This book presents views of the concept of intention and its relationship to communication from three perspectives: philosphy, linguistics, and artificial intelligence. The book is a record of a workshop held in 1987.

There has long been interest in why languages are shaped the way they are, and in the relationship between sign language and gesture. In sign languages, entity classifiers are handshapes that encode how objects move, how they are located relative to one another, and how multiple objects of the same type are distributed in space. Previous studies have shown that hearing adults who are asked to use only manual gestures to describe how objects move in space will use gestures that (...) bear some similarities to classifiers. We investigated how accurately hearing adults, who had been learning British Sign Language for 1–3 years, produce and comprehend classifiers in locative and distributive constructions. In a production task, learners of BSL knew that they could use their hands to represent objects, but they had difficulty choosing the same, conventionalized, handshapes as native signers. They were, however, highly accurate at encoding location and orientation information. Learners therefore show the same pattern found in sign-naïve gesturers. In contrast, handshape, orientation, and location were comprehended with equal accuracy, and testing a group of sign-naïve adults showed that they too were able to understand classifiers with higher than chance accuracy. We conclude that adult learners of BSL bring their visuo-spatial knowledge and gestural abilities to the tasks of understanding and producing constructions that contain entity classifiers. We speculate that investigating the time course of adult sign language acquisition might shed light on how gesture became conventionalized during the genesis of sign languages. (shrink)

Schuklenk and van de Vathorst's paper is a very welcome addition to the literature on the assisted dying debate and will be of great interest to clinicians working in the field of mental health.1 Many psychiatrists will have had patients who have asked them to allow them to die, to desist in their efforts to prevent their suicide, and one of us has had personal experience, outside of professional life, of being asked to aid in someone's attempt to end their (...) life in the context of an episode of mood disorder. The person with depression asking professionals, friends and family members to aid them in ending their life is a very real phenomenon. In their discussion, Schuklenk and van de Vathorst's paper uses two principles that we endorse and add weight to their argument: namely, the reality of suffering in depression and the parity of mental and physical illness. Indeed, the case Schuklenk and van de Vathorst make is a strong one and our commentary will focus on the premise of the argument around choosing death and some empirical clarification about competence in depression and the nature of treatment-resistant depression (TRD) and its prognosis. The conceptual concern we wish to discuss in relation to assisted dying, endorsed by the state and legislature, is not linked to any moral or religious concern, or even on grounds related to ‘slippery slope’ or ‘abuse’ arguments. Rather the worry is how one could operationalise decisions around assisted dying as based on competence and capacity and view such decisions as rational. I think this concern is not limited to depressive illness, but to all decisions regarding choosing non-existence. Schuklenk and van de Vathorst offer the following useful criteria to regulate assisted suicide:1. (shrink)

The progression of research and scholarly inquiry does not occur in isolation and is wholly dependent on accurate reporting of methods and results, and successful replication of prior work. Without mechanisms to correct the literature, much time and money is wasted on research based on a crumbling foundation. These guidelines serve to outline the respective responsibilities of researchers, institutions, agencies, and publishers or editors in maintaining the integrity of the research record. Delineating these complementary roles and proposing solutions for common (...) barriers provide a foundation for best practices. (shrink)

The 166th codex of the Bibliotheke of Photios comprises a summary of a peculiar work written by one Antonius Diogenes, entitled τ πρ Θούλην πιστα. This told the story of an Arkadian named Deinias, who travelled the world κατ ζήτησιν στορίας , coming eventually to Thule, where he met Mantinias and Derkyllis, a brother and sister from Tyre, and struck up an erotic relationship with Derkyllis . A narrative of Derkyllis, told to Deinias, seems to be inset at this point (...) , relating her own travels and including much Pythagorean material associated with her wonder-working companion, Astraios, which was authentic-seeming enough for Porphyrios to make use of it in his biography of Pythagoras. The Apista was a long work, running to 24 books, and it seems likely that a sizeable proportion of its length was devoted to paradoxographical material related to the places and peoples visited by the various narrators, but largely omitted from Photios' summary; the plot itself, though both complex and episodic, does not seem capable of sustaining such length. At the end of his summary Photios has a short discussion of the place of the Apista in literary history . Detailed analysis of this passage will form an important part of this paper, but for the moment it will suffice to say that Photios saw the work as germinal for Greek fiction, and in particular expresses the view that it was the ‘source and root’ of Lucian's True Histories. (shrink)

European Journal of Philosophy, Volume 30, Issue 2, Page 808-822, June 2022.

