This paper uses the notion of Galois-connection to examine the relation between valuation-spaces and logics. Every valuation-space gives rise to a logic, and every logic gives rise to a valuation space, where the resulting pair of functions form a Galois-connection, and the composite functions are closure-operators. A valuation-space (resp., logic) is said to be complete precisely if it is Galois-closed. Two theorems are proven. A logic is complete if and only if it is reflexive and transitive. (...) A valuation-space is complete if and only if it is closed under formation of super-valuations. (shrink)

A semantics of vagueness should reject the principle that every statement has a truth-value yet retain the classical tautologies. A many-value, non-truth-functional semantics and a semantics of super-valuations each have this result. According to the super-valuation approach, 'if a man with n hairs on his head is bald, then a man with n plus one hairs on his head is also bald' is false because it comes out false no matter how the vague predicate 'is bald' is (...) appropriately made precise. But why should a sentence in which components actually remain imprecise be regarded as actually false just because it would be false if its components were precise? On one of the alternative treatments of quantification allowed by the many-value approach, the sentence in question is assigned an intermediate value closer to 'false' than to 'true'. Despite the elegance of the super-valuation approach, there are reasons to prefer the many-value approach. (shrink)

The article contains an exposition of the moral philosophy of J. P. Sartre as well as a trial of its evaluation. The author presents the social basis and main theses of Sartre’s.philosophical system and stresses the questions of social conditioning, real contents, and functions of the situational ethics of Sartre. According to the author, the situational ethics of Sartre, being an expression of feelings of intellectuals, middle-class, and students in the period of violent changes in our civilization, simply describes a (...) certain type of man, peculiar to these conditions and this time. Therefore, this type cannot be considered a definite universal construction of a human subject. Pessimism, characteristic for the existentialism, as an expression of.certain social and political conditions, can be easily surmounted, provided that a possibility of definite social transformations can be demonstrated. This gives evidence of a positive alternative which proposes development of social democracy, elimination of the remnants of worship of the individual, as well as a more and more full realization of social humanism, that are limiting the experiments of existentialism. Together with an increasing conviction of a possibility to surmount and to abolish the capitalistic alienation and together with the development of socialist democracy, when marxist thinking comprises more and more effectively all aspects of human fates, the social basis of existentialism and its influence are losing ground. On the other hand, whatever might be said about arbitrariness and subjectivism of many theses of existentialism, it has raised many essential questions of particular importance in our time. These are: 1) subjective aspect of human freedom in situations of a choice of an action; 2) responsibility of an individual to himself, other people, and history; 3) contradiction between general systems of valuation and norms and of a definite situation in which a choice is taken; 4) danger of a non-authentic apparent communication; 5) danger of a lost of personality in conditions of consumptionist civilisation; 6) necessity of responsibility and engagement; 7) necessity of forbearance, tolerance and respecting the subjective world of other persons; 8) existence of conflict situations. According to the author, a resolution of the above problems, which are important for a modern man, can be done only basing on marxism which should be conceived in a creative way. It is necessary, however, to reject arbitrary assumptions of the existentialist metaphysics, ethical formalism, and, above all, ahistorical conception of freedom. The opinions of Sartre that the, good a priori cannot exist, that everybody should determine his own existence, and that in each situation he should maintain his creative attitude and moral alertness, are in a certain sense and within certain limits right and productive. However, depriving people of a possibility to build any system of values and norms of a super-subjective character is a risky thing and may lead to moral relativity and nihilism. The social function of the existentialism is also a double one. On the one hand, existentialism, which demonstrates a super-historical and unchangeable character of the drama of human existence, in some way confirms and justifies the social system submitted to critic. On the other hand, as it states a moral and idealistic outsidership, bareness, and loneliness of a human individual in a modern bourgeois 1society, existentialism presents an important ethical indictment directed to the capitalistic society and indirectly shows a necessity to create such relations which would remove the tragic gap between individual and society. This is the reason of a peculiar paradox that for same people the existentialism is a point of departure from the files of the revolutionary movement, and for others a point which leads into marxism – cum duo faciunt idem, non est idem. (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)

Aboitiz et al. describe a hypothesis on the origin of the isocortex. They propose the reptilian dorsal cortex to be the ancestral brain structure to the mammalian isocortex. But why did the dorsal cortex expand in mammals and not in reptiles? A change in development may have provided the mammalian cortex with the ability to organize and therefore the potential to expand.

