A decision maker bets on the outcomes of a sequence of coin-tossings. At the beginning of the game the decision maker can choose one of two coins to play the game. This initial choice is irreversible. The coins can be biased and the player is uncertain about the nature of one (or possibly both) coin(s). If the player is an expected-utility maximizer, her choice of the coin will depend on different elements: the nature of the game (namely, whether she can (...) observe the outcomes of the previous tosses before making her next decision), her utility function, the prior distribution on the bias of the coin. We will show that even a risk averter might optimally choose a riskier coin when learning is allowed. We will express most of our results in the language of stochastic orderings, allowing comparisons that are valid for large classes of utility functions. (shrink)

The present note first discusses the concept of s-convex pain functions in decision theory. Then, the economic behavior of an agent with such a pain function is represented through the comparison of some recursive lotteries.

Situations of conflict giving rise to social dilemmas are widespread in society and game theory is one major way in which they can be investigated. Starting from the observation that individuals in society interact through networks of acquaintances, we model the co-evolution of the agents’ strategies and of the social network itself using two prototypical games, the Prisoner’s Dilemma and the Stag-Hunt. Allowing agents to dismiss ties and establish new ones, we find that cooperation and coordination can be achieved through (...) the self-organization of the social network, a result that is nontrivial, especially in the Prisoner’s Dilemma case. The evolution and stability of cooperation implies the condensation of agents exploiting particular game strategies into strong and stable clusters which are more densely connected, even in the more difficult case of the Prisoner’s Dilemma. (shrink)

Human adults incline toward moral objectivism but may approach things more relativistically if different cultures are involved. In this study, 4-, 6-, and 9-year-old children (N = 136) witnessed two parties who disagreed about moral matters: a normative judge (e.g., judging that it is wrong to do X) and an antinormative judge (e.g., judging that it is okay to do X). We assessed children’s metaethical judgment, that is, whether they judged that only one party (objectivism) or both parties (relativism) could (...) be right. We found that 9-year-olds, but not younger children, were more likely to judge that both parties could be right when a normative ingroup judge disagreed with an antinormative extraterrestrial judge (with different preferences and background) than when the antinormative judge was another ingroup individual. This effect was not found in a comparison case where parties disagreed about the possibility of different physical laws. These findings suggest that although young children often exhibit moral objectivism, by early school age they begin to temper their objectivism with culturally relative metaethical judgments. (shrink)

In their attempt to connect the workings of the human mind with their neural realizers, cognitive neuroscientists often bracket out individual differences to build a single, abstract model that purportedly represents (almost) every human being’s brain. In this paper I first examine the rationale behind this model, which I call ‘Platonic Brain Model’. Then I argue that it is to be surpassed in favor of multiple models allowing for patterned inter-individual differences. I introduce the debate on legitimate (and illegitimate) ways (...) of mapping neural structures and cognitive functions, endorsing a view according to which function-structure mapping is context-sensitive. Building on the discussion of the ongoing debate on the function(s) of the so-called Fusiform “Face” Area, I show the necessity of indexing function-structure mappings to some populations of subjects, clustered on the basis of factors such as their expertise in a given domain. (shrink)

In his article, ‘Social constructionism and climate science denial’, Hansson claims to present empirical evidence that the cultural theory developed by Dame Mary Douglas, Aaron Wildavsky and ourselves leads to science denial. In this reply, we show that there is no validity to these claims. First, we show that Hansson’s empirical evidence that cultural theory has led to climate science denial falls apart under closer inspection. Contrary to Hansson’s claims, cultural theory has made significant contributions to understanding and addressing climate (...) change. Second, we discuss various features of Douglas’ cultural theory that differentiate it from other constructivist approaches and make it compatible with the scientific method. Thus, we also demonstrate that cultural theory cannot be accused of epistemic relativism. (shrink)

