We provide a syntax and a derivation system fora formal language of mathematics called Weak Type Theory (WTT). We give the metatheory of WTT and a number of illustrative examples.WTT is a refinement of de Bruijn''s Mathematical Vernacular (MV) and hence:– WTT is faithful to the mathematician''s language yet isformal and avoids ambiguities.

The paper first formalizes the ramified type theory as (informally) described in the Principia Mathematica [32]. This formalization is close to the ideas of the Principia, but also meets contemporary requirements on formality and accuracy, and therefore is a new supply to the known literature on the Principia (like [25], [19], [6] and [7]).As an alternative, notions from the ramified type theory are expressed in a lambda calculus style. This situates the type system of Russell and Whitehead in a modern (...) setting. Both formalizations are inspired by current developments in research on type theory and typed lambda calculus; see [3]. (shrink)

In this article, we study the prehistory of type theory up to 1910 and its development between Russell and Whitehead's Principia Mathematica ([71], 1910-1912) and Church's simply typed λ-calculus of 1940. We first argue that the concept of types has always been present in mathematics, though nobody was incorporating them explicitly as such, before the end of the 19th century. Then we proceed by describing how the logical paradoxes entered the formal systems of Frege, Cantor and Peano concentrating on Frege's (...) Grundgesetze der Arithmetik for which Russell applied his famous paradox and this led him to introduce the first theory of types, the Ramified Type Theory (RTT). We present RTT formally using the modern notation for type theory and we discuss how Ramsey, Hilbert and Ackermann removed the orders from RTT leading to the simple theory of types STT. We present STT and Church's own simply typed λ-calculus (λ → C) and we finish by comparing RTT, STT and λ → C. (shrink)

Typed λ-calculus uses two abstraction symbols which are usually treated in different ways: λx:*.x has as type the abstraction Πx:*.*, yet Πx:*.* has type □ rather than an abstraction; moreover, C is allowed and β-reduction evaluates it, but C is rarely allowed. Furthermore, there is a general consensus that λ and Π are different abstraction operators. While we agree with this general consensus, we find it nonetheless important to allow Π to act as an abstraction operator. Moreover, experience with AUTOMATH (...) and the recent revivals of Π-reduction as in [11, 14], illustrate the elegance of giving Π-redexes a status similar to λ-redexes. However, Π-reduction in the λ-cube faces serious problems as shown in [11, 14]: it is not safe as regards subject reduction, it does not satisfy type correctness, it loses the property that the type of an expression is well-formed and it fails to make any expression that contains a Π-redex well-formed. In this paper, we propose a solution to all those problems. The solution is to use a concept that is heavily present in most implementations of programming languages and theorem provers: abbreviations or let-expressions. We will show that the λ-cube extended with Π-conversion and abbreviations satisfies all the desirable properties of the cube and does not face any of the serious problems of Π-reduction. We believe that this extension of the λ-cube is very useful: it gives a full formal study of two concepts that are useful for theorem proving and programming languages. (shrink)

Type theory is a fast-evolving field at the crossroads of logic, computer science and mathematics. This gentle step-by-step introduction is ideal for graduate students and researchers who need to understand the ins and outs of the mathematical machinery, the role of logical rules therein, the essential contribution of definitions and the decisive nature of well-structured proofs. The authors begin with untyped lambda calculus and proceed to several fundamental type systems culminating in the well-known and powerful Calculus of Constructions. The book (...) also covers the essence of proof checking and proof development, and the use of dependent type theory to formalize mathematics. The only prerequisites are a good knowledge of undergraduate algebra and analysis. Carefully chosen examples illustrate the theory throughout. Each chapter ends with a summary of the content, some historical context, suggestions for further reading and a selection of exercises to help readers familiarize themselves with the material. (shrink)