We often encounter situations in which an undesirable outcome is brought about through a series or collection of seemingly inconsequen-tial actions. This phenomenon, referred to as the inefficacy paradox, oc-curs both intrapersonally and collectively. Paradoxically, while we have good reason to avoid such patterns of action, there appears to be no com-pelling reason to abstain from any of the individual actions constituting such a pattern given its trivial impact. This paper scrutinizes Chrisoula Andreou's prominent endeavor to resolve the inefficacy paradox (...) in both the intrapersonal and the collective context by utilizing their structural similarity. While her approach may prove successful in intrapersonal cases, the applicability of the proposed solution to collective cases is, I argue, ultimately limited. This is due to a fundamental dissimilarity be-tween these two kinds of cases, which I lay out in the paper. This insight may also shed light on the transferability of other proposed solutions to the inefficacy paradox from the intrapersonal to the collective context. (shrink)

Phillips & Silverstein argue that schizophrenia is a result of a deficit of the contextual coordination of neuronal responses. The authors propose that NMDA-receptors control these modulatory effects. However, hallucinations, which are among the principle symptoms of schizophrenia, imply a flaw in the interactions between neurons that is more fundamental than just a general weakness of contextual modulation.

Valuation is portrayed here as a dynamic and interactive process, not a static notion linked to willingness to pay. Valuation through economic measures can be built upon by creating trusting and legitimising procedures of stakeholder negotiation and mediation. This is a familiar practice in the US, but it is only beginning to be recognised as an environmental management tool in the UK. The introduction of strategic environmental and landuse appraisal plans for shorelines, estuaries, river catchments and rural landscapes, (...) combined with the mobilisation of protest around landuse proposals that are not seemingly justified on the basis of 'need' suggest that a more legitimate participatory form of democracy is required to reveal valuation through consensual negotiation. (shrink)

A central question for psychologists, economists, and philosophers is how human lives should be valued. Whereas egalitarian considerations give rise to models emphasizing that every life should be valued equally, empirical research has demonstrated that valuations of lives depend on a variety of factors that often do not conform to specific normative expectations. Such factors include emotional reactions to the victims and cognitive considerations leading to biased perceptions of lives at risk (e.g., attention, mental imagery, pseudo-inefficacy, and scope neglect). They (...) can lead to a valuation function with decreasing marginal value and sometimes even decreasing absolute value as the number of victims increases. As a result, people spend more money to save an individual while at the same time being insensitive and apathetic to large losses of life, despite endorsing egalitarian norms. In this conceptual paper, we propose a descriptive model highlighting the role of different motivations and the conditions under which cognitions and emotions result in deviations from egalitarian normative valuations of human lives. (shrink)

The computer is one of the most complex artifacts ever built. Given its complexity, it can be described from many different points of view. The aim of this paper is to investigate the representational structure and multifunctionality of a particular subset of computers, namely personal devices from a user-centred perspective. The paper also discusses the concept of “cognitive task”, as recently employed in some definitions of cognitive artifacts, and investigates the metaphysical properties of such artifacts. From a representational point of (...) view, the article introduces the concepts of artifactual meta-representation and of semi-transparency, two features that personal devices share with some cognitive and non-cognitive artifacts. Recognising the meta-representational nature of personal devices and of other cognitive artifacts, thus overcoming semi-transparency, is important for the understanding of why different artifacts offer us different cognitive affordances as well as different cognitive advantages. In this sense, it is not simply a theoretical achievement, but has some important practical consequences. In our highly technological world we can use different kinds of computers and artifacts for solving the same tasks, and we need to understand why some artifacts are better suited for some tasks than others. The ultimate characterisation of personal devices that emerges from this work is that of a sort of super-artifact. This special status is given to personal devices because of their distinctive features. They are in fact intrinsically multifunctional and meta-representational artifacts, with extremely variable structures. As super-artifacts, personal devices are characterised by macro-functionality and can be easily used as both cognitive artifacts and tools for other functions, depending on the kind of representations they instantiate. (shrink)

In this paper, the properties of the super quantum measures are studied. Firstly, the products of Dirac measures are discussed; Secondly, based on the properties of Dirac measures, the structures of super quantum measures are characterized; At last, we prove that any super quantum measure can determine a unique diagonally positive strongly symmetric signed measure. This result verifies the conjecture which was proposed by Gudder.

