Objective: Deep brain stimulation targeted to the ventral intermediate nucleus of the thalamus is effective for motor symptoms in essential tremor, but there is limited data on cognitive outcomes. We examined cognitive outcomes in a large cohort of ET DBS patients.Methods: In a retrospective analysis, we used repeated-measures ANOVA testing to examine whether the age of tremor onset, age at DBS surgery, hemisphere side implanted with lead, unilateral vs. bilateral implantations, and presence of surgical complications influenced the cognitive outcomes. Neuropsychological (...) outcomes of interest were verbal memory, executive functioning, working memory, language functioning, visuospatial functioning, and general cognitive function.Results: We identified 50 ET DBS patients; 29 males; the mean age of tremor onset was 35.84 years with a median age of 38 years. The mean age at DBS was 68.18 years. There were 37 unilateral 30 left, seven right, and 13 bilateral brain implantations. In the subgroup analysis, there was a significant interaction between assessment and age of tremor onset ; F = 4.47; p = 0.043 for working memory. The post hoc testing found improvements for younger onset ET. Similarly, there was a significant interaction between assessment and complications vs. no complications subgroups; F = 4.34; p = 0.043 for verbal memory with worsening scores seen for ET patients with complications. The remaining tests were not significant.Conclusion: In this large cohort of ET patients with, DBS was not accompanied by a significant decline in many cognitive domains. These outcomes were possibly related to the selection of patients with normal cognitive functioning before surgery, unilateral DBS implantations for the majority, and selection of patients with optimal response to DBS. (shrink)

Two basic theses underlie this work. The first, the specificity theorem, signifies that logic is essentially concerned with specific events and not with universal and transcendent systems. The second, the interbehavioral theorem, implies that no matter how logic is defined, it entails a psychological dimension that must be taken into account.

Traditional scholarly attention to human tragedy has been confined mainly within the artificial world of drama and literature. It has neglected to recognize the significant recurrence of tragedy throughout the entire realm of nature. This book attempts to place tragedy within the larger context of natural events, and to view it against a background of scientific philosophy and psychology.

As we build increasingly intelligent machines, we confront difficult questions about how to specify their objectives. One approach, which we call human-centered, tasks the machine with the objective of learning and satisfying human objectives by observing our behavior. This paper considers how human-centered AI should conceive the humans it is trying to help. We argue that an Aristotelian model of human agency has certain advantages over the currently dominant theory drawn from economics.

