There is substantial disagreement among philosophers of embodied cognitive science about the meaning of embodiment. In what follows, I describe three different views that can be found in the current literature. I show how this debate centers around the question of whether the science of embodied cognition can retain the computer theory of mind. One view, which I will label body functionalism, takes the body to play the functional role of linking external resources for problem solving with internal biological machinery. (...) Embodiment is thus understood in terms of the role the body plays in supporting the computational circuits that realize cognition. Body enactivism argues by contrast that no computational account of cognition can account for the role of commonsense knowledge in our everyday practical engagement with the world. I will attempt a reconciliation of these seemingly opposed views. (shrink)

A lot of research in cognition and decision making suffers from a lack of formalism. The quantum probability program could help to improve this situation, but we wonder whether it would provide even more added value if its presumed focus on outcome models were complemented by process models that are, ideally, informed by ecological analyses and integrated into cognitive architectures.

En el Fedón, tras ofrecer numerosos argumentos a favor de la inmortalidad del alma, se introduce un mythos acerca de su vida ultraterrena. Dado el tenor del tema en cuestión y las limitaciones humanas para dar con un logos estrictamente verdadero al respecto, Sócrates y sus allegados acuerdan en que se debe buscar el “más difícil de refutar” (85d1) entre los logoi humanos. Este trabajo intenta determinar en qué medida la asociación entre el mito presentado hacia el final del diálogo (...) y los argumentos precedentes contribuye a ese objetivo. En este sentido pretende mostrar, por un lado, que el mito mencionado posee los caracteres atribuidos a la noble mentira en R. II-III –texto que plantea la necesidad de acudir a relatos que, aunque ficticios, resultan útiles para instaurar la justicia en el alma del auditorio–; y, por el otro, que en virtud de su carácter persuasivo, el mito contribuye a fortalecer el logos hasta allí desarrollado para volverlo lo más irrefutable posible, generando confianza en la necesidad de llevar adelante una vida virtuosa, inclusive en el auditorio que no forma parte del círculo filosófico. (shrink)

In this paper, I endeavor to evaluate the ethical-political consequences of the metaphor of "teacher-midwife" awarded to Plato’s Socrates in Theaetetus and its use by different scholars to describe the role of teacher in a Philosophy with/for children context. The paper is divided into three sections: first an approach is made to the figure of Socrates in Meno, to the critique of his method as expressed by Jacques Rancière in The Ignorant Schoolmaster, and to the echoing of that critique by (...) Walter Kohan in his evaluation of the pedagogy of Pf/wC. Next, different descriptions of the teacher’s role in Pf/wC are reviewed, emphasizing the elements that emphasize the Socratic figure. For Matthew Lipman, one of the keys to turning classrooms into communities of philosophical inquiry was to substantially modify the teaching role. Because, on Lipman’s account, the teacher should not teach in the traditional sense, different metaphors have been sought to describe her role. In section, I argue that a description of the teacher as "guide" can be applied to many features that characterize Socrates. I analyze in depth the metaphor of the "teacher-midwife" establishing the links with those developed in and. Emphasis is placed on the ethical-political consequences of equating the teacher with a "teacher-midwife", especially if we take into account Plato's complete description of pedagogical maiusis in Theaetetus, and the centrality of the metaphor in Pf/wC pedagogical practice. Finally, I consider the very different image of the “birth” metaphor that is suggested by Hannah Arendt’s concept of “natality,” and explore its implications for a pedagogical alternative to the Socratic. (shrink)

El objetivo principal del artículo es mostrar que, en aspectos significativos, la obra artística de Franz Kafka, Samuel Beckett y Francis Bacon se hace cargo de ciertas aporías de la subjetividad moderna y puede entenderse como una respuesta crítica a las mismas dentro del horizonte de la modernidad. La especificidad de este arte crítico se analiza a través de una red de conexiones: en primer lugar, trazando contrastes entre la lógica de la acción presente en la tragedia moderna, y la (...) lógica del acontecimiento propia de la epopeya griega arcaica y la tragedia antigua; luego, estableciendo diferencias entre el sujeto de la tragedia moderna y el del arte crítico del siglo XX; y, por último, mostrando la existencia en éste de tensiones entre la lógica de la acción y la lógica del acontecimiento. (shrink)

