There has been a renewed interest of late in the thought of Henry of Ghent.1 Scholars have recognized that Henry was an influential figure at the University of Paris in the late-thirteenth century and that his influence extended well past his own generation. It is also widely acknowledged that Henry's thought developed significantly over the span of his career.2 The critical edition of Henry's works has proven to be crucial in assessing this development.3 Nonetheless there is little consensus on the (...) nature of the development, particularly with respect to his theory of cognition. One reason for the diversity of opinions is that no single trend can be identified in his doctrine as a whole; rather, distinct .. (shrink)

The paper argues in favour of a direct realist reading of Aquinas’s theory of intelligible species, in opposition to the recent representationalist challenges. In order to secure the direct realist reading, the paper follows three steps: a short description of Aquinas’s process of cognition, a survey of the direct realist arguments and the analysis of the representationalist interpretation. The final step consists of investigating the representationalist reading as it is suggested by two scholars, Claude Panaccio in Aquinas on (...) Intellectual Representation and Robert Pasnau in Theories of Cognition in the Latter Middle Ages. Thus, the paper can be construed as a reply to these two authors, due to the thorough attention paid to their argumentative trails. With regard to Panaccio’s reading the paper focuses on the identity between the intelligible species and the essence of the extra-mental object and argues that Panaccio understands identity in a very narrow sense. Concerning Pasnau’s line of reasoning the focus is on the primum cognitum status of the intelligible species, and the main argument is that intelligible species is understood by Aquinas as the quo and not the quod of cognition. As the paper shows, neither one, nor the other interpretation poses a threat to the direct realist reading of Aquinas’s intelligible species. (shrink)

Vivarium (VIV) is an international journal dedicated to the history of philosophy and intellectual life from the early Middle Ages to the early modern era. It is widely recognized as an unrivalled resource for the history of logic, semantics, epistemology, and metaphysics. It welcomes articles on medieval, Renaissance and early-modern thinkers, their ideas, arguments, and writings, as well as the institutional and intellectual life of this period. -/- Editions of texts as brief appendices to the main articles may be added. (...) Articles on early-modern philosophy are welcome if they link it with the medieval and Renaissance traditions. Articles on Arabic and Jewish thought are welcome if there is a clear connection with the Latin tradition. Vivarium also publishes regularly special issues devoted to a particular theme or philosopher. (shrink)

Intelligence is not a property unique to the human brain; rather it represents a spectrum of phenomena. An understanding of the evolution of intelligence makes it clear that the evolution of machine intelligence has no theoretical limits — unlike the evolution of the human brain. Machine intelligence will outpace human intelligence and very likely will do so during the lifetime of our children. The mix of advanced machine intelligence with human individual and communal intelligence will create an evolutionary discontinuity as (...) profound as the origin of life. It will presage the end of the human species as we know it. The question, in the author's view, is not whether this will happen, but when, and what should be our response. (shrink)

We review evidence for Macphail’s (1982, 1985, 1987) Null Hypothesis, that nonhumans animals do not differ either qualitatively or quantitatively in their cognitive capacities. Our review supports the Null Hypothesis in so much as there are no qualitative differences among nonhuman vertebrate animals, and any observed differences along the qualitative dimension can be attributed to failures to account for contextual variables. We argue species do differ quantitatively, however, and that the main difference in “intelligence” among animals lies in the (...) degree to which one must account for contextual variables. (shrink)

Burkart et al. present a paradox – general factors of intelligence exist among individual differences (g) in performance in several species, and also at the aggregate level (G); however, there is ambiguous evidence for the existence of g when analyzing data using a mixed approach, that is, when comparing individuals of different species using the same cognitive ability battery. Here, we present an empirical solution to this paradox.

