SummaryThe question of Cassius Dio’s time of writing is characterised by scant evidence and a lack of consensus. This article will present a highly significant correction to our understanding of the most important passage for this question, as well as two passages that have not generally been taken into consideration. The article will argue that Dio finished his main work in the late 210s and thereby support a so-called ‘early dating’. This is central for the current re-evaluation of Dio since (...) it gives a clearer picture of the background against which Dio conceived his work and his many sophisticated interpretations. (shrink)

Summary This article reinterprets Dio’s view of the fall of the Republic by arguing that Dio viewed institutional political competition, rather than ambitious individuals, as the central destructive driving force in the Late Republic. Dio’s interpretation is hereby unique among ancient historiography. This interpretation has been skilfully interwoven in the general narrative and only by reading Book 39 as a whole, does the interpretation emerge. According to Dio, institutional competition became inherently destructive in the Late Republic and Book 39 is (...) absolutely fundamental in understanding this transformation and the consequent failure of the Roman δημοκρατία. (shrink)

Mainstream analytic epistemology conceives knowledge as representation: as true justified (un-Gettiered) belief. Such representation is conceived as independent of practice, its justification to consist in experience, and experience as mere observation. Such notion of experience is too narrow to take the epistemic value of experimentation into account. But science is emphatically experimental. On the other hand, John Dewey defined experience as organism–environment interaction. Such interaction is bidirectional and hence experimental by nature. It involves feedback. Cybernetics studies feedback systems. Hence, cybernetic (...) epistemology is a consequence of Dewey’s definition. Cybernetic epistemology maintains that knowledge is practice, that is, an (approximately and relatively) invariant pattern of potential organism–environment interaction, rather than something independent of practice. In this article, I will make a case for cybernetic epistemology. It seems to dispense with the representational notion of knowledge and to provide an original justification for process ontology. (shrink)

The Estonian philosopher Rein Vihalemm (1938–2015) wished to reform realism in the philosophy of science. He was dissatisfied with the mainstream analytic philosophy of science—scientific realism and the various anti-realisms alike. He considered these approaches theory-driven and hence too distanced from actual scientific practice. His alternative, which he called practical realism, was inspired and influenced by Joseph Rouse’s original reading of Thomas Kuhn. Moreover, Vihalemm viewed as important some lessons from Marxism, which was prevalent in Estonian philosophy during the Soviet (...) occupation. For him, Marx himself inaugurated practical realism with his novel notion of practice that does not consider agency distinct from nature. He also mentions Kant, interpreted in a realistic manner, as a significant influence for his thesis that concepts only apply to practice. In this article, I will critically examine practical realism from the standpoint of classical pragmatism. My primary question is: what kind of realism practical realism can possibly be. (shrink)

In fluid-dynamics, several motivating factors can spur new lines of inquiry. Beginning with considerations on the exchange of momentum that takes place at small scales inside a fluid, and after introducing a generalized categorization of different types of fluid media, Understanding the Nature of Science presents a critical analysis of contemporary issues which are being debated in the scientific community. Next, the authors present an evolutionary ecological approach in which human knowledge is studied as the ecology of interacting data-information-knowledge systems (...) developing in time as a consequence of incessant learning from interactions with the environment on various levels of organization. The concluding section suggests the use of problem-based learning to promote conceptual changes from the "Nature of Science" naive views, usually found in students, to more informed views. (shrink)

Practice-based philosophy of science has gradually arisen in the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) and science and technology studies (STS) during the past decades. It studies science as an ensemble of practices and theorising as one of these practices. A recent study has shown how the practice-based approach can be methodologically justified with reference to Peirce and Dewey. In this article, I will explore one consequence of that notion: science, as practice, is necessarily social. I will disambiguate five different senses (...) in which science is social. First, science presupposes language, which is essentially social. Second, practices, including science, are adaptations of the behaviour of an organism to an environment, of which other organisms are a part. Third, practices, including science, are public and hence shareable. Fourth, scientific knowledge can serve as a vehicle of social and moral reform. Fifth, scientific knowledge can be applied to improve the human condition. This fivefold result bears on the problem of realism. (shrink)

