Several visual and emotional processes reflect similar underlying patterns of cortical activation. Characteristic individual perceptual style was measured by lateral attentional errors in a standard visual line-bisecting task. The direction of error indicates a predominance of activation in the contralateral prefrontal cortex. Individual differences in mood were measured by the self-endorsement of emotional adjectives. A total of 27 right-handed adults responded to the trait version of the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS). As predicted, rightward errors in visual line bisecting (...) correlated positively and significantly with the Positive Affect subscale. The scale adjectives determined and strong had significant correlations with the visual bisecting measure. The negative affect subscale was correlated with neither the line bisecting measure nor the positive subscale. An extension from trait to state measures tested the self-description of current affect using related synonyms and antonyms in a subset of 22 of the participants. Active, dominant, mighty, powerful, and strong were significantly associated with rightward bisecting errors, whereas passive and cooperative were correlated with errors in the opposite direction. The results were incompatible with the valence model (positive-negative), direction model (approach-withdrawal), and movement model (approach-resistance) of the lateral prefrontal substrate of emotion. The action tendency model (active approach-passive yielding) was supported. (shrink)

As more criminals are imprisoned, other individuals change their behavior to replace them, as predicted by the theory of strategic behavior. The physiological correlates of sociopathy suggest that research in cognitive neuroscience can lead toward a solution. Promising pathways include building upon current knowledge of self-deceit, the independence of positive and negative emotions, the lateralization of risk and caution, and the conditions promoting prosocial behavior.

The approach to critical realism, by D. Drake.--Pragmatism versus the pragmatist, by A. O. Lovejoy.--Critical realism and the possibility of knowledge, by J. B. Pratt.--The problem of error, by A. K. Rogers.--Three proofs of realism, by G. Santayana.--Knowledge and its categories, by R. W. Sellars.--On the nature of the datum, by C. A. Strong.

It is often supposed that in order to refute the view that laws of nature are necessary truths it is sufficient to appeal to Hume's argument from the conceivability of to the possibility of their being false. But while Hume's argument does present the necessitarian with insuperable difficulties it needs to be made clear just what these are. The mere appeal to Hume is quite insufficient for what he says can be interpreted in more than one way. And if it (...) constitutes an argument rather than a mere assertion Kneale has given reason to suppose that it is at least not obviously valid. The upshot of this article is that Hume's argument may be seen as a direct challenge to the notion that there could be propositions whose modal value is necessarily "opaque to the human intellect". (shrink)

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) was one of the seventeenth century's most important thinkers. A philosopher, mathematician and scientist, his work is comparable in scope and importance only to that of Newton and Descartes. His work dominated German philosophy until Kant, and was revived in the early part of this century when his important work on logic was re-discovered. This four volume set contains 97 of the most important essays ever written about Leibniz's work. The selection has been made to bring (...) out the scope of Leibniz's work in all the areas he wrote upon, as well as its importance to contemporary philosophy and the history of philosophy. It will be an essential reference work for anyone concerned with seventeenth century philosophy and science, as well as to all Leibniz specialists. (shrink)

I argue that Descartes and the Cartesians are likely in agreement that logic is an ars cogitandi whose aim is to perfect the ingenium by the exercise of its operations: ideating, judging, discoursing, and ordering. We can see that these elements are the underpinning of both the Regulae and the Discourse on Method, and thus, like Adrien Baillet and others in the seventeenth century, we can understand these two works as embodying Descartes’ “logic,” despite Descartes’ notorious anti-logic Renaissance rhetoric in (...) both writings. (shrink)

Studies of the conceptual abilities of nonhuman primates demonstrate the substantial range of these abilities as well as their limitations. Such abilities range from categorization on the basis of shared physical attributes, associative relations and functions to abstract concepts as reflected in analogical reasoning about relations between relations. The pattern of results from these studies point to a fundamental distinction between monkeys and apes in both their implicit and explicit conceptual capacities. Monkeys, but not apes, might be best regarded as (...) “paleo‐logicans” in the sense that they form common class concepts of identity on the basis of identical predicates (i.e., shared features). The discrimination of presumably more abstract relations commonly involves relatively simple procedural strategies mediated by associative processes likely shared by all mammals. There is no evidence that monkeys can perceive, let alone judge, relations‐between‐relations. This analogical conceptual capacity is found only in chimpanzees and humans. Interestingly, the “analogical ape,” like the child, can make its analogical knowledge explicit only if it is first provided with a symbol system by which propositional representations can be encoded and manipulated. (shrink)