Tomas Aquinas defined truth as the correspondence between things and understanding. Castro Alves paints the horror of the slave nautical traffic. In his essay On the Concept of History, Walter Benjamin reminds us: “The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the ‘emergency situation’ in which we live is the rule.” This ‘emergency situation’ was Fascism. Albert Camus defended his romance La Peste against the accusation of Roland Barthes that is was “dehors de l’histoire”, pointing out that it was not (...) only about the recent historical phenomenon of Fascism, but also about the permanent risk of its rebirth. Agnes Heller associates faith with prejudice and alienation. The following article will explore the Thomist concept of truth, Benjamin’s concept of history, Camus’ allegory of the plague, Agnes Heller’s notion of faith and Castro Alves’ powerful denouncement of slave traffic, to better criticize the phenomenon of post-truth, a rebirth of fascist information practices. (shrink)

What is mathematics about? And if it is about some sort of mathematical reality, how can we have access to it? This is the problem raised by Plato, which still today is the subject of lively philosophical disputes. This book traces the history of the problem, from its origins to its contemporary treatment. It discusses the answers given by Aristotle, Proclus and Kant, through Frege's and Russell's versions of logicism, Hilbert's formalism, Gödel's platonism, up to the the current debate on (...) Benacerraf's dilemma and the indispensability argument. Through the considerations of themes in the philosophy of language, ontology, and the philosophy of science, the book aims at offering an historically-informed introduction to the philosophy of mathematics, approached through the lenses of its most fundamental problem. (shrink)

Social norms have played a key role in the evolution of human cooperation, serving to stabilize prosocial and egalitarian behavior despite the self-serving motives of individuals. Young children’s behavior mostly conforms to social norms, as they follow adult behavioral directives and instructions. But it turns out that even preschool children also actively enforce social norms on others, often using generic normative language to do so. This behavior is not easily explained by individualistic motives; it is more likely a result of (...) children’s growing identification with their cultural group, which leads to prosocial motives for preserving its ways of doing things. (shrink)

Young children interpret some acts performed by adults as normatively governed, that is, as capable of being performed either rightly or wrongly. In previous experiments, children have made this interpretation when adults introduced them to novel acts with normative language (e.g. ‘this is the way it goes’), along with pedagogical cues signaling culturally important information, and with social-pragmatic marking that this action is a token of a familiar type. In the current experiment, we exposed children to novel actions with no (...) normative language, and we systematically varied pedagogical and social-pragmatic cues in an attempt to identify which of them, if either, would lead children to normative interpretations. We found that young 3-year-old children inferred normativity without any normative language and without any pedagogical cues. The only cue they used was adult socialpragmatic marking of the action as familiar, as if it were a token of a well-known type (as opposed to performing it, as if inventing it on the spot). These results suggest that – in the absence of explicit normative language – young children interpret adult actions as normatively governed based mainly on the intentionality (perhaps signaling conventionality) with which they are performed. (shrink)

The concepts and powerful mathematical tools of Dynamical Systems Theory (DST) yield illuminating methods of studying cognitive processes, and are even claimed by some to enable us to bridge the notorious explanatory gap separating mind and matter. This article includes an analysis of some of the conceptual and empirical progress Dynamical Systems Theory is claimed to accomodate. While sympathetic to the dynamicist program in principle, this article will attempt to formulate a series of problems the proponents of the approach in (...) question will need to face if they wish to prolong their optimism. The main points to be addressed involve the reductive tendencies inherent in Dynamical Systems Theory, its somewhat muddled position relative to connectionism, the metaphorical nature DST-C exhibits which hinders its explanatory potential, and DST-C's problematic account of causality. Brief discussions of the mathematical and philosophical backgrounds of DST, seminal experimental work and possible adaptations of the theory or alternative suggestions (dynamicist connectionism, neurophenomenology, R&D theory) are included. (shrink)

Debates on the moral status of human embryos have been highly and continuously controversial. For many, these controversies have turned into a fruitless scholastical endeavor. However, recent developments and insights in cellular biology have cast further doubt on one of the core points of dissent: the argument from potentiality. In this article we want to show in a nonscholastical way why this argument cannot possibly survive. Getting once more into the intricacies of status debates is a must in our eyes. (...) Not merely intellectual coherence but the standing and self-understanding of current stem cell research might profit from finally taking leave of the argument from potentiality. (shrink)

