The life of the brain is believed to be a major factor determining the existence of subjective reality during clinical death. The duration of the existence in question cannot be measured in the units of astronomical time for two reasons. Firstly, it is impossible to determine once and for all how long the brain survives after cardiac arrest and termination of breathing. Secondly, the duration of subjective time during near death experience (NDE) differs from that typical of daily regular experience. (...) Immobilization, loss of the sensation of one’s body, state of affect and severe sensory deprivation ensure that consciousness is focused and fixated in and onto itself exclusively which, in its turn, diminish and slacken the course of time so that it expands to eternity and subjective reality goes beyond the usual limits of the temporal “past-present-future” paradigm. (shrink)

The article deals with the main ideas of the political philosophy of Abu Abdallah Ibn al-Azraq al-Garnati (1427-1491), a well-known Muslim statesman, supreme judge of Granada, lawyer, diplomat, supporter of Arab Muslim peripatetism, a student of the outstanding thinker of the Muslim Middle Ages Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406). In the history of the political philosophy of the Muslim East, a number of major transformations in the development of the Arab Caliphate from the Medina state of the prophet to the Sultanate in (...) the Abbasid period should be noted, which were reflected in the development of the theory of the Arab-Muslim state (caliphate). The main problem of the theory of the caliphate was connected with the question of the relationship between power and authority in the context of the moral foundations of the state. The creative heritage of Ibn al-Azraq is mainly known for his work in the genre of adab ("mirrors of princes") “Miracles on the way, or the Nature of dominion”. The treatise became a classic of the political philosophy of the Muslim Middle Ages, in which, under the influence of Aristotelian ideas, a special place was given to the moral foundations of power and the state, that is, ethics was considered as a political science. In the form of instructive parables, the rulers and heirs to the throne were explained the basics of state administration as part of their studies and education. His doctrine of the virtues can be viewed as ethical rationalism with a belief in the moral perfection of people in power and subjects of the state. Since morals are largely acquired and a person can control them, the task of purifying his own morals and curing them is entrusted to him. In addition, accordingly, it is possible and necessary to cultivate virtues in rulers, since the well-being of the state and the ummah depends on their morals. The moral foundations of power determine the strength of political authority. (shrink)

This book is a collection of articles on research that attempts to connect logic and mathematics with empirical and cognition. There have been various such a...

Clinical mental health researchers may understandably struggle with how to incorporate biological assessments in clinical research. The options are numerous and are described in a vast and complex body of literature. Here we provide guidelines to assist mental health researchers seeking to include biological measures in their studies. Apart from a focus on behavioral outcomes as measured via interviews or questionnaires, we advocate for a focus on biological pathways in clinical trials and epidemiological studies that may help clarify pathophysiology and (...) mechanisms of action, delineate biological subgroups of participants, mediate treatment effects, and inform personalized treatment strategies. With this paper we aim to bridge the gap between clinical and biological mental health research by (1) discussing the clinical relevance, measurement reliability, and feasibility of relevant peripheral biomarkers; (2) addressing five types of biological tissues, namely blood, saliva, urine, stool and hair; and (3) providing information on how to control sources of measurement variability. (shrink)

The author aims at an objective reinterpretation of L.Feuerbach's doctrine and refuting the prejudices that exist in the historical and philosophical tradition in relation to the Feuerbachian philosophical system. Through an analysis of Feuerbach's views on such concepts as the historical and philosophical paradigm, the relation of man to the world, dialectics and religion, the author concludes that these elements of Feuerbach's doctrine were distorted by K. Marx, F. Engels and their followers. The author demonstrates through Feuerbachian responses to 11 (...) theses of Marx by H.M. Sass that some aspects of Feuerbach's philosophy remain relevant to philosophy, and that the founders of Marxism distorted Feuerbach's doctrine in order to distinguish their philosophical system as more modern and true. (shrink)

The author discusses A. M. Dorozhkin’s ideas about constructing and typology of “trading zones”. He considers the influence of the substantive economics’ on science and education. The author argues that the universality of the institutions of reciprocity, redistribution and trade makes possible their stability in the process of institutionalization of scientific and educational activities.