Descartes’ distinction between infinite and indefinite is important for his philosophy, but poorly understood. Various commentators have offered conflicting interpretations of it; some have even questioned ist importance. In this paper I wish to investigate Descartes’ various discussions of the distinction and to use my investigation to shed light on the related question of the authority of the "Conversation with Burman". I believe that the distinction is treated differently in the "Conversation" than it is in the Cartesian corpus proper and (...) that the difference of treatment is paradigmatic of other differences between that work and the works which come from Descartes’ own hand. I divide my discussion into two parts: first, on the reliability of the "Conversation" and Ferdinand Alquié’s critique of it; and second, on the distinction between the infinite and indefinite. (shrink)

Philosophers have turned their attention in recent years to many previously unmined topics, among them love and friendship. In this collection of new essays in philosophical and moral psychology, philosophers turn their analytic tools to a topic perhaps most resistant to reasoned analysis: erotic love. Also included is one previously published paper by Martha Nussbaum.Among the problems discussed are the role that qualities of the beloved play in love, the so-called union theory of love, intentionality and autonomy in love, and (...) traditional issues surrounding jealousy and morality. (shrink)

The author discusses how Rand’s largely underdeveloped concept of the “dual-aspect objective,” first introduced in the 1960s, is vital for understanding how knowledge is grounded in reality. He defines it, then applies it to perception and introspection, and to concepts, propositions, and syllogisms. The author also defines content of awareness, carefully distinguishing it from both object and form of awareness, and applies those distinctions throughout. In addition, he discusses how truth is both dual-aspect and contextual, and he extends his discussion (...) in Part 1 of Rand’s “unit-perspective,” showing how units, too, have a dual-aspect, even on the level of syllogisms. (shrink)

Résumé Dans quelle mesure la Logique de Port-Royal peut-elle être considérée comme une logique cartésienne? Et dans quelle mesure l’ Art de penser diffère-t-il des logiques antérieures? Telles sont les deux questions, étroitement liées l’une à l’autre, auxquelles je souhaite répondre dans cette étude en procédant à une série de comparaisons, d’une part avec ce que Descartes appelait sa logique, d’autre part avec ce que les cartésiens de la première génération entendaient par logique cartésienne, et pour finir avec l'évolution de (...) la logique scolastique au cours du XVII e siècle. Je conclus que la logique élaborée par les cartésiens est simplement venue confirmer certains des développements de la logique scolastique au XVII e siècle. La Logique de Port-Royal qui, pour les cartésiens de la fin du XVII e siècle, représente par excellence la logique cartésienne, a également bien des traits en commun avec une logique néo-scolastique. (shrink)

Starting from an examination of foundational issues, the book covers a range of topics, including animals, agency, enjoyment, the good life, contemplation, ...

We examine Duhem's critique of Maxwell, especially Duhem's complaints that Maxwell's theory is too bold or not systematic enough, that it is too dependent on models, and that its concepts are not continuous with those of the past. We argue that these complaints are connected by Duhem's historical criterion for the evaluation of physical theories. We briefly compare Duhem's criterion of historical continuity with similar criteria developed by "historicists" like Kuhn and Lakatos. We argue that Duhem's rejection of theoretical pluralism (...) was a primary factor preventing him from recognizing Maxwell's work as an autonomous tradition. (shrink)

Among theories which fit all of our data, we prefer the simpler over the more complex. Why? Surely not merely for practical convenience or aesthetic pleasure. But how could we be justified in this preference without knowing in advance that the world is more likely to be simple than complex? And isn’t this a rather extravagant a priori assumption to make? I want to suggest some steps we can take toward reducing this embarrassment, by showing that the assumption which supports (...) favouring simplicity is far more modest than it first seems. (shrink)

