enseignants plus structuré. Cette évaluation contribue à la littérature limitée sur la mise en œuvre d’un programme d’éducation inclusive dans un pays africain. (shrink)

Samson Liberman ABSTRACT: The aim of this paper is a socio-philosophical analysis of attention deficit phenomenon, which is being detected at the intersection of several subject areas. The main methodological instrument of the study is a Marxist principle of alienation. Alienation of attention, which, on the one hand, is being ….

Synthesizing self‐regulatory theories, we provide new insights into the antecedents of abusive supervision. We, from the perspective of supervisor's self‐regulatory resources depletion or impairment, introduce supervisor hindrance stress as an underlying mechanism of the subordinate deviance–abusive supervision relationship: this mediated relationship will be intensified at the level of high subordinate job performance. In addition, we develop a complex contingency model and propose a three‐way interaction (i.e., subordinate deviance, job performance, supervisor outcome dependence) to obtain the complete understanding of the subordinate (...) deviance–abusive supervision relationship facilitated through the supervisors’ hindrance stress. To test our moderated moderated mediation model, we gathered time‐lagged and multisource data from a large food service company located in southern China. We collected data at two different points (i.e., Time 1 and Time 2) from supervisors and their direct reports (N = 298 responses from 68 supervisors and 298 direct reports), and findings provide support for the hypothesized moderated moderated mediation model of our study. We highlight the implications of our study for theory, research, and practice. (shrink)

We take a fresh look at the logics of informational dependence and independence of Hintikka and Sandu and Väänänen, and their compositional semantics due to Hodges. We show how Hodges’ semantics can be seen as a special case of a general construction, which provides a context for a useful completeness theorem with respect to a wider class of models. We shed some new light on each aspect of the logic. We show that the natural propositional logic carried by the semantics (...) is the logic of Bunched Implications due to Pym and O’Hearn, which combines intuitionistic and multiplicative connectives. This introduces several new connectives not previously considered in logics of informational dependence, but which we show play a very natural rôle, most notably intuitionistic implication. As regards the quantifiers, we show that their interpretation in the Hodges semantics is forced, in that they are the image under the general construction of the usual Tarski semantics; this implies that they are adjoints to substitution, and hence uniquely determined. As for the dependence predicate, we show that this is definable from a simpler predicate, of constancy or dependence on nothing. This makes essential use of the intuitionistic implication. The Armstrong axioms for functional dependence are then recovered as a standard set of axioms for intuitionistic implication. We also prove a full abstraction result in the style of Hodges, in which the intuitionistic implication plays a very natural rôle. (shrink)

This paper informs about a specific German concept in Pedagogy, the concept of “tact”.Following an initial discussion of the particularities of the concept of (socio-) pedagogical tact, including its ethical and moral self-positioning and current demands for its operationality (1); will come the presentation of an empirical examination of the opportunities and limits to the feasibility of meeting these demands, based on a current example from the field of social work: ‘integrated family support’ (2); finally, options for further investigation of (...) the potential effects of ‘socio-pedagogical tact’ will be identified (3). (shrink)

Society’s relationship with modern animal farming is an ambivalent one: on the one hand there is rising criticism about modern animal farming; on the other hand people appreciate certain aspects of it, such as increased food safety and low food prices. This ambivalence reflects the two faces of modernity: the negative (exploitation of nature and loss of traditions) and the positive (progress, convenience, and efficiency). This article draws on a national survey carried out in the Netherlands that aimed at gaining (...) a deeper understanding about the acceptance of modern dairy farming in Dutch society. People take two dimensions into account when evaluating different aspects of modern dairy farming: (1) the way living beings are used for production and (2) the way a dairy farm functions as a business. In both these dimensions people appeared to adopt cautious opinions: most people preferred relatively traditional and natural farms and were concerned about the use of nature and treatment of animals in modern production—although this did not imply an outright rejection of modern animal farming. The study also looked for (and sought to explain) differences of opinion between social groups. Besides socio-demographic factors such as age and gender, farming experience and value-orientation (such as socially minded and professional) appeared to be important variables. The values and convictions within modern society can help to explain why some people are greatly concerned about animal welfare while some show less concern. This diversity also helps to explain why general information campaigns are quite ineffective in allaying concerns about modern animal farming. (shrink)

In the era of increasingly defined ontological insecurity and uncertainty driven by the ravages of COVID-19, urban informal settlement has emerged as a source of resilience. Indeed, the effects of a pandemic transcends its epidemiological characteristics to political economy and societal resilience. If resilience is the capacity of a system to adapt successfully to significant challenges that threaten the function or development of the human society, then ontological insecurity is about the lack of such capacity. Drawing on Keith Hartian’s understanding (...) of ‘informality’ of spaces, this policy brief attempts to identify and frame a research agenda for the future. The agenda would assist future researchers and policymakers provide responses that appropriately recognize groups and actors that define the urban informal space. (shrink)

