This paper argues that the Turing test is based on a fixed and de-contextualized view of communicative competence. According to this view, a machine that passes the test will be able to communicate effectively in a variety of other situations. But the de-contextualized view ignores the relationship between language and social context, or, to put it another way, the extent to which speakers respond dynamically to variations in discourse function, formality level, social distance/solidarity among participants, and participants' relative degrees of (...) power and status. In the case of the Loebner Contest, a present day version of the Turing test, the social context of interaction can be interpreted in conflicting ways. For example, Loebner discourse is defined 1) as a friendly, casual conversation between two strangers of equal power, and 2) as a one-way transaction in which judges control the conversational floor in an attempt to expose contestants that are not human. This conflict in discourse function is irrelevant so long as the goal of the contest is to ensure that only thinking, human entities pass the test. But if the function of Loebner discourse is to encourage the production of software that can pass for human on the level of conversational ability, then the contest designers need to resolve this ambiguity in discourse function, and thus also come to terms with the kind of competence they are trying to measure. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore some of the ways in which Artificial Intelligence (AI) is mediated discursively. I assume that AI is informed by an “ancestral dream” to reproduce nature by artificial means. This dream drives the production of “cyborg discourse”, which hinges on the belief that human nature (especially intelligence) can be reduced to symbol manipulation and hence replicated in a machine. Cyborg discourse, I suggest, produces AI systems by rhetorical means; it does not merely describe AI systems or (...) reflect a set of prevailing attitudes about technology. To support this argument, I analyse a set of research articles about an “embodied conversational agent” called the Real Estate Agent (REA). The articles about REA mobilise a set of rhetorical strategies that systematically downplay the system’s artificiality and bolster its humanlike qualities. Within the context of the dream of AI to produce humanlike machines, and given our strong bias for human-human interaction, the designers’ claim to REA’s humanness in their research articles, as I argue in the final section of this paper, needs little justification. (shrink)

It is commonplace in discussions of modern cosmology to assert that the early universe began in a special state. Conventionally, cosmologists characterize this fine-tuning in terms of the horizon and flatness problems. I argue that the fine-tuning is real, but these problems aren't the best way to think about it: causal disconnection of separated regions isn't the real problem, and flatness isn't a problem at all. Fine-tuning is better understood in terms of a measure on the space of trajectories: given (...) reasonable conditions in the late universe, the fraction of cosmological histories that were smooth at early times is incredibly tiny. This discussion helps clarify what is required by a complete theory of cosmological initial conditions. (shrink)

Despite the size and thanks to the rich brown coal reserves, the Czech Republic is one of the leading energy producers in Europe, and the 7th biggest exporter of electricity in the world. However, following the climate change mitigation, the novel energy policy that enhances the reduction of coal mining is about to be implemented. A preliminary material flow analysis of the Czech energy sector was carried out. The data obtained confirmed that this government act would result in a dramatic (...) reduction of revenues from electricity sales. Conversely, increased costs would be necessary in order to modernize nuclear power plants and promote the production of renewable energy. In addition, the economic analysis revealed that the act might be prejudicial to economic relations in Central and Western-European countries as some of them are significantly dependent on the electricity imported from the Czech Republic. Disputes between engineers and politicians were highlighted. The aforementioned interrelations were subsequently analyzed and a conclusion was made stating that global interests should have the highest moral priority. (shrink)

Effective Field Theory (EFT) is the successful paradigm underlying modern theoretical physics, including the "Core Theory" of the Standard Model of particle physics plus Einstein's general relativity. I will argue that EFT grants us a unique insight: each EFT model comes with a built-in specification of its domain of applicability. Hence, once a model is tested within some domain (of energies and interaction strengths), we can be confident that it will continue to be accurate within that domain. Currently, the Core (...) Theory has been tested in regimes that include all of the energy scales relevant to the physics of everyday life (biology, chemistry, technology, etc.). Therefore, we have reason to be confident that the laws of physics underlying the phenomena of everyday life are completely known. (shrink)

