Our visual system can process information at both conscious and unconscious levels. Understanding the factors that control whether a stimulus reaches our awareness, and the fate of those stimuli that remain at an unconscious level, are the major challenges of brain science in the new millennium. Since its publication in 1984, Visual Masking has established itself as a classic text in the field of cognitive psychology. In the years since, there have been considerable advances in the cognitive neurosciences, and a (...) growth of interest in the topic of consciousness, and the time is ripe for a new edition of this text. Where most current approaches to the study of visual consciousness adopt a 'steady-state' view, the approach presented in this book explores its dynamic properties. This new edition uses the technique of visual masking to explore temporal aspects of conscious and unconscious processes down to a resolution in the millisecond range. The 'time slices' through conscious and unconscious vision revealed by the visual masking technique can shed light on both normal and abnormal operations in the brain. The main focus of this book is on the microgenesis of visual form and pattern perception - microgenesis referring to the processes occurring in the visual system from the time of stimulus presentation on the retinae to the time, a few hundred milliseconds later, of its registration at conscious or unconscious perceptual and behavioural levels. The book takes a highly integrative approach by presenting microgenesis within a broad context encompassing visuo-temporal phenomena, attention, and consciousness. (shrink)

This book provides a thoroughly worked out and systematic presentation of an interpretivist position in the philosophy of mind, of the view that having mental properties is a matter of interpretation. Bruno Mölder elaborates and defends a particular version of interpretivism, the ascription theory, which explicates the possession of mental states with contents in terms of their canonical ascribability, and shows how it can withstand various philosophical challenges. Apart from a defence of the ascription theory from the objections commonly (...) directed against interpretivism, the book provides a critical analysis of major alternative accounts of mental state possession as well as the interpretivist ideas originating from Donald Davidson and Daniel Dennett. The viability of the approach is demonstrated by showing how one can treat mental causation as well as the faculties closely connected with consciousness -- perception and the awareness of one’s own mental states -- in the interpretivist framework. (shrink)

Common‐sense intuition suggests that, when people are engaged in informational exchanges, they communicate so as to be reasonably sure that they perform the exchanges faithfully. Over the years, we have found evidence suggesting that this intuition, which is woven into several influential theories of human communication, may be misleading. We first summarize this evidence and discuss its potential limitations. Then, we present a new study that addresses the potential limitations. A confederate instructed participants to “pick up the skask” from a (...) tray containing six objects and move it to a specific location. Since skask is a non‐word invented by us, participants had to ask for clarification to perform the instruction faithfully. In contradiction with the intuition that people pursue faithfulness when engaged in informational exchanges, 29 of the 48 participants we tested performed the instruction without asking for clarification. We identified a possible cause for this behavior, which occurred more frequently when avoiding the clarification was unlikely to result in an overt consequence (an error in the execution of the instruction that could be noticed by the confederate or the experimenter). Other factors such as individual differences and the specific interpersonal dynamics of the experimental settings, if they played a role at all, did it to an extent that is unlikely to be comparable to that of the role played by overt consequences. Considered together, our various assessments of the extent to which people engage in faithful informational exchanges converge on a simple conclusion: Communicating faithfully is a substantially demanding task, and people often fail at it. We discuss the implications of this conclusion and speculate on its relevance for understanding the evolutionary past of human communication. (shrink)

The Prince and the Wolf contains the transcript of a debate which took place on February 5, 2008 at the London School of Economics (LSE) between the prominent French sociologist, anthropologist, and philosopher Bruno Latour and the Cairo-based American philosopher Graham Harman.

