Après " le Temps et sa Flèche ", la deuxième rencontre " Physique et Interrogations Fondamentales ", dont le présent ouvrage rassemble les actes, était consacrée à une question, certes ancienne, mais que les développements des techniques de l'information posent avec une brûlante actualité, celle des rapports du virtuel et du réel. Les textes ici rassemblés témoignent du remarquable effort de clarté et d'accessibilité consenti par les auteurs. Par son existence même, ce livre met en évidence le fil conducteur qui (...) a traversé tous les débats de la rencontre, à savoir le puissant rôle heuristique du virtuel : Ce qu'il faut, c'est voir. Et voir c'est chercher à voir, derrière toutes les images, toutes les représentations, derrière toutes les visions, ce qui ne se laisse pas voir, mais qui se laisse chercher. ". (shrink)

Three experiments investigated the mechanisms, correlates, and methods of immunization against interrogative suggestibility (IS). IS involves reliance in memory reports on suggestions contained in misleading questions (Yield) and the tendency to change answers under negative feedback about the quality of previous testimony (Shift). All three studies found that the milder version of the tool used in the studies (GSS) resulted in lower Yield and Shift. In analyses considering the memory states of the participants, IS was found to be highest (...) when participants mistakenly attributed the information contained in the suggestive questions to the original material. However, significant percentages of the participants succumbed to suggestions and changed answers even when they were aware of the discrepancy between the original material and the information contained in the questions. The warning against suggestions was found to lower Yield and Shift, and this was especially true when participants were aware of discrepancies between original material and suggestions. Enhancing self-esteem and inducing mindfulness did not reduce IS. The correlations between IS, including IS in individual mindfulness states, with the Big Five personality traits, anxiety, susceptibility to influence, and self-esteem were inconsistent. (shrink)

The Interrogative Model of Inquiry and Dynamic Epistemic Logics are two central paradigms in formal epistemology. This paper is motivated by the observation of a significant complementarity between them: on the one hand, the IMI provides a framework for investigating inquiry represented as an idealized game between an Inquirer and Nature, along with an account of the interaction between questions and inferences in information-seeking processes, but is lacking a formulation in the multi-agent case; on the other hand, DELs model (...) various operations of information change in multi-agent systems, but the field is lacking a proper integration of question and inference dynamics, along with an application to the investigation of inquiry processes. The goal of this paper is to integrate the two paradigms in such a way as to combine their respective insights. To this end, we develop a formal system called DEL $$_\mathrm{IMI }$$ IMI which aims to represent the interaction between question and inference dynamics in inquiry—as described by the IMI—in a multi-agent setting, and this in such a way as to enable an investigation of inquiry games with multi-agent dimensions. The DEL $$_\mathrm{IMI }$$ IMI system is designed to represent the possible moves of such inquiry games through three types of epistemic actions: agents addressing questions to Nature, agents addressing questions to other agents, agents drawing logical inferences. We then show how the resulting framework can be used to formally define multi-agent inquiry games. We conclude by evaluating the interest of the DEL $$_\mathrm{IMI }$$ IMI system for the IMI and DELs paradigms. (shrink)

The speech act of inquiry is generally treated as a default kind of asking questions. The widespread norm states that one inquires whether p only if one does not know that p. However, the fact that inquiring is just one kind of asking questions has received little to no attention. Just as in the declarative mood we can perform not only assertions, but various other speech acts, like guesses or predictions, so in the interrogative mood we can also make (...) various speech act types. I propose a speech-act-theoretic account of a distinct kind of question that I label exam questions. According to the proposed account, one performs an exam question p only if (i) one has access to the answer to p, and (ii) one does not officially know whether the hearer knows the answer to p. Exam questions satisfy all the necessary requirements of being a distinct kind of speech act. Additionally, my proposal contributes to the recent expansion of the normative approach to a variety of speech acts. (shrink)

