A four-factor model of spiritual intelligence is first proposed. Supportive evidence is reviewed for the capacities of critical existential thinking, personal meaning production, transcendental awareness, and conscious state expansion. Based on this model, a 24-item self-report measure was developed and modified across two consecutive studies . The final version of the scale, the Spiritual Intelligence Self-Report Inventory , displayed excellent internal reliability and good fit to the proposed model. Correlational analyses with additional measures of meaning, metapersonal self-construal, mysticism, religiosity, and (...) social desirability offer support for construct and criterion-related validity. According to both intelligence criteria and current psychometric standards, findings validate the proposed model and measure of spiritual intelligence. Future directions are discussed. (shrink)

Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PID) is often seen as an improvement upon prenatal testing. I argue that PID may exacerbate the eugenic features of prenatal testing and make possible an expanded form of free-market eugenics. The current practice of prenatal testing is eugenic in that its aim is to reduce the numbers of people with genetic disorders. Due to social pressures and eugenic attitudes held by clinical geneticists in most countries, it results in eugenic outcomes even though no state coercion is (...) involved. I argue that technological advances may soon make PID widely accessible. Because abortion is not involved, and multiple embryos are available, PID is radically more effective as a tool of genetic selection. It will also make possible selection on the basis of non-pathological characteristics, leading, potentially, to a full-blown free-market eugenics. For these reasons, I argue that PID should be strictly regulated. (shrink)

In this paper I discuss the topics of mechanism and algorithmicity. I emphasise that a characterisation of algorithmicity such as the Turing machine is iterative; and I argue that if the human mind can solve problems that no Turing machine can, the mind must depend on some non-iterative principle — in fact, Cantor's second principle of generation, a principle of the actual infinite rather than the potential infinite of Turing machines. But as there has been theorisation that all physical systems (...) can be represented by Turing machines, I investigate claims that seem to contradict this: specifically, claims that there are noncomputable phenomena. One conclusion I reach is that if it is believed that the human mind is more than a Turing machine, a belief in a kind of Cartesian dualist gulf between the mental and the physical is concomitant. (shrink)

Murray MacBeath, in his essay ``Time's Square'', describes a fictitious scenariowhere various physical observations made by the participants would, he claims, invitethe interpretation that time for them is two-dimensional. In the present paper, however, Iargue that such observations come close to underdetermining the hypothesis of time's twodimensionality;for a rival hypothesis - that, under certain circumstances, the observationscan be explained in terms of the familiar time dilation effects predicted by special relativity- almost fits the evidence as well. That is, under certain (...) (albeit artificial) circumstances theworld can already behave almost as though it were temporally two-dimensional. (shrink)

"Methodological Solipsism and the Multiverse" defends the many-universes interpretation of quantum physics, but draws attention to a major philosophical obstacle to the interpretation's acceptance: the question of why, if there are many universes, all on a par with one another, at a particular time the 'I' is manifest in only one. This is known as the 'preferred basis' problem. The so-called methodological solipsism approach, introduced by Driesch and employed by philosophers, such as Putnam and Fodor, is used to answer the (...) question. (shrink)

In the field of computability and algorithmicity, there have recently been two essays that are of great interest: Peter Slezak's "Descartes's Diagonal Deduction," and David Deutsch's "Quantum Theory, the Church-Turing Principle and the Universal Quantum Computer." In brief, the former shows that Descartes' Cogito argument is structurally similar to Godel's proof that there are statements true but cannot be proven within a formal system such as Principia Mathematica, while Deutsch provides strong arguments for believing that the universe can be represented (...) as a Turing machine. King contends that the conjoining of Slezak's analysis with Deutsch's provides a perspective from which it is possible to argue that a scientific theology can be taken a little more seriously at present than in the past. , , , , In the field of computability and algorithmicity, there have recently been two essays that are of great interest: Peter Slezak's "Descartes's Diagonal Deduction," and David Deutsch's "Quantum Theory, the Church-Turing Principle and the Universal Quantum Computer." In brief, the former shows that Descartes' Cogito argument is structurally similar to Godel's proof that there are statements true but cannot be proven within a formal system such as Principia Mathematica, while Deutsch provides strong arguments for believing that the universe can be represented as a Turing machine. King contends that the conjoining of Slezak's analysis with Deutsch's provides a perspective from which it is possible to argue that a scientific theology can be taken a little more seriously at present than in the past. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie Jahrgang: 97 Heft: 1 Seiten: 1-33.

Astrolabes serving all latitudes are very rare. This recently rediscovered sixteenth-century Spanish example raises a host of questions which can only be addressed by considering all other such instruments and the few available textual sources. The instruments can all be traced back, not always directly, to an invention of the eleventh-century Andalusian astronomer Ali ibn Khalaf, preserved in the Old Castillian Libros del Saber de Astronomía of King Alfonso X. The design of this particular astrolabe and the engraving on it (...) are investigated in detail, and the as yet unidentified maker is associated with the circle around Juan de Herrera, architect of the palace-monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial. (shrink)