The troubling ethics and politics of philanthropy Is philanthropy, by its very nature, a threat to today’s democracy? Though we may laud wealthy individuals who give away their money for society’s benefit, Just Giving shows how such generosity not only isn’t the unassailable good we think it to be but might also undermine democratic values and set back aspirations of justice. Big philanthropy is often an exercise of power, the conversion of private assets into public influence. And it is a (...) form of power that is largely unaccountable, often perpetual, and lavishly tax-advantaged. The affluent—and their foundations—reap vast benefits even as they influence policy without accountability. And small philanthropy, or ordinary charitable giving, can be problematic as well. Charity, it turns out, does surprisingly little to provide for those in need and sometimes worsens inequality. These outcomes are shaped by the policies that define and structure philanthropy. When, how much, and to whom people give is influenced by laws governing everything from the creation of foundations and nonprofits to generous tax exemptions for donations of money and property. Rob Reich asks: What attitude and what policies should democracies have concerning individuals who give money away for public purposes? Philanthropy currently fails democracy in many ways, but Reich argues that it can be redeemed. Differentiating between individual philanthropy and private foundations, the aims of mass giving should be the decentralization of power in the production of public goods, such as the arts, education, and science. For foundations, the goal should be what Reich terms “discovery,” or long-time-horizon innovations that enhance democratic experimentalism. Philanthropy, when properly structured, can play a crucial role in supporting a strong liberal democracy. Just Giving investigates the ethical and political dimensions of philanthropy and considers how giving might better support democratic values and promote justice. (shrink)

This article examines how the availability of Big Data, coupled with new data analytics, challenges established epistemologies across the sciences, social sciences and humanities, and assesses the extent to which they are engendering paradigm shifts across multiple disciplines. In particular, it critically explores new forms of empiricism that declare ‘the end of theory’, the creation of data-driven rather than knowledge-driven science, and the development of digital humanities and computational social sciences that propose radically different ways to make sense of culture, (...) history, economy and society. It is argued that: Big Data and new data analytics are disruptive innovations which are reconfiguring in many instances how research is conducted; and there is an urgent need for wider critical reflection within the academy on the epistemological implications of the unfolding data revolution, a task that has barely begun to be tackled despite the rapid changes in research practices presently taking place. After critically reviewing emerging epistemological positions, it is contended that a potentially fruitful approach would be the development of a situated, reflexive and contextually nuanced epistemology. (shrink)

A flourishing literature assesses how sustainable business models create and capture value in socio-ecological systems. Nevertheless, we still know relatively little about how the organization of sustainable business models—of which cross-sector partnerships represent a core and distinctive mechanism—can support socio-ecological resilience. We address this knowledge gap by taking a complex adaptive systems (CAS) perspective. We develop a framework that identifies the key strategic, institutional, and learning elements of partnerships that sustainable business models rely on to support socio-ecological resilience. With our (...) analytical framework, we underpin the importance of assessing sustainable business initiatives in terms of their impact on resilience at the level of socio-ecological systems, not just of organizations. Therefore, we reveal how cross-sector partnerships provide the organizational support for sustainable business models to support socio-ecological resilience. By combining the key features of CAS and the key elements of partnerships, we provide insight into the formidable task of designing cross-sector partnerships so that they support socio-ecological resilience and avoid unintended consequences. (shrink)

This article argues against the view put forward by Margaret Archer that there is an irreconcilable divide between realist social theory and structuration theory. Instead, it argues for the systematic articulation of the two theories at both the ontological and the methodological levels. Each has developed a range of insightful and commensurable conceptualizations either missing or underdeveloped in the other. Archer's contention that structuration theory rejects the notion of `analytical dualism' central to the realist approach is shown to be mistaken; (...) Giddens's rejection of `dualism' refers to a different conceptualization of the term. Similarly, Archer's critique of structuration's notion of a `duality' involving structure and agency is rejected by showing that Archer's own morphogenetic approach itself relies upon such a notion. A final section distinguishes between six key problematics of social analysis. It is clear that, for a large number of possible questions within the majority of these problematics, it is a combination of both ontologies that would facilitate the most adequate substantive account. (shrink)

