The epistemological chasm between how we (implicitly and subjectively) perceive or imagine the actual world and how we (explicitly and “objectively”) think of its underlying entities has motivated perhaps the most disconcerting impasse in human thought: the explanatory gap between the phenomenal and physical properties of the world. Here, I advocate a combination of philosophical skepticism and simplicity as an informed approach to arbitrate among theories of consciousness. I argue that the explanatory gap is rightly a gap in our understanding, (...) but one that is not surprising; and we being observers biased by our first-person perspective and our existence may both hinder and (the realization we have them) assist our reasoning. Further, I unfold the concept of observer into two distinct notions based on its functional and phenomenal aspects, and exploit this device to elucidate the subject-observer relationship. Then, I proceed to analyze the philosophical zombie dilemma. Lastly, I contend that from a skeptical viewpoint, panpsychism (or neutral monism) is the most parsimonious doctrine accounting for the explanatory gap, and suggest that it would be possible to make headway in the hard problem of consciousness by uncovering non-trivial causal relationships between qualia states and functional states, if routine and controlled manipulation of neural circuits were easily available. (shrink)

Everyday aesthetic experiences and concerns occupy a large part of our aesthetic life. However, because of their prevalence and mundane nature, we tend not to pay much attention to them, let alone examine their significance. Western aesthetic theories of the past few centuries also neglect everyday aesthetics because of their almost exclusive emphasis on art. In a ground-breaking new study, Yuriko Saito provides a detailed investigation into our everyday aesthetic experiences, and reveals how our everyday aesthetic tastes and judgments (...) can exert a powerful influence on the state of the world and our quality of life. By analysing a wide range of examples from our aesthetic interactions with nature, the environment, everyday objects, and Japanese culture, Saito illustrates the complex nature of seemingly simple and innocuous aesthetic responses. She discusses the inadequacy of art-centered aesthetics, the aesthetic appreciation of the distinctive characters of objects or phenomena, responses to various manifestations of transience, and the aesthetic expression of moral values; and she examines the moral, political, existential, and environmental implications of these and other issues. (shrink)

I propose that the appropriate appreciation of nature must include the moral capacity for acknowledging the reality of nature apart from humans and the sensitivity for listening to its own story. I argue that appreciating nature exclusively as design is inappropriate to the extent that we impose upon nature a preconceived artistic standard as well as appreciation based upon historical/cultural/literary associationsinsofar as we treat nature as a background of our own story. In contrast, aesthetic appreciation informed by our attempt to (...) make sense of nature, such as science, mythology, and folklore, is appropriate because it guides our experience toward understanding nature’s own story embodied in its sensuous surface. (shrink)

This article examines the underexplored relationship between Amartya Sen's ‘capability approach’ to human well-being and education. Two roles which education might play in relation to the development of capacities are given particular attention: (i) the enhancement of capacities and opportunities and (ii) the development of judgement in relation to the appropriate exercise of capacities.

We propose a novel algorithm to transliterate English to Japanese and its application to a voice controlled browser, which enable ordinary Japanese people to browse English Web site by voice. Speech recognition software designed for native English speakers do not work for most Japanese because Japanese can't pronounce English as native English speakers do. Therefore, we combined Japanese speech recognition software with English-to-Japanese transliteration software. The accuracy of our transliteration algorithm is 80% recall for the top candidate, and 92% recall (...) for the top three candidates. The browser using this transliteration algorithm makes it possible for Japanese to navigate English Web pages almost as accurate as Japanese pages by voice commands. (shrink)

Recently, many opportunities have emerged to use the Internet in daily life and classrooms. However, with the growth of the World Wide Web (Web), it is becoming increasingly difficult to find target information on the Internet. In this study, we explore a method for developing the ability of users in information seeking on the Web and construct a search process feedback system supporting reflective activities of information seeking on the Web. Reflection is defined as a cognitive activity for monitoring, evaluating, (...) and modifying one's thinking and process. In the field of learning science, many researchers have investigated reflective activities that facilitate learners' problem solving and deep understanding. The characteristics of this system are: (1) to show learners' search processes on the Web as described, based on a cognitive schema, and (2) to prompt learners to reflect on their search processes. We expect that users of this system can reflect on their search processes by receiving information on their own search processes provided by the system, and that these types of reflective activity helps them to deepen their understanding of information seeking activities. We have conducted an experiment to investigate the effects of our system. The experimental results confirmed that (1) the system actually facilitated the learners' reflective activities by providing process visualization and prompts, and (2) the learners who reflected on their search processes more actively understood their own search processes more deeply. (shrink)