This article sketches an intellectual history of the distinction between Christian theology and Christian ethics. The twists and turns of that history have been obscured by a recent tendency to deny the distinction's usefulness, as part of a wider strategy for reasserting theology's relevance to modern social problems. By contrast, earlier theologians assumed the value of the theology/ethics divide, interpreting it through Aristotelian, neo-Kantian, and finally Marxist categories. The distinction fell into disrepute because theologians struggled to maintain the distinction consistently (...) and disagreed on the concerns implicated by it, variously using it to affirm the moral subject's agency, the divine/human difference, or the complexity of real people's circumstances. Nonetheless, the distinction has persisted as a useful shorthand for recognizing the limitations of Christian theology, qua a conceptual discourse, in fully apprehending its subject matter of the Christian life. (shrink)

In tackling emergentist Marxism in depth, this well-written volume demonstrates that critical realism and materialist dialectics are indispensable to theorizing the functioning of complex social and physical systems. Author Sean Creaven investigates Marxâes dialectics of being and consciousness, forces and relations of production, base and superstructure, class structure and class conflict, and demonstrates how they allow the social analyst to conceptualize geo-history as embodying a tendential evolutionary directionality, rather than as simply random or indeterminate in terms of its outcomes. (...) For those interested in social and political theory, Marxism and communism and contemporary social theory, this outstanding volume is an in important read and a valuable resource. (shrink)

Emotional hardcore and other music genres featuring screamed vocals are puzzling for the appreciator. The typical fan attaches appreciative value to musical screams of emotional pain all the while acknowledging it would be inappropriate to hold similar attitudes towards their sonically similar everyday counterpart: actual human screaming. Call this the screamed vocals problem. To solve the problem, I argue we must attend to the anti-sublimating aims that get expressed in the emotional hardcore vocalist’s choice to scream the lyrics. Screamed vocals (...) help us see the value in rejecting (a) restrictive social norms of emotional expressiveness and (b) restrictive artistic norms about how one ought to express or represent pain in art, namely that if one is going to do so they must ensure the pain has been ‘beautified’. In developing this second point I argue that emotional hardcore is well-suited (though not individually so) for putting pressure on longstanding views in the history of aesthetics about the formal relationship between art and human pain. (shrink)

This chapter corrects for Susan Sontag's undeserved neglect by contemporary ethical philosophers by bringing awareness to some of the unique metaethical insights born of her reflections on photographic representations of evil. I argue that Sontag's thought provides fertile ground for thinking about: (1) moral perception and its relation to moral knowledge; and (2) the epistemic and moral value of our emotional responses to the misery and suffering of others. I show that, contrary to standard moral perception theory (e.g. Blum 1994), (...) Sontag holds that we can have general moral perceptual knowledge. I then explore Sontag's idea that certain emotional responses, like sympathy and compassion, can sometimes be impertinent, in virtue of their having false or illusory content. I explain why this is so, and show the epistemic and motivational problems it poses for moral sentimentalism. (shrink)

lnek se zabv kritickm rozborem hlavnch metod zkoumn rakousk ekonomick koly. Nejprve je pozornost vnovna metodologickmu individualismu a subjektivismu a monch problm, kter jsou spojeny s jejich pln konzistentnm uplatovnm. Dle je vysvtlena neoprvnnost kritiky ekonomie hlavnho proudu rakouskou kolou z hlediska praxeologickho zkona. Posledn kapitola se vnuje kritice axiomatickho chpn racionality jakoto nutnho pedpokladu pro metodologick individualismus a praxeologii.

Some modern cosmological models predict the appearance of Boltzmann Brains: observers who randomly fluctuate out of a thermal bath rather than naturally evolving from a low-entropy Big Bang. A theory in which most observers are of the Boltzmann Brain type is generally thought to be unacceptable, although opinions differ. I argue that such theories are indeed unacceptable: the real problem is with fluctuations into observers who are locally identical to ordinary observers, and their existence cannot be swept under the rug (...) by a choice of probability distributions over observers. The issue is not that the existence of such observers is ruled out by data, but that the theories that predict them are cognitively unstable: they cannot simultaneously be true and justifiably believed. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Organizations constitute morally-complex environments, requiring organization members to possess levels of moral courage sufficient to promote their ethical action, while refraining from unethical actions when faced with temptations or pressures. Using a sample drawn from a military context, we explored the antecedents and consequences of moral courage. Results from this four-month field study demonstrated that authentic leadership was positively related to followers’ displays of moral courage. Further, followers’ moral courage fully mediated the effects of authentic leadership on followers’ ethical and (...) pro-social behaviors. Theoretical and practical implications for further integrating the work on moral courage, authentic leadership and ethics are discussed. (shrink)

A non-technical introduction to quantum mechanics, the Everett interpretation, and the emergence of spacetime.