This book looks at the origins and the many contemporary meanings of the virtual. Rob Shields shows how the construction of virtual worlds has a long history. He examines the many forms of faith and hysteria that have surrounded computer technologies in recent years. Moving beyond the technologies themselves he shows how the virtual plays a role in our daily lives at every level. The virtual is also an essential concept needed to manage innovation and risk. It is real but (...) not actual, ideal but not abstract. The virtual, he argues, has become one of the key organizing principles of contemporary society in the public realms of politics, business and consumption as well as in our private lives. (shrink)

Robert Boyd*†, Herbert Gintis‡, Samuel Bowles§, and Peter J. Richerson¶.

This paper develops and explores a pedagogical innovation for integrating virtue theory into business students' basicunderstanding of general management. Eighty-seven students, in 20 groups, classified three managers' real-time videotaped activitiesaccording to an elaboration of Aristotle's cardinal virtues, Fayol's management functions, and Mintzberg's managerial roles. The study's empirical evidence suggests that, akin to Fayol's functions and Mintzberg's roles, Aristotle's virtues are also amenable to operationalization, reliable observation, and meaningful description of managerial behavior. The study provides an oft-called-for empirical basis for further (...) work in virtue theory as an appropriate conceptual framework for the study and practice of management. The results indicate that virtue theory may be used to re-conceive our fundamental understanding of management, alongside its capacity to weigh moral judgment upon it. implications and suggestions for future research are discussed. (shrink)

This book takes the debate about the rationality of the transition to ethical life in Kierkegaard’s thought in a significantly new direction. Connecting the field of Kierkegaard studies with the meta-ethical debate about practical reasons, and engaging with Alasdair MacIntyre’s and Bernard Williams’ thought, it explores the rationality of the choices for ethical life and Christian existence. Defending a so-called ‘internalist’ understanding of practical reasons, Compaijen argues that previous attempts to defend Kierkegaard against MacIntyre’s charge of irrationality have failed. He (...) provides a thorough analysis of such fundamental topics as becoming oneself, the ideal of objectivity in ethics and religion, the importance of the imagination, the power and limits of philosophical argument, and the relation between grace and nature. This book will be of great interest to Kierkegaard scholars in philosophy and theology, and, more generally, to anyone fascinated by the rationality of the transition to ethical life and the choice to accept Christianity. (shrink)

If culture is defined as variation acquired and maintained by social learning, then culture is common in nature. However, cumulative cultural evolution resulting in behaviors that no individual could invent on their own is limited to humans, song birds, and perhaps chimpanzees. Circumstantial evidence suggests that cumulative cultural evolution requires the capacity for observational learning. Here, we analyze two models the evolution of psychological capacities that allow cumulative cultural evolution. Both models suggest that the conditions which allow the evolution of (...) such capacities when rare are much more stringent than the conditions which allow the maintenance of the capacities when common. This result follows from the fact that the assumed benefit of the capacities, cumulative cultural adaptation, cannot occur when the capacities are rare. These results suggest why such capacities may be rare in nature. (shrink)

Creativity: Theory, History, Practice offers important new perspectives on creativity in the light of contemporary critical theory and cultural history. Innovative in approach as well as argument, the book crosses disciplinary boundaries and builds new bridges between the critical and the creative. It is organized in four parts: · Why creativity now? offers much-needed alternatives to both the Romantic stereotype of the creator as individual genius and the tendency of the modern creative industries to treat everything as a commodity. · (...) Defining creativity, creating definitions traces the changing meaning of "create" from religious ideas of divine creation from nothing to advertising notions of concept creation. It also examines the complex history and extraordinary versatility of terms such as imagination, invention, inspiration and originality. · Creation as myth, story, metaphor begins with modern re-telling of early African, American and Australian creation myths and -picking up Biblical and evolutionary accounts along the way - works round to scientific visions of the Big Bang, bubble universes and cosmic soup. · Creative practices, cultural processes is a critical anthology of materials, chosen to promote fresh thinking about everything from changing constructions of "literature" and "design" to artificial intelligence and genetic engineering. Rob Pope takes significant steps forward in the process of rethinking a vexed yet vital concept, all the while encouraging and equipping readers to continue the process in their own creative or "re-creative" ways. Creativity: Theory, History, Practice is invaluable for anyone with a live interest in exploring what creativity has been, is currently, and yet may be. (shrink)