Practice-based philosophy of science has gradually arisen in the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) and science and technology studies (STS) during the past decades. It studies science as an ensemble of practices and theorising as one of these practices. A recent study has shown how the practice-based approach can be methodologically justified with reference to Peirce and Dewey. In this article, I will explore one consequence of that notion: science, as practice, is necessarily social. I will disambiguate five different senses (...) in which science is social. First, science presupposes language, which is essentially social. Second, practices, including science, are adaptations of the behaviour of an organism to an environment, of which other organisms are a part. Third, practices, including science, are public and hence shareable. Fourth, scientific knowledge can serve as a vehicle of social and moral reform. Fifth, scientific knowledge can be applied to improve the human condition. This fivefold result bears on the problem of realism. (shrink)

Thomas Hobbes's name often comes up as scholars debate the history of biopower, which regulates the biological life of individual bodies and entire populations. This article examines whether and to what extent Hobbes may be regarded as the first biopolitical philosopher. I investigate this question by performing a close reading of Hobbes's political texts and by comparing them to some of the most influential theories on biopolitics proposed by Michel Foucault, Giorgio Agamben, Roberto Esposito, and others. Hobbes is indeed the (...) first great thinker to assert the supreme political importance of safeguarding life. Furthermore, this prominence of non-contemplative life is not limited to mere survival but also seeks to allow for the people's happiness. This may indeed allow us to consider him as the first biopolitical philosopher, at least in some limited capacity. However, the Englishman's biopolitical stance lacks the practical aspects seen in examples of ‘properly modern’ biopolitics. Moreover, peoples’ lives were already governed radically in antiquity. I argue that Hobbes's biopolitical system was, therefore, minimal in the sense of a ‘biopolitical nightwatchman state’. However, he acted as an undeniable catalyst to the ‘properly biopolitical era of modernity’, when mundane life and happiness became the explicit main objects of virtually all politics. (shrink)

Curiosity is a wonder of the human mind. It goes to the heart of modernity, as a driving force for learning, novel insights, and innovation, both for individuals and communities. In societies dependent on science and development, finding out what promotes or hampers curiosity and wonder in school curricula and science education is accordingly essential. In this conceptual article, I suggest a framework for curiosity-based science education and I explore options for its wellbeing and development during preschool, preadolescence, and adolescence. (...) In preschool, curiosity and wonder are triggered by perceptive beauty rather than by facts, and a method emphasizing maximism as a complementary factor in preschool science education is proposed. In prepuberty, curiosity is encouraged by exploring the diversity of the world. Facts and clear-cut knowledge constitute a firm foundation for scientific thinking. In high school, curiosity is ignited by means of a better balance between models and phenomenology. Criticism has arisen over the one-sided use of models in high school science education, which limits scientific thinking to frameworks defined by the actual model. Possible solutions to maintain students’ curiosity and ideas to improve the balance between phenomenology and models are discussed. (shrink)

The Java® programming language is a general-purpose, concurrent, object-oriented language. Its syntax is similar to C and C++, but it omits many of the features that make C and C++ complex, confusing, and unsafe. The Java platform was initially developed to address the problems of building software for networked consumer devices. It was designed to support multiple host architectures and to allow secure delivery of software components. To meet these requirements, compiled code had to survive transport across networks, operate on (...) any client, and assure the client that it was safe to run. (shrink)

In this article, we explore the organization of assistance in multilingual interaction in Swedish residential care. The data that form the basis for the study cover care encounters involving three residents with a language background other than Swedish, totalling 13 hours and 14 minutes of video documentation. The empirical data consists of a collection of 134 instances where residents seek assistance with the realization of a practical action. For this article, three examples that involve the manipulation of an object have (...) been selected for analysis. We use the concept of ‘recruitment’ to encompass the various methods by which assistance is sought in the care encounter. In the first example, the need for assistance concerns the transfer of an object that is recognizable and physically available for both participants. This, in combination with the resident’s gestural work that pinpoints the description of the action, facilitates its realization. In the second and third examples, the realization of the action becomes more difficult because the object involved is not recognizable for the caregiver. The article highlights the collaborative ways in which residents manage to support their talk through bodily practices, and the strong and empathetic engagement with which caregivers become involved in interpreting the meaning of these practices. Finally, we discuss the implications of our findings for care provision in multilingual circumstances. (shrink)