Die vorliegende Arbeit versteht sich als eine Einführung in den systematischen Teil des Werkes in das, was über die Buchdeckelgrenzen des gleichnamigen Serienwerkes hinaus als Cassirers Philosophie der symbolischen Formen bezeichnet werden darf. Die Betonung soll dabei auf dem unbestimmten Artikel liegen: Es ist eine Weise des grundlegenden Verständnisses, die hier präsentiert wird. Sie steht im Verhältnis von Variation und Ergänzung zu den bereits vorliegenden Einführungen in Cassirers Werk; zugleich beansprucht sie aber insofern, etwas Neues und eine Alternative zu bieten, (...) als sie den Primat des Praktischen, unter dem Cassirers Kulturphilosophie steht, ernst nimmt und zum Leitfaden der Interpretation macht. (shrink)

Bell inequalities play a central role in the study of quantum nonlocality and entanglement, with many applications in quantum information. Despite the huge literature on Bell inequalities, it is not easy to find a clear conceptual answer to what a Bell inequality is, or a clear guiding principle as to how they may be derived. In this paper, we introduce a notion of logical Bell inequality which can be used to systematically derive testable inequalities for a very wide variety of (...) situations. There is a single clear conceptual principle, based on purely logical consistency conditions, which underlies our notion of logical Bell inequalities. We show that in a precise sense, all Bell inequalities can be taken to be of this form. Our approach is very general. It applies directly to any family of sets of commuting observables. Thus it covers not only the n-partite scenarios to which Bell inequalities are standardly applied, but also Kochen-Specker configurations, and many other examples. There is much current work on experimental tests for contextuality. Our approach directly yields, in a systematic fashion, testable inequalities for a very general notion of contextuality. There has been much work on obtaining proofs of Bell's theorem “without inequalities” or “without probabilities.” These proofs are seen as being in a sense more definitive and logically robust than the inequality-based proofs. On the hand, they lack the fault-tolerant aspect of inequalities. Our approach reconciles these aspects, and in fact shows how the logical robustness can be converted into systematic, general derivations of inequalities with provable violations. Moreover, the kind of strong non-locality or contextuality exhibited by the GHZ argument or by Kochen-Specker configurations can be shown to lead to maximal violations of the corresponding logical Bell inequalities. Thus the qualitative and the quantitative aspects are combined harmoniously. (shrink)

Ever since Kant asked: “How am I to develop the sense of freedom in spite of the restraint?” in his lecture on education, the tension between necessary educational influence and unacceptable restriction of the child’s individual development and freedom has been considered an educational paradox. Many have suggested solutions to the paradox; however, this article endorses recent discussions in educational philosophy that pursue the need to fundamentally rethink our understanding of education and upbringing. In this article it is argued that (...) it is incomprehensible to describe an intervention of an educator as a constraint on a child’s actions and that such an intervention would be in need of justification; as Kant and many others after him have done. Educational intervention should not be understood as a restriction of a child’s endeavour to learn, because any educational intervention is educational. Furthermore, it is argued that the notion of restraint is based on the concept of human beings as radically separated which lead to the assumption that education is restrictive per se. In contrast, this article argues that indoctrination, manipulation, and coercion are rather phenomena within our educational forms of life. Recognizing the interrelations between human beings should play a constitutive part in the conceptualisation of individual freedom. A bond with others is the foundation upon which a child develops its own identity and an understanding of itself as an agent who can express its own will and takes responsibility for its words and actions. (shrink)

The present study investigated whether infants learn the effects of other persons' actions like they do for their own actions, and whether infants transfer observed action-effect relations to their own actions. Nine-, 12-, 15- and 18-month-olds explored an object that allowed two actions, and that produced a certain salient effect after each action. In a self-exploration group, infants explored the object directly, whereas in two observation groups, infants first watched an adult model acting on the object and obtaining a certain (...) effect with each action before exploring the objects by themselves. In one observation group, the infants' actions were followed by the same effects as the model's actions, but in the other group, the action-effect mapping for the infant was reversed to that of the model. The results showed that the observation of the model had an impact on the infants' exploration behavior from 12 months, but not earlier, and that the specific relations between observed actions and effects were acquired by 15 months. Thus, around their first birthday infants learn the effects of other persons' actions by observation, and they transfer the observed action-effect relations to their own actions in the second year of life. (shrink)