The aim of my paper is to compare three alternative formal reconstructions of van Inwagen’s famous argument for incompatibilism. In the first part of my paper, I examine van Inwagen’s own reconstruction within a propositional modal logic. I point out that, due to the expressive limitations of his propositional modal logic, van Inwagen is unable to argue directly (that is, within his formal framework) for incompatibilism. In the second part of my paper, I suggest to reconstruct van Inwagen’s argument within (...) a first-order predicate logic. I show, however, that even though this reconstruction is not susceptible to the same objection, this reconstruction can be shown to be inconsistent (given van Inwagen’s own assumptions). At the end of my paper, I suggest to reconstruct van Inwagen’s argument within a quantified counterfactual logic with propositional quantifiers. I show that within this formal framework van Inwagen would not only be able to argue directly for incompatibilism, he would also be able to argue for crucial assumptions of his argument. (shrink)

Proposition I.1 is, by far, the most popular example used to justify the thesis that many of Euclid’s geometric arguments are diagram-based. Many scholars have recently articulated this thesis in different ways and argued for it. My purpose is to reformulate it in a quite general way, by describing what I take to be the twofold role that diagrams play in Euclid’s plane geometry (EPG). Euclid’s arguments are object-dependent. They are about geometric objects. Hence, they cannot be diagram-based unless diagrams (...) are supposed to have an appropriate relation with these objects. I take this relation to be a quite peculiar sort of representation. Its peculiarity depends on the two following claims that I shall argue for: ( i ) The identity conditions of EPG objects are provided by the identity conditions of the diagrams that represent them; ( ii ) EPG objects inherit some properties and relations from these diagrams. (shrink)

El imaginario poético que emerge de la cultura porteña del Pacífico Sur es un producto de la imaginación que responde a un ejercicio escritural histórico. Hacemos un repaso de estas manifestaciones a partir de tres momentos o sensibilidades que construyen una imagen del puerto de Valparaíso. Desde el relato de viaje, el gesto modernista y la narrativa del naturalismo, todos previos a un producto estético-literario mayor, enseñan en su mirada un modo de habitar el puerto que permiten proponer la existencia (...) de una cultura en conflicto con Occidente. Los pasajes de estas manifestaciones no pueden leerse aislados de esa poética del habitar porteño, sino como parte integral de un discurso de frontera que se pronuncia contra el olvido y a favor de la sobrevivencia histórica de estos puertos. (shrink)

Neste trabalho a noção de fenômeno saturado, proposta por Jean-Luc Marion, é apresentada criticamente e revista. Apoiando-se nas objeções levantadas por L.B. Puntel, que têm um impacto considerável sobre o projeto de Marion de pensar Deus exclusivamente de um ponto de vista fenomenológico, o autor revê o fenômeno saturado através de um retorno à sua fonte primeira: a terceira Crítica de Kant. Desta forma, a natureza simbólica desse fenômeno fica enfatizada, assim como sua constituição estrutural pela imaginação analógica. Em seguida, (...) enfocando o tipo específico de fenômeno saturado que é o fenômeno da revelação, mostra-se como esta versão revista da noção de Marion é adequada para se pensar a experiência do sagrado. Por fim, corrobora-se esse ponto de vista por meio de uma breve alusão à concepção de experiência religiosa em Rudolf Otto. (shrink)

In this event-related potential study a masking technique that prevents conscious perception of words and non-words through attentional distraction was used to reveal the temporal dynamics of word processing under non-conscious and conscious conditions. In the non-conscious condition, ERP responses differed between masked words and non-words from 112 to 160 ms after stimulus-onset over posterior brain areas. The early onset of the word–non-word differences was compatible with previous studies that reported non-conscious access to orthographic information within this time period. Moreover, (...) source localisations provided evidence for automatic activation of prelexical phonological information, whereas no evidence for non-conscious semantic processing was found. When subjects were informed about the masking technique, lexical differences occurred at later time intervals, suggesting conscious access to additional word related information. These results indicate that early visual word processing does not depend entirely on attentional resources, but that non-conscious processing probably is restricted to rather lower-level linguistic information. (shrink)

