In Philosophical Instruments Daniel Rothbart argues that our tools are not just neutral intermediaries between humans and the natural world, but are devices that demand new ideas about reality.

This volume explores contemporary social conflict, focusing on a sort of violence that rarely receives coverage in the evening news. This violence occurs when powerful institutions seek to manipulate the thoughts of marginalized people-manufacturing their feelings and fostering a sense of inferiority-for the purpose of disciplinary control. Many American institutions strategically orchestrate this psychic violence through tactics of systemic humiliation. This book reveals how certain counter-measures, based in a commitment to human dignity and respect for every person's inherent moral worth, (...) can combat this violence. Rothbart and other contributors showcase various examples of this tug-of-war in the US, including the politics of race and class in the 2016 presidential campaign, the dehumanizing treatment of people with mental disabilities, and destructive parenting styles that foster cycles of humiliation and emotional pain. (shrink)

Although Popper rarely examined the “life of the laboratory”, some of his epistemic doctrines reveal important themes about knowledge‐acquisition in the laboratory sciences. In particular, when modern instruments are needed for exploring the subatomic realm, empirical evidence is dispositional in a Popperian sense. Evidence is defined conditionally with respect to a complex system of technological apparatus and theoretical judgments.After summarizing certain elements of Popper's epistemology, the character of observation in the laboratory sciences is explored. A conception of property as capacities (...) is then developed. This conception of property is applicable to empirical studies using modem scientific instruments, as information‐processing systems. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to explore the semantics of metaphoric language in scientific contexts. According to the theory of metaphor advanced below, the benchmark of a metaphoric expression is the implicit transfer of semantic features across incongruous semantic fields. This transfer results in a conceptual variation of "meaning" in the receiving semantic field. Thus, the theory of metaphor rests on semantic field theory. Existing semantic approaches to metaphor are evaluated in Section 1. In Sections 2 and 3 an (...) alternative theory is introduced through an analysis of the mechanics of the feature transfer process followed by a discussion of some methodological cues for deciphering the metaphor's "meaning." As I explore in Section 4, this theory of metaphor explains how all metaphoric expressions are potentially literal depending on the general compliance of the community of speakers. Consequently, concept formation in scientific contexts is, in large measure, metaphoric. Finally, I argue in Section 5 that metaphoric concept formation is an essential aspect of scientific reasoning for the purpose of solving conceptual problems. (shrink)

Identity, Morality, and Threat offers a critical examination of the social psychological processes that generate outgroup devaluation and ingroup glorification as the source of conflict. Daniel Rothbart and Karyna Korostelina bring together essays analyzing the causal relationship between escalating violence and opposing images of the Self and Other.

Identity, Morality, and Threat offers a critical examination of the social psychological processes that generate outgroup devaluation and ingroup glorification as the source of conflict. Daniel Rothbart and Karyna Korostelina bring together essays analyzing the causal relationship between escalating violence and opposing images of the Self and Other.

Contrary to the assumptions of empiricist philosophies of science, the theory-laden character of data will not imply the inherent failure (subjectivity, circularity, or rationalization) of instruments to expose nature's secrets. The success of instruments is credited to scientists' capacity to create artificial technological analogs to familiar physical systems. The design of absorption spectrometers illustrates the point: Progress in designing many modern instruments is generated by analogically projecting theoretical insights from known physical systems to unknown terrain. An experimental realism is defended.