Adaptation by means of natural selection depends on the ability of populations to maintain variation in heritable traits. According to the Modern Synthesis this variation is sustained by mutations and genetic drift. Epigenetics, evodevo, niche construction and cultural factors have more recently been shown to contribute to heritable variation, however, leading an increasing number of biologists to call for an extended view of speciation and evolution. An additional common feature across the animal kingdom is learning, defined as the ability to (...) change behavior according to novel experiences or skills. Learning constitutes an additional source for phenotypic variation, and change in behavior may induce long lasting shifts in fitness, and hence favor evolutionary novelties. Based on published studies, I demonstrate how learning about food, mate choice and habitats has contributed substantially to speciation in the canonical story of Darwin’s finches on the Galapagos Islands. Learning cannot be reduced to genetics, because it demands decisions, which requires a subject. Evolutionary novelties may hence emerge both from shifts in allelic frequencies and from shifts in learned, subject driven behavior. The existence of two principally different sources of variation also prevents the Modern Synthesis from self-referring explanations. (shrink)

All effective communication is based on the participants trusting that they share their basic orientations to the world – that is, they have a common ground. In this paper, however, we examine situations in which such trust is lacking. Drawing on conversation–analytic methodology and on 30 hours of video data featuring persons with dementia and their caregivers in a Swedish-language daycare center in Finland, we consider some of the social consequences resulting from a lack of trust. Our analysis focused on (...) three different interactional contexts, highlighting the relevance of different facets of the participants’ common ground. These facets are anchored in the deontic, epistemic, and emotional orders, respectively. We show that, with regard to each order, a lack of trust in the existence of common ground has drastic consequences, leading to problems related to getting one’s will acknowledged, a scarcity of conversational partners, and a lack of resources to maintain affection. (shrink)

Lawami' al-Nazar fi Tahqiq Ma'ani al-Mukhtasar is Aḥmad b. Ya'qub al-Wallali's (d. 1128/1716) commentary on al-Sanusi's (d. 895/1490) compendium of logic, al-Mukhtasar. Al-Wallali was the first commentator on al-Sanusi's compendium after the author's autocommentary. In this publication, Ibrahim Safri offers a critical edition of this work, together with a study of the author's life and oeuvre. Safri also tries to show the indirect influence of Avicennism on logic in the Maghribi tradition in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. On the basis (...) of his writings on logic and philosophical theology, al-Wallali was considered a master of rational sciences by his contemporaries. (shrink)

Context: A central motivation behind various embodied, extended, and enactive (4E) approaches to cognition is to ground our understanding of minds and cognition within the biological structures that give rise to life. Because of this, their advocates often claim a natural kinship with dynamical and developmental systems theories. However, these accounts also explicitly or implicitly privilege individual organisms in ways that contrast with many of the insights of systems and developmental systems approaches to biology. Problem: The prioritization of individual organisms (...) within 4E approaches to cognition contrasts with the default entangled structure of biological systems associated with cognitive agency. We provide means for 4E cognitive science to move beyond an individual-centred view of cognitive agency. Method: We first identify and problematize individual-centredness within various predominant 4E approaches by comparison with biological research and developmental systems theory. Subsequently, we offer conceptual resources from the field of ecological research for understanding cognitive agency beyond the predominant focus on individual organisms. Results: Cognitive agency may be understood without privileging individual organisms by reading nonequilibrium maintenance in terms of a dynamic differentiation instead of individual organismic autonomy. This form of organizational structure corresponds to the notion of sympoiesis from ecological research. Implications: Approaching cognitive agency without privileging individual organisms should be invaluable to advocates of 4E cognition seeking to ground notions of cognition and mind within contemporary biological research. Constructivist content: We seek to expand upon existing constructivist perspectives on the organizing principles of cognitive agency, such as sensorimotor embodiment and autopoiesis, arguing that meta-organismic cognitive agents (including humans) embody distributed relations beyond the privileging of individual organisms. Key words: 4E cognition, autopoiesis, cognitive agency, developmental systems theory, enactivism, extended mind thesis, holobionts, sympoeisis. (shrink)