Die Geschichte der genetischen Pränataldiagnostik ist bislang als Teil der Geschichte der Humangenetik und deren Neuorientierung als klinisch-laborwissenschaftliche Disziplin in der zweiten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts betrachtet worden. Anhand neuen Quellenmaterials soll in diesem Beitrag gezeigt werden, dass das Interesse an der Pränataldiagnostik in Westdeutschland auch im Kontext von Forschungen entstand, die sich mit Gefahren für den Menschen in der Umwelt befassten. Anhand der Debatten um die Einrichtung des DFG-Schwerpunktprogramms „Pränatale Diagnostik genetischer Defekte“ 1970 untersuchen wir, wie die Technik der (...) Amniozentese in Westdeutschland von einer interdisziplinären Forschungsgruppe eingeführt wurde, die sich mit Schädigungen des Organismus durch Strahlen, Arzneimittel und andere Gebrauchsstoffe und Konsumgüter befasste. In einer als ökologische Wende bezeichneten Zeit wachsenden Umweltbewusstseins, so unsere These, sollte durch die Förderung der Pränataldiagnostik eine wahrgenommene Lücke in der Prävention umweltbedingt auftretender genetischer Anomalien geschlossen werden. Für die Pränataldiagnostik als „Schutzmaßnahme“ sprach unter anderem ihre erwartete Finanzierung als Krankenkassenleistung im Zuge der Reform des Abtreibungsrechts. Erst in einem zweiten Schritt führten Veränderungen von Strukturen der Forschung, vor allem aber Erfahrungen in der gynäkologischen Praxis zu einer Neuausrichtung auf die Diagnostik und Prävention mehrheitlich erblicher oder spontan auftretender Anomalien. Die Pränataldiagnostik, so wie sie schließlich in Westdeutschland ab den frühen 1980er Jahren routinemäßig Einsatz fand, hatte mit Fragen der „Umwelt“ kaum noch zu tun. Diese Fallstudie zur Frühgeschichte der genetischen Pränataldiagnostik handelt von dem noch wenig untersuchten Verhältnis von humangenetischer Forschung, klinischer Praxis und Umweltforschung und hat zum weiteren Ziel, den bisher in anderen Kontexten beschriebenen Wandel von Perspektiven in der Vorsorge um 1970 zu beleuchten. (shrink)

In recent years there has been increased recognition of the importance of high standards in ethics, governance and the integrity of research. This paper is a case study of the University of Bristol's approach to address these important activities in a Higher Education Institution. It will highlight the importance of working closely with the academic research community to ensure maximum engagement, leading to a sustained culture change that recognizes faculty and departmental specific needs. A key tool to ensuring high standards (...) of research integrity and compliance with the legislative framework is the development of a supportive quality assurance programme. (shrink)

We present a game semantics for Linear Logic, in which formulas denote games and proofs denote winning strategies. We show that our semantics yields a categorical model of Linear Logic and prove full completeness for Multiplicative Linear Logic with the MIX rule: every winning strategy is the denotation of a unique cut-free proof net. A key role is played by the notion of history-free strategy; strong connections are made between history-free strategies and the Geometry of Interaction. Our semantics incorporates a (...) natural notion of polarity, leading to a refined treatment of the additives. We make comparisons with related work by Joyal, Blass, et al. (shrink)

This paper compares and contrasts two infinite regress arguments against higher-order theories of consciousness that were put forward by the Buddhist epistemologists Dignāga (ca. 480–540 CE) and Dharmakīrti (ca. 600–660). The two arguments differ considerably from each other, and they also differ from the infinite regress argument that scholars usually attribute to Dignāga or his followers. The analysis shows that the two philosophers, in these arguments, work with different assumptions for why an object-cognition must be cognised: for Dignāga it must (...) be cognised in order to enable subsequent memory of it, for Dharmakīrti it must be cognised if it is to cognise an object. (shrink)

The civilization of the world has become a threat and distorted environmental integrity in the 20th century. Therefore, environmental ethics is currently getting important in academic considerations. Various public and private institutions such as universities and research centers output throughout the world are now paying attention and seriousness to the environment. This paper focuses on what mankind ought to do regarding the cross-cuttingness of environmental problems.

This article presents a structured and systematic approach for identifying and modelling compliance risks. The sophistication with which modern business is carried out and the unprecedented access to a global market means that businesses are exposed to increasing and diverse regulatory requirements in and across jurisdictions. Compliance with such requirements is practically challenging, partly due to the complexity of regulatory environments. One possibility in this regard is a risk-based approach to compliance, where resources are allocated to those compliance issues that (...) are most risky. Despite the need for risk-based compliance, few specific methods and techniques for identifying and modelling compliance risks have been developed. Due to the lack of methodological and tool support, compliance risk identification often involves unstructured brainstorming, with uncertain outcomes. The proposed approach consists of a five-step process for the structured identification and assessment of compliance risks. This process aims at facilitating the identification of compliance risks and their documentation in a consistent and reusable fashion. As part of the process, the article provides a systematic approach for a graphical modelling of compliance risks, which aims at facilitating communication among experts from different backgrounds. The creation of graphical models can be partly automated based on natural language patterns for regulatory requirements. Furthermore, the structuring of the compliance requirement in a template aims at simplifying the modelling of compliance risks and facilitating a potential future automated model. (shrink)

Ein Schwerpunkt liegt dabei auf der Problematisierung der Freiheit in den Kontroversen, die sich um den Anspruch auf Freiheit entwickelt haben, auf der Kontextualisierung der Freiheit in den Determinismen aller Provenienz; ein weiterer in ...