This paper discusses the prospects of a comprehensive philosophical account of promising that relies centrally on the notion of trust. I lay out the core idea behind the Trust View, showing how it convincingly explains the normative contours and the unique value of our promissory practice. I then sketch three distinct options of how the Trust View can explain the normativity of promises. First, an effect based-view, second, a view drawing on a wider norm demanding respect to those whom one (...) has invited to something, and finally, as a new suggestion, a Normative Interest View. This view holds that promising is a normative power that serves our interest in facilitating or enabling the relationship of trust between promisor and promisee. I argue that only those embracing the third view can fully account for the distinctive obligation that results from the giving of a valid promise in all cases. (shrink)

Healthcare policies developed during the COVID-19 pandemic to safeguard community health have the potential to disadvantage women in three areas. First, protocols for deferral of elective surgery may assign a lower priority to important reproductive outcomes. Second, policies regarding the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 may not capture the complexity of the considerations related to pregnancy. Third, policies formulated to reduce infectious exposure inadvertently may increase disparities in maternal health outcomes and rates of violence towards women. In this commentary, we (...) outline these challenges unique to women’s healthcare in a pandemic, provide preliminary recommendations and identify areas for further exploration and refinement of policy. (shrink)

Interoception, the ability to feel the body’s internal sensations, is an essential aspect of emotional experience. There is mounting evidence that interoception is impaired in common mental health disorders and that poor interoceptive awareness is a major contributor to emotional reactivity, calling for clinical interventions to address this deficit. The manuscript presents a comprehensive theoretical review, drawing on multidisciplinary findings to propose a metatheory of reinforcement mechanisms applicable across a wide range of disorders. We present a reconsideration of operant conditioning (...) through the co-emergence model of reinforcement, which is a neurophenomenological account of the interaction between cognition and interoception, and its consequences on behavior. The model suggests that during memory processing, the retrieval of autobiographical memory (including maladaptive cognition) is dependent upon its co-emerging interoceptive cues occurring at the encoding, consolidation and reconsolidation stages. Accordingly, “interoceptive reinforcement” during emotional distress is a common factor to all emotional disorders and a major cause for relapse. We propose that interoceptive desensitization has transdiagnostic benefits, readily achievable through the cultivation of equanimity during mindfulness training and can be integrated in cognitive and behavioral interventions to permit a transdiagnostic applicability. We summarize the contributions of this approach into 10 specific and testable propositions. (shrink)

Le chapitre v du livre II du Contrat social est généralement lu comme un chapitre sur la peine de mort. La mise au jour de la genèse de ce texte, la redéfinition de sa place dans l'économie du Contrat social conduisent également à remettre en question cette lecture. Dès lors la notion de droit de vie et de mort doit être réinterprétée et la position de Rousseau sur la peine de mort réévaluée. Book II, chapter 5 of Du contrat social (...) is usually read as a chapter about the death penalty. Bringing to light the genesis of this text and redefining its status within the economy of Du contrat social lead to call into question this interpretation.Hence the notion of right of life and death as well as Rousseau's view about the death penalty must be reevaluated. (shrink)

Visual control of our actions can be unconscious as well as conscious. The book explores unconscious and conscious vision, investigated using psychophysical and brain-recording methods. The book sheds new light on and advances experimental, philosophical, and scholarly research on visual consciousness.

Facticity and the Fate of Reason After Kant is the first history of the concept of facticity. G. Anthony Bruno argues that this concept’s coining, transmission, and repurposing by post-Kantian thinkers leaves a lasting divide concerning the question of whether a science of intelligibility can tolerate brute facts. In the phenomenological tradition, ‘facticity’ denotes undeducibly brute conditions of intelligibility such as sociality, mortality, and temporality. This suggests an affirmative answer to the post-Kantian question. However, the term’s original use in (...) the German idealist tradition is associated with a negative answer: a science of intelligibility must eliminate bruteness in order to be systematic, as Fichte says, or presuppositionless, as Hegel says. Moreover, eliminating bruteness requires a new logic for deducing conditions of intelligibility from reason’s self-contradictions, a dialectical logic that Fichte invents and Hegel develops. In response to the German idealists, Heidegger argues that dialectic ineluctably presupposes brute facts of lived experience, whose interpretation requires a hermeneutics of facticity. The untold history of the concept of facticity thus contains the deepest parting of the ways after Kant, one in which reason is fated to transform from the hand that holds the world to the thrown activity of being-in-the-world. Facticity and the Fate of Reason After Kant explores this transformation while confronting our inheritance of the still-pressing post-Kantian question. (shrink)