Background: Existing ethical guidelines recommend that, all else equal, past receipt of a medical resource (e.g. a scarce organ) should not be considered in current allocation decisions (e.g. a repeat transplantation).DiscussionOne stated reason for this ethical consensus is that formal theories of ethics and justice do not persuasively accept or reject repeated access to the same medical resources. Another is that restricting attention to past receipt of a particular medical resource seems arbitrary: why couldn't one just as well, it is (...) argued, consider receipt of other goods such as income or education? In consequence, simple allocation by lottery or first-come-first-served without consideration of any past receipt is thought to best afford equal opportunity, conditional on equal medical need. There are three issues with this view that need to be addressed. First, public views and patient preferences are less ambiguous than formal theories of ethics. Empirical work shows strong preferences for fairness in health care that have not been taken into account: repeated accessto resources has been perceived as unfair. Second, while difficult to consider receipt of many other prior resources including non-medical resources, this should not be used a motive for ignoring the receipt of any and all goods including the focal resource in question. Third, when all claimants to a scarce resource are equally deserving, then use of random allocation seems warranted. However, the converse is not true: mere use of a randomizer does not by itself make the merits of all claimants equal.SummaryMy conclusion is that not ignoring prior receipt of the same medical resource, and prioritizing those who have not previously had access to the medical resource in question, may be perceived as fairer and more equitable by society. (shrink)

Dynamical systems are mathematical structures whose aim is to describe the evolution of an arbitrary deterministic system through time, which is typically modeled as (a subset of) the integers or the real numbers. We show that it is possible to generalize the standard notion of a dynamical system, so that its time dimension is only required to possess the algebraic structure of a monoid: first, we endow any dynamical system with an associated graph and, second, we prove that such a (...) graph is a category if and only if the time model of the dynamical system is a monoid. In addition, we show that the general notion of a dynamical system allows us not only to define a family of meaningful dynamical concepts, but also to distinguish among a cluster of otherwise tangled notions of reversibility, whose logical relationships are finally analyzed. (shrink)

This essay examines the relation between causation and causal explanation. It distinguishes two prominent roles that causes play within the sciences. On the one hand, causes may work as metaphysical posits. From this standpoint, mainstream in contemporary philosophy, causation provides the ‘raw material’ for explanation. On the other hand, causes may be conceived as explanatory postulates, theoretical hypotheses lacking any substantial ontological commitment. This unduly neglected distinction provides the conceptual resources to revisit longstanding philosophical issues, such as overdetermination and causal (...) pluralism. It also inspires a provocative reframing of Russell’s famous, if notoriously elusive, remarks on the nature of causation. (shrink)

Il est urgent de réinvestir l'humanisme, ce mouvement d'émancipation culturelle, né à la Renaissance et fondé sur l’élan de l’esprit critique, sur le retour aux sources antiques et sur le développement des universités – notion qui paraît à certains désuète, voire politiquement «récupérée». Des chercheurs et des enseignants disent ici en quoi la formation universitaire, au-delà des sept arts libéraux qui assurent la maîtrise des chiffres et des lettres, ne peut qu’être humaniste, aujourd’hui comme hier: son objectif est de forger (...) des citoyennes et des citoyens qui mettent leurs talents et leurs compétences au service des autres et chez qui l’intelligence va de pair avec la conscience éthique. La bulle d’institution de l’Université de Louvain, en 1425, exprimait déjà en des termes étonnamment simples et actuels les principes fondateurs d’une université, sa vocation, son enracinement dans la cité et les liens privilégiés qui unissent ses étudiants, ses docteurs et ses professeurs. On trouve dans le présent petit livre une traduction française inédite de ce document essentiel de la fin du Moyen Âge, due à Lambert Isebaert. Cet ouvrage est une boussole pour l’esprit, de ceux qu’on garde à portée de main pour tenir le cap. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Klio Jahrgang: 99 Heft: 1 Seiten: 278-289.