Plant and animal species are information-processing entities of such complexity, integration, and adaptive competence that it may be scientifically fruitful to consider them intelligent. The possibility arises from the analogy between learning and evolution, and from recent developments in evolutionary science, psychology and cognitive science. Species are now described as spatiotemporally localized individuals in an expanded hierarchy of biological entities. Intentional and cognitive abilities are now ascribed to animal, human, and artificial intelligence systems that process information adaptively, and (...) that manifest problem-solving abilities. The structural and functional similarities between such systems and species are extensive, although they “are usually obscured by population-genetic metaphors that have nonetheless contributed much to our understanding of evolution.In this target article, I use Sewall Wright's notion of the “adaptive landscape” to compare the performances of evolving species to those of intelligent organisms. With regard to their adaptive achievements and the kinds of processes by which they are achieved, biological species compare very favorably to intelligent animals by virtue of interactions between populations and their environments, between ontogeny and phylogeny, and between natural, interdemic, organic, and species selection. Addressing the question of whether species are intelligent could help to refine our ideas about species, evolution, and intelligence, and could open new lines of empirical and theoretical inquiry in many disciplines. (shrink)

v. 1. Classical roots and medieval discussions -- v. 2. Renaissance controversis, later scholasticism, and the elimination of the intelligible species in modern philosophy.

Science requires postformal capabilities to compare competing explanations and conceptualize how to coordinate or integrate them. With conflicts thus reconciled, science advances. The Model of Hierarchical Complexity facilitates the coordination of current arguments about intelligence. A cross-species measurement theory of comparative cognition is proposed. It has potential to overcome the lack of a general measurement theory for the science of comparative cognition, and the lack of domain-general mechanisms for evolutionary psychologists. The hierarchical complexity of concepts and debates as well (...) as the new theory are scored, and demonstrate the postformal hierarchical complexity of the proposed theory. (shrink)

This paper offers an assessment of some of the central aspects of Edith Stein’s conception of intentional acts proposed in Potency and Act. Studies Towards a Philosophy of Being. Her account hinges upon a combination of Thomistic and Husserlian concepts. She borrows from Aquinas two conceptual pairs that are central to his metaphysics and theory of knowledge: the actuality-potency dichotomy; and the distinction between sensible and intelligible species. The distinction and relevant articulation between sensible and intelligible (...) class='Hi'>species provide Stein with the basis to present her own conception of intentionality (with special focus on perception): the sensible species is regarded as the correlate of the object’s Gestalt; by contrast, the intelligible species is mobilised to account for what Husserl labels noesis-noema correlation. But Stein’s ambition is also to inscribe her account of the species sensibilis within an overall (critical) interpretation of Husserl’s transcendental idealism. This work was supported by the Czech Science Foundation, financing the project “Intentionality and Person in Medieval Philosophy and Phenomenology” (GAČR 21-08256S). (shrink)

This ambitious work is an examination of the origin and development of the doctrine of intelligible species extending from classical thought through late medieval discussions. A second forthcoming volume will carry the analyses into Renaissance controversies, developments of late Scholasticism, and the elimination of the intelligible species in modern non-Aristotelian speculators. The presentation concentrates on printed sources of primary texts and a comprehensive utilization of most of the recent pertinent secondary literature. It is consistently focused on (...) the central issue of the status and function of mediating principles in the mental elaboration of sensory experience. With virtually every significant figure of all major intellectual currents considered, the foundations have been laid for presentations in the forthcoming second volume of Renaissance developments. (shrink)

Robots equipped with artificial intelligence pose a huge challenge to traditional ontological differentiations between the spheres of the human and the non-human. Drawing mainly from neo-animistic and perspectivist approaches in anthropology and science and technology studies, the paper explores the potential of new forms of interconnectedness and rhizomatic entanglements between humans and a world transcending the boundaries between species and material spheres. We argue that intelligent robots meet virtually all criteria Western biology came up with to define ‘life’ and (...) that it ultimately makes sense to recognize them as a new species that is part of our social universe. Contrasting dualistic concepts of man and nature with a monistic approach, we show that traditional properties of life (agency, self-replication, etc.) may apply to artefacts and that, once we accept the idea that social relationships are ultimately open connections to matter of any kind, the seemingly strict boundaries between species and material spheres can no longer be sustained. Instead, we propose to include ‘matter’ and ideas into the sphere of the social as agents in their own right to form a _relational ontology of multi-species assemblages_ (ROMA). (shrink)