L’idéalisme transcendantal de type fichtéen et schellingien a été développé à partir d’un certain nombre d’apories concernant, par exemple, la « chose-en-soi », le statut du sujet entre sens interne et externe et l’intersubjectivité. Surtout la version schellingienne du transcendantalisme aboutit à une nouvelle conception de l’ontologie, « post-kan-tienne ». Mais elle est basée sur un déplacement de la problématique kantienne, entamée déjà par Fichte, qui méconnaît radicalement un aspect essentiel de la découverte kantienne, à savoir que l’entendement est fonctionnalité, (...) dans un sens analogue à l’acception promue par Leonhard Euler en mathématiques. (shrink)

Un décret de Trikka trouvé en 1987, le premier que l'on connaisse pour cette cité, honore un Cretois de Tylissos, Orthotimos, fils de Kélaithos, qui devait être un officier au service de la Macédoine. Vers la fin du nr" siècle av. J.-C, il a été honoré par une autre cité thessalienne, Atrax. Le décret de Trikka présente deux particularités de formulaire : la mention d'un privilège appelé isomoiria, celle de tages «à Trikka». L'étude de ces deux expressions conduit à reposer (...) le problème des groupes d'exilés accueillis en Étolie, qui devaient former des communautés auxquelles les Étoliens reconnaissaient un statut de «polis» organisée. Ce décret apporte ainsi un éclairage nouveau sur l'histoire politique de la Thessalie à la fin du ni· siècle av. J.-C. (shrink)

L’article inscrit la guerre d’Ukraine dans le cadre d’une politique clausewitzienne de contre-révolution mondiale. Cette guerre interétatique est le résultat du cycle de déploiement des printemps et des soulèvements de la dernière décennie et a des répercussions synchroniques sur un clivage interne qui traverse d’autres pays. L’article se conclut par une vision alternative entre un conflit inter-impérialiste dans lequel l’Europe est menacée par le bloc atlantiste et une dichotomie autocraties/démocraties.

À partir d’auteurs comme Negri, Cocco, Viveiros de Castro et Fanon, cet article discute le devenir-indien comme un concept pour les forces expressives de luttes et de réinvention dans le Sud. À travers de formes concrètes d’intervention, on analyse un mode de résistance à la fois créatif et alternatif, qui prend le contre-pied de l’actuel agenda capitaliste et néo-développementiste.

Today childhood takes place within amultimedia context where education, marketingand entertainment operate together in one bigmelting pot. Childhood is commodified, asituation not everybody seems happy with. Dueto increasing exposure with violence and sexualactivities, for example in children's games,children seem to lose the chance to be realchildren. In the discussions about thiscommodified childhood, innocence and nostalgiaseem omnipresent concepts. In this article wefirst analyse the discourse about the innocenceof childhood as presented by Neil Postman inhis bestseller ``The Disappearance ofChildhood.'' Here, childhood is (...) seen as a periodwhich can mainly be characterised in terms of a``not yet.'' However, Postman's view on childhoodpresents only one side of the romanticcontinuum. The other side – in which the childappears as having a nature of her own – can beillustrated by ``On naïve and sentimentalpoetry,'' an essay written by Friedrich Schillerin 1795. Both opposing views on childhood canlead to a different interpretation of theinnocence of childhood. Finally, Schiller'sdichotomy – the naïve versus thesentimental poet – can be seen as a useful legup to the clarification of nostalgia whichseems to go hand in hand with the feeling ofthe loss of childhood. (shrink)