A new proof is given of the celebrated theorem of M. Davis, H. Putnam and J. Robinson concerning exponential Diophantine representation of recursively enumerable predicates. The proof goes by induction on the defining scheme of a partial recursive function.

This essay contextualizes the Dantean figure of Ulysses, as conceived by Yuri M. Lotman, and draws this key figure of modernity into a network of mutually interconnected discourses: primarily transhumanist visions of the human future in space, which nevertheless arise from the specifically modern epistemic dimension of “restlessness,” and intertwine with post-war astronautics, cyborg visions of human re-engineering, and revolutionary considerations of speculative realism. The key is Lotman’s emphasis on Ulysses as a figure of “energy of thought”; in this (...) regard, the essay shows how the original poetic “decision,” embodied by the Ulysses figure, advocates implicit cruelty in the name of the future (treated as an inevitable fate), and how this decision generates a logical and progressively unfolding series of “inhuman” images of man situated in the universe as an event of saturation of matter with merciless intelligence. (shrink)

Let M be a first-order structure; we denote by DEF(M) the set of all first-order definable relations and functions within M. Let π be any one-to-one function from N into the set of prime integers. Let ∣ and $\bullet$ be respectively the divisibility relation and multiplication as function. We show that the sets DEF(N,π,∣) and $\mathrm{DEF}(\mathbb{N},\pi,\bullet)$ are equal. However there exists function π such that the set DEF(N,π,∣), or, equivalently, $\mathrm{DEF}(\mathbb{N},\pi,\bullet)$ is not equal to $\mathrm{DEF}(\mathbb{N},+,\bullet)$ . Nevertheless, in all cases (...) there is an $\{\pi,\bullet\}$ -definable and hence also {π,∣}-definable structure over N which is isomorphic to $\langle\mathbb{N},+,\bullet\rangle$ . Hence theories TH(N,π,∣) and $\mathrm{TH}(\mathbb{N},\pi,\bullet)$ are undecidable. The binary relation of equipotence between two positive integers saying that they have equal number of prime divisors is not definable within the divisibility lattice over positive integers. We prove it first by comparing the lower bound of the computational complexity of the additive theory of positive integers and of the upper bound of the computational complexity of the theory of the mentioned lattice. The last section provides a self-contained alternative proof of this latter result based on a decision method linked to an elimination of quantifiers via specific tables. (shrink)

This article traces disagreements about the genetic effects of low-dose radiation exposure as waged by James Neel, a central figure in radiation studies of Japanese populations after World War II, and Yuri Dubrova, who analyzed the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident. In a 1996 article in Nature, Dubrova reported a statistically significant increase in the minisatellite DNA mutation rate in the children of parents who received a high dose of radiation from the Chernobyl accident, contradicting studies that found (...) no significant inherited genetic effects among offspring of Japanese A-bomb survivors. Neel’s subsequent defense of his large-scale longitudinal studies of the genetic effects of ionizing radiation consolidated current scientific understandings of low-dose ionizing radiation. The article seeks to explain how the Hiroshima/nagasaki data remain hegemonic in radiation studies, contextualizing the debate with attention to the perceived inferiority of Soviet genetic science during the Cold War. (shrink)

Philosophical Thought in Russia in the Second Half of the 20th Century is the first book of its kind that offers a systematic overview of an often misrepresented period in Russia's philosophy. Focusing on philosophical ideas produced during the late 1950s – early 1990s, it reconstructs the development of genuine philosophical thought in the Soviet period and introduces those non-dogmatic Russian thinkers who saw in philosophy a means of reforming social and intellectual life. Covering such areas of philosophical inquiry as (...) philosophy of science, philosophical anthropology, the history of philosophy, activity approach as well as communication and dialogue studies, the volume presents and thoroughly discusses central topics and concepts developed by Soviet thinkers in that particular fields. Written by a team of internationally recognized scholars from Russia and abroad, it examines the work of well-known Soviet philosophers (such as Mikhail Bakhtin, Evald Ilyenkov and Merab Mamardashvili) as well as those important figures (such as Vladimir Bibler, Alexander Zinoviev, Yury Lotman, Georgy Shchedrovitsky, Genrich Batishchev, Sergey Rubinstein, and others) who have often been overlooked. By introducing and examining original philosophical ideas that evolved in the Soviet period, the book confirms that not all Soviet philosophy was dogmatic and tied to orthodox Marxism and the ideology of Marxism-Leninism. It shows Russian philosophical development of the Soviet period in a new light, as a philosophy defined by a genuine discourse of exploration and intellectual progress, rather than stagnation and dogmatism. In addition to providing the historical and cultural background that explains the development of the 20th-century Russian philosophy, the book also puts the discussed ideas and theories in the context of contemporary philosophical discussions showing their relevance to nowadays debates in Western philosophy. With short biographies of key thinkers, an extensive current bibliography and a detailed chronology of Soviet philosophy, this research resource provides a new understanding of the Soviet period and its intellectual legacy 100 years after the Russian Revolution. (shrink)