Super-Humeanism is an even more parsimonious ontology than Lewisian standard Humean metaphysics in that it rejects intrinsic properties. There are point objects, but all there is to them are their relative positions and the change of them. Everything else supervenes on the Humean mosaic thus conceived. Hence, dynamical parameters come in on a par with the laws through their position in the best system. The paper sets out how Super-Humeanism has the conceptual means to reject van Inwagen’s consequence (...) argument not by taking the laws to depend on us, but by taking the initial values of the dynamical parameters that enter into the laws to be dependent on the motions that actually occur in the universe, including the motions of human bodies. The paper spells out the advantages of this proposal. (shrink)

Proponents of supervaluationism claim super-truth, i. e., truth on every admissible precisification, is identical to truth or, at least, is a suitable truth proxy. I object that super-truth is neither identical to nor a suitable proxy for truth. I argue that to claim a statement is super-true is simply to maintain that a certain counterfactual holds, and that a claim is true, counterfactually, is no reason to treat it as true. I further argue that, with super-truth (...) undermined, Roy Sorensen’s objection that supervaluationism cannot accommodate vague directly referential terms presents supervaluationism’s defenders with a significant challenge. (shrink)

Contingent valuation of people's willingness to pay has rapidly become the method of choice to value all manner of environmental damages. The correct measure is, however, the sum people require to compensate them for such losses, an amount which will normally be far larger than their willingness to pay. And on present evidence, responses to contingent valuation questions are not likely to represent any measure of economic values. The results of these valuation practices will, therefore, bias environmental (...) policies and distort incentives. (shrink)

The use of super‐resolution imaging techniques in cell biology has yielded a wealth of information regarding cellular elements and processes that were invisible to conventional imaging. Focusing on images obtained by stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscopy, we discuss how the new high‐resolution data influence the ways in which we use and interpret images in cell biology. Super‐resolution images have lent support to some of our current hypotheses. But, more significantly, they have revealed unexpectedly complex processes that cannot be (...) accounted for by the simpler models based on diffraction‐limited imaging. The super‐resolution imaging data challenge cell biologists to change their theoretical framework, by including, for instance, interpretations that describe multiple functions, functional errors or lack of function for cellular elements. In this context, we argue that descriptive research using super‐resolution microscopy is now as necessary as hypothesis‐driven research. (shrink)

In this paper, we present valuation semantics for the Propositional Intuitionistic Calculus (also called Heyting Calculus) and three important subcalculi: the Implicative, the Positive and the Minimal Calculus (also known as Kolmogoroff or Johansson Calculus). Algorithms based in our definitions yields decision methods for these calculi. DOI:10.5007/1808-1711.2010v14n1p125.

I will introduce and motivate eliminativist super-relationism. This is the conjunction of relationism about spacetime and eliminativism about material objects. According to the view, the universe is a big collection of spatio-temporal relations and natural properties, and no substance (material or spatio-temporal) exists in it. The view is original since eliminativism about material objects, when understood as including not only ordinary objects like tables or chairs but also physical particles, is generally taken to imply substantivalism about spacetime: if properties (...) are directly instantiated by spacetime without the mediation of material objects, then, surely, spacetime has to be a substance. After introducing briefly the two debates about spacetime (§1) and material objects (§2), I will present Schaffer's super-substantivalism (§3), the conjunction of substantivalism about spacetime and eliminativism about material objects at the fundamental level. I shall then expose and discuss the assumption from which the implication from eliminativism to substantivalism is drawn, and discuss the compatibility of eliminativism with relationism: if spacetime is not a substance, and if material objects are not real, how are we to understand the instantiation of properties (§4)? And what are the relata of spatio-temporal relations (§5)? I then show that each argument in favor of super-substantivalism offered by Schaffer also holds for super-relationism (§6) and examine several metaphysical consequences of the view (§7). I conclude that both super-substantivalism and super-relationism are compatible with Schaffer's priority monism (§8). (shrink)