'Shades of Goodness' is aimed at readers interested in moral theories, and particularly those wishing to construct or defend a moral theory.

Entanglement has long been the subject of discussion by philosophers of quantum theory, and has recently come to play an essential role for physicists in their development of quantum information theory. In this paper we show how the formalism of algebraic quantum field theory (AQFT) provides a rigorous framework within which to analyse entanglement in the context of a fully relativistic formulation of quantum theory. What emerges from the analysis are new practical and theoretical limitations on an experimenter's ability to (...) perform operations on a field in one spacetime region that can disentangle its state from the state of the field in other spacelike-separated regions. These limitations show just how deeply entrenched entanglement is in relativistic quantum field theory, and yield a fresh perspective on the ways in which the theory differs conceptually from both standard non-relativistic quantum theory and classical relativistic field theory. (shrink)

Peter Lewis ([1997]) has recently argued that the wavefunction collapse theory of GRW (Ghirardi, Rimini and Weber [1986]) can only solve the problem of wavefunction tails at the expense of predicting that arithmetic does not apply to ordinary macroscopic objects. More specifically, Lewis argues that the GRW theory must violate the enumeration principle: that 'if marble 1 is in the box and marble 2 is in the box and so on through marble n, then all n marbles are in the (...) box' ([1997], p. 321). Ghirardi and Bassi ([1999]) have replied that it is meaningless to say that the enumeration principle is violated because the wavefunction Lewis uses to exhibit the violation cannot persist, according to the GRW theory, for more than a split second ([1999], p. 709). On the contrary, we argue that Lewis's argument survives Ghirardi and Bassi' s criticism unscathed. We then go on to show that, while the enumeration principle can fail in the GRW theory, the theory itself guarantees that the principle can never be empirically falsified, leaving the applicability of arithmetical reasoning to both micro- and macroscopic objects intact. (shrink)

In an increasingly complex world with increasingly powerful organisations it seems inevitable that society – or groups in society – would become anxious about whether these organisations could be encouraged to match that power with an appropriate responsibility. This is the function of accountability – to require individuals and organisations to present an account of those actions for which society holds them – or would wish to hold them – responsible. And the history of social accounting, at its most fundamental, (...) is a history of attempts to develop this accountability. It seems to me that the widespread and systematic practice of social and environmental accounting is a deeply essential element in any well‐functioning, complex democracy. The corollary is that the absence of such mechanisms raises fundamental questions about the nature of modern democracies. This article briefly outlines what I believe to be the three strands of social accounting. It then identifies a few of the lessons that we may be able to learn from current experience and, in particular, how social accounting is related to accountability, democracy and sustainability. The central issue of the tension between accountability and control is touched upon: I then illustrate how the stakeholder model can be used to help define the social account, and conclude with a few words on attestation. (shrink)

Two key elements define the modern-day version of a socially responsible corporation: (1) targeting business activities on value creation in three dimensions, and (2) maintaining relationships with stakeholders. In this article, we argue that a proper understanding of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) lies in the intrinsic link between these two elements. A relational approach to CSR is called for. Circles of stakeholders reflect the level of involvement of different stakeholders with a corporation and the dynamics of their relations. In a (...) globalising world, connecting corporations to outer-circle groups of stakeholders can be substantially rewarding. Partnerships with Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) present a useful strategy for governance for the benefit of all. (shrink)