The presence of general intelligence poses a major evolutionary puzzle, which has led to increased interest in its presence in nonhuman animals. The aim of this review is to critically evaluate this question and to explore the implications for current theories about the evolution of cognition. We first review domain-general and domain-specific accounts of human cognition in order to situate attempts to identify general intelligence in nonhuman animals. Recent studies are consistent with the presence of general intelligence in mammals (rodents (...) and primates). However, the interpretation of a psychometricgfactor as general intelligence needs to be validated, in particular in primates, and we propose a range of such tests. We then evaluate the implications of general intelligence in nonhuman animals for current theories about its evolution and find support for the cultural intelligence approach, which stresses the critical importance of social inputs during the ontogenetic construction of survival-relevant skills. The presence of general intelligence in nonhumans implies that modular abilities can arise in two ways, primarily through automatic development with fixed content and secondarily through learning and automatization with more variable content. The currently best-supported model, for humans and nonhuman vertebrates alike, thus construes the mind as a mix of skills based on primary and secondary modules. The relative importance of these two components is expected to vary widely among species, and we formulate tests to quantify their strength. (shrink)

This series will include monographs and collections of studies devoted to the investigation and exploration of knowledge, information and data-processing systems of all kinds, no matter whether human, (other) animal or machine. Its scope is intended to span the full range of interests from classical problems in the philosophy of mind and phi losophical psychology through issues in cognitive psychology and socio biology (concerning the mental capabilities of other species) to ideas related to artificial intelligence and computer science. While (...) primary emphasis will be placed upon theoretical, conceptual and epistemologi cal aspects of these problems and domains, empirical, experimental and methodological studies will also appear from time to time. Among the most challenging and difficult projects within the scope of artificial intelligence is the development and implementation of com puter programs suitable for processing natural language. Our purpose in compiling the present volume has been to contribute to the foundations of this enterprise by bringing together classic papers devoted to crucial problems involved in understanding natural language, which range from issues of formal syntax and logical form to those of possible-worlds and situation semantics. The book begins with a comprehensive introduc tion composed by Jack Kulas, the senior editor of this work, which pro vides a systematic orientation to this complex field, and ends with a selected bibliography intended to promote further research. If our efforts assist others in dealing with these problems, they will have been worthwhile. J. H. F. (shrink)

As Artificial Intelligence researchers attempt to emulate human intelligence and transhumanists work toward superintelligence, philosophers and theologians confront a dilemma: we must either, on the one horn, (1) abandon the view that the defining feature of humanity is rationality and propose an account of spirituality that dissociates it from reason; or, on the other horn, (2) find a way to invalidate the growing faith in a posthuman future shaped by the enhancements of Intelligence Amplification (IA) or the progress of Artificial (...) Intelligence (AI). I grasp both horns of the dilemma and offer three recommendations. First, it is love understood as agape, not rational intelligence, which tells us how to live a godly life. Love tells us how to be truly human. Second, the transhumanist vision of a posthuman superintelligence is not only unrealistic, it portends the kind of tragedy we expect from a false messiah. Third, if as a byproduct of AI and IA research combined with H+ zeal the wellbeing of the human species and our planet is enhanced, we should be grateful. (shrink)