Enactive approaches to psychiatry have recently argued for an understanding of psychiatric conditions based within relational interactions between individuals and their environments. A central motivation for these enactive approaches is the goal of social integration: the integration of a naturalistic approach to psychiatric conditions with their broader sociocultural dimensions. One possible issue, however, is whether appeals to the autonomy and authenticity of relationally constituted enactive individuals can provide a means of adjudicating between harmful and beneficial social constraints upon individual behaviour. (...) This paper seeks to provide enactive approaches to psychiatry with a possible means of evaluating normative influences of social contexts beyond direct interactions with relationally constituted individuals. Some of the most significant influences of the sociocultural dimension of psychiatric conditions consist not in direct interaction with individuals, but in setting the terms for interactions and interactants alike. Insofar as some social influences precede and predefine dyadic relations between individuals and their social context, these cannot be accounted for as features of interactions, but must be assessed as independent structures of the sociocultural dimension. I will provide one potential means for enactive models to assess social norms using Canguilhem’s distinction between health and pathology. I will argue that Canguilhem’s conceptualization of health in terms of adaptive normative structure provides a potential tool for social integration which strongly complements enactive approaches to psychiatry. (shrink)

Theories of new materialism have gained increasing traction in the social and human sciences in recent decades, as thinkers like Donna Haraway, Bruno Latour and Jane Bennett have reinvigorated the philosophical interest in topics such as the agency of nonhuman matter, the relational nature of existence and the limitations of anthropocentric forms of inquiry. However, these theories have faced criticism from post-Marxist critical theorists, who argue that theories of new materialism blunt social and capitalist critique and promote obscurity by flattening (...) the world to a single ontological plane. In this article, I argue that these critiques rely on mischaracterizations of new materialist scholarship and that theories of new materialism can in fact help us re-examine – not reject, as their critics suggest – the role of critique, responsibility and human politics in the context of the Anthropocene and its unfolding ecological crises. (shrink)

Is romantic love a particularly Western and modern phenomenon, as many social theorists argue, or a universal experience, as sociobiologists claim? This article argues that both these approaches err in taking sexual attraction as the essential characteristic of romance, whereas historical and personal accounts stress idealization of a particular other. Romantic love is properly defined as an experience of transcendence and is elaborated in cultural configurations of three basic types. The first is in hierarchical and internally competitive societies where marriage (...) is a political matter and romantic relations are always adulterous and often non-sexual; the second is in individualistic, fragmented and fluid societies where love and marriage go together; the third is in highly structured disharmonic societies where romantic ties between youth are severed by arranged marriages. (shrink)

Hermeneutics and narration: a way to deal with qualitative data This article focuses a hermeneutic approach on the interpretation of narratives. It is based on the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur's theory of interpretation but modified and used within a caring science paradigm. The article begins with a presentation of the theoretical underpinnings of hermeneutic philosophy and narration, as well as Ricoeur's theory of interpretation, before going on to describe the interpretation process as modified by the authors. The interpretation process, which (...) consists of several stages, is exemplified and discussed using a single case from a larger study on suffering. The results of that study indicate that the struggle of suffering is perceived as a struggle formed between shame and dignity, and that nurses must engage in the process of preserving and restoring the dignity of their suffering patients. The authors suggest that Ricoeur's theory of interpretation is useful when trying to understand narrative data if the researcher realises that the process of distanciation, although central in Ricoeur's thinking, is not the goal of the process but rather a means to deal with the researcher's pre‐understandings. According to Ricoeur, distanciation is accomplished by putting the context aside and dealing with the text ‘as text’ and thereby explaining its meaning. Explanation thus becomes the dialectic counterpart to understanding in the interpretation process. The researchers further argue that distanciation must be followed by reflection, where the interpretations are linked back to the empirical context. (shrink)