In 1655 La Peyrère was the first to substantially argue for and popularize polygenism—the view that God created multiple original human mating pairs in separate acts of creation with numerous created before Adam. Positing or rejecting polygenism has been central to modern theorizing about human types and origins. Prominent recent interpreters have maintained that La Peyrère’s polygenism does not imply a hierarchy of human types. This paper reconstructs La Peyrère’s account and, in opposition to the dominant view, argues that his (...) polygenism produces a human species hierarchy. The Adamite species is superior to the Pre-Adamite species in virtue of its material composition, mode of creation, and form. The upshot is that La Peyrère’s theological system posits a proto-racialist conception of human types. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Understanding First: Exploring Its Scope and Testing Its LimitsMarga Reimer, PhD (bio)I thoroughly enjoyed reading and reflecting on this provocative, engagingly written, and persuasively argued paper. My commentary focuses on the authors’ “understanding first” principle. I begin by exploring that principle’s scope by appeal to aesthetic analogues to the moral cases of Pete and Jacob; I then explore its limits by appeal to cases involving agents struggling with (...) maladaptive traits that are more self-destructive than antisocial.According to the authors, when attempting to eliminate or reduce a maladaptive trait, it is important that the agent begin with a non-moralizing understanding of that trait’s “root cause.” In this way, the agent avoids some of the epistemically distorting and otherwise counterproductive effects associated with an approach that begins with a moralizing assessment of the problematic trait. They can then proceed with a reason-based “dispensation” of that trait.The cases of Pete and Jacob make these points vivid and lend them considerable credence. Moreover, the authors’ “understanding first principle” arguably exemplifies a more general, and no less plausible, principle concerning the remediation of virtually any problem. Who would deny that an objective, non-normative, understanding of a problem’s “root cause” might be useful in addressing that problem? Who would deny that normativizing a problem before understanding its origin might prevent a deeper understanding of that problem and therewith its maximally effective “treatment”?One way to showcase the intuitiveness of the authors’ “understanding first” principle would be to explore the applicability of an analogous principle to problems beyond those involving “moral matters.” Problems involving aesthetics might prove particularly illuminating in this regard insofar as aesthetics, like morality, is inherently normative and yet it lies beyond the scope of morality proper. If an “understanding first” principle can be shown to be applicable to certain types of aesthetic problems, then the authors’ already strong case for the applicability of such a principle to certain types of moral problems would be further strengthened.In the cases of Pete and Jacob, the problems are unambiguously moral: the patently antisocial behaviors of these two individuals are paradigmatically “bad” and their premature assessment as [End Page 205] such can be epistemically distorting and otherwise counterproductive. Consider now analogous cases involving aesthetic problems. Pete and Lucie are getting ready for the holidays and are expecting family from out of town. But there are a couple of problems. Pete notices an “ugly” stain on the living room carpet and Lucie notices a subtle but decidedly “nasty” odor permeating the entire house. Neither Pete nor Lucie know where the stain came from, nor where the odor is coming from. But both the stain and the odor are “pretty gross” and so they need to “get rid of” them before family arrive. There’s no time for investigative work into “root causes.”Pete scrubs the stain until the portion of carpet beneath it is threadbare; Lucie buys three different deodorizers, all of which eliminate the odor but only temporarily. Had Pete and Lucie understood the root causes of the “ugly” stain and “nasty” smell, their treatments might have been different—and, importantly, more effective. The stain turned out to be caused by red wine, easily treatable without leaving a noticeable “bald spot.” The lingering odor was from an easily fixable plumbing problem, albeit one requiring more extensive (and costly) work.Pete and Lucie’s aesthetic evaluations (“ugly,” “nasty”), coupled with a lack of understanding of “root causes,” have predictable results: their control over some “pretty gross” problems is significantly diminished. Similarly, with respect to moral evaluations of maladaptive traits (“bad,” “wrong”) coupled with a lack of understanding of “root causes.” As the authors show, such evaluations can be epistemically distorting and otherwise counterproductive with the result that the agent’s control over the problematic trait is significantly reduced.Further aesthetic analogues are easy to develop and potentially even more revealing. Imagine that Pete and Lucie, who are expecting family later in the week, are experiencing symptoms, both respiratory and gastrointestinal, that are “kind of yucky.” As with the maladaptive traits of Pete and Jacob, the problematic traits in this case are literally “in” the agent (vs... (shrink)

The National Academy of Science's 1956 study on the Biological Effects of Atomic Radiation was designed to provide an objective analysis to assess conflicting statements by leading geneticists and by officials in the Atomic Energy Commission. Largely because of its status as a detached, non-governmental evaluation by eminent scientists, no studies have had a broader impact on the development of biological thinking in regard to nuclear policies. This paper demonstrates that despite the first BEAR study's reputation as an objective and (...) independent study, it was the product of careful negotiation between Academy scientists, the Atomic Energy Commission, and Britain's Medical Research Council. This paper also reveals the fragility of the consensus that produced the Academy's report, the range of political uses of the report, and the subsequent disaffection of the scientists who took part in it. (shrink)

This article examines how deduction preserves certainty and how much certainty it can preserve according to Descartes’s Rules for the Direction of the Mind. I argue that the certainty of a deduction is a matter of four conditions for Descartes. First, certainty depends on whether the conjunction of simple propositions is composed with necessity or contingency. Second, a deduction approaches the certainty of an intuition depending on how many “acts of conceiving” it requires and—third—the complexity or difficulty of the acts (...) of thinking, which is determined by the content of the thoughts and on external factors. Fourth, certainty depends on the intellectual aptitude of the person using the deduction. A deduction lacks certainty when it relies on memory such that it is not apprehended with immediacy. However, the mental capacity and speed of a mind can be increased by training the special mental faculties of perspicacity and discernment. Increasing one’s intellectual aptitude allows for more steps of a deduction to be inferred in fewer acts of conceiving, thereby helping preserve the certainty of a deduction. (shrink)