Balfe argues against enhanced interrogation. He particularly focuses on the involvement of U.S. healthcare professionals in enhanced interrogation. He identifies several empirical and normative factors and argues that they are not good reasons to morally justify enhanced interrogation. I argue that his argument can be improved by making two points. First, Balfe considers the reasoning of those healthcare professionals as utilitarian. However, careful consideration of their ideas reveals that their reasoning is consequential rather than utilitarian evaluation. Second, torture is a (...) serious human rights abuse. When healthcare professionals become involved in enhanced interrogation, they violate not only human rights against torture but also human rights to health. Considering the consequential reasoning against human rights abuses, healthcare professionals’ involvement in enhanced interrogation is not morally justified. Supplementing Balfe’s position with these two points makes his argument more complete and convincing, and hence it can contribute to the way which shows that enhanced interrogation is not justified by consequential evaluation. (shrink)

The well known AGM framework for belief revision has recently been extended to include a model of the research agenda of the agent, i.e. a set of questions to which the agent wishes to find answers (Olsson & Westlund in Erkenntnis , 65 , 165–183, 2006 ). The resulting model has later come to be called interrogative belief revision . While belief revision has been studied extensively from the point of view of modal logic, so far interrogative belief (...) revision has only been dealt with in the metalanguage approach in which AGM was originally presented. In this paper, I show how to model interrogative belief revision in a modal object language using a class of operators for questions. In particular, the solution I propose will be shown to capture the notion of K-truncation , a method for agenda update in the case of expansion constructed by Olsson & Westlund. Two case studies are conducted: first, an interrogative extension of Krister Segerberg’s system DDL, and then a similar extension of Giacomo Bonanno’s modal logic for belief revision. Sound and complete axioms will be provided for both of the resulting logics. (shrink)

This paper aims to establish three major theses: (1) Not only declarative sentences, but also interrogatives and imperatives, may be classified as true or as false. (2) Declarative, imperative, and interrogative utterances may also be classified as honest or as dishonest. (3) Whether an utterance is honest or dishonest is logically independent of whether it is true or is false. The establishment of the above theses follows upon the adoption of a principle for identifying what is meant by any (...) sentence, declarative, interrogative, or imperative. The analysis aims to show that meaning is to be attributed to the uttered or written sentence-token, rather to the thereby exhibited sentence-type. Further, the meaning of the sentential token is to be identified with a purpose of the speaker, that the speaker would reveal to the addressee by uttering the sentence. The to be revealed purpose is analysed into two components: an ultimate concern (that the addressee stand in such and such a relation--e.g., of believing, or informing the speaker about, or making it true that) and an ultimate topic of concern (the state of affairs, i.e., proposition, relative to which the speaker would have the addressee stand in the specified relation). Sentential utterances "signify" different purposes by "expressing" different ultimate concerns and "indicating" different ultimate topics of concern. Variations in expressed concern are correlated with variations in sentential form, such as declarative, interrogative and imperative. Variations in indicated topic of concern are correlated with variations in the subject and predicate of the uttered sentence. Thus, for example, utterances of "Johnny will jump in the lake," "Will Johnny jump in the lake?" and "Johnny, go jump in the lake!" all indicate one and the same ultimate topic of concern but express different ultimate concerns with this topic. A sentential utterance is true or false according as its indicated topic of concern is true or false. Hence, declaratives, interrogatives and imperatives may all be classified as true or as false. But honesty or dishonesty is a function (explained in the paper) of the expressed concern, rather than of the topic of concern. Hence, although utterances of all sentential forms are honest or dishonest, their honesty or dishonesty is logically independent of their truth or falsity. (shrink)

Interrogational torture is torture that is done in order to gain information. It is wrong if it either wrongs the person being interrogated or is a free-floating wrong. In the relevant cases, interrogational torture need not wrong the person being interrogated. This is because in many cases it doesn’t, and is known not to, infringe on the tortured person’s moral rights. It is not clear whether interrogational torture is a free-floating wrong since we lack confidence in judging whether it violates (...) a consequentialist duty. Even if interrogational torture is morally permissible, it doesn’t follow that it is the best policy for a country to adopt. (shrink)