To sell a novel as socially relevant, the book cover, prefaces, and other paratext can help convey why readers should care and how the story should be read. But relevance can expire as society moves on. Reprints of groundbreaking classics that no longer engage contemporary concerns adapt their paratext to reach new readers, often by emphasizing the book’s historical and/or literary position. This article examines paratextual strategies across time and space for three Scandinavian novels with exceptional influence. Enlightenment-promoting Niels Klim’s (...) Underground Travels was the region’s first novel; Hunger is praised by many as the world’s first modernist novel; and The Man on the Balcony became the progenitor of Nordic Noir. Early paratext used anonymity, false veracity, or documentary elements to sell relevance. But with commercial success, and temporal and geographical distance, paratext became increasingly author focused and self-referential, at times all but ignoring the author’s intent for the story. (shrink)

This article investigates whether or not an ethical attitude manifests itself in the clinical supervision of nursing students. The data consist of 57 narratives written by nursing students, which were subjected to latent content analysis. The interpretation represents a caring science perspective based on Eriksson’s ‘caring ethics’. The results showed that some students received good supervision, while others felt hurt and humiliated. The students were of the opinion that they should feel welcome, be allowed to take responsibility and be treated (...) as individuals by their supervisors. Supervision can take a form such that the ethical element comes to the fore in the conduct of the students as well as of their supervisor. Both the students’ and the supervisor’s disposition permeates all the questions, actions and reflections that form part of supervision, which could help to bring students’ ethical sense to maturity. (shrink)

People with early-to-mid stage dementia frequently attend groups that provide opportunities for socialising and engaging in group activities, such as quizzes. This article uses conversation analysis to investigate the interactional strategies that the staff use to initiate and keep these quizzes ‘on track’, and what they orient to as impediments and facilitators of quiz progression. Specifically, we outline how staff deal with incorrect or ‘non-answers’, and what happens when players have their own goals or ‘projects’ that do not align with (...) staff members’ orientations to the overarching activity completion. We reflect on the tensions that arise between doing interactional work to progress through the quiz, and how that goal can conflict with attending to the needs or wishes expressed by the person living with dementia, potentially resulting in threats to the ‘face’ of the quiz players. Data are taken from a corpus of 10 quizzes recorded in 4 different group settings in England. (shrink)

This article examines the supposedly incomprehensibility of schizophrenic delusions. According to the contemporary classificatory systems (DSM-IV-TR and ICD-10), some delusions typically found in schizophrenia are considered bizarre and incomprehensible. The aim of this article is to discuss the notion of understanding that deems these delusions incomprehensible and to see if it is possible to comprehend these delusions if we apply another notion of understanding. First, I discuss the contemporary schizophrenia definitions and their inherent problems, and I argue that the notion (...) of incomprehensibility in these definitions rests heavily on Jaspers’ notions of understanding and empathy. Secondly, I discuss two Wittgensteinian attempts to comprehend bizarre delusions: (a) Campbell’s proposal to conceive delusions as framework propositions and (b) Sass’s suggestion to interpret delusions in the light of solipsism. Finally, I discuss the phenomenological conception of schizophrenia, which conceives delusion formation as resulting from alterations of the structure of experiencing and from underlying self-disorders. I argue that although a psychological understanding that seeks to grasp meaning in terms of motivations, desires, and other more straightforward psychological connections between mental states is impossible in schizophrenia, we can in fact have a philosophical understanding of the schizophrenic world and of the emergence of delusions typically found in schizophrenia. (shrink)

Ethics in caring is what we actually make explicit through our approach and how we invite the suffering patient into a caring relationship. This phenomenological study investigates suffering and health and how this presupposes a deeper reflection on ethics in caring. The aim was to try to discover, describe and understand how patients experience their life situation three years after undergoing surgery. The theoretical approach is based on central aspects of Eriksson’s caritative theory (i.e. the view of the person as (...) body, soul and spirit). The informants were four women and four men aged between 55 and 77 years. The empirical material revealed suffering that was connected with both illness and life. Suffering involves experiences of grief, loneliness and struggling. Health implies a yearning for something beyond the current life situation, a yearning to experience some meaning in life. This leads to an awareness of unplumbed possibilities. Understanding the experiences of individual patients demands of us, as both researchers and nurses, to act, seeking after the scientific truth (i.e. a deeper reflection of the ontological, epistemological and methodological questions). The idea of responsibility helps us to interpret and meet the innermost desires of suffering patients in their true presence. Caritative caring ethics means ‘being there’, confirming patients’ absolute dignity; it is a manifestation of the love that ‘just exists’. Compassion requires an inner disposition to go with others to the places where they are weak, vulnerable, lonely and broken. An ontology of caring provides both a starting point and a context for reflection about ethics and the ethical life. (shrink)

