Las pretensiones del autor son: (i) Describir la versión modal de la prueba ontológica propuesta por Charles Hartshorne, una versión que enfatiza la anomalía modal del concepto de Dios, que demuestra que las dos únicas alternativas metafísicas coherentes son el positivismo y un teísmo basado en la noción de “necesidad bajo condiciones tautológicas”, y que vindica esta última opción apelando a una filosofía del proceso inspirada en Whitehead y cuya herramienta conceptual básica es la distinción entre existencia y actualidad. (ii) (...) Evaluar la propuesta de Hartshorne, defendiéndola frente a equivocaciones frecuentes y desarrollándola en al menos dos aspectos, incluyendo un análisis del proyecto de Russell de reducir las proposiciones modales a enunciados de alcance, y proponiendo una concepción iterativa de la modalidad. (iii) Reivindicar la actitud filosófica de Hartshorne, un racionalismo circunspecto que evita el reduccionismo sin temer el conocimiento racional. (shrink)

El propósito de este artículo es cuestionar la lectura tradicional de las Meditaciones metafísicas, una lectura que, abstrayendo del reto escépticode una reducción de la razón al absurdo al que se enfrenta Descartes,magnifica la prioridad epistémica del argumento del Cogito, y que, haciendocaso omiso de su estrategia anti-escéptica, es incapaz de apreciar que, másque la recopilación de mejores evidencias a favor de las proposicionesnucleares, su función es la de sustraer razones para dudar, de tal forma queel Investigador adquiera una posición (...) ilustrada desde la que los escenariosescépticos carezcan de sentido. Descartes propone una versión modal ometafísica de confiabilismo análoga a la defendida en el panoramacontemporáneo por Ernest Sosa, una posición capaz de superar sincircularidad el escepticismo y que muestra cómo el uso correcto de la razón desemboca en una teoría ontológica que elimina la posibilidad de quenuestras facultades cognitivas no sean fiables. (shrink)

Nicolás, esta entrevista pretende ser un estímulo para que, al hilo de unas cuantas preguntas, expongas algunos aspectos de tu pensamiento y de tu trayectoria intelectual. La conmemoración de los cincuenta años de existencia de los Anales coincide aproximadamente con el momento de tu jubilación. Tú has dirigido la revista durante la mayor parte de este tiempo y, desde luego, has sido un testigo importante de la evolución de la filosofía jurídica durante ese periodo, además de haber participado directamente en (...) ella y de haber protagonizado algunos de sus momentos de mayor relieve. Por el interés que suscita tu propia obra, y por el interés que suscita esa obra y sus vicisitudes en el contexto político e intelectual en el que se ha desarrollado, te agradecemos que hayas aceptado contestar estas preguntas. Estamos seguros de que tus respuestas, la información que proporciones a los lectores, y la reflexión que tal vez te induzcan a realizar, serán de grandísima utilidad para todos los que cultivan la filosofía del derecho. (shrink)

IntroductionBisphenol A is highly debated and studied in relation to a variety of health outcomes. This large variation in the literature makes BPA a topic that is prone to selective use of literature, in order to underpin one’s own findings and opinion. Over time, selective use of literature, by means of citations, can lead to a skewed knowledge development and a biased scientific consensus. In this study, we assess which factors drive citation and whether this results in the overrepresentation of (...) harmful health effects of BPA.MethodsA citation network analysis was performed to test various determinants of citation. A systematic search identified all relevant publications on the human health effect of BPA. Data were extracted on potential determinants of selective citation, such as study outcome, study design, sample size, journal impact factor, authority of the author, self-citation, and funding source. We applied random effect logistic regression to assess whether these determinants influence the likelihood of citation.ResultsOne hundred sixty-nine publications on BPA were identified, with 12,432 potential citation pathways of which 808 citations occurred. The network consisted of 63 cross-sectional studies, 34 cohort studies, 29 case-control studies, 35 narrative reviews, and 8 systematic reviews. Positive studies have a 1.5 times greater chance of being cited compared to negative studies. Additionally, the authority of the author and self-citation are consistently found to be positively associated with the likelihood of being cited. Overall, the network seems to be highly influenced by two highly cited publications, whereas 60 out of 169 publications received no citations.ConclusionIn the literature on BPA, citation is mostly driven by positive study outcome and author-related factors, such as high authority within the network. Interpreting the impact of these factors and the big influence of a few highly cited publications, it can be questioned to which extent the knowledge development in human literature on BPA is actually evidence-based. (shrink)