The Syllabus for Certain Topics of Logic is a long treatise that Peirce wrote in October and November to complement the material of his 1903 Lowell Lectures. The last of the eight lectures was on abduction, first entitled “How to Theorize” and then “Abduction.” Of abduction, the Syllabus states that its “conclusion is drawn in the interrogative mood ”.1 This is not the first time that Peirce associates abduction to interrogations,2 but the statement is significant because it is the (...) first time that the “interrogative mood” is ascribed to speculative grammar. At the same time, such... (shrink)

Interrogating Modernity returns to Hans Blumenberg's epochal The Legitimacy of the Modern Age as a springboard to interrogate questions of modernity, secularisation, technology and political legitimacy in the fields of political theology, history of ideas, political theory, art theory, history of philosophy, theology and sociology. That is, the twelve essays in this volume return to Blumenberg's work to think once more about how and why we should value the modern. Written by a group of leading international and interdisciplinary researchers, this (...) series of responses to the question of the modern put Blumenberg into dialogue with other twentieth, and twenty-first century theorists, such as Arendt, Bloch, Derrida, Husserl, Jonas, Latour, Voegelin, Weber and many more. The result is a repositioning of his work at the heart of contemporary attempts to make sense of who we are and how we’ve got here. (shrink)

Until recently, torture was regarded as an unthinkable act. But in the dark years following September 11, 2001, many people have defended it openly as they have many other kinds of action previously considered taboo. And the underlying issues are complicated. Yet at least a virtually absolute prohibition on interrogational torture can be rationally defended.

Presents collected writings of Slavoj Zizek - one of the world's leading contemporary cultural commentators. Drawing upon a range of his prolific output, the articles here cover psychoanalysis, philosophy and popular culture.

A collection of articles by distinguished scholars from a variety of disciplines providing a postmodern perspective on the ethical and political issues raised by the classical figure of Antigone, a woman who questions the role of the patriarchal state.

The issue of adequacy of the Turing Test (TT) is addressed. The concept of Turing Interrogative Game (TIG) is introduced. We show that if some conditions hold, then each machine, even a thinking one, loses a certain TIG and thus an instance of TT. If, however, the conditions do not hold, the success of a machine need not constitute a convincing argument for the claim that the machine thinks.

L’interrogation en Italie du Nord : ce que les corpus nous disent et les questions qu’ils laissent ouvertesCet article traite de l’interrogation dans les variétés de l’Italie du Nord, plus précisément celles du ladin dolomitique. Une discussion sur les corpus disponibles, leurs avantages et leurs inconvénients est complétée par la présentation de mes enquêtes dialectales : méthodologie et données recueillies. Ainsi, on verra comment la recherche basée sur des corpus déjà existants et l’enquête de terrain peuvent se compléter, les données (...) des atlas linguistiques offrant un point de départ indispensable à des investigations plus spécifiques et nécessaires. (shrink)

This book brings together a collection of work from emerging and established scholars who have put forth a vision of what critical sociology is and what it could be in the early decades of the 21st century. Pushing beyond the theoretical outlines of sociological critique, the authors demonstrate how critical sociology is practiced through conceptual innovation and empirical analyses interweaving the themes of society, power, and culture. Interrogating the Social reinvents the project of critical sociology in two ways: by reflecting (...) upon society as an object of inquiry; and by questioning the existing social order's self-evident character and exclusionary effects. In doing so, it answers three related questions: How should social relations and interactions be re-thought today? What new institutional and discursive configurations of power are emerging? How do we make sense of contemporary cultural performances and movements This edited collection is suited to a wide and diverse audience across the disciplines of sociology, political science, social and political theory, and cultural studies. (shrink)