Quanto segue intende proporsi come il resoconto di una conversazione che Andrea Oliani, Bruno Cortesi e Pietro Vigiani, tutti studenti presso l’Almo Collegio Borromeo di Pavia, hanno intrattenuto con Emanuele Severino, volta ad enucleare, muovendo da spunti talvolta anche polemici, alcune delle concettualità fondanti quel corpus di dottrine che cade sotto il nome di severinismo. Severino è stato squisito nell’accoglierci e ospitarci nella sua dimora di Brescia, lucido e assolutamente puntuale nel controbattere alle nostre provocazioni. La discussione ha poi (...) trovato naturale seguito in una conferenza di carattere più divulgativo tenuta dal filosofo presso il Collegio Borromeo, dal titolo Sulla Tecnica. Severino consegue la laurea in Filosofia nel 1950 come alunno del Collegio Borromeo, discutendo una tesi intitolata Heidegger e la metafisica sotto la supervisione di Gustavo Bontadini. Solo un anno più tardi ottiene la libera docenza in filosofia teoretica. Nel 1964 pubblica lo scritto Ritornare a Parmenide, che, insieme a La Struttura Originaria rappresenta la miccia che innescherà negli anni successivi quello che molti hanno definito lo “scandalo” del severinismo. Questi scritti, come altri, posseggono una portata teorica tanto dirompente che già nel 1969, a seguito di un lungo e accurato esame condotto da Cornelio Fabro, la Chiesa cattolica proclamerà l’insanabile pposizione tra il pensiero di Severino e il Cristianesimo. Comprendere tale pensiero è cosa ardua, se prima non ci sia volti alla grecità delle origini: essa è, per Severino, il luogo ove in maniera inaudita (nel senso letterale di “mai udita prima”) viene pensato l’Incontrovertibile, il “Sempre Salvo”, ciò la cui egazione è auto-negazione, e che pertanto non può in alcun modo essere contraddetto; In altri termini: la Verità. Essa è anche stata in grado per la prima volta di concepire in maniera radicale L’Essere e il suo corrispettivo: il Niente inteso come radicale assenza di qualsiasi positività. L’aver inteso la Verità come Saphés (“Ciò che brilla di luce propria” da cui Philo-Sophìa) da un lato, e l’aver posto L’Essere e il Niente dall’altro, sono gli atti che per Severino fondano quell’immenso edificio culturale che ancora oggi domina il pianeta tutto: L’Occidente. È possibile, dunque, individuare una pars construens e una pars destruens negli scritti di Emanuele Severino: da una parte sembra che, facendo uso di un apparato logico e ontologico raffinatissimo, egli cerchi di porre in questione le categorie di pensiero occidentali risolvendo il Problema dell’Occidente alla radice, cioè eliminandolo (accenneremo a quale sia questo problema e a cosa significhi eliminarlo); in questa che è una vera e propria opera di demolizione, il Nostro (pars construens) intende mostrare come tutto quanto si mostra nell’orizzonte esperienziale sia “da sempre salvo” perché eterno. Ciò sfocia, in scritti quali Pensieri sul Cristianesimo, Technè, Il Giogo, Il Nulla e la Poesia, in una “ricostruzione” volta a mostrare come le categorie introdotte dal pensiero greco si riverberino in ogni forma della razionalità occidentale, dall’arte, alla filosofia, al diritto, alla politica, determinandone in maniera necessaria gli sviluppi. Precisiamo, per correttezza, che lo stesso non è stato rivisto da Severino. (shrink)

Phillips & Silverstein offer an exciting synthesis of ongoing efforts to link the clinical and cognitive manifestations of schizophrenia with cellular accounts of its pathophysiology. We applaud their efforts but wonder whether the highly inclusive notion of “context” adequately captures some important details regarding schizophrenia and NMDA/glutamate function that are suggested by work on language processing and cognitive electrophysiology.