In the revised and updated edition of this popular book, Sean Burke shows how the attempt to abolish the author is fundamentally misguided and philosophically ...

The concept of alienation: Hegelian themes in modern social thought -- Creative activity and alienation in Hegel and Marx -- The concept of labour -- The individual and society -- Freedom and the "realm of necessity" -- Alienation as a critical concept -- Private property and communism -- The division of labour and its overcoming -- Marx's concept of communism.

A provocative close reading revealing a radical, proto-phenomenological Socrates.

We have a much better understanding of physics than we do of consciousness. I consider ways in which intrinsically mental aspects of fundamental ontology might induce modifications of the known laws of physics, or whether they could be relevant to accounting for consciousness if no such modifications exist. I suggest that our current knowledge of physics should make us skeptical of hypothetical modifications of the known rules, and that without such modifications it’s hard to imagine how intrinsically mental aspects could (...) play a useful explanatory role. Draft version of a paper submitted to Journal of Consciousness Studies, special issue responding to Philip Goff’s Galileo’s Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness. (shrink)

This book provides an account of the nature of time, especially time's arrow and the role of entropy, at a semi-popular level. Special attention is given to statistical mechanics, the past hypothesis, and possible cosmological explanations thereof.

I discuss "Poetic Naturalism" -- there is only one world, the natural world, but there are many ways of talking about it -- both as a general concept, and how it accounts for our actual world. I talk about emergence, fundamental physics, entropy and complexity, the origins of life and consciousness, and moral constructivism.

I defend the extremist position that the fundamental ontology of the world consists of a vector in Hilbert space evolving according to the Schrödinger equation. The laws of physics are determined solely by the energy eigenspectrum of the Hamiltonian. The structure of our observed world, including space and fields living within it, should arise as a higher-level emergent description. I sketch how this might come about, although much work remains to be done.

The need to understand the systems that support ethical health research has long been recognized, but there are limited descriptions of actual health research ethics (HRE) systems. Using participatory network mapping methods, we empirically defined Malaysia's HRE system. 13 Malaysian stakeholders identified 4 overarching and 25 specific HRE system functions and 35 actors internal and 3 external to the Malaysian HRE system responsible for those functions. Functions requiring the most attention were: advising on legislation related to HRE; optimizing research value (...) to society; and defining standards for HRE oversight. Internal actors with the greatest potential for more influence were: the national network of research ethics committees; non-institution-based research ethics committees; and research participants. The World Health Organization, an external actor, had the largest untapped potential for influence overall. In summary, this stakeholder-driven process identified HRE system functions and actors that could be targeted to increase HRE system capacity. (shrink)

El Banquete de Platón escenifica una subversión lúdica de la paiderastía por parte de la philosophía a través de sucesivos discursos interconectados. Fedro y Agatón elogian a Érōs como un dios que preside las relaciones homoeróticas, ya sea en la guerra o en la paz. Pausanias y Erixímaco distinguen entre dos Érōtes, ansiosos por supervisar estas comunidades pederásticas e incluso la armonía cósmica. Pero Aristófanes subvierte su perspectiva al introducir al Andrógino, una combinación de hombre y mujer, el cual, siendo (...) expuesto por Sócrates-Diotima, dará finalmente a luz al Érōs-Daímōn. Solo él nos asegurará una verdadera comunidad humana al permitirnos una verdadera comunión con lo divino, como atestigua el elogio final de Alcibíades a Sócrates. (shrink)