James Bond 007 strode into the human imagination in the novel Casino Royale in 1953 and hit the movie screens with Dr. No in 1962. He has become one of the best-known personalities, real or imagined, in global history. One out of every four people in the entire world has now seen a Bond movie, and every month thousands of new readers become addicted to Ian Fleming’s original Bond stories. In James Bond and Philosophy, seventeen scholars examine hidden philosophical issues (...) in the hazardous, deceptive, glamorous world of Double-0 Seven. Is Bond a Nietzschean hero who graduates "beyond good and evil"? Does Bond paradoxically break the law in order, ultimately, to uphold it like any "stupid policeman"? What can Bond’s razor-sharp reasoning powers tell us about the scientific pursuit of truth? Does 007’s license to kill help us understand the ethics of counterterrorism? What motivates all those despicable Bond villains—could it be a Hegelian quest for recognition? (shrink)

Like Aristophanes’ Frogs, Plato’s Symposium stages a contest between literary genres. The quarrel between Socrates and Aristophanes constitutes the primary axis of this contest, and the speech of Alcibiades echoes and extends that of Aristophanes. Alcibiades’ comparison of Socrates with a satyr, however, contains the key to understanding Socrates’ implication, at the very end of the dialogue, that philosophy alone understands the inner connectedness, and hence the proper nature, of both tragedy and comedy. I argue that Plato reflects in the (...) character of Socrates the primordial wisdom embodied in satyric drama. I conclude with a brief consideration of Nietzsche’s challenge to Plato’s Dionysian wisdom. (shrink)

Jerry Fodor argued for an account of belief attribution very close to the theory of direct reference. I argue that his account conflicts with constraints on psychological explanation which he ought to accept.

The complexities of Henry More's eclectic Neoplatonism and his recklessly energetic poetic style have hitherto deterred scholars from undertaking a complete study of his long philosophical poem, A Platonick Song of the Soul . The aim of my dissertation is to study the Platonick Song in its entirety. I attempt to unravel the different strands of thought that it is woven of and reveal the consistency of thought and architectonic scheme of the work. ;The major themes of the Platonick Song (...) are the immateriality of the soul, its immortality, and its unfailing consciousness. I begin my study with an appraisal of More's work as an answer to Lucretius's De Rerum Natura, which had proclaimed the corporeality and mortality of the soul. The first poem of the Platonick Soul, "Psychozoia" is studied as an allegorical prelude to the work, and the Plotinian and Chaldean origins of More's systems are examined. The five poems after "Psychozoia" are divided into three sections dealing with the immortality of the soul , the macrocosmic manifestation of the soul and the alert soul "Antipsychophannychia," "The Praeexistency of the Soul" and "Antimonopsychia"). In the course of these three chapters, I have occasion to demonstrate More's reliance on the arguments of Ficino and Galileo. In the final chapter of my study, I reveal the importance of the Platonick Song for an understanding of the metaphysics, psychology and ethics of More's mature philosophy. In addition, I analyze the ways in which More's concepts of spirit, matter, space and the Deity resembled and differed from those of his Cambridge friend, Isaac Newton. (shrink)

I examine two views of Professor Von Wright's: in the philosophy of action and in the philosophy of perception. I partly agree and partly disagree with him.

The series offers a publication forum for innovative works on all topics of analytic philosophy. The focus is on the disciplines of theoretical philosophy: metaphysics, ontology, epistemology, philosophy of language, logic. Furthermore, works that additionally include contributions to the history of philosophy are also welcome.