Partiendo de la genealogía del neoliberalismo que Michel Foucault traza en _Nacimiento de la biopolítica_ hasta los ordoliberales alemanes, se sostendrá que, si en lugar de haberla basado en sus textos posteriores a la Segunda Guerra Mundial, Foucault hubiera acudido a los textos fundacionales de la época de Weimar: a) no hubiera incurrido en el equívoco de pensar que el papel del Estado fue secundario para estos, y b) habría advertido el carácter autoritario de su propuesta. Así, analizaremos en detalle (...) la inverosímil confluencia en torno a una misma tesis de Carl Schmitt y de los ordoliberales en la década de 1930: Estado fuerte, economía sana. Se concluirá invitando a seguir analizando el papel central del Estado y el autoritarismo en el neoliberalismo, tanto en el pasado como en el presente. (shrink)

El presente artículo analiza el concepto de Diferencia en la filosofía de Gilles Deleuze. Se constata, en este sentido, que la dicotomía inmanencia-trascendencia juega un papel protagónico en la articulación de dicha propuesta. Si bien un plano de composición inmanente no entra en una dialéctica negativa de tipo hegeliano respecto a un plano de organización trascendente, la primacía del primero resulta evidente en la conceptualización de la diferencia. Así, analizaremos las tensiones generadas por dicho enfoque en lo concerniente al despliegue (...) de la diferencia como razón suficiente en un plano inmanente, lo cual nos llevará a problematizar este concepto desde un plano diferente; a saber, un plano inminente que emerge de forma silenciosa en el último trabajo de Gilles Deleuze. (shrink)

This paper argues that the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics suggests a form of holism for which the whole (total ensemble of paths) has properties that are not strongly reducible to the properties of the parts (the single trajectories). Feynman’s sum over histories calculates the probability amplitude of a particle moving within a boundary by summing over all the possible trajectories that the particle can undertake. These trajectories and their individual probability amplitudes are thus necessary in calculating the total (...) amplitude. However, not all possible trajectories are differentiable, thus suggesting that they are not physical possibilities, but only mathematical entities. It follows that if the possible differentiable trajectories are taken to be part of the physical system, they are not sufficient to calculate the total probability amplitude. The conclusion is that the total ensemble is weakly non-supervenient upon the physically possible trajectories. (shrink)

In this paper, I delineate the first pages of a philosophical genealogy which outlines the cornerstones of a philosophy of bio-technical forms. In so doing, the essay contributes to the philosophical understanding of some key scientific concepts. In particular, it analyses the philosophical and historical preconditions, the epistemic assumptions, as well as the ontological commitments of the concept of form as used in digital design and in bionics. In the first section, I investigate Ernst Kapp’s philosophy of technical forms. In (...) the second section, I analyse the emergence of biotechnology, today’s bionics, as an independent technical discipline. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Austro-Hungarian botanist Raoul Heinrich Francé (1874–1943) founded this discipline with the aim of imitating the technical solutions chosen by nature. In the conclusion, I draw broader conclusions about the philosophy of bio-technical forms. Particularly, I argue, first, that the role of materiality and form-intrinsic propriety is of central importance in processes of form design. Second, I define morphology as a theory of possible constructions of forms in space and not, as in evolutionary biology, a science of the changes of forms in time. This characterises what I have called the ontological turn in form-design disciplines: nature operates technically to conceive new forms. (shrink)

Peter van Inwagen’s original formulation of the Consequence Argument employed an inference rule that was shown to be invalid given van Inwagen’s interpretation of the modal operators in the Consequence Argument. In response, van Inwagen recently suggested a revised interpretation of his modal operators. Following up on a debate between Blum and Schnieder, I analyze van Inwagen’s revised interpretation in terms of explanatory notions and I argue that van Inwagen faces a dilemma: he either has to admit that beta entails (...) fatalism, or he has to admit that a new counterexample invalidates beta. Either way, it seems reasonable to reject beta and to conclude that the Consequence Argument fails. Further, I argue that Widerker’s well-known substitute for rule beta is faced with a similar dilemma and, therefore, is bound to fail as well. I conclude that, if the modal operators are interpreted in terms of explanatory notions, neither van Inwagen’s nor Widerker’s rule of inference turns out to be valid. (shrink)

