A case study is presented of the development of computer-based support tools for power engineers in the electricity supply industry. The objective was to develop an expert system to support witching schedule production. A user-centred approach was followed which led the user community to conclude that a switching schedule production assistant (SSPA) was required which would leave control with the power engineer. Prototype systems were developed and evaluated in user trials which revealed that a significant and more general purpose tool (...) would be a computer generated electricity network display that the engineers could manipulate. The paper concludes that the process of enabling users to evaluate alternative forms of technology can facilitate the development systems that are useful, acceptable and usable. (shrink)

R F Dearden; Theory and Practice in Education, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 14, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 17–29, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-.

R F Dearden; Education and Politics, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 14, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 149–156, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9752.198.

„My sole purpose in this paper is to try and correct what I take to be a common misinterpretation of Hume’s opinions on mathematics. I shall not enquire whether he was right or wrong in holding these opinions. Nor shall I offer opinions of my own.“.

Even today, a century after the publication of the “Origin of Species”, current zoological literature often reveals an insufficient grasp of the implications of the now generally accepted view that it is natural selection that confers direction on the evolutionary process.This is, in part, due to a reaction against oversimplified teleology and against Lamarckism. In rejecting Lamarck's thesis that the activities of an animal directly affect its hereditary characters it is frequently assumed that this implies that such activities are irrelevant (...) to the study of evolution. This is a non-sequitur, for activities may affect evolution not directly, through heredity, but indirectly, by influencing the direction of the selective forces impinging on the organism. Reasons are given for concluding that changes in habits and behaviour frequently precede structural change and, in fact, determine the direction of the latter.As an example of a concept which deserves a more evolutionary treatment than it commonly receives, the subject of neoteny is considered. It appears that failure to think in terms of the selective forces involved has frequently led to error. An analysis in functional terms is made of the theory that the chordates represent secondarily glorified sea-squirts and it is concluded that this idea is unlikely to be correct. The characteristics of man that are commonly considered to be neotenous are also discussed. It is concluded that a facile and unanalytical application of the label “neoteny” to many of the evolutionary changes involved has tended to obscure rather than to clarify their significance: the neotenous features of man are not those that have been of primary importance in human evolution, but are secondary to the acquisition of new characters which are not to be found in either the adult or the young stages of any other primate.Aujourd'hui, un siècle après l'apparition de l'Originedes Espèces, la conviction est presque générale que la sélection naturelle dirige le procès de l'évolution. Néanmoins, les publications zoologiques actuelles révèlent souvent une compréhension insuffisante de ce qui en résulte.Ceci doit en partie être considéré comme réaction contre une téléologie simpliste et contre le Lamarckisme. En rejetant la thèse de Lamarck, que les activités d'un animal ont une influence