Giuseppe Gallis konsequentes Streben nach einer angemessenen Berücksichtigung beider Pole, des Subjektpols ebenso wie des Objektpols, sowohl in der Forschung als auch in allen Bereichen des menschlichen Lebens kommt im vorliegenden Sammelband in allen Arbeiten zum Tragen. Galli eröffnet damit auch neue Felder f8r die gestalttheoretische Forschungs- und Anwendungspraxis. Er erschließt Themen, die nicht zuletzt auch f8r die medizinischen, philosophischen, psychologischen und psychotherapeutischen Aufgabenstellungen zentral sind. Er plädiert nicht nur allgemein für einen dialogischen Ansatz in der zwischenmenschlichen Begegnung, er führt (...) in einer Reihe von Aufsätzen in diesem Sammelband auch sehr konkret die Fruchtbarkeit eines solchen Dialogs mit der Gedankenwelt eines Norbert Elias, Szvetan Todorovic und Paul Ricoeur für eine Bereicherung und Weiterentwicklung der Gestalttheorie vor Augen. (shrink)

The feeling of acting voluntarily is a fundamental component of human behavior and social life and is usually accompanied by a sense of agency. However, this ability can be impaired in a number of diseases and disorders. An important example is apraxia, a disturbance traditionally defined as a disorder of voluntary skillful movements that often results from frontal-parietal brain damage. The first part of this article focuses on direct evidence of some core symptoms of apraxia, emphasizing those with connections to (...) agency and free will. The loss of agency in apraxia is reflected in the monitoring of internally driven action, in the perception of specifically self-intended movements and in the neural intention to act. The second part presents an outline of the evidences supporting the functional and anatomical link between apraxia and agency. The available structural and functional results converge to reveal that the frontal–parietal network contributes to the sense of agency and its impairment in disorders such as apraxia. The current knowledge on the generation of motor intentions and action monitoring could potentially be applied to develop therapeutic strategies for the clinical rehabilitation of voluntary action. (shrink)

Great scholars in philosophy possess a keen analytical mind, excel in logical reasoning, and exhibit meticulous attention to detail. They rigorously define terms, avoiding ambiguities and errors. Originality and the willingness to challenge conventions are their hallmarks. They make significant contributions across various philosophical fields. They transparently address the exact aim of their research, and what it is not. Finally, they anticipate the impact of their theories on the current literature, and how such an impact should blossom across the future (...) generations. In this respect, great philosophers address open problems and propose big questions for the foreseeable research efforts of those who will follow. Mario Alai embodies the qualities of a great scholar in philosophy, and the various essays in this volume are an evidence to that. It is challenging to condense a lifetime of research in one book. However, the Editors of the present volume’s aim was to face this challenge, to make a collection dedicated to Mario Alai’s work not only possible but, as metaphysicians would say, actual. The book attempts to bring together the reflections of three different generations of scholars - i.e., mentors, colleagues, and students - on Alai’s thought. Viewed from this perspective, the extensive and valuable contributions that follow, crafted in honor of Mario Alai and his scholarly endeavors, come as no surprise. All the chapters focus on a theme that was very dear to the philosophical curiosity of Mario Alai. Moreover, in engaging with these different topics, the plethora of contributions gives us a sense of the work by Alai. To make sense of the different contributions as a unified enterprise, this volume is organized into three sections, which seek to gather writings that revolve around Mario’s most substantial contributions, while elucidating their contemporary significance in the global discourse. Moreover, it endeavors to offer precious insights into the origins and development of these contributions, as observed through Mario’s writings and responses. This represents a sort of closure of the theoretical circle, clearly showing how the work by Mario Alai has been appreciated through different generations, originating from his relation to his mentors, on the one hand, while also shedding new light on his students’ research interests, on the other. Editing such a wealth of material was, again, no small feat. Still, the taxonomy we have chosen for this book will assist readers in navigating the profound depths of Alai’s philosophical research. Consequently, the book is structured into the following three parts: 1. Realism in History of Philosophy, History of Science, and Metaphysics. 2. Scientific Realism. 3. Realism in Philosophy of Language, Epistemology, and Experimental Philosophy. Each contribution actively participates in a substantial conversation with Alai’s body of work, as a deep theoretical dialogue between the author and Mario. Consequently, it appeared fitting to let Alai conclude this conversation, with direct responses to these philosophy-provoking pieces in his honor. We shall refrain from further commentary on the works within this book and allow them to express their significance independently to appreciate the river of ideas flowing through Mario’s work1. Beyond their philosophical substance, they are a vivid testament to Alai’s enduring dedication and ongoing contributions, in different moments of his research life. (shrink)