The network model of EEG formation has revealed a unified mechanism for disparate EEG phenomena: for various reactions as well as for ontogenetic and phylogenetic differences. EEG rhythmicity was shown to be an external manifestation of the functioning of the intracortical stabilizing system which provides normal informational operations in the cerebral cortex.

More than one third of the human brain is devoted to the processes of seeing - vision is after all the main way in which we gather information about the world. But human vision is a dynamic process during which the eyes continually sample the environment. Where most books on vision consider it as a passive activity, this book is unique in focusing on vision as an 'active' process. It goes beyond most accounts of vision where the focus is on (...) seeing, to provide an integrated account of seeing AND looking. The book starts by pointing out the weaknesses in our traditional approaches to vision and the reason we need this new approach. It then gives a thorough description of basic details of the visual and oculomotor systems necessary to understand active vision. The book goes on to show how this approach can give a new perspective on visual attention, and how the approach has progressed in the areas of visual orienting, reading, visual search, scene perception and neuropsychology. Finally, the book summarises progress by showing how this approach sheds new light on the old problem of how we maintain perception of a stable visual world. Written by two leading vision scientists, this book will be valuable for vision researchers and psychology students, from undergraduate level upwards. (shrink)

This paper is a critical discussion of A.N. Prior’s contribution to the modern understanding of indeterminism and human freedom of choice. Prior suggested that these ideas should be conceived in terms of his tense logic. It can be demonstrated that his approach provides an attractive formalization that makes it possible to discuss indeterminism and human freedom of choice in a very precise manner and in a broader metaphysical context. It is also argued that Prior’s development of this approach was closely (...) linked to his very personal struggles with fundamental religious and metaphysical questions. In his opinion, holding the doctrine of divine foreknowledge together with the doctrine of human freewill gives rise to difficult logical and philosophical problems. It appears that Prior, rather early on, decided to support what was later known as the Peircean solution, although he also analysed what he considered to be the most important alternative solution—the Ockhamist solution. This paper offers a discussion of some of Prior’s published books and papers as well as some of the papers in his Nachlass. (shrink)

Cappelen and Hawthorne’s Relativism and Monadic Truth (2009) offers an extended defense of a thesis they call simplicity, which, in brief, holds that propositions are true or false simpliciter. Propositions are cast in their traditional roles as the contents of assertions, and as the semantic values of declarative sentences in contexts. Simplicity stands in sharp contrast to forms of relativism including, for instance, a form that hold that our claims are true or false only relative to a judge. This applies (...) especially to claims of taste, which come out true or false only relative to the judge who finds things tasty (e.g. Glanzberg 2007, Lasersohn 2005). But simplicity also rejects the more widespread temporalist view that propositions are true or false only relative to a time, and it rejects the even more widely held view that propositions are true or false only relative to a world. One reason that has been advanced for temporalism, e.g. by Kaplan (1989), is that our languages seem to contain non-trivial temporal operators. Hence, the argument goes, the semantic values of sentences need to be temporally neutral, i.e. vary for truth or falsehood with time. The same goes for possible worlds and modal operators. Hence, Kaplan and many others think of the semantic values of sentences as sets of world-time pairs. It has been tempting to apply this sort of argument much more widely, to see the semantic values of sentences as varying not just with world and time, but perhaps with location and other parameters as well. Kaplan.. (shrink)