directe sur ses caractéristiques héréditaires, on admet fréquemment que de pareilles activités n'ont rien à voir avec l'étude le l'évolution. Cependant, une telle conclusion n'est pas justifiée, car les activités peuvent influer sur l'évolution non pas directement, par la voie de l'hérédité, mais indirectement en agissant sur la direction des forces sélectives que l'organisme rencontre. Des raisons ont été données qui mènent à conclure que des changements dans les habitudes et dans le comportement précèdent maintes fois le changement structural et même déterminent la direction de celui-ci.Comme exemple d'un concept qui mérite un traitement plus évolutionniste qu'il ne reçoive en général, la néoténie a été examinée. Il paraît que l'on a fait beaucoup d'erreurs en ne tenant pas compte des forces sélectives engagées. Une analyse au pointde-vue de la fonction a été appliquée à la théorie que les chordées ne sont que des ascidies néoténiques transfigurées par après, et il s'ensuit que cette idée n'est probablement pas correcte. Aussi les caractéristiques de l'homme généralement regardées comme neoténiques ont été discutées. Il en résulte que, en désignant légèrement et sans analyse plusieurs changements évolutionnaires comme néoténie, on a plutôt obsurci qu'éclairci leur signification. Ce ne sont pas les traits néoteniques de l'homme qui ont joué le rôle principal dans l'évolution humaine; au contraire, ils n'apparaissent qu'après l'acquisition de quelques nouvelles caractéristiques qui ne se trouvent ni dans l'adulte ni dans les phases plus jeunes des autres primates.Sogar heutzutage, ein Jahrhundert nach dem Erscheinen der „Origin of Species”, zeigt die jetzige zoologische Literatur oft eine unzulängliche Einsicht in die Folgerungen, zu denen die jetzt allgemein akzeptierte Annahme leitet, dass die natürliche Selektion die Richtung des Evolutionsprozesses bedingt.Dies ist teilweise zu sehen als eine Reaktion gegen eine einseitige Teleologie und gegen das Lamarckismus. Bei der Ablehnung der TheseLamarck's, dass die Aktivitäten eines Tieres einen direkten Einfluss ausüben auf seine erbliche Konstitution, nimmt man oft an, dass dies bedeutet, dass derartige Aktivitäten demnach nichts zur Sache tun bei dem Studium der Evolution. Zu einer derartigen Konklusion ist man jedoch nicht berechtigt, denn, obwohl die Aktivitäten die Evolution nicht direkt beeinflussen können mittels der Erblichkeit, so können sie dies jedoch indirekt, weil sie die Richtung der selektiven Kräfte, welche auf das Organismus einwirken, bestimmen. Es werden Argumente gegeben, welche die Konklusion rechtfertigten, dass Änderungen in Gewohnheit und Verhalten oft Strukturänderungen vorhergehen und tatsächlich die Richtung dieser letztgenannten bestimmen. Die Neotenie wirdt als ein Beispiel eines Begriff betrachtet, welcher eine mehr evolutionäre Behandlung verdient als bisher geschehen ist. Es ergibt sich dass man viele Irrtümer hat gemacht, indem man den betreffenden selektiven Kräften keine Rechnung getragen hat. Eine Analyse der Theorie, welche die Chordaten als neotenische Ascidien betrachtet, wird von einem funktionellen Gesichtspunkt aus durchgeführt. Daraus scheint der Schluss berechtigt, dass diese Theorie falsch ist. Auch werden die menschlichen Kennzeichen, welche gewöhnlich als neotenische betrachtet werden, besprochen. Die Konklusion lautet, dass, wenn man leichtfertig und ohne genügende Analyse den Zettel „Neotenie“ für mancherlei evolutive Änderungen anwendet, man die richtige Bedeutung dieser Erscheinung vielmehr verdunkelt als aufklärt: nicht die neotenische Kennzeichen des Menschen sind am wichtigsten in seiner Evolution; in Gegenteil sie erscheinen nur sekundär, nachdem die neuen Kennzeichen, welche sich weder in den Erwachsenen noch in den jüngeren Stadien von den anderen Primaten finden lassen, erschienen sind. (shrink)