En el mundo actual, en el que se está reduciendo la abundancia y la inalterabilidad de la diversidad cultural, nuestras barreras culturales se pueden salvar —aunque no adulterar— si todo el mundo en todas partes se acoge a los derechos humanos. En el presente artículo intento defender la idea de que, para conseguirlo, tenemos que elaborar una pluralidad de aprobaciones de los derechos humanos universalmente aplicables que sea diversa pero bien cimentada culturalmente; en resumidas cuentas, deberíamos adoptar una justificación plural (...) de los derechos humanos. (shrink)

Open peer commentary on the article “A Moving Boundary, a Plastic Core: A Contribution to the Third Wave of Extended-Mind Research” by Timotej Prosen. Abstract: We explore both some novel claims made by Prosen’s account of plastic cores and some overlaps between his and other accounts of third-wave extended mind. In the first instance we discuss whether the Markov blanket formalism should be regarded as incompatible with a third-wave extended view. Secondly, we discuss whether Prosen’s proposal of a plastic core (...) quite meets the radical departure of the third wave from organism-centeredness - or whether Prosen’s contribution might be more aptly considered as a compromise between second- and third-wave extended mind. (shrink)

We delineate the distinctness of sympoiesis from adaptive notions of autopoiesis and explain why we see it as helpful to the exploration and explanation of agentive and adaptive cognitive systems.

Rapid individual cognitive phenotyping holds the potential to revolutionize domains as wide‐ranging as personalized learning, employment practices, and precision psychiatry. Going beyond limitations imposed by traditional lab‐based experiments, new efforts have been underway toward greater ecological validity and participant diversity to capture the full range of individual differences in cognitive abilities and behaviors across the general population. Building on this, we developed Skill Lab, a novel game‐based tool that simultaneously assesses a broad suite of cognitive abilities while providing an engaging (...) narrative. Skill Lab consists of six mini‐games as well as 14 established cognitive ability tasks. Using a popular citizen science platform (N = 10,725), we conducted a comprehensive validation in the wild of a game‐based cognitive assessment suite. Based on the game and validation task data, we constructed reliable models to simultaneously predict eight cognitive abilities based on the users’ in‐game behavior. Follow‐up validation tests revealed that the models can discriminate nuances contained within each separate cognitive ability as well as capture a shared main factor of generalized cognitive ability. Our game‐based measures are five times faster to complete than the equivalent task‐based measures and replicate previous findings on the decline of certain cognitive abilities with age in our large cross‐sectional population sample (N = 6369). Taken together, our results demonstrate the feasibility of rapid in‐the‐wild systematic assessment of cognitive abilities as a promising first step toward population‐scale benchmarking and individualized mental health diagnostics. (shrink)

Americans seem to fear that their society is breaking apart, but how accurate is this portrayal and how justified is the fear? Introducing a balanced viewpoint into this intense debate, John Hall and Charles Lindholm demonstrate that such alarm is unfounded. Here they explore the institutional structures of American society, emphasizing its ability to accommodate difference and defuse conflict. The culture, too, comes under scrutiny: influenced by Calvinistic beliefs, Americans place faith in the individual but demand high moral commitment to (...) the community. Broad in scope and ambition, this short book draws a realistic portrait of a society that is among the most powerful and stable in the world, yet is perennially shaken by self-doubt. (shrink)

Auditory verbal hallucinations form an essential criterial feature in the schizophrenia definition in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders -IV and International Classification of Diseases -10. In both classificatory systems, the presence of a hallucinatory voice that continuously comments the patient’s behavior or thoughts, or the presence of several voices that discuss the patient with each other, is a sufficient criterion to diagnose schizophrenia. The DSM-IV defines a hallucination as “a sensory perception that has the..

In "The Aesthetics of Imagination in Design," Mads Folkmann investigates design in both material and immaterial terms.