If you do not wish to construe philosophical discourse as simply a discourse of cognition, a theoretical discourse; if you think it is also a practical, ethical discourse: how should you write? How should you frame the ethos, the authority of your discourse? This article re‐presents an extended preface I wrote and rewrote obsessively over a period of nearly two years in an effort to forge a voice and mode of address adequate to my sense of philosophical discourse as a (...) practical discourse, whilst also being accountable to the generic requirements of a PhD. As the textual record of this struggle, the value of this text must remain primarily in its capacity to evoke or provoke similar generic memories or ambitions in the reader. (shrink)

Although the academic interest in ethical mutual fund performance has developed steadily, the evidence to date is mainly sample-specific. To tackle this critique, new research should extend to unexplored countries. Using this as a motivation, we examine the performance and risk sensitivities of Canadian ethical mutual funds vis-à-vis their conventional peers. In order to overcome the methodological deficiencies most prior papers suffered from, we use performance measurement approaches in the spirit of Carhart (1997, Journal of Finance 52(1): 57–82) and Ferson (...) and Schadt (1996, Journal of Finance 51(2): 425–461). In doing so, we investigate the aggregated performance and investment style of ethical and conventional mutual funds and allow for time variation in the funds’ systematic risk. Our␣Canadian evidence supports the conjecture that any␣performance differential between ethical mutual funds and their conventional peers is statistically insignificant. (shrink)

This article examines the relationship between the use of computer-based systems and transformations in parts of the social order. Answers to this question rest heavily on the way computer-based systems are consumed -not just produced or dissemtnated. The discourse about computerezation advanced in many professional magazines and the mass media is saturated with talk about "revolution, " and yet substantial social changes are often difficult to cdentcfy in carefully designed empirical studies. The article examines qualitative case studies of computerization in (...) welfare agencies, urban planning, accounting, marketing, and manufacturing to examine the ways that computerization alters social life in varced ways: sometemes restructuring relationships and in other cases reinforcing existing social relationships. The article also examines some of the theoret ical issues in studies of computerization, such as drawing boundaries. It concludes with some observations about the sociology of computer sctence as an academic discipline. (shrink)

We show that three fundamental information-theoretic constraints -- the impossibility of superluminal information transfer between two physical systems by performing measurements on one of them, the impossibility of broadcasting the information contained in an unknown physical state, and the impossibility of unconditionally secure bit commitment -- suffice to entail that the observables and state space of a physical theory are quantum-mechanical. We demonstrate the converse derivation in part, and consider the implications of alternative answers to a remaining open question about (...) nonlocality and bit commitment. (shrink)

The era from the late fifties to the early seventies was marked in Africa and the Caribbean by a rush of newly articulated anticolonial sentiment that was associated with the burgeoning of both international back consciousness and more localized nationalist movements. Between 1957 and 1973 the vast majority of African and the larger Caribbean colonies won their independence; the same period witnessed the Cuban and Algerian revolutions, the latter phase of the Kenyan “Mau Mau” revolt, the Katanga crisis in the (...) Cong, the Trinidadian Black Power uprising and, equally important for the atmosphere of militant defiance, the civil rights movement in the United States, the student revolts of 1968, and the humbling of the United States during the Vietnam War. This period was distinguished, among Caribbean and African intellectuals, by a pervasive mood of optimistic outrage. Frequently graduates of British or French universities, they were the first generation from their regions self-assured and numerous enough to call collectively for a renunciation of Western standards as the political revolts found their cultural counterparts in insurrections against the bequeathed values of the colonial powers.In the context of such challenges to an increasingly discredited European colonialism, a series of dissenting intellectual chose to utilize a European text as a strategy for getting “out from under this ancient mausoleum of [Western] historic achievement.”1 They seized upon The Tempest as a way of amplifying their class for decolonization within the bounds of the dominant cultures. But at the same time these Caribbeans and Africans adopted the play as a founding text in an oppositional lineage which issued from a geopolitically and historically specific set of cultural ambitions. They perceived that the play could contribute to their self-definition during a period of great flux. So, through repeated, reinforcing, transgressive appropriations of The Tempest, a once silenced group generated its own tradition of “error” which in turn served as one component of the grander counterhegemonic nationalist and black internationalist endeavors of the period. Because that era of Caribbean and African history was marked by such extensive, open contestation of cultural values, the destiny of The Tempest at that time throws into uncommonly stark relief the status of value as an unstable social process rather than a static and, in literary terms, merely textual attribute. Rob Nixon is a Ph.D. candidate in English at Columbia University. He is working on the topics of exile and Third World-metropolitan relations in the writing of V. S. and Shiva Naipaul. His previous contribution to Critical Inquiry is “No Names Apart: The Separation of Word and History in Derrida’s ‘Le Dernier Mot du Racisme’ ”. (shrink)