This paper is about a topic in the semantics of interrogatives.1 In what follows a number of assumptions figure at the background which, though intuitively appealing, have not gone unchallenged, and it seems therefore only fair to draw the reader’s attention to them at the outset. The first assumption concerns a very global intuition about the kind of semantic objects that we associate with interrogatives. The intuition is that there is an intimate relationship between interrogatives and their answers: an (...) class='Hi'>interrogative determines what counts as an answer.2 Given a certain, independently motivated, view on what constitutes the meaning of an answer, this intuition, in return, determines what constitutes the meaning of an interrogative. For example, starting from the observation that answers are true or false in situations, we may be led to the view that answers express propositions, i.e., objects which determine a truth value in a situation. Given that much, our basic intuition says that interrogatives are to be associated with objects which determine propositions. Such objects will be referred to as ‘questions’ in what follows. Notice that all this is largely framework independent: we have made no assumptions yet about what situations, propositions, and questions are, we have only related them in a certain systematic way. In fact we will use a more or less standard, but certainly not uncontroversial, specification in what follows: situations are identified with (total) possible worlds; propositions with sets of worlds; and questions with equivalence relations on the set of worlds. The second assumption that plays a role in what follows is of a more linguistic nature. Interrogatives typically occur in two ways: as independent expressions, and as complements of certain verbs. The assumption is that these two ways of occurring are systematically related, not just syntactically but also semantically.3 Notice that the exact nature of this relationship is underdeter.. (shrink)

The interrogation of Meletus in the Apology at 24c4–28al is not infrequently seen as a typical case of all that is intellectually and artistically dissatisfying in Plato's practice of the genre of philosophical dialogue: not only are we presented with a philosopher who makes some claim to being committed to setting a particularly stringent standard for honesty in argumentation making sophistical arguments, but we are presented also with a cardboard interlocutor who is forced by the hand of Plato to acquiesce (...) to those arguments in a fashion that is completely dissatisfying to the reader. The best anyone seems to do to save Plato from these charges of artistic incompetence and intellectual dishonesty is to appeal to such a level of historical accuracy for the text that the stupidity of Meletus' responses can be attributed to the stupidity of Meletus himself, or to point out features of the political and legal situation that might prevent Meletus from answering the questions by drawing on his true motivation—which is presumably more coherent. Taylor says of this passage: The humour of the situation is that the prosecutor cannot venture to say what he means by either of his charges without betraying the fact that, owing to the ‘amnesty’, the matters complained of are outside of the competency of the court… Hence, when Meletus is pressed to explain what he means, he has to take refuge in puerile nonsense. (shrink)

This article seeks to interrogate the category of the ‘political’ through an exploration of the present trajectory of feminist peace activism in Sri Lanka. It provides a critical appraisal of current strategies adopted by the majority of feminist organizations that seem to suggest a shift from ‘refusal’ to ‘request’. This results in the resort to more ‘feel safe’ campaigns, rather than the placement of oneself in an antagonistic and oppositional relationship with the state, which continuously calls the political into question. (...) It concludes by considering two other kinds of political trajectories and the disparate conceptual challenges each offers. (shrink)

In this paper I propose a version of interrogative logic as a form of representation of the underlying logic of scientific practices—a kind of model-based reasoning, since it takes into account an oracle or model that can be consulted—by means of modified tableaux that can represent a game with two types of moves: logical steps and queries, governed by (modified) tales and a query rule, respectively. In this way, the process of acquiring knowledge is analogous to the justification of (...) a thesis through the method of modified tableaux. (shrink)

The need to turn an enemy into an adversary is an ethical obligation. I try to show that this obligation has multiple religious and philosophical resources. The ethical imperative also requires us to not overstate and magnify any problem at hand to the point that it becomes insurmountable and enmity becomes an end in itself. I do ask the question whether Springs thinks of Colin Kaepernick’s peaceful protest by taking the knee at football games as an instance of healthy conflict. (...) Are the terms peace and healthy conflict perhaps not better viewed as allegories for the interrogation of the human condition? Perhaps healthy conflict remains a series of questions rather than concrete outcomes. (shrink)