Kant's theory of judgment establishes the conceptual framework for understanding the subtle relationships between the experimental scientist, the modern instrument, and nature's atomic particles. The principle of purposiveness which governs judgment has also a role in implicitly guiding modern experimental science. In Part 1 we explore Kant's philosophy of science as he shows how knowledge of material nature and unobservable entities is possible. In Part 2 we examine the way in which Kant's treatment of judgment, with its operating principle of (...) purposiveness, enters into his critical project and underlies the possibility of rational science. In Part 3 we show that the centrality given to judgment in Kant's conception of science provides philosophical insight into the investigation of atomic substances in modern chemistry. (shrink)

Although Popper rarely examined the “life of the laboratory” , some of his epistemic doctrines reveal important themes about knowledge‐acquisition in the laboratory sciences. In particular, when modern instruments are needed for exploring the subatomic realm, empirical evidence is dispositional in a Popperian sense. Evidence is defined conditionally with respect to a complex system of technological apparatus and theoretical judgments.After summarizing certain elements of Popper's epistemology , the character of observation in the laboratory sciences is explored . A conception of (...) property as capacities is then developed . This conception of property is applicable to empirical studies using modem scientific instruments, as information‐processing systems. (shrink)

Moral contracts and the patient-physician relationship.

Highlighting the work of the most prominent and influential scholars in the field, the articles reflect a diversity of philosophical opinion and demonstrate to students how each position is subject to constructive criticism and how this criticism motivates alternative positions.

SummaryAfter presumably cleaning science of induction, Karl Popper claims to offer a purely noninductivist theory of science. In critically evaluating this theory, I focus on the allegedly noninductive character of this theory. First, I defend and expand Wesley Salmon's charge that Popper's dismissal of induction renders science useless for practical purposes. Without induction practitioners have no grounds for believing that the predicted event will actually take place. Second, despite Popper's demands to the contrary, his theory of science is shown to (...) rest on induction. In particular, the function he attributes to background knowledge in testing a scientific hypothesis requires induction. (shrink)

Based on the design of many modern chemical instruments, information about a specimen is retrieved after the specimen undergoes agitation, manipulation and disturbance of its internal state. But can we retain the traditional ideal that instruments should reveal properties that are definable independently of all modes of detection? In this paper I argue that the capacity of chemical instruments to convert experimental phenomena to information places constraints on the way in which the specimen is characterized. During research, the specimen is (...) defined by those properties which permit its detection. Based on modern instrumentation, this constraint necessitates a conception of the specimen as a reactive system of dynamical properties. The dream of a purely transparent detection process violates the design of chemical instruments. This mutual dependence of instrument and specimen is illustrated by empirical studies of the geometrical configuration of DNA. (shrink)

This study explains scientific progress through analogical cross-fertilization of ideas between distinct physical systems. In many cases, progress can be generatedfrom a radically new juxtaposition of apparently incongruous physical systems.

The success of chemistry is directly credited to the capacity of instruments to provide human contact to the structures of physical reality. Empiricist philosophers have given scant attention to instruments as a separate topic of inquiry on the grounds that reliability of instruments is reducible to the epistemology of common sense experience. I argue that the reliability of many modern instruments is based on their design as analogical replication of natural systems. Scientists designed absorption spectrometers as artificial technological replicas of (...) familiar physical systems. Such designs are generated by analogical projections of theoretical insights from known physical systems to unknown terrain. Instrumentation enables scientists to extend theoretical understanding to previously hidden domains. After exploring this analogical function of instruments, the nature of instrumental data is discussed, followed by an explicit rejection of both skepticism and naive realism. In the end I argue for an experimental realism which lacks any theory-neutral access to the fundamental analogies of nature. (shrink)

This book offers a detailed study of the psycho-politics of governmental manipulation, in which a vulnerable population is disciplined by contorting their sense of self-worth. In many conflict settings a nation's government exerts its dominance over a marginalized population group through laws, policies and practices that foster stark inequality. This book shows how such domination comes in the form of systems of humiliation orchestrated by governmental forces, and draws upon recent findings in social psychology, conflict analysis, and political sociology. Case (...) studies are provided of governmental directives, verdicts, policies, decisions and norms that, when enforced, foster debasement, disgrace or denigration. One case centers on the US immigration laws that target vulnerable population groups, while another focuses on the ethnic discrimination of the central government of Sudan against the Sudanese Africans. By contrast, the book's conclusion focuses on the collective compassion that is exhibited by some people who are immersed in protracted violent conflict. The practices of systemic compassion represent a counter-force to such governmental humiliation. This book will be of much interest to students of peace and conflict studies, sociology, psychology, ethics, philosophy and International Relations. on that is exhibited by some people who are immersed in protracted violent conflict. The practices of systemic compassion represent a counter-force to such governmental humiliation. This book will be of much interest to students of peace and conflict studies, sociology, psychology, ethics, philosophy and International Relations. (shrink)