To apply reinforcement learning to difficult classes such as real-environment learning, we need to use a method robust to perceptual aliasing problem. The exploitation-oriented methods such as Profit Sharing can deal with the perceptual aliasing problem to a certain extent. However, when the agent needs to select different actions at the same sensory input, the learning efficiency worsens. To overcome the problem, several state partition methods using history information of state-action pairs are proposed. These methods try to convert a POMDP (...) environment into an MDP environment, and thus they are sometimes very useful. However, their computation cost is very high especially in large state spaces. In contrast, memory-less approaches try to escape from the aliased states by outputting actions stochastically. However, these methods output actions stochastically even in unaliased states, and thus the learning efficiency is bad. If we desire to guarantee the rationality in POMDPs, it is efficient to output actions stochastically only in the aliased states and to output one action deterministically in the other unaliased states. Hence, to discriminate between aliased states and unaliased states, the utilization of χ² -goodness-of-fit test is proposed by Miyazaki et al. They point out that, in aliased states, the distributions of the state transitions by random search and a particular policy are different. This difference doesn't occur owing to non-deterministic actions. Hence, if the agent can collect enough samples to implement the test, the agent can distinguish between aliased states and unaliased states well. However, such a test needs a large amount of data, and it's a problem how the agent collects samples without worsening learning efficiency. If the agent uses random search in the course of learning, the learning efficiency worsens especially in unaliased states. Therefore, in this research, we propose a new method called Extended On-line Profit Sharing with Judgement (EOPSwJ) to detect important incomplete perception, which doesn't need large computation cost and numerous samples. We use two criterions for detecting important incomplete perceptions to attain a task. One is the rate of transitions to each state, and the other is the deterministic rate of actions. We confirm the availability of EOPSwJ using two simulations. (shrink)

In recent decades, designers, architects, and landscape architects concerned with their contribution to today’s ecological problems started formulating a new way of designing and creating artifacts. Called “ecological design” and promoted as a corrective alternative to conventional practice, its basic tenet is to draw from nature a guidance for design, rather than imposing our design on nature. This newapproach signifies a welcome change, first by calling attention to the ecological implications of artifacts, a subject matter generally neglected in environmental ethics, (...) and, second, by providing useful, specific suggestions regarding the ecologically responsible way of designing artifacts. However, the conceptual basis and resultant implications of ecological design deserve and need critical analyses. I argue that the basic premise of ecological design—that nature should act as the authority—is problematic by examining analogous strategies from social, political, moral, and aesthetic realms, as well as by exploring its specific application in the promotion of “native” plants in gardens. I end with another issue often neglected in the practice of ecological design: our aesthetic response to the created objects. (shrink)

In the context of contemporary nihilistic tendencies in democracy and education, Dewey’s pragmatism must respond to the criticism that it lacks a tragic sense. By highlighting the Emersonian perfectionist dimension latent in the concept of growth, this paper attempts to reveal a sense of the tragic in Dewey’s work—his humble recognition of the double nature of democracy as both attained and unattained. It is precisely the lack of this sense of the tragic that characterises contemporary nihilism. In resistance to this, (...) Deweyan growth points to a perfectionist education committed to the re–awakening of intensity of impulse. (shrink)

In the contemporary culture of accountability and the ‘economy’ of education this generates, pragmatism, as a philosophy for ordinary practice, needs to resist the totalising force of an ideology of practice, one that distracts us from the rich qualities of daily experience. In response to this need, and in mobilising Dewey's pragmatism, this paper introduces another standpoint in American philosophy: Stanley Cavell's account of the economy of living in Thoreau's Walden. By discussing some aspects of Cavell's The Senses of Walden (...) that suggest both apparent similarities and radical differences between Thoreau and Dewey, I shall argue that Cavell discovers rich dimensions of practice in Thoreau's American philosophy, ones that are overshadowed in Dewey's pragmatism: that he demonstrates another way of ‘making a difference in practice’. Cavell, as a critical interlocutor of Dewey, from within American philosophy, offers a way of using language in resistance to the rhetoric of accountability and in service to the creation of democracy as a way of life. I shall conclude by suggesting that the enriched tradition of American philosophy from Dewey to Cavell is to be found in their promotion of philosophy as education and education as philosophy. (shrink)

BackgroundThe concept of career identity is integral to nursing practices and forms the basis of the nursing professions. Positive career identity is essential for providing high-quality care, optimizing patient outcomes, and enhancing the retention of health professionals. Therefore, there is a need to explore potential influencing variables, thereby developing effective interventions to improve career identity.ObjectivesTo investigate the relationship between moral distress, moral courage, and career identity, and explore the mediating role of moral courage between moral distress and career identity among (...) nurses.DesignA quantitative, cross-sectional study.MethodsA convenient sample of 800 nurses was recruited from two tertiary care hospitals between February and March 2022. Participants were assessed using the Moral Distress Scale-revised, Nurses’ Moral Courage Scale, and Nursing Career Identity Scale. This study was described in accordance with the STROBE statement.Ethical considerationResearch ethics approval was obtained from the researcher’s university and hospital where this study was conducted prior to data collection.FindingsMoral distress is negatively associated while moral courage is positively associated with career identity among nurses. Moral courage partially mediates the relationship between moral distress and career identity ( β = −0.230 to −0.163, p < 0.01).DiscussionThe findings reveal a relationship between moral distress, moral courage, and career identity among nurses.ConclusionBy paying attention to nurses’ moral distress and courage, healthcare providers can contribute to the development of effective interventions to improve career identity, and subsequently performance, among nurses. (shrink)

Yuriko Saito, the leading figure in the field, explores the nature and significance of the aesthetic dimensions of people's everyday lives. She argues that everyday aesthetics can be an effective instrument for directing humanity's collective and cumulative world-making project.