Michel Foucault inaugure avec ses "reportages d'idées" sur le soulèvement iranien contre le Shah (1978-1979) une approche du présent et un mode d'écriture situés au point de rencontre de la philosophie et du journalisme. Il s'y interroge sur ce qui, dans cet événement, fait époque, en tant qu'il signale la fin de l'ère des révolutions et se trouve placé sous le signe énigmatique du soulèvement d'un peuple tout entier contre un pouvoir despotique. Au coeur de sa réflexion s'identifie une réflexion (...) sur la spiritualité politique qui anime les masses iraniennes - ce mélange inextricable d'inspiration religieuse et d'aspiration à la dignité, l'égalité, la liberté. Ce qui le fascine dans ces événements, c'est la puissance mobilisatrice de la religion (l'Islam dans sa version chiite, ici) non pas au service de l'obscurantisme et de l'asservissement, mais de la lutte pour l'émancipation - comment, avant l'établissement de la théocratie de Khomeiny, la foi religieuse comme le terreau commun de la "volonté de tous" d'un peuple en lutte pour son émancipation. Ces reportages, dans la mesure même où il ont suscité à l'époque de leur publication des discussions acharnées et sont encore aujourd'hui susceptibles d'être discutés, dessinent une ligne de force qui conduit à toutes les discussions en litige dans le présent, à propos des relations entre politique et religion, du rôle de l'Islam dans les sociétés modernes, des luttes des peuples contre la violence du pouvoir. (shrink)

The introduction of information technology in the society and its pervasiveness in every aspect of citizens' daily life highlight societal stakes related to the goals regarding the uses IT, such as social networks. This paper examines two cases that lack a straightforward link with privacy as addressed and protected by existing law in Europe and the United-States , but whose characteristics, we believe fall on other privacy function and properties. In Western societies, individuals rely on normative discourses, such as the (...) legal one, in order to ensure protection. Hence, the paper argues that other functions of privacy need either further framing into legislation or they need to constitute in themselves normative commitments of an ethical nature for technology development and use. Some initiatives at the EU level recall such commitments, namely by developing a normative discourse based on ethics and human values. We argue that we need to interrogate society about those normative discourses because the values we once cherished in a non-digital society are seriously being questioned. (shrink)

In this paper, I have two main goals. First, I will argue that traditional medical values mandate, as opposed to forbid, at least minimal physician participation in hostile interrogations. Second, I will argue that traditional medical duties or responsibilities do not apply to medically-trained interrogators. In support of this conclusion, I will argue that medically-trained interrogators could simply choose not to enter into a patient-physician relationship. Recognizing that this argument might not be convincing, I will then propose three further arguments (...) against the claim that medical knowledge creates special duties: the logical argument, the metaphysical argument, and the argument from analogy. Finally, I will argue that invocations of role-differentiated morality, professionalism, and oaths could not circumvent the central argumentation of this paper. (shrink)

The controversy over abusive interrogations of prisoners during the war against terrorism spotlights the need for clear ethics norms requiring physicians and other clinicians to prevent the mistreatment of prisoners. Although policies and general descriptions pertaining to clinical oversight of interrogations in United States' war on terror prisons have come to light, there are few public records detailing the clinical oversight of an interrogation. A complaint by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) led to an Army investigation of an interrogation (...) at the United States prison at Guantanamo Bay. The declassified Army investigation and the corresponding interrogation log show clinical supervision, monitoring and treatment during an interrogation that employed dogs, prolonged sleep deprivation, humiliation, restraint, hypothermia and compulsory intravenous infusions. The interrogation and the involvement of a psychologist, physician and medics violate international and medical norms for the treatment of prisoners. (shrink)

This article commends Jaakko Hintikka's interrogative model of reasoning as an aid to historiography in relation to historical inquiry and explanation. After an initial discussion of David Hackett Fischer's appeal to the "logic of historical thought" in terms of his overlapping complementary emphases with Hintikka's interrogative model, a critical evaluation is given of Fischer's brief but strong comments regarding the role of why-questions in historical explanation. From there the main part of the article is given over to how (...) the interrogative model provides an account of the nature of explanation in general using Hintikka's recently published work on explanation theory. The theory of explanation that uses the interrogative model is applied to historical explanation and illustrated in the way the interrogative model serves a descriptively-valuable role in historiography by reference to historical inquiry and explanation in Herodotus. (shrink)

