It may appear that in order to be any way at all, a thing must exist. A possible – worlds version of this claim goes as follows: (E) For every x, for every possible world w, Fx at w only if x exists at w. Here and later in (R), the letter ‘F’ is used as a schematic letter to be replaced with a one – place predicate. There are two arguments against (E). The first is by analogy. Socrates is (...) widely admired now but he does not exist now. So, it is not the case that for every x, for every time t, Fx at t only if x exists at t. Possible worlds are analogous to times. Therefore, (E) is false (cf., Kaplan 1973: 503 – 05 and Salmon 1981: 36 – 40). For the second argument, replace ‘F’ with ‘does not exist’. (E) then says that for every x, for every possible world w, x does not exist at w only if x exists at w. This is obviously false. Therefore (E) is false (cf., Kaplan 1977: 498). Despite their considerable appeal, these arguments are not unassailable. The first argument suffers from the weakness inherent in any argument from analogy; the analogy it rests on may not.. (shrink)

『古事記伝』の完成に一生を費した宣長は、また、親思いで子煩悩、恐妻家で、町内の諸行事や歌会にまめに参加する、すぐれて人間的な生涯を送った人でもあった。本書は、言語をとおして人間存在にこだわり続けた本居 宣長の基礎的入門である。.

「意識のクオリア」も五感も、すべては錯覚だった。「心は脳が作り上げた幻想である」ことを述べた著者が、自己意識や五感が錯覚であることに的を絞って説明。.

This book covers a broad range of topics in the history of economics that have relevance to economic theories. The author believes that one of the tasks for a historian of economics is to analyze and interpret theories currently outside the mainstream of economic theory, in this case non-Walrasian economics. By doing so, he argues, new directions and new areas for research can be developed that will extend the current theories. Familiar topics covered include: the division of labor, economies of (...) scale, wages, profit, international trade, market mechanisms, and money. These are considered in the light of the well-known non-Walrasian schools of thought: the classical, Marxian, Austrian, and Cambridge schools. (shrink)

Mark Jago’s four arguments against Takashi Yagisawa’s extended modal realism are examined and shown to be ineffective. Yagisawa’s device of modal tense renders three of Jago’s arguments harmless, and the correct understanding of predications of modal properties of world stages blocks the fourth one.

In this article, I highlight the following points. In 2022, the publication of the two volumes Inédits I (1946-1947) and Inédits II (1947-1949) was a great surprise. Among the many discoveries I made, I will focus here on the reading notes Merleau-Ponty had prepared on Hegel’s Aesthetics. I suggest that the motives of his reading of Hegel’s Aesthetics must be understood according to two aspects, intimately linked: they are first due to the fact that he himself was trying to formulate (...) his own theory of art and aesthetics; and second that he had in mind Sartre’s work What is Literature? I show that, indeed, in his reading of the Aesthetics, Merleau-Ponty very clearly focuses on the distinction between the different genres of art and on their historical divisions. This is a point that leads me to raise the following question: What are the distinctions between artistic genres in Merleau-Ponty? Here, for me it is above all a question of taking into account Merleau-Ponty’s reservations, exposed in his later essay “Indirect Language and the Voices of Silence,” concerning the Sartrean conception of literature which distinguishes poetry from prose. Ultimately, I defend the idea that Merleau-Ponty proposes an experience of art that is inter-genre and inter-media, which opens an indefinite horizon from the historical limitation of art. Based on his theory of language and art, he thus recognized the historicity of language and art, while considering the possibility of transforming this historicity into something open. (shrink)

In this paper, I show that Aristotle’s refutation of the Eleatic argument in Physics I.8 is based on the idea that a thing at the starting point of coming to be is composite and is made up of what underlies and a priva­tion. In doing so, I clarify how the concept of accidentality as used in his solution should be understood in relation to the composite nature of what comes to be. I also suggest an explanation of why Aristotle’s discus­sion (...) of the Eleatic dilemma in Physics I.8, unlike his discussion in the previous chapter, is not clear. (shrink)

Modal realism -- Time, space, world -- Existence -- Actuality -- Modal realism and modal tense -- Transworld individuals and their identity -- Existensionalism -- Impossibility -- Proposition and relief -- Fictional worlds -- Epistemology.

Sherlock Holmes is a fictional individual. So is his favorite pipe. Our pre-theoretical intuition says that neither of them is real. It says that neither of them really, or actually, exists. It also says that there is a sense in which they do exist, namely, a sense in which they exist “in the world of” the Sherlock Holmes stories. Our pre-theoretical intuition says in general of any fictional individual that it does not actually exist but exists “in the world of” (...) the relevant fiction. I wish to defend this pretheoretical intuition. To do so, I need to defend two claims: that fictional individuals do not actually exist, and that they exist “in the world of” the relevant fiction. The aim of this paper is to defend the first claim. (shrink)

We explore the understanding of conscious states in terms of spatio-temporal dynamics through modelling a mobile agent. Conscious states are associated with an agent's spontaneous and deterministic fluctuation between attachment to and detachment from the surroundings. It is because of this fluctuating nature, we argue, that an agent can perceive structure in the world. Perception requires a conscious state in physical devices. This is a central concern of this paper, and we examine it by simulating a mobile agent equipped with (...) an interconnected Fitz-Hugh-Nagumo (FHN) neuron network with delayed signal transmissions. The agent can move around a space by sensing the environment pattern through the input neurons and computing the motor outputs via the FHN network. The agent shows a variety of motion styles and a spontaneous selection of motion styles responding to the surroundings. Such a phenomenon is named embodied chaotic itinerancy (ECI), as an extension of chaotic itinerant dynamics, which is known to be a typical dynamic with a high degree of freedom. We take this selective mode of response to be significant, particularly those interacting with spatial pattern, as an inevitable property of conscious states. (shrink)