Introduction. In the Russian philosophical tradition, domestic philosophical concepts are rather poorly considered at the moment. In fact, there is no coverage of regional specific features: the problems that worried and united Russian philosophers within the boundaries of one or another temporalterritorial locality. The purpose of the article is to consider the views of the Tyumen philosopher-ethicist Yuri Mikhailovich Fedorov in the context of their relevance at present and in the context of a continuous research tradition. Methods. The author (...) proceeds from the methods of hermeneutics, which are obligatory in this case, and also uses L. Laudan’s theory of research traditions, M. Foucault’s optics and the concept of permanent modernity. Scientific novelty of the research. The author clarifies Yu.M. Fedorov’s views through the specified methodology, considering his works in the context of a continuing philosophical tradition, with a special emphasis on the methods of subjectification. Results and conclusions. Taking into consideration the results of analytical reading of Yu.M. Fedorov’s key work “Universe of Morality”, it is concluded that the author’s concept, which combines the features of idealism, cosmism, structuralism, semiotics and existentialism, with some reservations (indicated in the article), suggests an adequate model of subjectification for a person of the XXI century. (shrink)

The subject of this research is the philosophy of the Tyumen philosopher Yuri Mikhailovich Fyodorov – a representative of the Tyumen philosophical tradition, who focused on the problems of ethics, namely practical implementation of the ethical in the context of development of the North and establishment of a new society from fundamentally different individuals. Tyumen philosophers were concerned with the question of how to form a single moral essence out of the agonistic society. For solving this problem, Yuri (...) Mikhailovich Fyodorov turned to Neo-Platonism, cosmism, and Russian religious philosophy, as well as paid particular attention to the question of elevation of human to a moral entity. The ways for such subjectification proposed by Fedorov are examined in this article. The scientific novelty consists in the fact that the philosopher is not widely known, as well as in the emphasis on the process of subjectification, epimeleia heautou in interpretation of M. Foucault, or the self-nurturing practices. It is illustrated that creativity, freedom, kindness and love are the key practices of self-nurturing which Y. M. Fyodorov indicated as the procedures of subjectification. From his perspective, these four concepts are the goal and practice for an individual, who seeks to surpass his own foundations. The philosophy of Y. M. Fyodorov aims to substantiate the unity of man with man, man with being; as well as attach meaning, value and vector to human life; contra pose something genuine, profound and eternal to the concepts that deprive an individual of the right to power over himself and the right to the long-term existence. (shrink)

Este trabajo está divido en dos partes: en la primera de ellas se aborda la novela decimonónica de Eça de Queirós El crimen del padre Amaro: Escenas de la vida devota, así como la adaptación cinematográfica de Carlos Carrera y el guión de Vicente Leñero para la película El crimen del padre Amaro. Y un particular retorno al género novelístico El padre Amaro de Vicente Leñero. La metodología que se usará en este primer apartado será: exégesis de la adaptación, resumen (...) y elementos característicos de la novela Eça de Queirós, la denuncia social, y la relación amorosa; en una segunda parte se realizará un análisis de El crimen del Padre Amaro bajo la perspectiva de semiótica de la cultura de Yuri M. Lotman basada en su texto Estructura del texto artístico. (shrink)