Species conservation activities are gaining more attention in the context of environmental degradation. This article proposes to tackle different semiotic aspects of reintroduction as one possible way of furthering species conservation. More specifically, we aim to bring forth the strength of ecosemiotic perspective when dealing with such a complex matter with many different human and non-human subjects. We concentrate on animal agency, search and function tone, semiotic fitting and changes in umwelten when analysing the reintroduction process from the (...) perspective of the animal. When considering the locals’ perspective, we take into account the appeal and cultural placement of the species, as well as human and non-human umwelt overlap when it comes to resources. As our case study we use the European mink (Mustela lutreola) and its reintroduction to the island of Hiiumaa and planned reintroduction to the island of Saaremaa in Estonia. By employing semiotic analysis, we discover that reintroduced animals need to exhibit innovation and plasticity to establish novel semiotic relations but also restore relations characteristic to the historical environments of the species. We argue that human views and expectations towards the species and (re)introduction efforts account for animals’ appearance and agency. Additionally, contrast with other wild species, the perceived overlap of human and non-human umwelten, and broader conservation discourse are decisive for the formation of interspecific relations in situ. Thus, ecosemiotcs proves to be a valuable research platform for an analysis of conservation practices that targets both, sociocultural context and animal umwelten. (shrink)

This is the first of a two-volume monograph on the Unification of Artificial Intelligence and Psychology. It unifies the topics of representation, meaning, thinking, communication, and understanding. Such a unification requires the establishment of a novel, fully explicated, theoretical construct —noémon system— that replaces all the inadequately developed concepts that historically have been used as constitutive notions of cognitive science. The space of noémon systems encompasses an awe-inspiring variety of noémon species and an increasing variety of artificially noémon entities (...) and hybrid noémon systems. As such, it is a superspace of the space of phenomena addressed by cognitive science. The theory of noémon systems (TNS) described in this two-volume monograph is envisaged as the first step towards an emerging science of noémon systems. (shrink)

> Future people count. There could be a lot of them. We can make their lives better. > > -- William MacAskill, What We Owe The Future > > [Longtermism is] quite possibly the most dangerous secular belief system in the world today. > > -- Émile P. Torres, Against Longtermism Philosophers,1 2 psychologists,3 4 politicians5 and even some tech billionaires6 have sounded the alarm about artificial intelligence (AI) and the dangers it may pose to the long-term future of humanity. (...) Some believe it poses an existential risk (X-Risk)7 to our species, potentially causing our extinction or bringing about the collapse of human civilisation as we know it. The above quote from philosopher Will MacAskill captures the key tenets of ‘longtermism’, an ethical standpoint that places the onus on current generations to prevent AI-related—and other—X-Risks for the sake of people living in the future.1 2 Developing from an adjacent social movement commonly associated with utilitarian philosophy, ‘effective altruism’, longtermism has amassed following of its own. Its supporters argue that preventing X-Risks is at least as morally significant as addressing current challenges like global poverty. However, critics are concerned that such a distant-future focus will sideline efforts to tackle the many pressing moral issues facing humanity now.8 9 Indeed, according to ‘strong’ longtermism,10 future needs arguably should take precedence over present ones. In essence, the claim is that there is greater expected utility to allocating available resources to prevent human extinction in the future than there is to focusing on present lives, since doing so stands to benefit the incalculably large number of people in later generations who will far outweigh existing populations.1 Taken to the extreme, this view suggests it would be morally permissible, or even required, to actively neglect, harm or destroy large swathes of humanity as …. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence represents a key technology being inbuilt into evermore products. Research investigating attitudes towards artificial intelligence surprisingly is still scarce, although it becomes apparent that artificial intelligence will shape societies around the globe. To better understand individual differences in attitudes towards artificial intelligence, the present study investigated in n = 351 participants associations between the Affective Neuroscience Personality Scales (ANPS) and the Attitudes towards Artificial Intelligence framework (ATAI). It could be observed that in particular higher levels of SADNESS were (...) associated with higher negative attitudes towards AI (fearing AI). The findings are discussed in this work from an evolutionary perspective because primary emotional systems—according to Affective Neuroscience Theory—represent tools for survival, which have been homologously conserved across mammalian species including homo sapiens. (shrink)