Topics in Cognitive Science, Volume 14, Issue 2, Page 241-257, April 2022.

Yuriko Saito discusses aspects of our everyday experience that have been neglected by modern Western aesthetic theories.

There is a task-specificity in the visual-tactile interaction for perception: The polymodal posterior parietal cortex is related to the comparison of the shapes coded by different sensory modalities, whereas the lateral occipital complex is the part of the network for multimodal shape identification. These interactions may be mediated by some latent pathways potentiated by sensory deprivation or learning.

Everyday aesthetic experiences and concerns occupy a large part of our aesthetic life. However, because of their prevalence and mundane nature, we tend not to pay much attention to them, let alone examine their significance. Western aesthetic theories of the past few centuries also neglect everyday aesthetics because of their almost exclusive emphasis on art. In a ground-breaking new study, Yuriko Saito provides a detailed investigation into our everyday aesthetic experiences, and reveals how our everyday aesthetic tastes and judgments (...) can exert a powerful influence on the state of the world and our quality of life. By analysing a wide range of examples from our aesthetic interactions with nature, the environment, everyday objects, and Japanese culture, Saito illustrates the complex nature of seemingly simple and innocuous aesthetic responses. She discusses the inadequacy of art-centered aesthetics, the aesthetic appreciation of the distinctive characters of objects or phenomena, responses to various manifestations of transience, and the aesthetic expression of moral values; and she examines the moral, political, existential, and environmental implications of these and other issues. (shrink)

In the name of efficiency, the practice of education has come to be dominated by neoliberal ideology and procedures of standardization and quantification. Such attempts to make all aspects of practice transparent and subject to systematic accounting lack sensitivity to the invisible and the silent, to something in the human condition that cannot readily be expressed in an either-or form. Seeking alternatives to such trends, Saito reads Dewey’s idea of progressive education through the lens of Emersonian moral perfectionism (to (...) borrow a term coined by Stanley Cavell). She elucidates a spiritual and aesthetic dimension to Dewey’s notion of growth, one considerably richer than what Dewey alone presents in his typically scientific terminology. (shrink)

Neglect of everyday aesthetics -- Significance of everyday aesthetics -- Aesthetics of distinctive characteristics and ambience -- Everyday aesthetic qualities and transience -- Moral-aesthetic judgments of artifacts.

BackgroundA brief measure of dispositional mindfulness is important for applied research on mindfulness. Although short forms of the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire, which measures the five aspects of mindfulness, have been developed worldwide, the validity and reliability of the Japanese version has not been examined. This study aims to examine the validity and reliability of the 24-item and 15-item versions of the FFMQ in Japan, which are the most widely used versions worldwide.MethodsOnline surveys were conducted for 889 adults in Japan (...) through an online survey company using self-reported questionnaires including the FFMQ to confirm the factor structure and validity. To examine construct validity, we examined the relationship between the short form of FFMQ and mind wandering, interoceptive awareness, experiential avoidance, cognitive fusion, openness, neuroticism, self-compassion, depression, and anxiety, which have been theoretically or empirically shown to be related to mindfulness. In addition, 137 adults responded to the FFMQ again, after four weeks, for the test-retest reliability.ResultsThe correlated five-factor and four-factor models and the higher-order factor hierarchical model did not show sufficient goodness of fit, while the 24-item version showed acceptable fit when uncorrelated method factors loaded on by the positive and negative items were added. However, the 15-item version did not show acceptable fits for any of the models. Regarding reliability, the 24-item version showed acceptable values. In terms of the relationship between the original and the shortened version of the FFMQ, the 24-item version shared approximately 80% of the variance with the original one. In addition, although the wording effects of positive and negative items seemed to affect the correlations between the FFMQ and the other scales, the associations with related concepts were as predicted generally, supporting the construct validity of the short form of the FFMQ.ConclusionIn Japan, the 24-item version of FFMQ showed acceptable validity and reliability similar to the original version, and we recommend that the 24-item version be used. (shrink)

狂信的な国粋主義者か、はたまた魂の尊厳を問うた求道者か。民俗学と国粋主義の親和性とは。多角的な視点からファシズムを再考する。.

We investigated the relationship between attentional resources and pedaling cadence using electroencephalography to measure P300 amplitudes and latencies. Twenty-five healthy volunteers performed the oddball task while pedaling on a stationary bike or relaxing. We set them four conditions, namely, performing only the oddball task, performing the oddball task while pedaling at optimal cadence, performing the oddball task while pedaling faster than optimal cadence, and performing the oddball task while pedaling slower than optimal cadence. P300 amplitudes at Cz and Pz electrodes (...) under optimal, fast, and slow conditions were significantly lower than those under control conditions. P300 amplitudes at Pz under fast and slow conditions were significantly lower than those under the optimal condition. No significant changes in P300 latency at any electrode were observed under any condition. Our findings revealed that pedaling at non-optimal cadence results in less attention being paid to external stimuli compared with pedaling at optimal cadence. (shrink)