Disguised plagiarism often goes undetected. An especially subtle type of disguised plagiarism is translation plagiarism, which occurs when the work of one author is republished in a different language with authorship credit taken by someone else. I focus on the challenge of demonstrating this subtle variety of plagiarism and examine the corruptive influence that plagiarizing articles exert on unsuspecting researchers who later cite them in the downstream literature as genuine products of research. I conclude by arguing that an open discussion (...) of plagiarizing articles in philosophy is necessary for maintaining the reliability of the body of published research and for restoring integrity to scholarly communication. (shrink)

This paper concerns a puzzle about the logical form of expressions involving repeated `and's. Obvious attempts to solve the problem fail. It happens that a proper solution surprisingly requires the semantic notions of sampling and expression. I speculate that this may provide an alternative to conversational implicature.

_Background:_ Cognitive biases play an important role in the formation and maintenance of delusions. These biases are indicators of a weak reflective mind, or reduced engaging in reflective and deliberate reasoning. In three experiments, we tested whether a bias to accept non-sense statements as profound, treat metaphorical statements as literal, and suppress intuitive responses is related to psychotic-like experiences. _Methods:_ We tested deliberate reasoning and psychotic-like experiences in the general population and in patients with a former psychotic episode. Deliberate reasoning (...) was assessed with the bullshit receptivity scale, the ontological confabulation scale and the cognitive reflection test (CRT). We also measured algorithmic performance with the Berlin numeracy test and the wordsum test. Psychotic-like experiences were measured with the Community Assessment of Psychic Experience (CAPE-42) scale. _Results:_ Psychotic-like experiences were positively correlated with a larger receptivity toward bullshit, more ontological confabulations, and also a lower score on the CRT but not with algorithmic task performance. In the patient group higher psychotic-like experiences significantly correlated with higher bullshit receptivity. _Conclusion:_ Reduced deliberate reasoning may contribute to the formation of delusions, and be a general thinking bias largely independent of a person's general intelligence. Acceptance of bullshit may be facilitated the more positive symptoms a patient has, contributing to the maintenance of the delusions. (shrink)

carrington places race and racism at the center of his densely written analysis of science fiction, fantasy, utopia, and other forms of popular culture. He moves easily between a broad range of forms, which include memoirs, television series, comic books, novels, novelizations, fandom and fanzines, and short fiction and fiction circulated on the Internet. Popular culture helps us to construct notions of identity and race, and for carrington many constituent groups, notably fans, develop its key concepts and values.Speculative fiction is (...) for carrington a framework that links these various forms of popular culture. Here, SF is a genre different from literature, as it is situated closer to, and is more deeply... (shrink)

Some theorists, worried about liberalism’s potential as a foundation for public health ethics, suggest that republicanism provides a better background of justification for public health policies, interventions, etc. In this article, this suggestion is put to the test, and it is argued that (i) contemporary (civic) republicanism and liberalism are not nearly as opposed as it is sometimes suggested, and that (ii) the kind of republicanism which one leading scholar in the field, Bruce Jennings, as an alternative to liberalism, does (...) not reflect the contemporary understanding of republicanism as held by, e.g. Phillip Pettit et al. (shrink)

This paper defends the acts/omissions distinction which underpins the present law on euthanasia, from various criticisms, and aims to show that it is supported by fundamental principles. After rejecting arguments that deny the coherence and/or legal relevance of the distinction, the discussion proceeds to focus on the causal relationship between the doctor and the patient's death in each case. Although previous analyses, challenging the causal efficacy of omissions generally, are shown to be deficient, it is argued that in certain cases (...) of causing death by omission the causal authorship of the doctor lapses. The final part of the paper examines why this should be morally significant and proposes an answer in terms of the principle of equality. Assuming all other factors are equal, the infringement of this principle provides an additional reason against actively killing a patient, which is not present in cases of passively letting die. (shrink)