Some people (e.g., Drs. Paul and Susan Lim) and, with them, organizations (e.g., the National Embryo Donation Center) believe that, morally speaking, the death of a frozen human embryo is a very bad thing. With such people and organizations in mind, the question to be addressed here is as follows: if one believes that the death of a frozen embryo is a very bad thing, ought, morally speaking, one prevent the death of at least one frozen embryo via embryo adoption? (...) By way of a three‐premise argument, one of which is a moral principle first introduced by Peter Singer, my answer to this question is: at least some of those who believe this ought to. (Just who the “some” are is identified in the paper.) If this is correct, then, for said people, preventing the death of a frozen embryo via embryo adoption is not a morally neutral matter; it is, instead, a morally laden one. Specifically, their intentional refusal to prevent the death of a frozen embryo via embryo adoption is, at a minimum, morally criticizable and, arguably, morally forbidden. Either way, it is, to one extent or another, a moral failing. (shrink)

Some conspicuous characteristics of argumentation as we all know this phenomenon from our shared everyday experiences are in my view vital to its theoretical treatment because they should have methodological consequences for the way in which argumentation research is conducted. To start with, argumentation is in the first place a communicative act complex, which is realized by making functional verbal communicative moves.

Emotion, Sense, Experience calls on historians of emotions and the senses to come together in serious and sustained dialogue. The Element outlines the deep if largely unacknowledged genealogy of historical writing insisting on a braided history of emotions and the senses; explains why recent historical treatments have sometimes profitably but nonetheless unhelpfully segregated the emotions from the senses; and makes a compelling case for the heuristic and interpretive dividends of bringing emotions and sensory history into conversation. Ultimately, we envisage a (...) new way of understanding historical lived experience generally, as a mutable product of a situated world-brain-body dynamic. Such a project necessarily points us towards new interdisciplinary engagement and collaboration, especially with social neuroscience. Unpicking some commonly held assumptions about affective and sensory experience, we re-imagine the human being as both biocultural and historical, reclaiming the analysis of human experience from biology and psychology and seeking new collaborative efforts. (shrink)

Combining methods in social scientific research has recently gained momentum through a research strand called Mixed Methods Research. This approach, which explicitly aims to offer a framework for combining methods, has rapidly spread through the social and behavioural sciences, and this article offers an analysis of the approach from a field theoretical perspective. After a brief outline of the MMR program, we ask how its recent rise can be understood. We then delve deeper into some of the specific elements that (...) constitute the MMR approach, and we engage critically with the assumptions that underlay this particular conception of using multiple methods. We conclude by offering an alternative view regarding methods and method use. (shrink)