The current volume provides an interpretation of American pragmatism according to which pragmatism is not opposed to metaphysics but instead represents a vital, non-dismissive, non-deflationary attempt to respond to classical questions of philosophy concerning the nature of reality, truth, goodness, beauty, ideality, etc. American pragmatism has been often interpreted as a form of crass utilitarianism applied to all areas of philosophy – a precipitation of the “industrialist” spirit of the United States. This book demonstrates how such an interpretation is misguided. (...) The chapters focus on different topics in the philosophies of Peirce and Dewey – what is “meaning,” what is the human self, what is truth, what is consciousness, what “semiotics” can add to realism – that articulate the unitary view that the “real” is always inhabited by and open to the “ideal.”. (shrink)

In this paper I will claim that the standard interpretation of Aquinas’s philosophy of mind is not satisfactory. A better reading is possible, which I will call strong hylomorphic dualism. Thus, I intend to do three things: first, I introduce strong hylomorphic dualism by highlighting the shortcomings of the standard reading, to which I will refer as weak hylomorphic dualism; second, I reconstruct two arguments provided by Aquinas to prove that his position is in fact best understood as strong hylomorphic (...) dualism. Finally, I suggest that Aquinas thinks of the relationship between intellect and phantasms in terms of what could be called diagrammatic causality, as exemplified by his theory of abstraction and attention to the phantasms. (shrink)

By inserting the dialogue between Einstein, Schlick and Reichenbach into a wider network of debates about the epistemology of geometry, this paper shows that not only did Einstein and Logical Empiricists come to disagree about the role, principled or provisional, played by rods and clocks in General Relativity, but also that in their lifelong interchange, they never clearly identified the problem they were discussing. Einstein’s reflections on geometry can be understood only in the context of his ”measuring rod objection” against (...) Weyl. On the contrary, Logical Empiricists, though carefully analyzing the Einstein–Weyl debate, tried to interpret Einstein’s epistemology of geometry as a continuation of the Helmholtz–Poincaré debate by other means. The origin of the misunderstanding, it is argued, should be found in the failed appreciation of the difference between a “Helmholtzian” and a “Riemannian” tradition. The epistemological problems raised by General Relativity are extraneous to the first tradition and can only be understood in the context of the latter, the philosophical significance of which, however, still needs to be fully explored. (shrink)

The notion of schema has been given a major role by Recanati within his conception of primary pragmatic processes, conceived as a type of associative process. I intend to show that Recanati’s considerations on schemata may challenge the relevance theorist’s argument against associative explanations in pragmatics, and support an argument in favor of associative (versus inferential) explanations. More generally, associative relations can be shown to be schematic, that is, they have enough structure to license inferential effects without any appeal to (...) genuine inferential processes. Associative processes are thus able to explain a number of pragmatic and linguistic phenomena which have instead been thought to require specialized inferential processes. (shrink)

Cognitive Robotics can be defined as the study of cognitive phenomena by their modeling in physical artifacts such as robots. This is a very lively and fascinating field which has already given fundamental contributions to our understanding of natural cognition. Nonetheless, robotics has to date addressed mainly very basic, low­level cognitive phenomena like sensory­motor coordination, perception, and navigation, and it is not clear how the current approach might scale up to explain high­level human cognition. In this paper we argue that (...) a promising way to do that is to merge current ideas and methods of 'embodied cognition' with the Russian tradition of theoretical psychology which views language not only as a communication system but also as a cognitive tool, that is by developing a Vygotskyan Cognitive Robotics. We substantiate this idea by discussing several domains in which language can improve basic cognitive abilities and permit the development of high­level cognition: learning, categorization, abstraction, memory, voluntary control, and mental life. (shrink)