This paper consists of critical interrogations and speculative reflections on the ethical bearings of Emmanuel Levinas’ resourceful and intricate views on death, otherness, and time, while illustrating the nature of the philosophical challenges confronting the interpreters of his prolific writings, and investigating their intellectual, moral and political prolongations. This line of inquiry probes the multiple aspects of ethical responsibility that are entailed by the “face-to-face” relation with the other, and their potential theoretical extensions in meditations on the notion of “visage”, (...) particularly in the context of concrete practices and everyday demands. Moreover, this study offers selective analytic parallels with Martin Heidegger’s thoughts on mortality, along with associated pointers by Jean-Paul Sartre, in view of further elucidating the ethical implications of Levinas’ thinking, and exploring their tacit entanglements with politics. (shrink)

This thesis deals with the theory of interrogative belief revision, a recent development in the subfield of philosophical logic known as belief revision theory. While classical belief revision theory deals with the dynamics of an agent’s beliefs, interrogative belief revision aims to describe the dynamics of the agent’s questions about the world, or research agenda, as well. Great emphasis is put on the interaction between belief change and changes in the research agenda. I develop both the technical framework (...) for this theory by constructing and investigating modal logics for reasoning about the dynamics of research interests, as well as pursuing further the philosophical foundations and applications of the theory. Among the contributions of the thesis are: - a novel interpretation of the theory founded on a notion of epistemic strategies - a solution to the previously open problem of contraction and revision in this context - several systems of modal logic that can be used to reason about interrogative belief revision - completeness results and decidability results for these logics - a characterization of a class of relevant conditionals based on a notion of agenda relevance. (shrink)

In this essay Troy Richardson works to develop a conceptual framework and set of terms by which a diplomatic reception of different forms of law can be developed in multicultural education. Taking up the trope of the door in multiculturalist discourse as a site in which a welcoming of the difference of others is organized, Richardson interrogates the complex nature of receptivity to Indigenous customary law, in particular. He argues that, within this trope, a metonymic structure operates in relation to (...) the deployment of “policy” that maintains a perspective of customary law as premodern and primitive. This structure leads to an impoverished set of terms and a lack of diplomacy toward difference. Richardson proceeds by considering the notion of extraterritoriality and the metonyms that organize Emmanuel Levinas's discourse of “doors” in conceptualizing a welcoming receptivity. The term “extraterritoriality” anticipates the law of the other as it approaches the door and implies a diplomatic moment of reception of such difference. Richardson concludes by highlighting Jacques Derrida's evaluation of Levinas's discourse of receptivity and by considering the possibilities for a diplomatic engagement with the laws of others toward a mutation in the current geopolitical moment. (shrink)

Tetris provides a difficult, dynamic task environment within which some people are novices and others, after years of work and practice, become extreme experts. Here we study two core skills; namely, choosing the goal or objective function that will maximize performance and a feature-based analysis of the current game board to determine where to place the currently falling zoid so as to maximize the goal. In Study 1, we build cross-entropy reinforcement learning models to determine whether different goals result in (...) different feature weights. Two of these optimization strategies quickly rise to performance plateaus, whereas two others continue toward higher but more jagged heights. In Study 2, we compare the zoid placement decisions made by our best CERL models with those made by 67 human players. Across 370,131 human game episodes, two CERL models picked the same zoid placements as our lowest scoring human for 43% of the placements and as our three best scoring experts for 65% of the placements. Our findings suggest that people focus on maximizing points, not number of lines cleared or number of levels reached. They also show that goal choice influences the choice of zoid placements for CERLs and suggest that the same is true of humans. Tetris has a repetitive task structure that makes Tetris more tractable and more like a traditional experimental psychology paradigm than many more complex games or tasks. Hence, although complex, Tetris is not overwhelmingly complex and presents a right-sized challenge to cognitive theories, especially those of integrated cognitive systems. (shrink)

