George F. Kennan's political realism defines the object of diplomacy as the pursuit of the national self-interest and renders legitimate any means which expediently serve that purpose.

Classical realism is enjoying a renaissance in the study of international relations. It is well known that the analytical and normative international-political thought of early 20th-century classical realists is based on assumptions about human nature. Yet current knowledge of these assumptions remains limited. This article therefore revisits and examines the nature and intellectual roots of the human nature assumptions of three truly consequential classical realists. The analysis shows — similar to the causa Hans J. Morgenthau — that the human nature (...) assumptions of George F. Kennan, Walter Lippmann and E. H. Carr are — to varying degrees — Freudian. Unless this hitherto neglected dimension is recognized, an understanding of their international-political thought and of the political philosophy of realism remains incomplete. Two conclusions are presented. First, current criticism of classical realism’s human nature assumptions is unjustified. Second, any (re-) engagement with classical realism must recognize its human nature baggage. Realist international-political theorizing is necessarily human nature-based international-political theorizing. (shrink)

In this response, George Ellis comments on the publications of Part I. He responds first to Sara Green and Robert Batterman, before outlining his thoughts on Otávio Bueno’s piece.

Introduction -- Part I: Humanism : its modern construction and deconstruction -- The modern construction of the person -- The critique of modern humanism -- Part II: Pre-philosophical awareness of the foundations of human meaning -- Foundations for human meaning in totemic thought -- Myth as picturing human life and meaning -- Part III: The western notion of the person for global times -- Building the notion of the human person in western philosophy -- Human subjectivity and the unity and (...) plurality of cultures -- Karol Wojtyla's philosophy of person as integration of being and consciousness -- Part IV: Asian paths for person and community -- Confucian harmony and humane progress -- Hinduism : metaphysical path to the holy. (shrink)

This chapter responds to claims that causal closure of the underlying microphysics determines brain outcomes as a matter of principle, even if we cannot hope to ever carry out the needed calculations in practice. The reductionist position is that microphysics alone determines all, specifically the functioning of the brain. Here I respond to that claim in depth, claiming that if one firstly takes into account the difference between synchronic and diachronic emergence, and secondly takes seriously the well established nature of (...) biology in general and neuroscience in particular, downward causation enables genuine causal powers to occur at higher emergent levels in biology and that causal closure is in reality an interlevel affair involving even social levels. (shrink)

The procedures used to ensure reliable occurrences of the A-not-B error distort and miss essential features of Piaget's original observations. A model that meshes a mental event, highly restricted by testing procedures, to the dynamics of bodily movement is of limited value. To embody more than just perseverative reaching, the formal model must incorporate Piaget's essential features.

A biogenetic structural explanation is offered for the cross‐culturally common mystical experience called portalling, the experience of moving from one reality to another via a tunnel, door, aperture, hole, or the like. The experience may be evoked in shamanistic and meditative practice by concentration upon a portalling device (mirror, mandala, labyrinth, skrying bowl, pool of water, etc.). Realization of the portalling experience is shown to be fundamental to the phenomenology underlying multiple reality cosmologies in traditional cultures and is explained in (...) terms of radical re‐entrainment of the neurological systems mediating experience in the brain. Phenomenological experiments with mirror portalling devices from both the Tibetan and the Tsimshian religious traditions are reported. (shrink)

Instead of arguing for a specific animal model, Striedter will review the history and philosophy of animal models in biomedical research, examining their various advantages and limitations.

In this response, George Ellis comments on the publications of Part IV. He responds first to James Woodward, Richard Healey, Jan Voosholz, Simon Friederich and Sach Mukherjee, before outlining his thoughts on Max Kistler’s piece.

PART The Origins of a Philosophy of Reality "When you have listened, not to me, but to the Law (Logos), it is wise to agree that all things are one. ...

Totemic unity as key to community in thought and action -- Myth : the emergence of diversity within unity -- The individual in the Greek polis -- The synthesis of personal uniqueness and social unity in Christian and Islamic thought -- Modern alienation of individuals and society -- Opening a new paradigm for civil society and social harmony : a contemporary metaphysics of freedom -- The diversified unity of a global whole.

Ontogenetic factors constrain the evolution of species-typical traits. Because human infants are born “prematurely” relative to other primates, the development of handedness during infancy can reveal important ontogenetic influences on handedness that may have contributed to the evolution of the human species-typical trait of a population-level right-hand dominance.

It has been just over 100 years since the birth of Alan Turing and more than 65 years since he published in Mind his seminal paper, Computing Machinery and Intelligence. In the Mind paper, Turing asked a number of questions, including whether computers could ever be said to have the power of “thinking”. Turing also set up a number of criteria—including his imitation game—under which a human could judge whether a computer could be said to be “intelligent”. Turing’s paper, as (...) well as his important mathematical and computational insights of the 1930s and 1940s led to his popular acclaim as the “Father of Artificial Intelligence”. In the years since his paper was published, however, no computational system has fully satisfied Turing’s challenge. In this paper we focus on a different question, ignored in, but inspired by Turing’s work: How might the Artificial Intelligence practitioner implement “intelligence” on a computational device? Over the past 60 years, although the AI community has not produced a general-purpose computational intelligence, it has constructed a large number of important artifacts, as well as taken several philosophical stances able to shed light on the nature and implementation of intelligence. This paper contends that the construction of any human artifact includes an implicit epistemic stance. In AI this stance is found in commitments to particular knowledge representations and search strategies that lead to a product’s successes as well as its limitations. Finally, we suggest that computational and human intelligence are two different natural kinds, in the philosophical sense, and elaborate on this point in the conclusion. (shrink)

We applaud Brown, Elliott, and Paine (2013) for their overarching goal of providing ethical justification for decisions to withdraw nonfutile life-sustaining medical treatments in some cases after...

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The multiplication of rights— legally enforceable claims on the attention, actions, and resources of others—can carry us only so far. Improvements for the handicapped depend primarily on improving the attitudes of the nonhandicapped majority through appeals to conscience and good will.