Some contemporary theories about the origin and the nature of language resort to concepts with no bearing on Darwinian evolutionary hypothesis or evo-devo perspective which are both based on the reconstruction of species morphological structure transformation. These theories, which evoke qualitative leap, cultural evolution, structure/function coevolution as esplicative principles for human evolution, in our opinion, result compatible in some points with the most recent Intelligent Design accounts. Attempting to substantiate itself as a scientific theory, the contemporary ID is ready (...) to give up creationist explanation just to impeding Darwin’s fundamental idea according to which it’s possible to explain evolution only through a gradual material modification of structures. For comprehending a complex phenomenon as human language – according to ID – it’s necessary appealing to a second substance, whatever it is. This idea seems to be at the bottom of all those theories which have rejected monistic structural explanation for embracing functional, psychological or cultural accounts. We consider these kinds of explanation real unresolved residuals of ID, residuals nested in the heart of the most accredited scientific theories. (shrink)

Charles Darwin's Origin of Species, published in 1859, was a revolutionary attempt “to overthrow the dogma of separate creations,” a declaration that provoked different reactions among the religious, ranging from mild enthusiasm to anger. Christians sympathetic to Darwin's effort sought to make Darwinism appear compatible with their religious beliefs. Two of Darwin's most prominent defenders in the United States were the Calvinists Asa Gray, a Harvard botanist, and George Frederick Wright, a cleric-geologist. Gray, who long favored a “special origination” (...) in connection with the evolution of humans and questioned whether natural selection can account for the formation of organs, the making of eyes, etc., embraced natural selection as the primary mechanism underlying the production of most species. He also went so far as to invoke divine providence, rather than randomness, to explain the variations on which natural selection acted. This chapter discusses creationism, intelligent design, and modern biology. (shrink)

Scotus holds that dispositional and occurrent cognitions are qualities that inhere in the soul. These qualities have semantic or conceptual content. I show that such content is nothing in any sense real, and that this content consists either in the relevant quality’s being measured by an extramental object, or in its being such that it would be measured by such an object in the case that there were such an object. The measurement relation, in the case of an intelligible (...) species, is secured by the species’s internal structure; in the case of an act of cognition, it is secured either by some sort of relation to a species, or by a relation to an external object. (shrink)

The author discusses the problem of what AI is and how we can understand the “anthropocentrism” of AI from a philosophical point of view. Three interpretations of the relationship between humans and technology are presented: 1) AI-aided human intelligence, based on the extension theory of technology (Stiegler, 1998); 2) human-aided AI intelligence, based on ideas related to political economy (Crawford, 2021); and 3) the relativity of the anthropocentric frame of reference (AFR), based on the taxonomy of species. The purpose (...) of the article is to provide considerations of the three different interpretations of the relationship between humans and technology and how they lead to different opportunities to answer the question of how we can understand AI’s creativity. (shrink)

Trade in high-value-added toxins for therapeutic and biological use is expanding. These toxins are generally derived from microalgae belonging to the dinoflagellate family. Due to the difficulties to grow these sensitive planktonic species and to the complexity of methods used to synthesize these molecules, which are generally complex chemical structures, biotoxin manufacturers called on artificial intelligence technologies. Manufacturing processes have been greatly improved through the development of specific learning neural networks, applied to each phases of biotoxin production: photo-bioreactors operating (...) at optimal yied; new chemical synthesis research processes; toxin biosynthetic research pathways offering short-cut possibilities. (shrink)

Humans are remarkably adaptable, and therefore a successful species. There are many speculative answers to the question of why this is so. One of them represents the cultural intelligence hypothesis, which consid-ers cultural learning skills as the key to human success. This work aims to present the hypothesis of cultural intelligence as a viable alternative to more conventional approaches within the debate about the origin of human intelligence, such as the hypothesis of general and improvisational intelligence. Theirmutual comparison shows (...) that cultural intelligence hypothesis must necessarily work with flexible social learning strategies to describe cultural transmission, thus losing part of its explanatory power. As the theory of metacognitive strategies of social learning by cognitive psychologist Cecilia Heyes shows, there is a way to combine the flexibility of human reasoning with the “stupid” process of cultural selection. (shrink)