_Yanomami_ raises questions central to the field of anthropology—questions concerning the practice of fieldwork, the production of knowledge, and anthropology's intellectual and ethical vision of itself. Using the Yanomami controversy—one of anthropology's most famous and explosive imbroglios—as its starting point, this book draws readers into not only reflecting on but refashioning the very heart and soul of the discipline. It is both the most up-to-date and thorough public discussion of the Yanomami controversy available and an innovative and searching assessment of (...) the current state of anthropology. The Yanomami controversy came to public attention through the publication of Patrick Tierney's best-selling book, _Darkness in El Dorado,_ in which he accuses James Neel, a prominent geneticist who belonged to the National Academy of Sciences, as well as Napoleon Chagnon, whose introductory text on the Yanomami is perhaps the best-selling anthropological monograph of all time, of serious human rights violations. This book identifies the ethical dilemmas of the controversy and raises deeper, structural questions about the discipline. A portion of the book is devoted to a unique roundtable in which important scholars on different sides of the issues debate back and forth with each other. This format draws readers into deciding, for themselves, where they stand on the controversy’s—and many of anthropology’s—central concerns. All of the royalties from this book will be donated to helping the Yanomami improve their healthcare. (shrink)

In Alastair Norcross argues that scalar consequentialism is the most plausible form of consequentialism, but his arguments are flawed: he is simply mistaken when he suggests that there is a problem with deriving absolutes like right and wrong from gradable properties such as goodness; he cannot justify his claim that the choice of a threshold will always be arbitrary; and his argument only shows that the consequentialist doesn't care about permissibility. Furthermore, I argue that, although Norcross was right to claim (...) that a scalar theory can be action-guiding (to an extent), he was mistaken to think that ought If anything can be said in favour of scalar consequentialism, it is only that it is the most honest form of consequentialism, because it doesn't pretend to care about permissibility. (shrink)

Historians have long sought putative connections between different areas of Newton’s scientific work, while recently scholars have argued that there were causal links between even more disparate fields of his intellectual activity. In this paper I take an opposite approach, and attempt to account for certain tensions in Newton’s ‘scientific’ work by examining his great sensitivity to the disciplinary divisions that both conditioned and facilitated his early investigations in science and mathematics. These momentous undertakings, exemplified by research that he wrote (...) up in two separate notebooks, obey strict distinctions between approaches appropriate to both new and old ‘natural philosophy’ and those appropriate to the mixed mathematical sciences. He retained a fairly rigid demarcation between them until the early eighteenth century. At the same time as Newton presented the ‘mathematical principles’ of natural philosophy in his magnum opus of 1687, he remained equally committed to a separate and more private world or ontology that he publicly denigrated as hypothetical or conjectural. This is to say nothing of the worlds implicit in his work on mathematics and alchemy. He did not lurch from one overarching ontological commitment to the next but instead simultaneously—and often radically—developed generically distinct concepts and ontologies that were appropriate to specific settings and locations as well as to relevant styles of argument. Accordingly I argue that the concepts used by Newton throughout his career were intimately bound up with these appropriate generic or quasi-disciplinary ‘structures’. His later efforts to bring together active principles, aethers and voids in various works were not failures that resulted from his ‘confusion’ but were bold attempts to meld together concepts or ontologies that belonged to distinct enquiries. His analysis could not be ‘coherent’ because the structures in which they appeared were fundamentally incompatible.Author Keywords: Connectionism; Incoherence; Appropriateness; Setting; Discipline; Genre; Structure. (shrink)

Why does American law allow the recreational use of some drugs, such as alcohol, tobacco, and caffeine, but not others, such as marijuana, cocaine, and heroin? The answer lies not simply in the harm the use of these drugs might cause, but in the perceived morality—or lack thereof—of their recreational use. Despite strong rhetoric from moral critics of recreational drug use, however, it is surprisingly difficult to discern the reasons they have for deeming the recreational use of (some) drugs morally (...) wrong. In this book, Rob Lovering lays out and dissects various arguments for the immorality of using marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and other drugs recreationally. He contends that, by and large, these arguments do not succeed. Lovering's book represents one of the first works to systematically present, analyze, and critique arguments for the moral wrongness of recreational drug use. Given this, as well as the popularity of the morality-based defense of the United States' drug laws, this book is an important and timely contribution to the debate on the recreational use of drugs. (shrink)

This article discusses studies and politicalinitiatives concerned with enhancing publicinvolvement in major technological decisions.It argues that such decisions should include asignificant role for the mass media, andrespect for the diverse relations betweenscience and governance. The notion of`regulated worlds' is proposed as a startingpoint in a discourse that brings together themass media, science management, anddeliberative democracy.

