We argue that a fashionable interpretation of the theory of natural selection as a claim exclusively about populations is mistaken. The interpretation rests on adopting an analysis of fitness as a probabilistic propensity which cannot be substantiated, draws parallels with thermodynamics which are without foundations, and fails to do justice to the fundamental distinction between drift and selection. This distinction requires a notion of fitness as a pairwise comparison between individuals taken two at a time, and so vitiates the interpretation (...) of the theory as one about populations exclusively. (shrink)

At the phenomenal level, consciousness can be described as a singular, unified field of recursive self-awareness, consistently coherent in a particualr way; that of a subject located both spatially and temporally in an egocentrically-extended domain, such that conscious self-awareness is explicitly characterized by I-ness, now-ness and here-ness. The psychological mechanism underwriting this spatiotemporal self-locatedness and its recursive processing style involves an evolutionary elaboration of the basic orientative reference frame which consistently structures ongoing spatiotemporal self-location computations as i-here-now. Cognition computes action-output (...) in the midst of ongoing movement, and consequently requires a constant self-locating spatiotemporal reference frame as basis for these computations. Over time, constant evolutionary pressures for energy efficiency have encouraged both the proliferation of anticipative feedforward processing mechansims, and the elaboration, at the apex of the sensorimotor processing hierarchy, of self-activating, highly attenuated recursively-feedforward circuitry processing the basic orientational schema independent of external action output. As the primary reference frame of active waking cognition, this recursive i-here-now processing generates a zone of subjective self-awareness in terms of which it feels like something to be oneself here and now. This is consciousness. (shrink)

Les concepts scientifiques, même usés, même désuets, ne sont jamais définitivement périmés. Ils peuvent toujours faire retour dans les conjonctures théoriques ultérieures. Cela tient à la nature très particulière du concept, irréductible aux descriptions positivistes : issus de l’expérience et ayant vocation à en rendre raison, les concepts représentent autant d’arrachements à l’expérience et de survols explicatifs de l’expérience. Des épistémologues antipositivistes du xxe siècle ont été attentifs à de telles caractéristiques philosophiques. On expose ici leur modèle de la conceptualisation (...) scientifique et on le met au travail sur un cas, le concept de tendance, dont on montre il survit à la période de sa première formulation et il mérite de revenir dans les débats psychophysiologiques contemporains. (shrink)

A system of natural deduction rules is proposed for an idealized form of English. The rules presuppose a sharp distinction between proper names and such expressions as the c, a (an) c, some c, any c, and every c, where c represents a common noun. These latter expressions are called quantifiers, and other expressions of the form that c or that c itself, are called quantified terms. Introduction and elimination rules are presented for any, every, some, a (an), and the, (...) and also for any which, every which, and so on, as well as rules for some other concepts. One outcome of these rules is that Every man loves some woman is implied by, but does not imply, Some woman is loved by every man, since the latter is taken to mean the same as Some woman is loved by all men. Also, Jack knows which woman came is implied by Some woman is known by Jack to have come, but not by Jack knows that some woman came. (shrink)

Dans le courant du XVII e siècle se multiplient en Chine les discours sur l’amitié. En partie liés à la déliquescence des structures traditionnelles et notamment familiales qui servaient de base au fonctionnement social de l’empire, ils proposent de réévaluer le lien amical dans l’organisation politique. He Xinyin (1517-1579) est à cet égard l’un des penseurs les plus innovants et radicaux. À travers la lecture de quelques essais majeurs recueillis dans le recueil de ses œuvres complètes, l’article entend expliciter la (...) réévaluation de l’amitié et sa dimension subversive chez cet auteur et montrer comment une telle redéfinition a pu instiller dans la culture chinoise du XVII e siècle et au-delà de nouveaux rapports subjectifs où l’individu émerge comme une entité cardinale dans les rapports sociaux ainsi que les idées de liberté d’expression. (shrink)

"The extensive attention devoted to abortion has led Christians for too long to overlook much of the exploding bioethics agenda. Moreover, to focus only on 'issues' is to fail to address the profound changes taking place in the very nature of the medical profession. This book signals the commitment of the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity to help expand the church's bioethical vision and to foster a more substantial Christian contribution to the public debate."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by (...) Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved. (shrink)

Bioethics, Volume 36, Issue 2, Page 111-112, February 2022.