The most reliable source for a reconstruction of Galileo's progress toward a science of motion is the series of undated fragmentary notes on that subject preserved in Codex A of the Galilean manuscripts at Florence. A gathering of such fragments was published by Favaro in the National Edition of Galileo's works, following the Discorsi. The more sophisticated fragments are clearly associated with the composition of that work, and show a definite and consistent understanding of acceleration. Eliminating those, it will be (...) found that the earlier notes fall into recognizable groups. First, there are some that refer to “moment of gravity”, or to the impetus of a body along a line of descent, and are associated with the discussion of inclined planes in De motu. Second, some refer to descent along arcs and chords of circles, associated with Galileo's letter of 29 November 1602 to Guido Ubaldo. These first two groups of notes do not explicitly refer to accelerated motion, and should not be assumed to do so implicity, where such an assumption can be avoided. (shrink)

Among other interesting proposals, Juan Comesaña’s _Being Rational and Being Right_ makes a challenging case that one’s evidence can include falsehoods. I explore some ways in which we might have to rethink the roles that evidence can play in inquiry if we accept this claim. It turns out that Comesaña’s position lends itself to the conclusion that while false evidence is possible and not even terribly uncommon, I can be rationally sure that I don’t currently have any and perhaps also (...) that I won’t get any, and (absent certain evidence to the contrary) you are not afflicted with any either. This conclusion might seem too good to be true. I finish by raising a puzzle about one of the main motivations for Comesaña’s view. (shrink)

A standard framework for business ethics views the inquiry as an application of major ethical theories to specific issues in business. As these theories are largely presented as being principled, the exercise therefore becomes one of applying general principles to business situations. Many adopting this standard approach have thus resisted the implementation of the most prominent development in ethical theory in recent history: that of particularism. In this article, I argue that particularist thinking has much to offer to business ethics (...) and that standard resistance to particularist business ethics is based largely on misunderstandings. I do so by illustrating how the harbinger of particularism, W. D. Ross, countenances the practical wisdom of particularist ethics while being 1) invulnerable to standard objections to particularist business ethics and 2) compatible with the generalism of the standard approach. The Rossian business ethic is therefore one that the standard approach should be eager to include. (shrink)

This is a dictionary of Descartes and Cartesian philosophy, primarily covering philosophy in the 17th century, with a chronology and biography of Descartes's life and times and a bibliography of primary and secondary works related to Descartes and to Cartesians.

Quine has long maintained in connection with his theses of under-determination of physical theory and indeterminacy of translation that there is a fact of the matter to physics but no fact of the matter to translation. In this paper, I investigate Quine's reasoning for this claim. I show that Quine's thinking about under-determination over the last twenty-five years has landed him in a contradiction: he says of two global physical theories that are empirically equivalent but logically incompatible that only one (...) is trueand that they are both true. In accord with the former position, I explain Quine'ssemantical argument for the claim that there is a fact of the matter to physics but not to translation. However, Quine has apparently come to regard this position as inconsistent with his empiricistic scruples: if both theories imply all and only true observation categoricals, then in what sense could one of them be false? Quine'strivial expedient argument construes such pairs of theories as merely two true descriptions of the same world in different terms. In accord with this latter position, I suggest that Quine is left without a way to differentiate under-determination and indeterminacy. In short, Quine's contradiction poses a serious dilemma: either only one such theory is true and his empiricism is sacrificed, or both theories are true and his distinction between under-determination and indeterminacy is sacrificed. (shrink)

Conjecture (1) of [Ma83] is confirmed here by the following result: if $3 \leq \alpha < \omega$, then there is a finite relation algebra of dimension α, which is not a relation algebra of dimension α + 1. A logical consequence of this theorem is that for every finite α ≥ 3 there is a formula of the form $S \subseteq T$ (asserting that one binary relation is included in another), which is provable with α + 1 variables, but not (...) provable with only α variables (using a special sequent calculus designed for deducing properties of binary relations). (shrink)