This is the first book to explore the cognitive science of effortless attention and action. Attention and action are generally understood to require effort, and the expectation is that under normal circumstances effort increases to meet rising demand. Sometimes, however, attention and action seem to flow effortlessly despite high demand. Effortless attention and action have been documented across a range of normal activities--from rock climbing to chess playing--and yet fundamental questions about the cognitive science of effortlessness have gone largely unasked. (...) -/- This book draws from the disciplines of cognitive psychology, neurophysiology, behavioral psychology, genetics, philosophy, and cross-cultural studies. Starting from the premise that the phenomena of effortless attention and action provide an opportunity to test current models of attention and action, leading researchers from around the world examine topics including effort as a cognitive resource, the role of effort in decision making, the neurophysiology of effortless attention and action, the role of automaticity in effortless action, expert performance in effortless action, and the neurophysiology and benefits of attentional training. -/- Contributors: Joshua M. Ackerman, James H. Austin, John A. Bargh, Roy F. Baumeister, Sian L. Beilock, Chris Blais, Matthew M. Botvinick, Brian Bruya, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Marci S. DeCaro, Arne Dietrich, Yuri Dormashev, László Harmat, Bernhard Hommel, Rebecca Lewthwaite, Örjan de Manzano, Joseph T. McGuire, Brian P. Meier, Arlen C. Moller, Jeanne Nakamura, Evgeny N. Osin, Michael I. Posner, Mary K. Rothbart, M. R. Rueda, Brandon J. Schmeichel, Edward Slingerland, Oliver Stoll, Yiyuan Tang, Töres Theorell, Fredrik Ullén, Robert D. Wall, Gabriele Wulf. (shrink)

' I heartily recommend it to any philosopher of language interested in the issues. [] Logicians, of course, will want to savour the whole thing.' Australian Journal of Philosophy, 71:3 (1993).

Resumo Entre 1988 e 1993, Iúri M. Lótman formulou algumas proposições sobre “a voz da massa anônima”: uma voz coletiva que, em certas situacões ligadas a crises de caráter cultural, é portadora de paixões violentas que podem produzir interferências profundas no curso da história. Em seus últimos trabalhos, o semioticista russo postulou, diante disso, a noção de uma semiótica das emoções como objeto de estudo para entender a dinâmica cultural, em especial de períodos tidos como revolucionários ou de transição, a (...) saber, quando a massa anônima é capaz de manipular os eventos ou quando, revendo o passado, confere aos eventos uma interpretação distorcida. Lótman focalizou, principalmente, a relação entre as grandes fraturas históricas, os mecanismos de autopropagação do medo e a criação cultural de bodes expiatórios. O presente estudo visa abordar a reflexão de Lótman sobre perseguição, com especial atenção à figura da mulher durante o fenômeno de caça às bruxas. ABSTRACT Between 1988 and 1993, Yuri Lotman composed a series of reflections on “the voice of the anonymous mass”: a collective voice that, in particular situations linked to a cultural crisis, is the bearer of striking passions, which can deeply influence history. In his late works, the Russian semiotician postulated, therefore, the idea of a semiotics of emotions as an object of study to understand the dynamics of culture, especially during periods perceived as revolutionary or transitional―namely, when the anonymous mass manipulates the events or, when looking back, gives them a distorted interpretation. Lotman focused in particular on the relationship between great historical fractures, the self-propagating mechanisms of fear, and the cultural creation of scapegoats. This paper is devoted to framing Lotman’s reflection on persecution, paying particular attention to women during the phenomenon of the witch hunt. (shrink)

It is commonly believed that populist politics and social media pose a serious threat to our concept of truth. Philosophical pragmatists, who are typically thought to regard truth as merely that which is 'helpful' for us to believe, are sometimes blamed for providing the theoretical basis for the phenomenon of 'post-truth'. In this book, Sami Pihlström develops a pragmatist account of truth and truth-seeking based on the ideas of William James, and defends a thoroughly pragmatist view of humanism which gives (...) space for a sincere search for truth. By elaborating on James's pragmatism and the 'will to believe' strategy in the philosophy of religion, Pihlström argues for a Kantian-inspired transcendental articulation of pragmatism that recognizes irreducible normativity as a constitutive feature of our practices of pursuing the truth. James himself thereby emerges as a deeply Kantian thinker. (shrink)