The use of the human microbiome as a subject of study for forensic purposes raises a number of issues, ranging from a challenge to our traditional concept of identity to respect for privacy and the type of consent to be obtained when a microbiome sample is taken. The particular nature of this study requires the joint work of a multidisciplinary team made up of specialists in ethics, forensic science, law, microbiology, philosophy and political science.

The tourism industry is a significant driver of the global economy and impacts societies all over the world that are currently experiencing radical change. Responding to these changes requires economic paradigms and educational systems based on new foundations. Humanistic tourism proposes a values-based disciplinary perspective for tourism at the intersection between humanistic and tourism management, and is rooted in human dignity and societal wellbeing. Integrating humanistic management principles into higher education tourism management programs, and changing the nature of what is (...) taught and how, would benefit students, future managers and all stakeholders. This paper aims at improving higher education tourism programs by combining humanistic management education and the Tourism Education Futures Initiative’s values-based tourism education. It draws on an integrated Humanistic Tourism Education framework to help develop future tourism managers’ skills and abilities to adopt alternative leadership models within the sector and to foster critical and responsible tourism thinking and practice. With best-practice examples from three universities in three different countries, this study illustrates new pedagogical approaches and proposes recommendations for implementing humanistic tourism management in higher education with the aim of training ethical and responsible managers equipped with an awareness of the social, cultural, and environmental challenges – and possible solutions to these – in their respective destinations. (shrink)

This set is a carefully balanced selection of writings representing some of the most important currents in the thought of city and regional planning during the period 1870-1940 when urban planning emerged as a serious disciplinary field. The set consists of eight key books from this period, handsomely illustrated and reproduced in their entirety, and a separate volume of fifteen seminal short selections - all by major figures of the time, such as Abercrombie, Geddes, and the Olmsteds. Soria y Mata's (...) writings on the linear city also appear in translation for the first time. In addition to seminal works on city planning, the set covers themes such as neighbourhood, Utopian and visionary planning; planning for parks; housing; transportation systems, and public health. A wide variety of cities feature including Paris, Vienna, Amsterdam, Berlin, London, Manchester, New York and San Francisco, showing a great diversity of cultural styles. Early Urban Planning 1870-1940 is of continued importance today, as it highlights ideals which remain strikingly relevant in development of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. (shrink)

Psychiatry as a discipline oscillates between the language of emotions and that of biology; ranging from the immersion into the subjective experience of another person to the objective approach of biomedical science. The tension between these different approaches may seem irreconcilable and confusing to some. This was not the case for Karl Jaspers who pioneered a systematic reflection on the concepts underlying psychiatric theory and practice. In this essay, we engage with Jaspers' thinking and create a dialogue with contemporary psychiatric (...) research and philosophy of mind. Jaspers' conception of erklären and verstehen and his position on research in the neuroscience of mental disorders is brought together with the thought of Thomas Nagel and John Searle. We argue for the compatibility of Jaspers' ideas with Nagel's and Searle's views on the mind/body problem. Furthermore, we look at current trends in biological research in psychiatry through the lens of Jaspers' General Psychopathology, from there we derive suggestions and insights for psychiatric theory and practice. (shrink)

Avec des textes de D. Armstrong, M.Esfeld, K. Fine, D. Lewis, H. Mellot, K. Mulligan, M. Rea, P. Unger, P. van Inwagen, D. Zimmerman. L’ontologie est la partie de la métaphysique qui traite de l’être en général, et non d’un être en particulier, et son domaine d’enquête excède même le monde actuel puisqu’elle porte sur l’ensemble du possible, sur les objets possibles et réels ainsi que sur leurs propriétés ou sur leurs structures ultimes. Ce volume fournit les textes fondamentaux pour (...) réfléchir aux principales notions de l’ontologie contemporaine. Y sont abordés les problèmes de la composition matérielle des objets, de la causalité, de la nature du temps et des relations en général. Les questions de méthode portent sur le lien avec la logique et les sciences tout autant que sur le recours aux catégories conceptuelles et aux intuitions. (shrink)