La lectura que ha recibido Spinoza ha variado de acuerdo con la época y los intereses propios de sus intérpretes. Algunas lecturas, como las de sus contemporáneos, han encontrado en él una fuente de ateísmo radical, mientras el romanticismo lo llamará “el ebrio de Dios”. Estas interpretaciones también permiten hacer juicios sobre las religiones reveladas, es decir, sobre aquellas religiones positivas tales como el cristianismo, el judaísmo o el islam. Una lectura clásica de Spinoza ha denigrado totalmente la religión. En (...) este artículo, sin embargo, propongo mostrar que aquella interpretación es errada, pues Spinoza entiende la religión como una visión de mundo imaginativa que permite, por medio de los afectos, la tradición y la obediencia, la cohesión de la comunidad. La teología, distinta de la religión, será el verdadero adversario de Spinoza. Para cumplir con lo planteado, se analizarán las dos figuras que expresan cada campo social: el profeta y el teólogo. La hipótesis es que el profeta expresa una relación de inmanencia frente a su comunidad, mientras el teólogo se establece sobre la base de una representación trascendente, ejecutando un dominio político de servidumbre y superstición sobre sus fieles. (shrink)

This article starts out by introducing the category of the ‘one-character film’ — that is, narrative feature films that rely on a single onscreen character. One-character films can range from extremely laconic movies entirely focused on the action in the narrative here-and-now via highly talkative films that revolve around soliloquies of self-reflection, questioning of identity and a problematizing of the narrative past to strongly dialogue-heavy films that — via phones and other telecommunication devices — reach far beyond the depicted scene. (...) It is on the latter that the article eventually focuses. Films like Buried, Locke or The Guilty centrifugally thrust the viewers into a simultaneous present that remains invisible and that they have to imagine in sensory ways. Imagining this invisible elsewhere, which I call mise en esprit, can be facilitated and evoked through various cinematic means such as reduced within-modality-interference, suggestive verbalizations, acousmatic voices and sound effects. (shrink)

Lehar's revival of phenomenology and his all-encompassing Gestalt Bubble model are ambitious and stimulating. I offer an illustrated caution about phenomenology, a more fractured alternative to his Bubble model, and two lines of phenomena that may disqualify his isomorphism. I think a perceptual-inquiry model can contend.

The theoretical proposal that perceptual experience be thought of as expectancies about sensorimotor contingencies, rather than as expressions of mental representations, is endorsed; examples that effectively enforce that view are discussed; and one example (of perceptual coupling) that seems to demand a mental representation, with all of the diagnostic value such a tool would have, is raised for consideration.

In agreement with Barsalou's point that perceptions are not the records or the products of a recording system, and with a nod to an older system in which perception is an activity of testing what future glances bring, I argue that the behavior of perceptual inquiry necessarily makes choices in what is sampled; in what and how the sample is encoded, and what structure across samples is pursued and tested; and when to conclude the inquiry. Much of this is now (...) being hectically rediscovered, but a comprehensive approach like the one Barsalou proposes should help preserve what progress is made. (shrink)

This paper explores themes of _wildness_, _awakening_ and _transformative learning_ in a land-based MBA leadership course. For twenty years, students have consistently characterized their participation as being a life-changing experience that shapes their personal choices and leadership actions for years afterwards. Many describe personal, social or ecological _awakenings_ that have catalyzed a deeper ethos of connectedness, care and responsibility for the well-being of the planet and future generations. I distinguish _wildness_ from _wilderness_ and consider its role in generating and sustaining (...) culture. I critically examine the MBA as a vehicle for cultivating effective and ethical leaders along with the promise and limitations of _awakened leadership_. I historically contextualize various forms of spiritual and social awakening, review the theoretical foundations of ecological awakening, and warily consider transformative learning as a _pedagogy of awakening_. I outline the overall approach of the leadership course and discuss three primary transformative learning components; _Indigenous pedagogies_, _nature as teacher_, and a range of _transformative practices_. I suggest that wildness offers a distinct pedagogical wellspring for educators working to shift and recalibrate patterns of consciousness and culture and conclude that transformative learning provides a way to integrate a pedagogy of awakening into management education and leadership training. (shrink)

The ways in which work gets done are observably different from the ways in which those in positions of responsibility talk about that work or from the ways in which the organizational and business literature portrays work. The ethnographic study of work focuses on work practice, on what is actually done, and on how those doing the work make sense of their practice, but this is rarely part of either corporate or organizational discourse about work This article tries to show (...) what is missing from this discourse and suggests that the corporate model is based on a common misapprehension of the nature of technique and confounds the ways humans work with the ways machines work. (shrink)