Gil R, Arroyo-Anllo EM, Ingrand P, Gil M, Neau JP, Ornon C, Bonnaud V. Self-consciousness and Alzheimer’s disease. Acta Neurol Scand 2001: 104: 296–300. # Munksgaard 2001. Objectives – To propose a neuropsychological study of the various aspects of self-consciousness (SC) in Alzheimer’s disease. Methods – Forty-five patients with probable mild or moderate AD were included in the study. Severity of their dementia was assessed by the Mini Mental State (MMS). Fourteen questions were prepared to evaluate SC. Results – No (...) significant correlations were found between SC score and educational level, age, and duration of disease. A significant correlation was found between SC score and the severity of dementia, whereas frontal disturbances were just short of the significance threshold. The various aspects of SC were not impaired to the same degree. The most disturbed ones were awareness of cognitive deficiencies, moral judgements and prospective memory. The least disturbed aspects were awareness of identity and of mental representation of the body. Items relating to anosognosia and moral judgements were significantly correlated with the MMS score, whereas affective state, body representation disorders, prospective memory, and capacities for introspection were not related to the severity of the dementia. Consciousness of identity was sound, regardless of MMS score. Conclusions – AD clearly induces an heterogeneous impairment of SC. SC requires a convergence of many neural networks. In AD, neuronal alterations involve many cortical areas and information sent to the associative frontal cortex from memory, language and visuospatial areas is lacking or disturbed. Thus, the sequential order of successive stimuli cannot be maintained by the heteromodal associative cortex (dorsal convexity of the prefrontal cortex), and the supramodal associative cortex (located rostrally in the frontal lobes) is unable to provide reliable monitoring and assessment of simultaneous neural cognitive networks carrying insufficient and inadequate input. The core deficiency in AD patients might be impaired SC equated with the disability to maintain sequential and simultaneous ‘‘attention to life’’. The Self-Consciousness Questionnaire, a clinical scale providing multidimensional measurement, indicates that different aspects of consciousness are not correlated with overall cognitive deficiency as determined by the MMSE. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hume Studies Volume XXIII, Number 2, November 1997, pp. 315-335 Reid: Conception, Representation and Innate Ideas ROGER D. GALLIE Section I of this paper begins with a presentation of Thomas Reid's doctrine of the signification of words, of what words signify or represent. That presentation serves to introduce a problem of interpretation, namely, what Reid thinks the connection is between conceiving something and grasping what a term for (...) it signifies. It is pointed out that even if Reid maintains that what a word signifies is conceived by both speaker and hearer when that word is understood, this is a far cry from the position that he takes the stronger view, whether for all or only for some things, that their being conceived involves the understanding of a term or terms. The position that he does indeed take this stronger, although moderate, view is defended in sections II, III and IV. In sections II and III it is argued that, in Reid's view, for an adequate conception of an individual, real or imaginary, a conception of its attributes is needed. In section IV it is argued that the possession of general conceptions (in distinction from their formation), without which conception of attributes is impossible, requires appropriate understanding of general terms. So since for the conception of an individual a conception of its attributes is needed, and since for the conception of attributes appropriate understanding of general terms is required, we arrive at a textually well-founded position: for the conception of most things, in Reid's view, understanding of terms is indispensable. Roger D. Gallie is at the Department of Philosophy, Nottingham University, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD UK. email: Roger[email protected] 316 Roger D. Gallie The remainder of the paper considers the following question: to what extent, if any, Reid is committed to acceptance of nativist views on concept possession? To answer, in section V we consider to what extent Reid's moderate position on the possession of conceptions commits him to accepting Jerry Fodor's representational theory of mind (RTM) for propositional attitudes. It is clear that the view that a propositional attitude state such as belief involves some relation between a person and a representation such as a significant word, phrase or sentence of a natural language such as English can fairly be attributed to Reid. But it is also clear that Reid cannot be an adherent of the view that persons have a functional cum computational relation to Fodorean mental representations, so he cannot be an adherent of any nativism ex- plicitly contained in such a view. But it is to be noted that in his Inquiry, Chapter IV, Reid argues by a different route that in order to acquire a language such as English prior mastery of a system of significant signs is required. In section VI Keith Lehrer's argument in criticism of a reductionist interpretation of a position such as Fodor's is presented: that for a sign to signify something to someone presupposes that that person has a conception of what is signified. It is however pointed out that since there is a case for not viewing Fodor's position as reductionist overall Fodor can accept Lehrer's argument. Lehrer's innatist position, which he both claims to follow easily from this critical argument and to be a correct interpretation of Reid, is then presented: that we must presuppose an innate understanding of some signs to account for our learning the meaning of any signs. The objection that Reid too must accept the alleged innatist implications of Lehrer's critical argument in view of the implications of his moderate position on the possession of conceptions is considered and rebutted. In section VIII argue that while Lehrer makes a respectable case for innate principles of formation of conceptions such as that of hardness, something that Reid clearly endorses in his Inquiry, Chapter V, he does not succeed in making a case for there being any innate possession of conceptions. Finally, in section VIII, Reid's mature views in the Intellectual Powers, Essay VI, on how conceptions come to be possessed are expounded, and are fleshed out with some... (shrink)