We will be dealing with “sequential circuits” in the sense of E. F. Moore and G. H. Mealy. Each such circuit is assumed to have a finite number of input wires and a finite number of output wires. Each element of such a circuit will be assumed to be an and-circuit, an or-circuit, a not-circuit, or a delay circuit, for some specified temporal delay. Each element has one output wire which, however, may branch in order to serve several purposes simultaneously. (...) The and-circuits and or-circuits have two input wires each, while the not-circuits and the delay circuits have one input wire each. (shrink)

Pylyshyn argues against representations with pictorial properties that would be superimposed on a scene. We present evidence against this view, and a new method to depict pictorial properties. We propose a continuum between the top-down generation of internal signals (imagery) and the bottom-up signals from the outside world. Along the continuum, superstitious perceptions provide a method to tackle representational issues.

Depuis qu’a paru Le fromage et le vers, le cas du meunier Menocchio a donné lieu à de nombreuses exégèses. On cherche ici à le comprendre à la lumière d’un existentialisme de la connaissance, en partant du principe que son système d’idées est cohérent, et qu’il dérive de la situation qui est la sienne, dans ses dimensions indissolublement personnelles, sociales et « écologiques ». Pour appréhender le sens d’une telle expérience tout en restituant la portée d’une épistémologie élargie aux conditions (...) de toute existence, il paraît essentiel de s’appuyer sur les réflexions méthodologiques de Carlo Ginzburg aussi bien que sur des analyses d’ethnologie européenne qu’il lui est arrivé de mentionner. (shrink)

Les recherches de Natalie Depraz sur l’intersubjectivité rejoignent ici celles de Frédéric Mauriac, particulièrement dans les cas dits « d’urgence psychiatrique ». La question est ainsi de savoir comment poser et penser le rapport fulgurant de la force vitale à ce désir tout humain de vouloir en finir. En ces cas, quelles paroles faut-il oser et quel mode de relation convient-il d’instaurer? La contribution entend offrir des perspectives théoriques et pratiques, essentiellement thérapeutiques, en mettant d’abord en évidence, d’une part, (...) la situation de la phénoménologie henryenne devant la phénoménologie historique et, d’autre part, sa situation devant une praxis fondée sur la singularité de l’approche en deuxième personne. (shrink)

Using an international sample of environmental and social firm-level ratings between 2007 and 2019, we form synthetic overlapping region-based equity portfolios to examine the impact of screening stringency on abnormal returns and specific risk. While previous literature analyzes this relationship in a bidimensional setting, inferences made in this study are additionally robust to regional levels of market efficiency. Our results suggest that (1) screening stringency displays an inverted curvilinear relationship with risk-adjusted returns and (2) the impact on specific risk is (...) strictly increasing. Thus, portfolios that employ marginal and substantial screening incur the cost of responsible investing. However, moderate screening has the benefit of increasing performance without the burden of financing the least responsible corporations. (shrink)

The intersection of AI and neurotechnology has resulted in an increasing number of medical and non-medical applications and has sparked debate over the need for new human rights, or “neurorights,”...

This book contributes to the environmental humanities field by offering an analysis of the Anthropocene fantasy: the idea that the Anthropocene is an opportunity to remake our terrestrial environment thanks to the power of technology. The author argues that the earth always escapes the human desire to remake and master it.

Following Wallace’s suggestion, Darwin framed his theory using Spencer’s expression “survival of the fittest”. Since then, fitness occupies a significant place in the conventional understanding of Darwinism, even though the explicit meaning of the term ‘fitness’ is rarely stated. In this paper I examine some of the different roles that fitness has played in the development of the theory. Whereas the meaning of fitness was originally understood in ecological terms, it took a statistical turn in terms of reproductive success throughout (...) the 20th Century. This has lead to the ever-increasing importance of sexually reproducing organisms and the populations they compose in evolutionary explanations. I will argue that, moving forward, evolutionary theory should look back at its ecological roots in order to be more inclusive in the type of systems it examines. Many biological systems can only be satisfactorily accounted for by offering a non-reproductive account of fitness. This argument will be made by examining biological systems with very small or transient population structures. I argue this has significant consequences for how we define Darwinism, increasing the significance of survival over that of reproduction. (shrink)