A quiet revolution in genetics is increasingly rendering our milieu strange and artificial. Epigenomics, informatic cousin of epigenetics, is a xenoforming process, giving birth to an alien milieu, replacing the natural with the technical. If epigenetics is understood as the heritable changes in gene expression that do not alter DNA sequence, epigenomics takes as object the set of epigenetic modifications. Environmental, social, even political aspects of life’s variability are re-understood digitally in epigenomic profiles, the previous categories computationally accounted for as (...) potential triggers of epigenesis. Following Gilbert Simondon, the xenoforming procedures of epigenomics can be understood as the concretization and adaptation processes of a technical object, the invention of which gives birth to a technogeographic milieu. In this article, the author examines Simondon’s work, especially, ‘On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects’, alongside contemporary scholarship on epigenetics. (shrink)

Cost conversations are essential to informed consent because patients have a right to information that they think is relevant, and patients overwhelmingly report that cost information is relevant to their medical decisions. Providers have an ethical responsibility to provide necessary information for informed consent, and therefore must discuss costs. The Shared Decision Making model is ideal for enabling this exchange of information, and decision aids are also helpful. Although barriers exist, many useful tools can help providers fulfill this obligation, and (...) encouraging progress is being made to improve cost transparency from insurers and facilities. (shrink)

The 166th codex of the Bibliotheke of Photios comprises a summary of a peculiar work written by one Antonius Diogenes, entitled τ πρ Θούλην πιστα. This told the story of an Arkadian named Deinias, who travelled the world κατ ζήτησιν στορίας, coming eventually to Thule, where he met Mantinias and Derkyllis, a brother and sister from Tyre, and struck up an erotic relationship with Derkyllis. A narrative of Derkyllis, told to Deinias, seems to be inset at this point, relating her (...) own travels and including much Pythagorean material associated with her wonder-working companion, Astraios, which was authentic-seeming enough for Porphyrios to make use of it in his biography of Pythagoras. The Apista was a long work, running to 24 books, and it seems likely that a sizeable proportion of its length was devoted to paradoxographical material related to the places and peoples visited by the various narrators, but largely omitted from Photios' summary; the plot itself, though both complex and episodic, does not seem capable of sustaining such length. At the end of his summary Photios has a short discussion of the place of the Apista in literary history. Detailed analysis of this passage will form an important part of this paper, but for the moment it will suffice to say that Photios saw the work as germinal for Greek fiction, and in particular expresses the view that it was the ‘source and root’ of Lucian's True Histories. (shrink)

In 1880 Spyridon Lambros discovered in the library of the Dionysiou monastery on Mount Athos a manuscript containing, among other things, the missing second book of a compilation of zoological lore made for the emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos , generally referred to as the Sylloge Constantini. The first book, already known from a manuscript in Paris, proclaims in its heading that the compilation was based on the epitome of Aristotle's περ ζων by Aristophanes of Byzantium, with supplements from the writings (...) of Aelian, Timotheos and others. These supplements are found exclusively in the second book, which Lambros edited, along with the first, for the Supplementum Aristotelicum. They add greatly to our knowledge of the περ ζων by the fifth-century grammarian Timotheos of Gaza, a work hitherto known only from the so-called Epitome Augustana, a selection of 53 unconnected chapters made in the reign of Constantine IX Monomachos. (shrink)

In 1880 Spyridon Lambros discovered in the library of the Dionysiou monastery on Mount Athos a manuscript containing, among other things, the missing second book of a compilation of zoological lore made for the emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos, generally referred to as the Sylloge Constantini. The first book, already known from a manuscript in Paris, proclaims in its heading that the compilation was based on the epitome of Aristotle's περ ζων by Aristophanes of Byzantium, with supplements from the writings of (...) Aelian, Timotheos and others. These supplements are found exclusively in the second book, which Lambros edited, along with the first, for the Supplementum Aristotelicum. They add greatly to our knowledge of the περ ζων by the fifth-century grammarian Timotheos of Gaza, a work hitherto known only from the so-called Epitome Augustana, a selection of 53 unconnected chapters made in the reign of Constantine IX Monomachos. (shrink)

There is currently great controversy over the contribution antimicrobial use in animal agriculture has made to antimicrobial resistance in pathogenic bacteria with negative consequences for human health. In light of this, the approval process for antimicrobials used in US animal agriculture, known as New Animal Drug Application or NADA, is currently being revised by the federal government. We explore the public deliberations over the development of these new policies focusing our attention on the interaction between pharmaceutical companies and the U.S. (...) Food and Drug Administration. What appears to be an antagonistic public discourse is examined in terms of its ability to simultaneously legitimate the roles of the Food and Drug Administration as the official arbiter of policy on antimicrobial use in animal agriculture and as a protector of the public welfare, as well as the role of pharmaceutical companies as the producers of safe and effective products necessary for the protection of public well-being. (shrink)

This book is a rich blend of analyses by leading experts from various cultures and disciplines. A compact introduction to a complex field, it illustrates biotechnology's profound impact upon the environment and society. Moreover, it underscores the vital relevance of cultural values. This book empowers readers to more critically assess biotechnology's value and effectiveness within both specific cultural and global contexts.