This paper introduces the logics of super-strict implications, where a super-strict implication is a strengthening of C.I. Lewis' strict implication that avoids not only the paradoxes of material implication but also those of strict implication. The semantics of super-strict implications is obtained by strengthening the (normal) relational semantics for strict implication. We consider all logics of super-strict implications that are based on relational frames for modal logics in the modal cube. it is shown that all logics (...) of super-strict implications are connexive logics in that they validate Aristotle's Theses and (weak) Boethius's Theses. A proof-theoretic characterisation of logics of super-strict implications is given by means of G3-style labelled calculi, and it is proved that the structural rules of inference are admissible in these calculi. It is also shown that validity in the S5-based logic of super-strict implications is equivalent to validity in G. Priest's negation-as-cancellation-based logic. Hence, we also give a cut-free calculus for Priest's logic. (shrink)

We give a valuation theoretic characterization for a real closed field to be recursively saturated. This builds on work in [9], where the authors gave such a characterization forκ-saturation, for a cardinal$\kappa \ge \aleph _0 $. Our result extends the characterization of Harnik and Ressayre [7] for a divisible ordered abelian group to be recursively saturated.

This Article discusses what a “super-precedent” is in American Constitutional Law. Additionally, it describes the current criteria used to identify super-precedents and the limitations of these criteria. It then mentions the various precedents that have been afforded this august title and suggests the need for an additional criterion to ensure the continued protection of those precedents most closely associated with the protection of human rights. Finally, the article identifies three additional precedents, beyond those usually recognized, that ought to (...) be ranked super-precedents and provides a basis for ranking all precedents, grounded in autonomy, when they either conflict with one another or encounter a compelling state interest. (shrink)

In this article, building on our multidisciplinary expertise on philosophy, anthropology, and social study of microbes, we discuss and analyze new approaches to justice that have emerged in thinking with more-than-human contexts: microbes, animals, environments and ecosystems. We situate our analysis in theory of and practical engagements with antimicrobial resistance and climate emergency that both can be considered super-wicked problems. In offering solutions to such problems, we discuss a more-than-human justice orientation, seeking to displace human exceptionalism while still engaging (...) with human social justice issues. We offer anthropological narratives to highlight how more-than-human actors already play an important role in environmental and climate politics. These narratives further justify the need for new ethical frameworks, out of which we, for further development outside the scope of this article, suggest a queer feminist posthumanist one. (shrink)

Recent advances in the Super Linguistics of pictures have laid the Super Semantic foundation for modelling the phenomena of narrative sequencing and co-reference in pictorial and mixed linguistic-pictorial discourses. We take up the question of how one arrives at the pragmatic interpretations of such discourses. In particular, we offer an analysis of: (i) the discourse composition problem: how to represent the joint meaning of a multi-picture discourse, (ii) observed differences in narrative sequencing in prima facie equivalent linguistic vs (...) pictorial discourses, and (iii) the phenomenon of co-referencing across pictures. We extend Segmented Discourse Representation Theory to spell out a formal Super Pragmatics that applies to linguistic, pictorial and mixed discourses, while respecting the particular ‘genius’ of either medium and computing their distinctive pragmatic interpretations. (shrink)

We define and study abstract valuation semantics for logics, an algebraically well-behaved version of valuation semantics. Then, in the context of the behavioral approach to the algebraization of logics, we show, by means of meaningful bridge theorems and application examples, that abstract valuations are suited to play a role similar to the one played by logical matrices in the traditional approach to algebraization.

Kripke’s theory of truth succeeded in providing a trivalent semantics for a language that contains its own truth predicate and means of self-reference; but it did so by radically restricting the expressive power of the logic. In Kripke’s analysis, the Liar (e.g. This very sentence is not true) receives the indeterminate truth value; but the logic cannot express the fact that the Liar is something other than true: in order to do so, a weak negation not* would be needed, but (...) it would also make the logic inconsistent (because the ‘Super Liar’ This very sentence is not* true could not be assigned any truth value). Taking a hint from the quantificational form of the problematic sentences (… is something other than true), we define a hierarchy of negations which each quantifies over a domain of truth values, assimilated to ordinals. The resulting logic has as many negations and truth values as there are ordinals. Unlike Kripke’s logic, it enjoys a form of expressive completeness. And although the logic is not monotonic, we show that under broad conditions we can construct a variety of fixed points; one of them emulates Kripke’s ‘least fixed point’, while another one assigns a different truth value to each Super Liar. (shrink)