The work of the later Wittgenstein has had a vast influence in the field of social science. This is hardly surprising as the effect of that philosophy has been an emphasis on the priority of the social. Empiricist philosophy started with the private experience of the individual and from there built up an inter-subjective picture of the world. Wittgenstein, on the other hand, began with the rule-governed practices of a community. Both the nature of private experience, and of an objective (...) world, was deemed to depend on concepts all could share. Society is the source of such concepts and thus becomes the key notion in our understanding of ourselves and our relation to the world. (shrink)

Health professionals do not always have the luxury of making “right” choices. This article introduces the “devil's choice” as a metaphor to describe medical choices that arise in circumstances where all the available options are both unwanted and perverse. Using the devil's choice, the paper criticizes the principle of double effect and provides a re-interpretation of the conventional legal and ethical account of symptom relief in palliative care.

New forms of information technology, such as email, webpages and groupware, are being rapidly adopted. Intended to improve efficiency and effectiveness, these technologies also have the potential to radically alter the way people communicate in organizations. The effects can be positive or negative. This paper explores how technology can encourage or discourage moral dialogue -- communication that is open, honest, and respectful of participants. It develops a framework that integrates formal properties of ideal moral discourse, based on Habermas' theory of (...) communicative action, with properties of informal communication that help sustain good moral conversations. Ten criteria distilled from these works form the basis of a template that can be used for assessing the positive and negative impacts of emerging information technologies on moral dialogue. (shrink)

Descartes’ physics is dependent on his metaphysics, which is to say, on knowledge of the nature of God and of the human soul. This is clear throughout Descartes’ work, but it is especially so in th...

Descartes. An Intellectual Biography by Stephen Gaukroger, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1995. xx + 499pp. 25.00 ISBN 0-19-823994-7 Descartes. Biographie by Gen vieve Rodis-Lewis, Calmann-L vy, Paris, 1995. 371pp.

The Platonic view that art is incapable of providing us with knowledge is sufficiently widely held as to merit a serious attempt at refutation. Once it is acknowledged that there are alternative forms of knowledge other than propositional, then it is possible to establish the truth of the claim that the knowledge which art affords has a value on a par with that provided by other disciplines. Art, it is argued, has a unique potential to provide imaginative insights by reference (...) to which we may understand what it is like to experience and to feel, in ways very different from those with which we may be familiar. It is shown to be instrumental in enabling us to refine our moral concepts as well as in determining what is salient from the moral point of view. As a powerful tool in the education of the emotions, artworks have the power to increase our moral sensitivity and to sharpen our perception of what is required of us inways that are otherwise unobtainable. (shrink)

Distinguished scholars discuss the problem of self-deception, or rather, self and deception.

. Prospects for uniting religion and science are brightened by recently changed views of consciousness and mind‐brain interaction. Mental, vital, and spiritual forces, long excluded and denounced by materialist philosophy, are reinstated in nonmystical form. A revised scientific cosmology emerges in which reductive materialist interpretations emphasizing causal control from below upward are replaced by revised concepts that emphasize the reciprocal control exerted by higher emergent forces from above downward. Scientific views of ourselves and the world and the kinds of values (...) upheld by scientific belief undergo basic transformations, making them more compatible with religious motivation and moral responsibility. (shrink)