Normal 0 21 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 This article will present an interpretation of Wittgenstein ’ s understanding of the relationship between ethics and aesthetics. In extension, it will inform recent discussions regarding a special kind of nonsensicality , which forms a central part of ethical and aesthetical expressions. Instead of identity between ethics and aesthetics, we should understand the relationship in terms of interdependence . Both attitudes provide a view sub specie aeternitatis and thus permit a view of the (...) world as a whole. Employing the vocabulary of Charles Taylor and Harry Frankfurt, it must be remembered that rather than a neutral view from nowhere, such wholeness arises out of strong evaluations that are made against the backdrop of a constitutive framework of intelligibility. At this point, the epistemic gain of actualizing Wittgenstein will reveal itself: it will put us in a position where it is possible to differentiate between ethical and aesthetical forms of identification that Taylor and Frankfurt neglect. However, in order to actualize Wittgenstein ’ s ideas, it is necessary to argue that Tractatus should not be understood in a Kantian fashion as suggested by Tilghman for instance. (shrink)

According to Scotus, an intelligible species with universal content, inherent in the mind, is a partial cause of an occurrent cognition whose immediate object is the self-same species. I attempt to explain how Scotus defends the possibility of this causal activity. Scotus claims, generally, that forms are causes, and that inherence makes no difference to the capacity of a form to cause an effect. He illustrates this by examining a case in which an accident is an instrument (...) of a substance in the production of a certain sort of effect. All that is required is that the accident is relevantly joined to the substance, whether or not it inheres in the substance. Since intelligible species are bearers of semantic content, it follows that non-inherent objects of thought can also be the bearers of such content. Such objects are included in the mind without inherence, and the boundary between the mind and external reality is to this extent broken down. (shrink)

Why are humans so clever? This book explores the idea that this cleverness has evolved through the increasing complexity of social groups. It brings together contributions from leaders in the field, examining social intelligence in different animal species and exploring its development, evolution and the brain systems upon which it depends.

What can the actions of stockbreeders, as they select the best individuals for breeding, teach us about how new species of wild animals and plants come into being? Charles Darwin raised this question in his famous, even notorious, Origin of Species (1859). Darwin's answer - his argument by analogy from artificial to natural selection - is the subject of our book. We aim to clarify what kind of argument it is, how it works, and why Darwin gave it (...) such prominence. As we explain more fully in our Introduction, we believe that the argument becomes much more intelligible when set, contextually, in a story stretching from classical Greek mathematics to modern evolutionary genetics: a long story, and a broad one too, encompassing everything from Darwin's earliest notebook theorising on the births and deaths of species, to agrarian capitalism as a distinctive form of economic life, to shifting Western reflections on art-nature relations. (shrink)

Fear and concerns regarding AI and robots have existed for a long time, and the emergence of strong artificial intelligence, on par with human intelligence, is likely just a few decades away. The primary purpose of this article is to establish a theoretical framework for navigating the relationship between humans and this advanced form of artificial intelligence. This article first points out that the most fundamental characteristic of life is its continuous process of evolution and iteration. By analyzing the developmental (...) history of intelligence in different species, it can be observed that intelligence also exhibits a similar evolutionary phenomenon. Therefore, from this perspective, intelligence can be defined as a new form of information life. Under this premise, similarities and differences between information life forms and conventional biological life become apparent. The most significant distinction lies in the fact that the survival of biological life is based on non-replicable matter and energy, leading to extensive competition and food chain phenomena within ecosystems. In contrast, the survival of information life relies more on replicable information, fostering tendencies towards peace and communication. Based on this theoretical premise, there is a potential for a harmonious coexistence between humans and AI. This theory also provides guidance for the positive development of human society. (shrink)