The PRDM family has recently spawned considerable interest as it has been implicated in fundamental aspects of cellular differentiation and exhibits expanding ties to human diseases. The PRDMs belong to the SET domain family of histone methyltransferases, however, enzymatic activity has been determined for only few PRDMs suggesting that they act by recruiting co‐factors or, more speculatively, confer methylation of non‐histone targets. Several PRDM family members are deregulated in human diseases, most prominently in hematological malignancies and solid cancers, where they (...) can act as both tumor suppressors or drivers of oncogenic processes. The molecular mechanisms have been delineated for only few PRDMs and little is known about functional redundancy within the family. Future studies should identify target genes of PRDM proteins and the protein complexes in which PRDM proteins reside to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the biological and biochemical functions of this important protein family. (shrink)

Busca-se neste artigo apresentar, ainda que de forma panorâmica, algumas inferências sobre o estatuto da Ética no primeiro Wittgenstein, a partir da noção de análise completa da proposição e com base na teoria pictórica exposta no Tractatus. Tais inferências terão como plano de fundo a exposição que Wittgenstein faz em sua Conferência sobre a Ética, de 1929, onde o filósofo parece sustentar uma relação intrínseca entre juízos de valor ético e a perspectiva da primeira pessoa.

Wittgenstein’s ideas are a common ground for developers of Natural Language Processing (NLP) systems and linguists working on Language Acquisition and Mastery (LAM) models (Mills 1993; Lowney, Levy, Meroney and Gayler 2020; Skelac and Jandrić 2020). In recent years, we have witnessed a fast development of NLP systems capable of performing tasks as never before. NLP and LAM have been implemented based on deep learning neural networks, which learn concepts representation from rough data, but are nonetheless very effective in tasks (...) such as question answering, textual entailment, and translation (Devlin et al. 2019; Kitaev, Cao and Klein 2019; Wang et al. 2019). In this paper, I will debate some Wittgensteinian concepts that impact the architectures of many NLP deep-learning systems. I will focus, in particular, on the attempt to build a specific kind of architecture to model a private language. The discussion, I think, helps extract philosophical assumptions leading the research and development of AI systems capable of language modelling. In this paper, I will address some of the main features of NLP systems2 used for word embedding and one proposal to manipulate through a neural network a form of private language (Lawney et al. 2020). In §2, I will reconstruct the complex path of the private language argument (PLA). In §3, I will discuss connectivist language models and introduce notions about NPL systems' architecture. An overview of this kind of model is helpful to introduce the work of Lowney, Levy, Meroney and Gayler (2020). They submit that their model can respond to the issues raised by Wittgenstein in the notorious Private Language Argument (PLA). This argument unexpectedly turned out to be relevant not only for the philosophy of language but also for NLP and LAM modellers. I will describe the language game concept in NLP, how it is embedded, and its role in inductive systems development. This central concept in Wittgenstein’s work is relevant to describe the role of context in understanding the meanings of words. In §4, I present the Wittgensteinian main concepts in play in the connectivist paradigm. I argue that the connectionist theoretical framework can better catch the dependency of word meaning on context. There seems to be a correlation between Wittgenstein's invitation to look, an invitation to dismiss the aim of theorizing about languages, and the absence of theory-ladenness in deep learning technologies involved in NLP. In §5, I criticize Lowney and colleagues’ claim, whose model does not successfully capture Wittgenstein’s Beetle in the Box case. Moreover, I argue that even if we can distinguish a strong and a weak definition of a private language, Wittgenstein’s argument also holds for deep-learning models, and his worries are still a good guide for NLP developers. (shrink)

Scientific understanding in the field of cognitive sciences is a multifaceted concept that necessitates reflecting on the integration of various explanations. In this paper, I argue that different kinds of explanations regarding cognitive sciences can be integrated into an account of explanatory scientific understanding, as proposed by Khalifa. Moreover, I propose that scientific understanding should be distinct from mere knowledge and should be conceptualized as a nexus of explanation. This paper explores the theoretical foundations of scientific understanding, discusses different types (...) of explanations in cognitive sciences, criticises a reduction problem in Khalifa’s account and elucidates how these explanations can be effectively integrated to foster a holistic understanding of cognitive phenomena. Through an interdisciplinary approach, the aim of this paper is to enrich our comprehension of cognitive sciences and promote a more unified perspective on scientific understanding. (shrink)