This article explores medical diplomacy as a means of navigating distinct but related nation-building and internationalist projects during the Cold War. It examines how medical professionals from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV) utilized their expertise to bolster foreign relations and assert national independence. This article focuses on how three tuberculosis (TB) specialists – Đặng Đức Trạch, Phạm Ngọc Thạch and Phạm Khắc Quảng – adopted, adapted and circulated techniques of TB control, including a modified version of bacillus Calmette–Guérin (BCG) (...) vaccine. Amidst these endeavours, these medical-doctors-cum-diplomats navigated various forms of internationalism while soliciting medical assistance. Their roles within the DRV's state apparatus were prominently showcased from the 1950s to the 1970s, particularly at international gatherings such as the conferences of Ministers of Health of the Socialist Countries (MOHOSC). Because of the political complexities inherent in socialist internationalism, these conferences provided a crucial platform for dialogue among socialist nations when other avenues were limited. Consequently, the DRV's medical experts cultivated goodwill and garnered political support, despite encountering mixed results in their TB control initiatives. (shrink)

Strong Nash equilibrium and coalition-proof Nash equilibrium rely on the idea that players are allowed to form coalitions and make joint deviations. Both of these notions consider cases in which any coalition can be formed. Accordingly, there may arise “conflicts of interest” that prevent a player from choosing an action that simultaneously meets the requirements of two coalitions to which he or she belongs. Here, we address this observation by studying an organizational framework such that the coalitional structure is motivated (...) by real-life examples where players cannot form some coalitions and formulated in such a way that no conflicts of interest remain. We define an organization as an ordered collection of partitions of the player set such that any partition is coarser than the partitions that precede it. For any given organization, we introduce the notion of organizational Nash equilibrium. We analyze the existence of equilibrium in a subclass of games with strategic complementarities and illustrate how the proposed notion refines the set of Nash equilibria in some examples of normal form games. (shrink)

闇斎門下の個性豊かな諸家の事跡を通して、垂加神道の史的展開を検討すると共に、『日本書紀』神代巻の解釈に見える思想の根幹を明らかにする。.

In contemporary Japanese society, it is difficult to find a marriage partner, and therefore, “Konkatsu,” the search for a marriage partner, has become a socially accepted activity in Japan. In response to this social challenge, in addition to private companies, governments and non-profit organizations are supporting individuals in their search for a marriage partner. This paper reviews statistical information related to marriage hunting published in Japan. In addition, some of the authors’ collaborative activities and academic publications based on these activities (...) are reviewed. Subsequently, the paper discusses and highlights the importance of helping individuals have confidence in their physical attractiveness. (shrink)

Western Political Thought in Dialogue with Asia is a unique collection of essays that examines the exchange of political ideas between Western Europe and Asia from the Middle Ages to the early twentieth century. The contributors to the volume call for globalizing the scope of research and teaching in the history of political thought.

When I assertively utter the sentence `Spot is a cat', the sentence I utter expresses a proposition. The truth condition of the proposition so expressed is determined by the semantic values of the singular term, `Spot', and the predicate, `is a cat'. If `Spot' refers to a certain particular entity E and `is a cat' expresses a certain particular property P, then the proposition in question is true if and only if E has P. Such is the theoretical cash value (...) of reference. The referent of a given singular term generally figures in this manner in the truth condition of the proposition expressed by any sentence containing the singular term outside direct quotations and other referentially opaque contexts.1 Given this understanding of the notion of reference, I wish to address an important question: How is the reference of a proper name determined? (shrink)

This article contributes to the critical engagement with luck egalitarianism by advancing two arguments. Firstly, it questions the cogency of the dichotomies – e.g., luck/choice, person/circumstance, agency/structure – and the accompanying moral ideal of pure voluntarism. This makes it difficult for luck egalitarianism to dissect appropriately the inequalities embedded in social relations, such as social networks and involuntary associations, in which voluntariness and contingency as well as agency and structure are intertwined. Secondly, it suggests that the relational approach, which has (...) been developed, inter alia, in the empirical study of inequality, provides a morally and practically adequate perspective on egalitarian justice. The relational approach achieves this by converging upon those in‐between social relations that are irreducible to the macro‐level structure and to micro‐level agency. Moreover, a relationally sensitive perspective on inequality can adeptly respond to the difficulties that luck‐egalitarian theories encounter. (shrink)

Modal Dimensionalism is a metaphysical theory about possible worlds that is naturally suggested by the often-noted parallelism between modal logic and tense logic. It says that the universe spreads out not only in spatiotemporal dimensions but also in a modal dimension. It regards worlds as nothing more or less than indices in the modal dimension in the way analogous to the way in which Temporal Dimensionalism regards temporal points and intervals as indices in the temporal dimension. Despite its naturalness and (...) intuitive appeal. Modal Dimensionalism has been largely ignored while the debates between David Lewis and his critics have dominated the discourse on the nature of possible worlds. It is high time that we took Modal Dimensionalism seriously as a viable alternative. (shrink)