En este artículo se exponen las conclusiones de un estudio cuyo objetivo principal fue describir y analizar las situaciones de discriminación, violencia y desigualdad contra enfermeros/as gays y lesbianas con pretexto de su orientación sexual y/o expresión de género en organizaciones de salud públicas y privadas de Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires (en adelante, CABA). Aquí se analizan las estrategias y los modos en que gays y lesbianas gestionan la información personal relativa a su orientación sexual en sus intercambios socio-laborales (...) para evitar el estigma.Este escrito se centra en dos categorías principales que ordenaron la investigación: (a) las posibilidades de expresar la propia orientación sexual en los respectivos espacios de trabajo y su vinculación con el estigma real o anticipado en las interacciones con compañeros/as, superiores y pacientes; y (b) el heterosexismo internalizado como una categoría vinculada tanto con el estigma anticipado y experimentado como con los distintos grados de apertura sobre la propia orientación sexual en el trabajo.Para alcanzar el objetivo propuesto, se adoptó un enfoque cualitativo y se analizaron 20 entrevistas a enfermeros y enfermeras gays, lesbianas y heterosexuales, sumado a la indagación de diversas fuentes secundarias, desde los lineamientos de la teoría fundamentada en datos. Como conclusión, se destaca la asociación entre el grado de asunción de la propia identidad sexual, el uso de estrategias de gestión de la información personal y el heterosexismo internalizado, que repercuten en la reproducción de la opresión y el estigma entre gays y lesbianas en comparación con la población heterosexual. Por lo tanto, este trabajo pretende hacer un aporte significativo a las discusiones y los estudios sobre diversidad sexual en los espacios de trabajo de Argentina y la región. (shrink)

Our ordinary conception of time has it that there are temporal particulars: not only do people do things, but there are particular doings by people; not only are we born, but the birth of each one of us was a particular event, and each of us will have our own particular death. Temporal particulars in this sense are individuated, fundamentally, by their temporal locations or relations, rather than by their intrinsic or qualitative characteristics. In this respect they are unrepeatable, not (...) just de facto, but as a matter of their very nature. However, there is a tradition in philosophy that seriously downplays this aspect of our thinking about time. According to this tradition, the fundamental unit of temporal representation is _tensed truth_; the notion of an unrepeatable particular, individuated by its temporal location, is at best an abstraction from a complex of tensed truths. The aims of this paper are, first, to argue that the representation of temporal particulars is deeply implicated in our ordinary conception of the past as fixed and unalterable; and, secondly, to argue that the theorist of tensed truth is able to provide only a pale imitation of this aspect of our thinking. I will then reflect on the consequences of this for debates about the metaphysics of tense. (shrink)

It is suggested, following a proposal made recently by Smolin, that the most fundamental law of the universe takes this form: Among the set of all possible universes compatible with an irreducibly minimal set of structural constraints, the actually realized universe is the one which maximizes a mathematically well-defined number (the variety) that measures the structural variety of the universe (in the totality of its history). This gives expression to Leibniz's idea that the actual universe gives “the greatest variety possible, (...) but with the greatest possible order.” Two models are proposed in which the idea can be realized and its consequences tested; both are discrete in nature and satisfy highly nonlocal laws. In such a scheme a unique (finite) universe is called into being by the fundamental requirement of maximal variety (for given definition of the variety), which it is conjectured could have such a powerful ordering effect that space, time, the currently known laws of physics, and the observed structure of the universe could all appear as emergent consequences of the single underlying law. (shrink)

In der Politik, im Recht, in der Wirtschaft, in Wissenschaft und Technik, im Umgang mit Natur und Umwelt stellen sich alte moralische Probleme neu und werden neue, bisher unbekannte aufgeworfen. Die angewandte Ethik formuliert ethische Richtlinien für die verschiedenen Bereiche der modernen Zivilisation, in denen unsere alltägliche moralische Intuition nicht ausreicht. Das Handbuch stellt elf solcher Bereichsethiken - darunter Medizinethik, Ethik der Gen- und Biowissenschaften, Wirtschaftsethik, Journalistische Ethik, Politische Ethik - fundiert und informativ vor. Die Einleitung führt in die Ethik (...) und ihre zentralen Ansätze ein; die Schlusskapitel ”Ethik des Risikos“ und ”Ethik des Lebens“ erörtern übergreifende Fragen, die in mehreren Bereichsethiken eine wesentliche Rolle spielen. Für die Neuauflage wurde das Handbuch gründlich überarbeitet und aktualisiert. Neben dem Personenregister enthält es nun auch ein Sachregister. (Quelle: Homepage des Verlags). (shrink)

Is it Possible to Experiment with Thought? Ernst Mach’s Notion of Thought Experiment and its Pedagogical Context around 1900. The article tries to establish the crucial importance of the pedagogical dimension of Ernst Mach’s ideas on experimenting with thought. The focus on contemporary pedagogics demonstrates, first, that Mach’s didactic approach to physics is part of a much broader stream of pedagogical writings that transcends national and disciplinary borders and comprises a diversity of authors, e.g. Wilhelm Jerusalem, William James or Alfred (...) N. Whitehead; second, that the much‐heralded controversy between Mach and the French philosopher of science Pierre Duhem about thought experiments does not only revolve around epistemological issues but rather stems from their antagonist vision of teaching physics; and finally, third, that G. Stanley Hall’s psychogenetic theory of pedagogics bears a strong resemblance with the evolutionary naturalism of Machian epistemology and helps explaining key tenets of Mach’s conception of thought experiment. By establishing a broad convergence between the work of all these authors despite their different academic upbringing, background and nationality the article argues for a complex and historically fine‐grained vision of the relations between natural, social and human sciences going beyond dichotomies like ‘Erklären’ and ‘Verstehen’ or the ‘Two Cultures’. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: * No Use for That Hypothesis * Swinburne on Souls * Material Souls * Whatever Works for You * References * Further Reading.