Plutarch’s Dialogue on Love (Erōtikos), certainly one of his most sublime and intriguing masterpieces, has for a long time puzzled many readers and commentators, concerning both its attitude towards Plato and its precise political and metaphysical scope. At a first level, some have argued that the main theme of the dialogue, from beginning to end, is the praise of conjugal love, and that Plutarch’s revolutionary conception of marriage departs from Plato’s one. At a second level, some have objected that the (...) main point is rather the central praise of the god of Love, which ensures the possibility for true human love, by rekindling the Thespian tradition of the Erōtideia. As regards politics and religion, Plutarch seems therefore to distance himself from Plato. Still, at a third level, many have noticed the great literary and philosophical debt of the Chaeronean towards his acknowledged model, for the dialogue is constantly borrowing from the Symposium and the Phaedrus. Whilst the reference to the latter is clearer, the influence of the former is much more problematic. All scholars have then struggled with the extraordinary absence in the text of the well‑known Erōs‑Daimōn, especially since Plutarch makes direct use of and explicit allusions to Diotima’s speech. How can we plainly explain such an enigmatic absence? And does it necessarily mean any departure from the essence of Platonic philosophy? We propose an entirely new reading of the Dialogue on Love based upon the general hypothesis that it dramatically and symbolically represents the birth through the text of the Erōs‑Daimōn. The whole dialogue reveals itself as being a staging of the locus classicus of Plato’s Symposium, the familial triad Plutarch‑Timoxena‑Autoboulos reflecting the philosophical triad Socrates‑Diotima‑Erōs‑Daimōn, which is further supported by the harmonization of the Egyptian triad Osiris‑Isis‑Horus with the Platonic triad Poros‑Penia‑Erōs in the Isis and Osiris. Thus, the birth of the philosophical love in the soul of the reader is finally happening. (shrink)

A survey is presented showing an above-average performance by candidates of several Central/Eastern European countries in the world-wide competition for the Alexander von Humboldt fellowships in the period before 1989, in spite of various administrative obstacles imposed by their countries. The success rate can be linked to the traditionally relatively high level of educational standards there. The administrative obstacles are illustrated by taking the former Czechoslovakia as an example, and also by way of a personal case study.

Reichenbach's 'principle of the common cause' is a foundational assumption of some important recent contributions to quantitative social science methodology but no similar principle appears in econometrics. Reiss (2005) has argued that the principle is necessary for instrumental variables methods in econometrics, and Pearl (2009) builds a framework using it that he proposes as a means of resolving an important methodological dispute among econometricians. We aim to show, through analysis of the main problem instrumental variables methods are used to resolve, (...) that the relationship of the principle to econometric methods is more nuanced than implied by previous work, but nevertheless may make a valuable contribution to the coherence and validity of existing methods. (shrink)

Celebrated yoga teacher and activist Seane Corn shares pivotal accounts of her life with raw honesty—enriched with in-depth spiritual teachings—to help us heal, evolve, and change the world “My first lessons in spirituality and yoga had nothing to do with a mat, but everything to do with waking up. They included angels, seeing God, and being in Heaven. But, believe me, not the way you might think.” So begins Revolution of the Soul. What comes next reads like a riveting memoir (...) filled with uncensored moments of joy, pain, wonder, and humor. Except, this book is so much more than that. Seane's real purpose is to guide us into a deep, gut-level understanding of our highest Self through yoga philosophy and other tools for emotional healing—not just as abstract ideas but as embodied, fully felt wisdom. Why? To spark a "revolution of the soul" in each of us, so we can awaken to our purpose and become true agents of change. Just a few of the stops along the way include: The everyday "angels" Seane finds in the gritty corners of New York's 1980s East Village; her early struggles as a total yoga-class misfit; the profound shadow work and body-based practices that helped her to heal childhood trauma, OCD, unhealthy behaviors, and relationship wounding; hard-earned lessons from some of the most heartbreaking places on the planet; and many other unforgettable teaching stories. (shrink)

Cosmological models that invoke a multiverse - a collection of unobservable regions of space where conditions are very different from the region around us - are controversial, on the grounds that unobservable phenomena shouldn't play a crucial role in legitimate scientific theories. I argue that the way we evaluate multiverse models is precisely the same as the way we evaluate any other models, on the basis of abduction, Bayesian inference, and empirical success. There is no scientifically respectable way to do (...) cosmology without taking into account different possibilities for what the universe might be like outside our horizon. Multiverse theories are utterly conventionally scientific, even if evaluating them can be difficult in practice. (shrink)

Everything possible to be believed is an image of truth (The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Blake) Introduction In this book I deal with some of the central ...