Dire que le discours moral de l'Eglise est mal recu est un euphemisme. Il est en verite heretique. Critique par ceux qui l'ignorent comme par ceux qui devraient le connaitre, parfois deforme et rarement defendu, il n'esquive pas le debat rationnel. Mais qui se soucie de raison tandis que partout et sans partage regne l'emotion? Peu osent s'ecarter du dogme selon lequel le l'individu ne doit avoir que deux maitres: le desir tout-puissant, createur d'un univers virtuel et ephemere, et l'hygiene, (...) ultime etalon du rapport a autrui. Peu resistent aux sirenes du relativisme ambiant, meme parmi d'eminents moralistes chretiens persuades du fait meme d'avoir eu raison trop tot dans une Eglise trop frileuse. Il se pourrait pourtant que la critique philosophique decouvre dans la reflexion morale chretienne une vraie sagesse, qui n'est pas la veuve du temps qui passe, dont l'ambition est seulement de raviver la flamme fragile de notre conscience morale. Pascal Jacob ne se limite pas pour autant a une critique d'une certaine theologie contemporaine, il expose avec pedagogie la rationalite de la pensee chretienne ainsi que les positions de l'Eglise, en particulier sur des questions controversees. L'auteur: Pascal Jacob, Agrege de philosophie, Professeur a l'IPC - Facultes libres de philosophie et de psychologie, enseigne egalement l'Ethique en licence de psychologie et en Institut de soins Infirmiers (IFSI) et la philosophie en lycee. (shrink)

Embodied simulation and the epistemic motivation to search for the of other people's behaviors are not necessary for specific and functional responding to, and hence processing of, human facial expressions. Rather, facial expression processing can be achieved through lower-cognitive, heuristical perceptual processing and expression of prototypical morphological musculature movement patterns that communicate discrete trustworthiness and capacity cues to conspecifics.

Meditation is an umbrella term for a number of mental training practices designed to improve the monitoring and regulation of attention and emotion. Some forms of meditation are now being used for clinical intervention. To accompany the increased clinical interest in meditation, research investigating the neural basis of these practices is needed. A central hypothesis of contemplative neuroscience is that meditative states, which are unique on a phenomenological level, differ on a neurophysiological level. To identify the electrophysiological correlates of meditation (...) practice, the electrical brain activity of highly skilled meditators engaging in one of six meditation styles was recorded. A mind-wandering task served as a control. Lempel–Ziv complexity showed differences in nonlinear brain dynamics during meditation compared with mind wandering, suggesting that meditation, regardless of practice, affects neural complexity. In contrast, there were no differences in power spectra at six different frequency bands, likely due to the fact that participants engaged in different meditation practices. Finally, exploratory analyses suggest neurological differences among meditation practices. These findings highlight the importance of studying the electroencephalography correlates of different meditative practices. (shrink)

A sample of 460 low-income women completed a mate preference questionnaire and surveys that assessed family background, life history, conscientiousness, sexual motives, self-ratings (e.g., looks), and current circumstances (e.g., income). A cluster analysis revealed two groups of women: women who reported a strong preference for looks and money in a short-term mate and commitment in a long-term mate, and women who reported smaller differences across mating context. Group differences were found in reported educational levels, family background, sexual development, number of (...) children, and motives for having sex. Implications for understanding individual differences in women’s mate-preference trade-offs are discussed. (shrink)

Although it often chafed at scientists' wishes to promote international cooperation, the U.S. Navy was a great supporter of such initiatives during the 1950s. This essay examines the impetus for the Navy's alliance with scientists to bolster its antisubmarine capabilities, the reasons for its acceptance of international cooperation as a means to ensure its technological capabilities during a general war, and the source of its clashes with scientists over the issue of classification. Using diverse sources, including the records of the (...) Navy's Strategic Plans Division, the essay illustrates that, despite the confluence of interests between the Navy and oceanographers, there was a decisive difference in their views as to the ultimate utility of basic research. This difference stemmed largely from scientists' limited perception of science as the capital for new technology and the Navy's perception of science as the collection of operational data for existing technology. This essay, which takes the Navy's views more fully into account, brings to light an issue that should be an important component of any analysis of scientists working with the military. (shrink)