Many common human traits are believed to be a composite reflection of multiple genetic and non‐genetic factors and the genetic contribution is consequently often difficult to characterise. Recent advances suggest that subtle variation in the regulation of gene expression may contribute to complex human traits. In two reports,1,2 Cheung and colleagues scale up human genetics analysis to an impressive level in a genome‐wide search for the regulators of gene expression. They perform linkage analysis on expression profiles for over 3,500 genes (...) and then employ the HapMap resource3 to take positive findings through to association studies at the genome‐wide level. This work gives new insights into the complexities of gene regulation and the plausibility of genome‐wide study design. BioEssays 28: 968–972, 2006. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Le but de cette encyclopédie en deux volumes, rédigée à l’instigation du président Hoover, était d’exposer tous les aspects de la vie sociale américaine, dans le dessein bien arrêté de saisir les rapports existant entre les différentes sphères sociales et de déterminer les transformations qui se produisent au sein de la société. Ces transformations devaient non seulement être constatées, mais on voulait encore essayer de trouver leur tendance générale, leur „trend“, c’est-à-dire la loi qui les détermine. Dans une critique des (...) résultats et des méthodes de cette „expression collective de la recherche sociale aux États-Unis“, M. G. s’efforce de montrer qu’en dépit de l’ampleur considérable de l’ouvrage, qui est également, en quelque sorte, une encyclopédie de la société américaine, le but scientifique visé n’a pas été atteint, et qu’il ne pouvait pas l’être. En effet, la théorie d’Ogburn, qui est à la base de l’ouvrage, et d’après laquelle les crises sont dues à des disproportions dans la vitesse de développement des différentes régions sociales, est insuffisante. Elle présuppose un ordre social relativement stable, dans lequel les dérangements peuvent être considérés comme de simples oscillations autour d’un noyau sain en lui-même. Comme le phénomène fondamental, la crise économique, n’est pas traité, on renonce à reconnaître méthodiquement que tous les processus sociaux sont incontestablement influencés par les faits économiques. Une autre objection importante, illustrée par M. G. au moyen d’une série d’exemples, concerne la notion du „trend“, empruntée à l’étude de la conjoncture. Le „trend“ ne peut pas avoir une loi sociale adéquate, parce qu’il tend à transformer tous les rapports sociaux qualitatifs en rapports mathématico-statistiques de valeurs. Le système actuel de la société, avec ses multiples ramifications, ne pourra toutefois jamais être saisi à i’aide de méthodes uniquement quantitatives ; il exige au contraire, dans son ensemble, une interprétation dynamique de la société. Comme le „Report“ y a renoncé, son intention théorique devait nécessairement échouer. Plus encore : les propositions pratiques qu’il fait pour l’élimination des défauts de la société américaine n’arrivent pas à la racine du mal.The joint report written at the request of president Hoover undertakes to present every aspect of social life in America. It has more over the special purpose of comprehensing the inter-relationships between these separate social compartments, and determining what social changes are taking place. Not only are these changes to be ascertained but the attempt made to grasp their trend, or in other words, to grasp the law determining these changes. G. seeks to show in a criticism of the results and methods of this „collective expression of sociological research in the United States“, that notwithstanding the extraordinary experience these 40 leading social scientists could draw upon, and the admirable comprehensiveness of this work-indeed an encyclopedia of American social life-, the scientific aim was not achieved, and could not be achieved. This is due to the insufficiency of Ogburn’s theory which underlies the work, that phenomena of crisis are to be traced to the disproportionate rates of change of the various provinces of social life. It presupposes a relatively stable social order in which upheavals are felt as mere oscillations around an intrinsically firm nucleus. Because the fundamental phenomenon of the economic crisis is not considered, the Report dispenses with the approach to a methodological standpoint, according to which all social processes are decisively determined by economic processes. Another important objection, which G. illustrates by a series of examples relates to concept of the trend borrowed from the business cycle. This can in no way furnish a suitable social law, because it tends to resolve all qualitative social relationships into mathematical- statistical formulae. Present day society, with its manifold divisions, can never be understood by quantitative methods only, but presumes a dialectical point of view for social life as a whole, which is ever in a state of flux. Since such a theoretical aim vitiated, but even its practical proposals, which it puts forward to rectify the shortcomings of American social life, fail to touch the root of the evil. (shrink)