Pt. 1. Disempowering civilians -- Who dies in armed conflicts? -- Distinguishing the enemy from the innocent in war -- Deportation from Crimea -- Genocide in Rwanda -- The Second Lebanon War -- Better safe than dead in Iraq -- part 2. Conflict theory as value theory -- Limitations of social identity theories in relation to conflict analysis -- Understanding group identity as collective axiology -- The normative dimensions of identity conflicts -- Causality in explanations of civilian devastation.

This slim volume contains much that is suggestive, but little that is substantive. This is unfortunate, as there is need of a sustained analysis of the epistemology of instruments.

Edited by Daniel Rothbart of George Mason University in Virginia, this book is a collection of Rom Harré's work on modeling in science (particularly physics and psychology). In over 28 authored books and 240 articles and book chapters, Rom Harré of Georgetown University in Washington, DC is a towering figure in philosophy, linguistics, and social psychology. He has inspired a generation of scholars, both for the ways in which his research is carried out and his profound insights. For (...) Harré, the stunning discoveries of research demand a kind of thinking that is found in the construction and control of models. Iconic modeling is pivotal for representing real-world structures, explaining phenomena, manipulating instruments, constructing theories, and acquiring data. This volume in the new Elsevier book series Studies in Multidisciplinarity includes major topics on the structure and function of models, the debates over scientific realism, explanation through analogical modeling, a metaphysics for physics, the rationale for experimentation, and modeling in social encounters. * A multidisciplinary work of sweeping scope about the nature of science * Revolutionary interpretation that challenges conventional wisdom about the character of scientific thinking * Profound insights about fundamental challenges to contemporary physics * Brilliant discoveries into the nature of social interaction and human identity * Presents a rational conception of methods for acquiring knowledge of remote regions of the world * Written by one of the great thinkers of our time. (shrink)

Identity, Morality, and Threat offers a critical examination of the social psychological processes that generate outgroup devaluation and ingroup glorification as the source of conflict. Daniel Rothbart and Karyna Korostelina bring together essays analyzing the causal relationship between escalating violence and opposing images of the Self and Other.

An extended argument that cognitive phenomena—perceiving, imagining, remembering—can be best explained in terms of an interface between contentless and content-involving forms of cognition. -/- Evolving Enactivism argues that cognitive phenomena—perceiving, imagining, remembering—can be best explained in terms of an interface between contentless and content-involving forms of cognition. Building on their earlier book Radicalizing Enactivism, which proposes that there can be forms of cognition without content, Daniel Hutto and Erik Myin demonstrate the unique explanatory advantages of recognizing that only some (...) forms of cognition have content while others—the most elementary ones—do not. They offer an account of the mind in duplex terms, proposing a complex vision of mentality in which these basic contentless forms of cognition interact with content-involving ones. -/- Hutto and Myin argue that the most basic forms of cognition do not, contrary to a currently popular account of cognition, involve picking up and processing information that is then used, reused, stored, and represented in the brain. Rather, basic cognition is contentless—fundamentally interactive, dynamic, and relational. In advancing the case for a radically enactive account of cognition, Hutto and Myin propose crucial adjustments to our concept of cognition and offer theoretical support for their revolutionary rethinking, emphasizing its capacity to explain basic minds in naturalistic terms. They demonstrate the explanatory power of the duplex vision of cognition, showing how it offers powerful means for understanding quintessential cognitive phenomena without introducing scientifically intractable mysteries into the mix. (shrink)

A pioneering work in the philosophy of mind, Content and Consciousness brings together the approaches of philosophers and scientists to the mind--a connection that must occur if genuine analysis of the mind is to be made. This unified approach permits the most forbiddingly mysterious mental phenomenon--consciousness--to be broken down into several distinct phenomena, and these are each given a foundation in the physical activity of the brain. This paperback edition contains a preface placing the book in the context of recent (...) work in the area. (shrink)

This paperback edition contains a preface placing the book in the context of recent work in the area.