A major new history of how the Enlightenment transformed people’s everyday lives The Secular Enlightenment is a panoramic account of the radical ways that life began to change for ordinary people in the age of Locke, Voltaire, and Rousseau. In this landmark book, familiar Enlightenment figures share places with voices that have remained largely unheard until now, from freethinkers and freemasons to French materialists, anticlerical Catholics, pantheists, pornographers, readers, and travelers. Margaret Jacob, one of our most esteemed historians of (...) the Enlightenment, reveals how this newly secular outlook was not a wholesale rejection of Christianity but rather a new mental space in which to encounter the world on its own terms. She takes readers from London and Amsterdam to Berlin, Vienna, Turin, and Naples, drawing on rare archival materials to show how ideas central to the emergence of secular democracy touched all facets of daily life. Human frailties once attributed to sin were now viewed through the lens of the newly conceived social sciences. People entered churches not to pray but to admire the architecture, and spent their Sunday mornings reading a newspaper or even a risqué book. The secular-minded pursued their own temporal and commercial well-being without concern for the life hereafter, regarding their successes as the rewards for their actions, their failures as the result of blind economic forces. A majestic work of intellectual and cultural history, The Secular Enlightenment demonstrates how secular values and pursuits took hold of eighteenth-century Europe, spilled into the American colonies, and left their lasting imprint on the Western world for generations to come. (shrink)

This essay argues that muthos in the broad sense of “story” or “narrative” is essential to a philosophical understanding of the roots of justice and injustice within the soul. I examine the use of narrative in two different contexts: the tale of the Gygean ring of invisibility that Glaucon tells in Plato's Republic, and the parable of Agnes and the Merman in Søren Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling. These two muthoi make possible a direct, inner experience of the fundamental difference between (...) just and unjust souls. They guide us to the insight that the capability of radical injustice is rooted in the absence of the very powers of sympathetic imagination and intellect that unlock their meaning. Because the deepest insights of these Platonic and Kierkegaardean texts come to light only through the interpretation of a story, they cannot be communicated in the “nonmythical” form of logos or philosophical argument alone. (shrink)

Popularized in the seventeenth-century, polygenism is the view that God created multiple first human progenitors. This article reassesses the seventeenth-century version of polygenism and argues that the idea played an important role in American anthropology and conceptions of race in later centuries.

Kierkegaard's relationship to the literary Socrates of antiquity, an ironic and ambiguous figure who reflects the uncertain nature of reality itself, uniquely recapitulates Plato's relationship to the historical Socrates. For Kierkegaard as for Plato, contact with Socrates results in an explosion of poetic and philosophical creativity—a demonstration of Socrates’ pedagogical potency that implicitly resolves what Plato calls the “ancient quarrel between philosophy and poetry.” This chapter reflects on that ancient quarrel and its connection with the figure of Socrates, traces the (...) birth of Kierkegaard's Socrates in his dissertation, and sketches the developing significance of Socrates in Kierkegaard's major pseudonymous writings. (shrink)

Background: Psychiatric nurses are regularly confronted with the uses and effects of control interventions such as mechanical restraints. Although there are evident tensions in the literature regarding the use of mechanical restraints, very little research has focused on the lived and embodied experience of their use, whether from the patient’s perspective or the perspective of nursing staff responsible for their application. Research aims: (1) to gain access to the bodily phenomenon of being placed in mechanical restraints; (2) to give voice (...) to the intimate experiential understanding of this experience; and (3) through phenomenological interpretation, to understand the subjective processes and meaning-making of this experience. Research design: For this research, we adopted a distinctly ethics-oriented application of the methodology known as interpretative phenomenological analysis, that is, the interpretive dimension of the research focused on ethical practice in mental healthcare – one that is informed by experiential accounts of the lived body. Participants and research context: A total of 40 in-depth semi-structured, nondirected interviews with both nurses (n = 21) and patients (n = 19) we conducted to meet the aims of this article. Participants were recruited from an inpatient psychiatric unit of a Canadian general hospital. Ethical considerations: The research received research ethics board clearance from both the hospital where the study took place and the University of Ottawa. Findings: The comparative analysis is presented under the following headings: (1) context of care, (2) meaning of quality of care, (3) emotional reactions and nurse–patient relationship, (4) meeting the needs and (5) need for alternatives. Discussion/conclusions: The research findings are discussed in light of current literature and implications for practice. (shrink)

This is the first chapter of Ways of Seeing co-authored with Marc Jeannerod. We ague for a representational approach to the puzzles of both visual perception and visually-guided actions.