As Reflexões sobre o otimismo são as mais antigas reflexões kantianas sobre metafísica que aparecem no legado manuscrito [ handschiftlicher Nachlass ], remetendo-se ao fecho de 1753 ou 1754. Para justificar a importância de sua tradução, eu argumento que as consequências oriundas do problema da teodicéia, que cerceiam sua problemática, apresentam-se como alguns dos aspectos fundamentais do desenvolvimento intelectual kantiano no que concerne aos âmbitos da teologia racional e da ética. Por um lado, argumento que a crítica à teodicéia de (...) Leibniz abre espaço para as primeiras reflexões kantianas em torno da teologia racional, proporcionando as bases para o fundamento da prova apresentada em o Único argumento possível para uma demonstração da existência de Deus. Por outro, eu deixo indicado que as reflexões são, do mesmo modo, o ponto de partida para profundas investigações em torno do conceito de perfeição, investigações essas que vão incidir diretamente no próprio modo kantiano de caracterização da vontade. (shrink)

Résumé La philosophie de Bruno Latour se traduit dans son dernier livre comme une Enquête sur les modes d’existence. Une lecture de ce dernier livre permet de jeter un regard rétrospectif sur l’ensemble de l’œuvre sociologique et anthropologique de l’auteur, et de la présenter comme une philosophie de l’attention. Cette attention s’aiguise en se portant sur l’ensemble de ces modes, sur leurs différences ontologiques et les bifurcations qu’ils introduisent dans le registre de l’expérience. La question centrale, en se déterminant (...) progressivement comme une question cosmologique et éthique – à quel monde tenons-nous? – infléchit la pratique des sciences sociales en direction d’une philosophie qui soit à la hauteur de ce qu’exige la condition des Modernes. (shrink)

This is a review of the book Metaética: algumas tendências. The book contains papers of three important philosophers in this subject, Peter Railton, Allan Gibbard and Stephen Darwall. Since this book has been published, the study of metaethics has been improved in Brazil. In this review we describe the main aspects of the book, focusing on Railton’s ideas.

France has witnessed a significant rise in the recourse to sub-contracting over the last twenty years. However the latter is not to be seen as a response to the supposedly growing instability of the economic environment. It is primarily a further stage in the effective subordination of labour to capital. The replacement of direct labour by a commercial relation is used in order to bypass the framework of social legislation which labour had established through its struggles. Contrary to the formal (...) fragmentation of collective labour, capital has maintained its unity and its control of the process of production. Capital thus becomes even more hierarchical, by way of its wilful invocation of an alleged “market constraint”, the aim of which is to engineer a new disciplining of the labour force. (shrink)

Cet article discute les grands enjeux économiques qui caractérisent la profession d’avocat. Dans un premier temps sont développés les principaux aspects microéconomiques liés à l’organisation de la profession. Cette analyse permet d’étudier les mérites du modèle professionnel « ordinal ». Dans un second temps, l’article propose une approche plus macroéconomique du rôle de la profession d’avocats, ce qui conduit à mettre particulièrement en évidence l’importance du « capital humain juridique » dans une perspective de développement économique et social.

Bruno Liebrucks hat sein Hauptwerk <I>Sprache und Bewusstsein zur Begrundung einer -Philosophie von der Sprache her- geschrieben. Entworfen wird eine Philosophie des nicht automatisierten Denkens, das der Sprachlichkeit des Menschen gerecht wird. Das Wesen der Sprache ist das Wesen des Menschen, sagt Liebrucks und stellt sich damit gegen eine Verabsolutierung von Technik und Automation, die bei den Dingen einsetzt und beim Menschen endet. Die Dominanz einer formalen, mathematisierten Logik versperrt den Weg zur Sprache als der Bedingung der Moglichkeit eines (...) geistigen Daseins des Menschen. Das Lesebuch enthalt eine Sammlung von langst vergriffenen Liebrucks-Texten, die eine Einfuhrung in das epochale Werk bieten.". (shrink)