Among the many vivid metaphors in Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, one stands out. The understanding of how cumulative natural selection gives rise to adaptations is, Dennett says, like a “universal acid”—an idea so powerful and corrosive of conventional wisdom that it dissolves all attempts to contain it within biology. Like most good ideas, this one is very simple: Once replicators (material objects that are faithfully copied) come to exist, some will replicate more rapidly than others, leading to adaptation by natural selection. (...) The great power of the idea is that the resulting adaptations can be understood by asking what leads to efficient, rapid replication. Given that ideas seem to replicate, it is natural that Dawkins (1976, 1982), Dennett (1992), and others have explored the possibility of using this idea to explain cultural evolution. (shrink)

The history of emotions has become a thriving focus within the discipline of history, but it has in the process gained a critical purchase that makes it relevant for other disciplines concerned with emotion research. The history of emotions is entangled with the history of the body and brain, and with cultural and political history. It is interested in the how and why of emotion change; with the questions of power and authority behind cultural scripts of expression, conceptual usages, and (...) emotional practices. This work has reached a level of maturity and sophistication in its theoretical and methodological orientation, and in its sheer quantity of empirical research, that it contributes to emotion knowledge within the broad framework of emotion research. (shrink)

Aesthesis, the classical term for sensing and perceiving, is at the heart of innumerable problems that plague global society. The purpose of this article is to open a conversation on aesthesis. We survey the roots and relevance of aesthesis as a direct albeit contested relation and engagement with the world and with Others. From its pre-Socratic origins, aesthesis has been both a pragmatic, somatic concept, prompting a re-evaluation of the distinction between experience and abstraction. We trace its ongoing repression from (...) Plato through ‘western’ theories of formal Aesthetics. Drawing on a relational interpretation of Protagoras’ aesthesis, we argue that modern pragmatists and radical empiricists, as well as more contemporary critics of the ‘colonization’ of aesthesis (Mignolo and Vasquez) by formal Aesthetics recognize and develop the relational and ethical aspects of aesthesis. We consider the role of the body, affect, and of the intangible or virtual qualities of aesthesis. The ethics of obligations (Weil) in the polis (Arendt) shows how aesthesis informs politics despite its repression in favour of moral and legal norms. We argue this is relevant to contemporary crises such as xenophobia and ecocidal climate warming. (shrink)

Rob Clifton was one of the most brilliant and productive researchers in the foundations and philosophy of quantum theory, who died tragically at the age of 38. Jeremy Butterfield and Hans Halvorson collect fourteen of his finest papers here, drawn from the latter part of his career (1995-2002), all of which combine exciting philosophical discussion with rigorous mathematical results. Many of these papers break wholly new ground, either conceptually or technically. Others resolve a vague controversy intoa precise technical problem, which (...) is then solved; still others solve an open problem that had been in the air for soem time. All of them show scientific and philosophical creativity of a high order, genuinely among the very best work in the field. The papers are grouped into four Parts. First come four papers about the modal interpretation of quantum mechanics. Part II comprises three papers on the foundations of algebraic quantum field theory, with an emphasis on entanglement and nonlocality. The two papers in Part III concern the concept of a particle in relativistic quantum theories. One paper analyses localization; the other analyses the Unruh effect (Rindler quanta) using the algebraic approach to quantum theory. Finally, Part IV contains striking new results about such central issues as complementarity, Bohr's reply to the EPR argument, and no hidden variables theorems; and ends with a philosophical survey of the field of quantum information. The volume includes a full bibliography of Clifton's publications. Quantum Entanglements offers inspiration and substantial reward to graduates and professionals in the foundations of physics, with a background in philosophy, physics, or mathematics. (shrink)