Jim Joyce has argued that David Lewis’s formulation of causal decision theory is inadequate because it fails to apply to the “small world” decisions that people face in real life. Meanwhile, several authors have argued that causal decision theory should be developed such that it integrates the interventionist approach to causal modeling because of the expressive power afforded by the language of causal models, but, as of now, there has been little work towards this end. In this paper, I (...) propose a variant of Lewis’s causal decision theory that is intended to meet both of these demands. Specifically, I argue that Lewis’s causal decision theory can be rendered applicable to small world decisions if one analyzes his dependency hypotheses as causal hypotheses that depend on the interventionist causal modeling framework for their semantics. I then argue that this interventionist variant of Lewis’s causal decision theory is preferable to interventionist causal decision theories that purportedly generalize Lewis’s through the use of conditional probabilities. This is because Lewisian interventionist decision theory captures the causal decision theorist’s conviction that any correlation between what the agent does and cannot cause should be irrelevant to the agent’s choice, while purported generalizations do not. (shrink)

A number of authors have recently used causal models to develop a promising semantics for non-backtracking counterfactuals. Briggs shows that when this semantics is naturally extended to accommodate right-nested counterfactuals, it invalidates modus ponens, and therefore violates weak centering given the standard Lewis/stalnaker interpretation of the counterfactual in terms of nearness or similarity of worlds. In this paper, I explore the possibility of abandoning the Lewis/stalnaker interpretation for some alternative that is better suited to accommodate the causal modeling (...) semantics. I argue that a revision of McGee’s semantics can accommodate CM semantics without sacrificing weak centering, and that CM semantics can therefore be situated within a general semantics for counterfactuals that is based on the nearness or similarity of worlds. (shrink)

Reuben Louis Goodstein (1912-1985) foi aluno de Wittgenstein em Cambridge de1931 a 1934. Neste artigo, faço uma breve descrição de seu trabalho na lógica matemática,no qual se percebe a influência das idéias de Wittgenstein, inclusive a substituição,em seu cálculo equacional, da indução matemática por uma regra de unicidade de umafunção definida por uma função recursiva. Esse último aspecto se encontra no Big Typescriptde Wittgenstein. Também mostro que as idéias fundamentais do cálculo equacionalpodem ser encontradas não apenas no período (...) intermediário, mas, in nuce, nas observaçõessobre matemática do Tractatus Logico-philosophicus. A partir disso, procuro desenvolverum argumento contra uma leitura corrente daquele livro, o assim chamado “NovoWittgenstein”. Outra conexão entre Goodstein e Wittgenstein se encontra na rejeição dateoria da quantificação; na parte final do artigo, recorro às observações críticas de Goodsteinsobre a Lei do Terceiro Excluído (que também incluem uma crítica a Brouwer e à suarejeição “pela metade” dessa lei) para lançar luz sobre as observações do próprioWittgenstein a esse respeito. (shrink)

This is a major contribution to the theoretical and comparative literature on welfare states, written by some of the most original and challenging feminist ...

Landmarks of Scientfic Socialism: Anti-Dühring (German: Herrn Eugen Dührings Umwälzung der Wissenschaft, "Herr Eugen Dühring's Revolution in Science") is a book by Friedrich Engels, which was first published in German in 1878. It had previously been serialised in a periodical called Vorwärts. There were two other German editions during Engels' life. Anti-Dühring was first published in English translation in 1907.The work was perhaps Engels' most important contribution and development within Marxist theory.Eugen Dühring had previously created his own version of socialism, (...) which was supposed to be a replacement for Marxism. This work was supposed to be a defence of Marxism against produced his own version of socialism, intended as a replacement for Marxism from Dühring's attack. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in (...) the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

It has been proposed by Dawkins, Dennett and others that memes are the units of cultural evolution. We here concentrate on Dennett's account because of the role it plays in his explanation of human consciousness - which is our principal target. Memes are claimed to be replicators that work on Darwinian principles. But in what sense are they replicators, and in what way are they responsible for their own propagation? We argue that their ability to replicate themselves is severely limited, (...) particularly in the case of language-borne memes. We contend, too, that the theory has unacceptable consequences for the role of design in accounting for cultural change, unless we seriously want to entertain the thought that design has as little relevance to cultural evolution as it does to the evolution of species. Finally, we argue that the account fails to do justice to the complexities of social practices. (shrink)

For the past 30 years, Paget Henry has been one of the most articulate and creative voices in Caribbean scholarship, making seminal contributions to the study of Caribbean political economy, C.L.R. James studies, critical theory, phenomenology, and Africana philosophy. This volume includes some of his most important essays from across his remarkable career, providing an introduction to a broad range of pressing contemporary themes and to the unique mind of one of the leading Caribbean intellectuals of his generation.

Paul Lewis and Walter Gulick summarize and evaluate Mark Micthell’s new book, Michael Polanyi: The Art of Knowing, and Mitchell responds to their comments in this symposium article.

We describe a general method for verifying inequalities between real-valued expressions, especially the kinds of straightforward inferences that arise in interactive theorem proving. In contrast to approaches that aim to be complete with respect to a particular language or class of formulas, our method establishes claims that require heterogeneous forms of reasoning, relying on a Nelson-Oppen-style architecture in which special-purpose modules collaborate and share information. The framework is thus modular and extensible. A prototype implementation shows that the method is promising, (...) complementing techniques that are used by contemporary interactive provers. (shrink)

This volume offers patristic comment on the second half of the second article of the Nicene Creed, concerning the work of Christ.