The law of armed conflict prevents the coerced extraction of information from Prisoners of War (PoWs). We claim, however, that the letter of that law involves too broad a concept of coercion. On a natural reading, there is a sense in which any extraction of information—by any method—is coercive. We respect the notion that PoWs ought not be treated poorly, but we argue “coercion” should not be understood so broadly. With respect to its use in international law, we favor a (...) moralized notion of “coercion,” as opposed to a non-moralized one. We explain what this means, and argue why this is a better reading of the law. We think a moralized notion of coercion is more intuitive, is more in line with both actual practice and the intent of the framers of international law, and has practical benefits as well. (shrink)

In Jaakko Hintikka's interrogative model of inquiry, the strategic principles governing empirical inquiry turn out to be closely related to those governing deductive reasoning. Hence it is important to study the precise analogies which obtain between deductive logic and interrogative inquiry. The basic concept of the interrogative model is the relation of model consequence $\text{M}\colon \text{T}\vdash \text{C}$. It is said to obtain iff C can be derived from T by means of an interrogative process in the (...) model M. We prove here a counterpart of Craig 's interpolation theorem for the concept of model consequence. The interrogative analogue to definability is a logical generalization of methodologists' concept of identifiability. For this concept, we prove an analogue to Beth's theorem. Some further philosophical consequences of these results are mentioned. For instance, identifiability is a good rational reconstruction of the idea of observability. (shrink)

Epiphenomenalism has had a long historical tradition. It is the view that mental properties are causally inert with respect to the physical world. In this paper, I argue that this tradition faces enormous challenges and needs better arguments to defend its position, and to demonstrate this, I interrogate the strands including computationalism, the idea of the illusion of conscious will, and causal exclusionism.

We propose a dynamic-epistemic analysis of the different epistemic operations constitutive of the process of interrogative inquiry, as described by Hintikka’s Interrogative Model of Inquiry (IMI). We develop a dynamic logic of questions for representing interrogative steps, based on Hintikka’s treatment of questions in the IMI, along with a dynamic logic of inferences for representing deductive steps, based on the tableau method. We then merge these two systems into a dynamic logic of interrogative inquiry which articulates (...) a joint treatment of questions and inferences, providing thereby a unified framework representing the informational dynamics of interrogative inquiry. We provide sound and complete axiomatic systems for the three dynamic logics that we introduce, we compare our framework with existing approaches, and we finally propose several directions for further work. (shrink)

Background Over the last decade, the return of results (ROR) in precision medicine research (PMR) has become increasingly routine. Calls for individual rights to research results have extended the “duty to report” from clinically useful genetic information to traits and ancestry results. ROR has thus been reframed as inherently beneficial to research participants, without a needed focus on who benefits and how. This paper addresses this gap, particularly in the context of PMR aimed at increasing participant diversity, by providing investigator (...) and researcher perspectives on and questions about the assumed value of ROR in PMR.Methods Semi-structured interviews with a purposive sample of investigators and researchers across federally funded PMR studies in three national consortia, as well as observations of study activities, focused on how PM researchers conceptualize diversity and implement inclusive practices across research stages, including navigating ROR.Results Interviewees (1) validated the value of ROR as a benefit of PMR, while others (2) questioned the benefit of clinically actionable results to individuals in the absence of sufficient resources for translating findings into health care for diverse and disadvantaged populations; (3) expressed uncertainties in applying the presumed value of ROR as a benefit for non-clinical results; and (4) and debated when the promise of the value of ROR may undermine trust in PMR, and divert efforts to return value beyond ROR.Conclusions Conceptualizations of diversity and inclusion among PM researchers and investigators raise unique ethical questions where unexamined assumptions of the value of ROR inform study recruitment efforts to enroll minoritized and under-represented populations. A lack of consideration for resources and infrastructure necessary to translate ROR into actionable information may hinder trustworthy community-research relationships. Thus, we argue for a more intentional interrogation of ROR practices as an offer of benefit and for whom. (shrink)