William Paley ( Natural Theology , 1802) developed the argument-from-design. The complex structure of the human eye evinces that it was designed by an intelligent Creator. The argument is based on the irreducible complexity ("relation") of multiple interacting parts, all necessary for function. Paley adduces a wealth of biological examples leading to the same conclusion; his knowledge of the biology of his time was profound and extensive. Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species is an extended argument demonstrating that the "design" (...) of organisms can be explained by natural selection. Moreover, the dysfunctions, defects, waste, and cruelty that prevail in the living world are incompatible with a benevolent and omnipotent Creator. They come about by a process that incorporates chance and necessity, mutation and natural selection. In addition to science, there are other ways of knowing, such as art, literature, philosophy, and religion. Matters of value, meaning, and purpose transcend science. (shrink)

The world of artificial intelligence appears to be in rapid transition, and claims that artificial general intelligence is impossible are competing with concerns that we may soon be seeing Artificial Godlike Intelligence and that we should be very afraid of this prospect. This article discusses the issues from a psychological and social perspective and suggests that with the advent of Generative Artificial Intelligence, something that looks to humans like Artificial General Intelligence has become a distinct possibility as is the idea (...) of making it semi-autonomous: not just responding to discrete external inputs or performing specific tasks but able to prompt itself to create an ongoing stream of cognition that can possess something akin to a ‘purpose’. Add to that the ability of computers to be connected in vast networks, and we can envisage intelligences with staggering amounts of knowledge and reasoning capability, engaging with humans to anticipate and grant wishes. Such Semi-Autonomous Godlike Artificial Intelligences (SAGAIs—meaning ‘engagements’ in Hindi) could end up like Kali, wreaking death and destruction on our species or like Thor, acting as a saviour and protector of humanity. Which of these our SAGAIs most resemble could depend on whose wishes it is designed to serve: a rich oligarchy seeking ever greater wealth and power whatever the cost to others, or a populace that has compassion for each other and for life on the planet. (shrink)

As we now know, most, if not all, philosophers in the High Middle Ages agreed that what we immediately perceive are external objects and that the immediate object of perception must not be some image present to the mind. Yet most — but not all — philosophers in the High Middle Ages also held, following Aristotle, that perception is a process wherein the percipient takes on the likeness of the external object. This likeness — called a species — is (...) a representation (of some sort) by means of which we immediately perceive external objects. But how can perception be at once direct — or immediate — and at the same time by way of representations? The usual answer here was that the species represents the external object to some percipient even though the species itself is not at all perceived: the species is that by which I perceive and not that which I perceive. John Buridan defends this traditional view — call it direct realism with representations. However, just a couple of decades before Buridan, one of the more important philosophers at Paris, Durand of St.-Pourçain, had already rejected direct realism with representation. Durand defends what I will call direct realism without representations. On his view, a species is not at all necessary during overtly direct forms of perception, neither as cause nor as representation. This paper has two parts. In the first part, I will discuss some of the more interesting arguments that Durand makes against direct realism with representations. In the second part, I will look at Buridan's defense of the view. -/- . (shrink)

Although brain size and the concept of intelligence have been extensively used in comparative neuroscience to study cognition and its evolution, such coarse-grained traits may not be informative enough about important aspects of neurocognitive systems. By taking into account the different evolutionary trajectories and the selection pressures on neurophysiology across species, Logan and colleagues suggest that the cognitive abilities of an organism should be investigated by considering the fine-grained and species-specific phenotypic traits that characterize it. In such a (...) way, we would avoid adopting human-oriented, coarse-grained traits, typical of the standard approach in cognitive neuroscience. We argue that this standard approach can fail in some cases, but can, however, work in others, by discussing two major topics in contemporary neuroscience as examples: general intelligence and brain asymmetries. (shrink)