Are there really beliefs? Or are we learning (from neuroscience and psychology, presumably) that, strictly speaking, beliefs are figments of our imagination, items in a superceded ontology? Philosophers generally regard such ontological questions as admitting just two possible answers: either beliefs exist or they don't. There is no such state as quasi-existence; there are no stable doctrines of semi-realism. Beliefs must either be vindicated along with the viruses or banished along with the banshees. A bracing conviction prevails, then, to the (...) effect that when it comes to beliefs (and other mental items) one must be either a realist or an eliminative materialist. (shrink)

_Behavioral and Brain Sciences_ , 15, 183-247, 1992. Reprinted in _The Philosopher's Annual_ , Grim, Mar and Williams, eds., vol. XV-1992, 1994, pp. 23-68; Noel Sheehy and Tony Chapman, eds., _Cognitive Science_ , Vol. I, Elgar, 1995, pp.210-274.

Claims pertaining to understanding are made in a variety of contexts and ways. As a result, few in the philosophical literature have made an attempt to precisely characterize the state that is y understanding x. This paper builds an account that does just that. The account is motivated by two main observations. First, understanding x is somehow related to being able to manipulate x. Second, understanding is a mental phenomenon, and so what manipulations are required to be an understander must (...) only be mental manipulations. Combining these two insights, the paper builds an account (URM) of understanding as a certain representational capacity—specifically, understanding x involves possessing a representation of x that could be manipulated in useful ways. By tying understanding to representation, the account correctly identifies that understanding is a fundamentally cognitive achievement. However, by also demanding that which representations count as understanding-conferring be determined by their practical effects, URM captures the insight that understanding is vitally connected to practice. URM is fully general, and can apply equally well to understanding states of affairs, understanding events, and even understanding people and works of art. The ultimate test of URM is its applicability in actual scientific and philosophical discourse. To that end the paper discusses the importance of understanding in the philosophy of science, psychology, and computer science. (shrink)

Clark has recently suggested that predictive processing advances a theory of neural function with the resources to put an ecumenical end to the “representation wars” of recent cognitive science. In this paper I defend and develop this suggestion. First, I broaden the representation wars to include three foundational challenges to representational cognitive science. Second, I articulate three features of predictive processing’s account of internal representation that distinguish it from more orthodox representationalist frameworks. Specifically, I argue that it posits a resemblance-based (...) representational architecture with organism-relative contents that functions in the service of pragmatic success, not veridical representation. Finally, I argue that internal representation so understood is either impervious to the three anti-representationalist challenges I outline or can actively embrace them. (shrink)

Damasio remarks, it "informs virtually all research on mind and brain, explicitly or implicitly." Indeed, serial information processing models generally run this risk (Kinsbourne, 1985). The commentaries provide a wealth of confirming instances of the seductive power of this idea. Our sternest critics Block, Farah, Libet, and Treisman) adopt fairly standard Cartesian positions; more interesting are those commentators who take themselves to be mainly in agreement with us, but who express reservations or offer support with arguments that betray a continuing (...) allegiance to one or another tenet of the view we sought to discredit. (shrink)

Predictive processing has recently been advanced as a global cognitive architecture for the brain. I argue that its commitments concerning the nature and format of cognitive representation are inadequate to account for two basic characteristics of conceptual thought: first, its generality—the fact that we can think and flexibly reason about phenomena at any level of spatial and temporal scale and abstraction; second, its rich compositionality—the specific way in which concepts productively combine to yield our thoughts. I consider two strategies for (...) avoiding these objections and I argue that both confront formidable challenges. (shrink)