Andy Clark has argued that language is “in many ways the ultimate artifact” (Clark 1997, p.218). Fuelling this conclusion is a view according to which the human brain is essentially no more than a patterncompleting device, while language is an external resource which is adaptively fitted to the human brain in such a way that it enables that brain to exceed its unaided (pattern-completing) cognitive capacities, in much the same way as a pair of scissors enables us to “exploit our (...) basic manipulative capacities to fulfill new ends” (Clark 1997, pp.193-4). How should we respond to this bold reconceptualization of our linguistic abilities? First we need to understand it properly. So I begin by identifying and unpacking (and making a small “Heideggerian” amendment to) Clark’s main language-specific claims. That done I take a step back. Clark’s approach to language is generated from a theoretical perspective which sees cognition as distributed over brain, body, and world. So I continue my investigation of Clark’s incursion into linguistic territory by uncovering and illustrating those key ideas from the overall distributed cognition research programme which are particularly relevant in the present context. I then use this analysis as a spring-board from which to examine a crucial issue that arises for Clark’s account of language, namely linguistic inner rehearsal. I argue that while there is much to recommend in Clark’s treatment of this issue, some significant difficulties remain to be overcome. Via this critique of Clark’s position, alongside some proposals for how the revealed problems might be addressed, I hope to edge us that bit closer to a full understanding of our linguistic abilities. (shrink)

In Contingent Computation, M. Beatrice Fazi offers a new theoretical perspective through which we can engage philosophically with computing. The book proves that aesthetics is a viable mode of investigating contemporary computational systems. It does so by advancing an original conception of computational aesthetics that does not just concern art made by or with computers, but rather the modes of being and becoming of computational processes. Contingent Computation mobilises the philosophies of Gilles Deleuze and Alfred North Whitehead in order to (...) address aesthetics as an ontological study of the generative potential of reality. Through a novel philosophical reading of Gödel’s incompleteness theorems and of Turing’s notion of incomputability, Fazi finds this potential at the formal heart of computational systems, and argues that computation is a process of determining indeterminacy. This indeterminacy, which is central to computational systems, does not contradict their functionality. Instead, it drives their very operation, albeit in a manner that might not always fit with the instrumental, representational and cognitivist purposes that we have assigned to computing. (shrink)

Wines with geographical indication can be classified and represented by such features as designations of origin, producers, vintage years, alcoholic strength, and grape varieties; these features allow us to define wines in terms of a set of necessary and/or sufficient conditions. However, wines can also be identified by other characteristics, involving their look, smell, and taste; in this case, it is hard to define wines in terms of necessary and/or sufficient conditions, as wine concepts exhibit typicality effects. This is a (...) setback for the design of computer science ontologies aiming to represent wine concepts, since knowledge representation formalisms commonly adopted in this field do not allow for the representation of concepts in terms of typical traits. To solve this problem, we propose to adopt a hybrid approach in which ontology-oriented formalisms are combined with a geometric representation of knowledge based on conceptual spaces. As in conceptual spaces, concepts are identified in terms of a number of quality dimensions. In order to determine those relevant for wine representation, we use the terminology developed by the Italian Association of Sommeliers to describe wines. This will allow us to understand typicality effects about wines, determine prototypes and better exemplars, and measure the degree of similarity between different wines. (shrink)

In this paper, I seek to provide building blocks for a reconciliation of the ethical care for heritage protection and nature restoration ethics. It will do so, by introducing a hermeneutic landscape philosophy that takes landscape as a multi-layered “text” in need of interpretation, and place identities as build upon certain readings of the landscape. I will argue that from a hermeneutic perspective, both approaches appear to complement each other. Renaturing presents a valuable correction to the anthropocentrism of many European (...) rural cultures. Yet, heritage protectionists rightly point to the value of narratives for Old World identities. I will conclude with a short reflection on how such a hermeneutic environmental ethic can be helpful in dealing with environmental conflicts. (shrink)

In their paper, “Helpful Lessons and Cautionary Tales: How Should COVID-19 Drug Development and Access Inform Approaches to Non-Pandemic Diseases?” Holly Fernandez Lynch and colleagues have present...