This volume is an indispensable reference for a wide range of scholars working across multidisciplinary fields of inquiry that focus on British and continental histories of medicine and sexuality, gender history and studies of nineteenth ...

The aim of this article is to address the recently renewed debate pertaining to esotericism, secret messages encoded within writings from antiquity, especially in the writings of Plato. The question of esotericism has assumed a prominent role within debates concerning the history of political thought. Ever since Leo Strauss offered his suspicion that there were secrets ‘buried in the writings of the rhetoricians of antiquity’, the idea that philosophers deliberately concealed their true beliefs in a way that few could detect (...) has been fiercely debated. More recently, the research of J.B. Kennedy has made international headlines for discovering a musical pattern embedded within Platonic writings, a pattern that Kennedy insists is evidence of Plato’s Pythagorean allegiance. The theses proffered by Strauss and Kennedy are empty doctrines of esotericism, or empty esotericisms. These doctrines insinuate the presence of secret or coded writing within Platonic dialogues but reveal no actual secret. These theses of esotericism falsely represent Plato as hyper-cryptic.Without actually providing substantive content, these notions of esotericism compel the reader to merely negate the exoteric writings of Plato, which actually render his already heterodox writings as commonplace and orthodox. (shrink)

This chapter offers a general outline of Schopenhauer’s peculiarly named concept of the 'acquired character’ and explains its basic function in his ethical thought. For Schopenhauer, a person of acquired character is someone who knows the ways of acting (Handlungsweise) that are most expressive of their individuality and who allows that self-knowledge to structure their practical and emotional life. In keeping with certain elements of his psychological determinism, acquired character is not the acquisition of a ‘new’ character; rather, it is (...) the acquisition of self-knowledge of one’s essentially fixed empirical character. It is part of the argument of this chapter that by introducing the acquired character into his reflections on human action and agency Schopenhauer weaves a certain view of individual flourishing (eudaimonia) into his ethics. There are two central ingredients of Schopenhauer’s conception of eudaimonia, and both are linked to the acquired character. The first is self-knowledge; the second is a sense of personal autonomy that follows in the wake of the first. The chapter ends with a brief attempt to connect Schopenhauer’s concept of acquired character to contemporary debates in ethics concerning autonomy, practical identity, and what some call the ‘normative significance of self’. (shrink)

Graduate-level textbook in general relativity.

We study the conservation of energy, or lack thereof, when measurements are performed in quantum mechanics. The expectation value of the Hamiltonian of a system changes when wave functions collapse in accordance with the standard textbook treatment of quantum measurement, but one might imagine that the change in energy is compensated by the measuring apparatus or environment. We show that this is not true; the change in the energy of a state after measurement can be arbitrarily large, independent of the (...) physical measurement process. In Everettian quantum theory, while the expectation value of the Hamiltonian is conserved for the wave function of the universe, it is not constant within individual worlds. It should therefore be possible to experimentally measure violations of conservation of energy, and we suggest an experimental protocol for doing so. (shrink)

This paper argues that cultural analyses of electric light, including aspects of actor-network theory, may raise the spectre of complexity, but do not do it justice when they omit to provide analysis of the intertwined roles of culture and political economy in the formation of the provision and use of electric light. The essay looks at the marketization of electric power, at outages in the eastern and western US megacities, at the collapse of the public utility model and chaotic implementation (...) of market models in Mumbai, Lagos and other poor megacities, and concludes that while theft of power provides a temporary solution, abandoning centralized market models in favour of microgrids is the only sure way to return agency to slum dwellers. (shrink)

The essay investigates the possibility of a closer connection of Husserlian phenomenology and that tradition in semiotics of art which originates mainly withSchelling and Goethe. The affinity between semiotically approached tropology and phenomenology is supported if a symbol is conceived not only as an analogy of the designated, but also as its direct grasping. This grasping shows some features of rational contemplation as understood by phenomenology. Modelling symbol as a synthetic trope enables us to proceed to the model of an (...) "artistic situation" as a square generated by a decomposition of the triangle of reference. The complexity of the processes within the "square" results from a fusion of the effects of the linear, natural circuit and the feedback, culturally historical circuit. (shrink)