- How can anthropology improve our understanding of the interrelationship between nature and culture? - What can anthropology contribute to practical debates which depend on particular definitions of nature, such as that concerning sustainable development? Humankind has evolved over several million years by living in and utilizing 'nature' and by assimilating it into 'culture'. Indeed, the technological and cultural advancement of the species has been widely acknowledged to rest upon human domination and control of nature. Yet, by the 1960s, the (...) idea of culture in confrontation with nature was being challenged by science, philosophy and the environmental movement. Anthropology is increasingly concerned with such issues as they become more urgent for humankind as a whole. This important book reviews the current state of the concepts of 'nature' we use, both as scientific devices and ideological constructs, and is organised around three themes: - nature as a cultural construction; - the cultural management of the environment; and - relations between plants, animals and humans. (shrink)

This volume critically and constructively discusses philosophical questions which have particular bearing on the formulation of educational aims. The book is divided into three major parts: the first deals with the nature of education, and discusses the various general aims, such as 'mental health', 'socialization' and 'creativity' which have been thought to characterize it; the second section is concerned with the nature of reason and its relationship to feeling, will and action; finally the development of different aspects of reason in (...) an educational context is considered. (shrink)

It has come to be expected that collections issued by the Royal Institute of Philosophy will contain work that has quality or is otherwise interesting. This volume runs true to form and presents plenty of both. It gives the proceedings of the conference arranged by the Institute at Exeter in 1973, consisting of five symposia together with Chairman's remarks of about eight pages or so for each symposium, and in three cases postscripts by the first speaker. The contributors and topics (...) are: R. F. Dearden and Elizabeth Telfer on ‘Autonomy as an Educational Ideal’ with R. M. Hare as Chairman; R. K. Elliott and Glenn Langford on ‘Education and the Development of the Understanding’ with Paul Hirst as Chairman; David Cooper and Timothy O'Hagan on ‘Quality and Equality in Education’ with R. F. Atkinson as Chairman; Mary Warnock and Richard Norman on ‘The Neutral Teacher’ with Alan Montefiore as Chairman; Stuart Brown and A. Phillips Griffiths on ‘Academic Freedom’ with R. S. Peters as Chairman. (shrink)

Jung was intrigued from early in his career with coincidences, especially those surprising juxtapositions that scientific rationality could not adequately explain. He discussed these ideas with Albert Einstein before World War I, but first used the term "synchronicity" in a 1930 lecture, in reference to the unusual psychological insights generated from consulting the I Ching. A long correspondence and friendship with the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Wolfgang Pauli stimulated a final, mature statement of Jung's thinking on synchronicity, originally published in 1952 (...) and reproduced here. Together with a wealth of historical and contemporary material, this essay describes an astrological experiment Jung conducted to test his theory. Synchronicity reveals the full extent of Jung's research into a wide range of psychic phenomena. This paperback edition of Jung's classic work includes a new foreword by Sonu Shamdasani, Philemon Professor of Jung History at University College London. (shrink)

We introduce a linear analogue of Läuchli's semantics for intuitionistic logic. In fact, our result is a strengthening of Läuchli's work to the level of proofs, rather than provability. This is obtained by considering continuous actions of the additive group of integers on a category of topological vector spaces. The semantics, based on functorial polymorphism, consists of dinatural transformations which are equivariant with respect to all such actions. Such dinatural transformations are called uniform. To any sequent in Multiplicative Linear Logic (...) , we associate a vector space of“diadditive” uniform transformations. We then show that this space is generated by denotations of cut-free proofs of the sequent in the theory MLL + MIX. Thus we obtain a full completeness theorem in the sense of Abramsky and Jagadeesan, although our result differs from theirs in the use of dinatural transformations.As corollaries, we show that these dinatural transformations compose, and obtain a conservativity result: diadditive dinatural transformations which are uniform with respect to actions of the additive group of integers are also uniform with respect to the actions of arbitrary cocommutative Hopf algebras. Finally, we discuss several possible extensions of this work to noncommutative logic.It is well known that the intuitionistic version of Läuchli's semantics is a special case of the theory of logical relations, due to Plotkin and Statman. Thus, our work can also be viewed as a first step towards developing a theory of logical relations for linear logic and concurrency. (shrink)

R F Dearden; Freedom and the Development of Autonomy: a reply to Victor Quinn, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 18, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 271–27.

R F Deaden; In Defence of Children's Enquiry, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 11, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 170–175, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467.

Reading the Republic without reference to the less familiar Laws can lead to a distorted view of Plato's political theory. In the Republic the philosopher describes his ideal city; in his last and longest work he deals with the more detailed considerations involved in setting up a second-best 'practical utopia.' The relative neglect of the Laws has stemmed largely from the obscurity of its style and the apparent chaos of its organization so that, although good translations now exist, students of (...) philosophy and political science still find the text inaccessible. This first full-length philosophical introduction to the Laws will therefore prove invaluable. The opening chapters describe the general character of the dialogue and set it in the context of Plato's political philosophy as a whole. Each of the remaining chapters deals with a single topic, ranging over material scattered through the text and so drawing together the threads of the argument in a stimulating and readily comprehensible way. Those topics include education, punishment, responsibility, religion, virtue and pleasure as well as political matters and law itself. Throughout, the author encourages the reader to think critically about Plato's ideas and to see their relevance to present-day philosophical debate. No knowledge of Greek is required and only a limited background in philosophy. Although aimed primarily at students, the book will also be of interest to more advanced readers since it provides for the first time a philosophical, as opposed to linguistic or historical, commentary on the Laws in English. (shrink)