This article investigates how the turn to affect within the humanities and social sciences re-imagines the relationship between cultural theory and science. We focus on how the writings of two neuroscientists (Antonio Damasio and Joseph LeDoux) and one developmental psychologist (Daniel Stern) are used in order to ground certain claims about affect within cultural theory. We examine the motifs at play in cultural theories of affect, the models of (neuro)biology with which they work, and some fascinating missteps characterizing the taking (...) up of scientific literature. While neuroscience frames the affective as part of a system of regulation that makes both self and social coherence possible, in cultural theory’s narratives, by contrast, affectivity becomes a placeholder for the inherent dynamism and mutability of matter. The article interrogates the consequences of cultural theory’s strange borrowings from neuroscience and developmental psychology in their institution of a model of subjectivity preoccupied with a lived present in excess of the hold of habit and embodied history. (shrink)

Against the background of not-so-distant debate regarding “enhanced” interrogation techniques used by the United States during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which many understand to be torture, this essay explores the moral complexities of “ordinary” interrogation practices, those that are clearly not forms of torture. Based on analysis of the written reflections of two United States interrogators on the work they did during the Iraq war, I categorize the roles played by multiple modes of empathy within interrogation and argue (...) that empathetic responsiveness within the context of military interrogation poses a significant threat to the moral integrity of interrogators. (shrink)

This essay draws on a wide range of feminist, psychoanalytic and other anti-racist theorists to work out the specific mode of space as ‘contained’ and the ways it grounds dominant contemporary forms of racism i.e. the space of phallicized whiteness. Offering a close reading of Lacan’s primary models for ego-formation, the mirror stage and the inverted bouquet, I argue that psychoanalysis can help us to map contemporary power relations of racism because it enacts some of those very dynamics. Casting the (...) production of subjectivity on the field of the visual, Lacan performs some of the fundamental conceptions of space and embodiment that ground the dominant forms of racism in these cultural symbolics. Namely, he articulates a body that is bound by skin, structured by a logic of containment, cathected through aggression and distance, and read primarily through the way it looks – both how it appears and how it beholds the appearances of other bodies. Unraveling this nexus of power relations, I argue that a fundamental anti-racist strategy is to interrupt, interrogate and re-deploy this interpellation of images. Key Words: ego-formation • embodiment • historicity • Lacan • ontological • phallus • race/racial difference/racism • space • visual • whiteness. (shrink)

This essay contributes to scholarly discussions on the affective politics of demagoguery, especially in relation to the rhetoric of white victimhood and resentment, by exploring how civics education could formulate an anti-demagogic pedagogical response. Contemporary understandings of demagoguery as a rhetoric that emphasizes in-group identity and frames solutions as a matter of punishing an out-group, while also converting the shared vulnerability of life into an affective politics of white victimhood, create a new urgency to reconsider how civics education may help (...) students identify and interrogate demagoguery. This essay discusses potential risks in pedagogical efforts of civics education to confront demagoguery and examines ways out of these pedagogical missteps. The essay joins other scholars who call for a reorientation in how educators promote and practice civics education so that it takes into consideration that we live in a culture that is already demagogic. (shrink)

It is a widespread idea that suspended judgement implies a state of doxastic neutrality. Jane Friedman has recently claimed that while inquiring into a given question, one suspends one’s judgement on it. Jointly considered, the previous claims imply that one is in a state of doxastic neutrality about a given question while inquiring into it. In this article, I explore the leading cases against Friedman’s perspective, arguing that it is debatable whether they exhibit inquiries into questions without doxastic neutrality. However, (...) I will propose the possibility of “explorative disconfirmation inquiries” to show that doxastically non-neutral inquiries do exist. (shrink)

Social justice is a concept we take for granted. We assume that it means using state structures to ensure equality and fairness. But is that true? Or, do state structures of social order actually inhibit creativity, freedom, social welfare, and belonging? This collection broadens the boundaries of the ways we think about what constitutes criminality and interrogates issues of social justice and power in new, innovative and critical ways. The essays examine a wide variety of themes, including the deconstruction of (...) concepts of freedom and equality, notions of criminality and deviance, state regulation of social order, and various aspects of feminist criminology. (shrink)