A revived figure of teenage Albert Einstein is confronted at the threshold of the second millennium with a problem of a graphical likeness of the Lambert W function-based cosmological equations to a logarithmic-exponential discontinuous function that he has just plotted. To puzzle the issue out his mind is put onto an imaginary mathematical-philosophical-physical trail ride around the Universe. Euler’s identity that he invited to ride pillion on his Pegasus of Imagination spanks the cavalier’s horse to carry him on wings of (...) Leibniz’ zero-nothingness unity-infiniteness array towards a non-Euclidean landscape of novel cosmological equations – which describe behaviour of principal cosmological parameters as an exclusive function of the scale factor. Zero, unity, p, and Euler’s number become in the rider’s eyes a quaternion of linesmen – and the imaginary unit the one who as a chief referee opens and controls on the space-time playground a collective mass-energy game. And while the young cavalier observes from a horseback of his mount that within the playground expansion the cosmic match is running into the order of timelessness and spacelessness the Universe with all of its ever existing forms and events, thoughts and memories, unveils to him its all-encompassing face of eternity and immortality attributable to God. (shrink)

Příspěvek poukazuje na současnou pozici (roli) transdisciplinárního přístupu ve vědě, kdy upozorňuje na potřebu, důvody a význam inter- a transdisciplinární spolupráce napříč humanitními i přírodními vědami. Výklad se opírá o zásadní ideové fundamenty filosofie a metodologie vědy a zasazuje problematiku do širšího kontextu informatizace, respektive takzvané informační společnosti, která vytváří nové (virtuální) světy (jako produkty konstruktivního typu racionality). Dále je představen obecný postup při výzkumu nových fenoménů stavějících na transdisciplinární platformě. Popsaný vývoj v oblasti vědy s sebou nese také změnu (...) přístupu ke vzdělanosti (potřebu změny). Do popředí se v současné době (opět) dostává otázka multioborově vzdělaného člověka. (shrink)

It seems natural to ask why the universe exists at all. Modern physics suggests that the universe can exist all by itself as a self-contained system, without anything external to create or sustain it. But there might not be an absolute answer to why it exists. I argue that any attempt to account for the existence of something rather than nothing must ultimately bottom out in a set of brute facts; the universe simply is, without ultimate cause or explanation.

In recent years, policy debates in the United States have focused heavily on rising healthcare costs and what measures can be taken to ensure greater provision of healthcare to individuals of limited means. Much of the rhetoric on this subject has taken on an explicitly moral character, and one common sentiment is that healthcare is or should be viewed as a basic human right. However, the notion of a right to healthcare has not been well articulated, and critics have failed (...) to distinguish between legal and moral rights. Additionally, there are numerous problems inherent to viewing healthcare as a basic human right-many of which are in direct conflict with distinctly American conceptualizations of rights. The present paper reviews the debate over “rights”-both legal and natural-to healthcare, and argues that problems associated with natural rights arguments render them severely compromised. Instead, market systems commonly accepted in American society may be better suited to reducing healthcare costs and increasing access to services in the United States. (shrink)

We study the question of how to decompose Hilbert space into a preferred tensor-product factorization without any pre-existing structure other than a Hamiltonian operator, in particular the case of a bipartite decomposition into "system" and "environment." Such a decomposition can be defined by looking for subsystems that exhibit quasi-classical behavior. The correct decomposition is one in which pointer states of the system are relatively robust against environmental monitoring (their entanglement with the environment does not continually and dramatically increase) and remain (...) localized around approximately-classical trajectories. We present an in-principle algorithm for finding such a decomposition by minimizing a combination of entanglement growth and internal spreading of the system. Both of these properties are related to locality in different ways. This formalism could be relevant to the emergence of spacetime from quantum entanglement. (shrink)

What responsibility does an author bear for his legacy? Do 'catastrophic' misreadings of authors, as we have seen with totaliatarian readings of Plato and fascist interpretations of Nietzsche, testify to authorial recklessness? These and other questions are the starting point for a new theory of authorial ethics. Continuing the mission of the 'returned author' begun in his pioneering book The Death and Return of the Author, Burke recommends the 'law of genre' as a contract drawn up between author and reader (...) to establish ethical responsibility. Criticism, under this contract, becomes an ethical realm and realm of the ethical. -- Back cover. (shrink)