It is generally believed that the de Broglie-Bohm model does not admit a particle interpretation for massive relativistic spin-0 particles, on the basis that particle trajectories cannot be defined. We show this situation is due to the fact that in the standard representation of the Klein-Gordon equation the wavefunction systematically contains superpositions of particle and anti-particle contributions. We argue that by working in a Foldy-Wouthuysen type representation uncoupling the particle from the anti-particle evolutions, a positive conserved density for a particle (...) and associated density current can be defined. For the free Klein-Gordon equation the velocity field obtained from this current density appears to be well-behaved and sub-luminal in typical instances. As an illustration, Bohmian trajectories for a spin-0 boson distribution are computed numerically for free propagation in situations in which the standard velocity field would take arbitrarily high positive and negative values. (shrink)

Soviet attitude towards Bohr reflects changes in the ideological approach to science. During the last period before Stalin's death danov proclaimed the campaign against Western influence in Soviet philosophy and science. Nevertheless the physicist M. A. Markov tried to introduce complementarity as a materialistic interpretation of quantum-mechanics in 1948. He was officially condemned. This was followed by a period (1948-54) during which heavy attacks were made against the Copenhagen school. In 1958, after a personal exchange of thoughts with Bohr, academician (...) Fock declared complementarity and probability to be irreversible steps towards a new insight into physical reality, at the same time correcting some of Bohr's epistemological conceptions. (shrink)

The medieval Islamic philosophers held a certain conception of the divine unity that assumes the necessary existent to be both one and simple. The oneness of the necessary existent meant that it is the only necessary existent and its simplicity meant that it admits no composition whatsoever – it is pure essence and its essence is necessary existence. In The Incoherence of the Philosophers al-Ġazālī presents, with elaboration, an exposition of the philosophers' conception of the divine unity, several arguments for (...) its two components, and his critique of these arguments. In this paper I focus on six of the arguments attributed to the philosophers. Following the textual evidence, I reconstruct these arguments and offer two possible interpretations of them. The first interpretation, which I call the many-argument interpretation, sees one of the arguments as employing the simplicity of the necessary existent to establish its oneness and the other five arguments as invoking oneness to establish simplicity. The second interpretation, which I call the one-argument interpretation, doesn't offer a new reading for the first argument but sees the other five arguments as defending the simplicity of the necessary existent based on its basic concept. I argue for the superiority of the one-argument interpretation. Résumé Les philosophes de l'Islam classique ont une doctrine de l'unité divine selon laquelle l'existant nécessaire est à la fois unique et simple. Son unicité signifie qu'il est le seul existant nécessaire, sa simplicité qu'il n'admet aucune sorte de composition; il est pure essence et son essence est existence nécessaire. Dans la Destruction des Philosophes, al-Ġazālī présente avec force détails un exposé de la doctrine de l'unité divine des philosophes, plusieurs arguments en faveur de ses deux composantes, ainsi que sa critique de ces arguments. Je me concentre ici sur six des arguments qu'il attribue aux philosophes. En suivant les données textuelles, je reconstruis ces arguments et en propose deux interprétations possibles. La première, que j'appelle l'interprétation “à arguments multiples”, identifie l'un des arguments comme s'appuyant sur la simplicité de l'existant nécessaire pour établir son unicité, et les cinq autres comme s'appuyant sur son unicité pour établir sa simplicité. La seconde, que j'appelle l'interprétation “à argument unique”, conserve la première lecture du premier argument mais voit dans les cinq autres une défense de la simplicité de l'existant nécessaire fondée sur sa notion fondamentale. J'argumente en faveur de la supériorité de l'interprétation “à argument unique”. (shrink)

carrington places race and racism at the center of his densely written analysis of science fiction, fantasy, utopia, and other forms of popular culture. He moves easily between a broad range of forms, which include memoirs, television series, comic books, novels, novelizations, fandom and fanzines, and short fiction and fiction circulated on the Internet. Popular culture helps us to construct notions of identity and race, and for carrington many constituent groups, notably fans, develop its key concepts and values.Speculative fiction is (...) for carrington a framework that links these various forms of popular culture. Here, SF is a genre different from literature, as it is situated closer to, and is more deeply... (shrink)