P3 is the most prominent of the electrical potentials of the human electroencephalogram that are sensitive to psychological variables. According to the most influential current hypothesis about its psychological significance [E. Donchin's], the “context updating” hypothesis, P3 reflects the updating of working memory. This hypothesis cannot account for relevant portions of the available evidence and it entails some basic contradictions. A more general formulation of this hypothesis is that P3 reflects the updating of expectancies. This version implies that P3-evoking (...) stimuli are initially unexpected but later become expected. This contradiction cannot be resolved within this formulation. The alternative “context closure” hypothesis retains the concept of “strategic information processing” emphasized by the context updating hypothesis. P3s are evoked by events that are awaited when subjects deal with repetitive, highly structured tasks; P3s arise from subjects' combining successive stimuli into larger units. The tasks in which P3s are elicited can accordingly be classified in terms of their respective formal sequences of stimuli. P3 may be a physiological indicator of excess activation being released from perceptual control areas. (shrink)

This chapter examines how our sense modalities interact in the perception of persistence. The chapter concentrates on two questions. The first concerns perceptual processing—do perceptual computations of object persistence ever integrate and compute over representations from more than one modality? It argues that this question should be answered affirmatively. The second question concerns perceptual experience—do experiences of object persistence ever exhibit a constitutively multisensory phenomenal character, or is the phenomenology of object persistence always uniquely associated with just one modality? The (...) chapter argues that the available evidence underdetermines the answer to this question, but suggests ways it might be empirically resolved. (shrink)

The first main result isolates some conditions which fail for the class of graphs and hold for the class of Abelian p-groups, the class of Abelian torsion groups, and the special class of "rank-homogeneous" trees. We consider these conditions as a possible definition of what it means for a class of structures to have "Ulm type". The result says that there can be no Turing computable embedding of a class not of Ulm type into one of Ulm type. We apply (...) this result to show that there is no Turing computable embedding of the class of graphs into the class of "rank-homogeneous" trees. The second main result says that there is a Turing computable embedding of the class of rank-homogeneous trees into the class of torsion-free Abelian groups. The third main result says that there is a "rank-preserving" Turing computable embedding of the class of rank-homogeneous trees into the class of Boolean algebras. Using this result, we show that there is a computable Boolean algebra of Scott rank ${\mathrm{\omega }}_{1}^{\mathrm{C}\mathrm{K}}$. (shrink)

Dworkin respondeu afirmativamente à pergunta título do seu texto “Não existe mesmo nenhuma resposta certa em casos controversos?”. Posner criticou Dworkin e respondeu a mesma pergunta negativamente. Discute-se neste artigo as diferentes maneiras como cada filósofo entendeu a pergunta que acarreta diferentes respostas a ela, isto é, de que modo diferenças na concepção do que é o Direito acarretam diferenças a respeito da existência de respostas certas para questões jurídicas.

A través de este escrito se pretende dar a conocer algunos aportes de lafundamentación de la ciencia de la mecánica en el siglo XVIII adelantados porLeohnard Euler y ponerlos en relación con algunas de las respectivaspropuestas de Jean le Rond d’Alelmbert. Se resalta, en particular, que laspreocupaciones de estos dos pensadores no se limitan sólo a una intención dematematización de la ciencia de la mecánica. También existe en ellos la intenciónexplícita de clarificación de la mecánica a través de la reorganizaciónconceptual (...) de las nociones primeras y de la identificación de los principios enlos que debe fundamentarse esta ciencia, ambas intenciones soportadas enpresupuestos epistemológicos sobre la certeza y la validez de nuestroconocimiento. (shrink)

In this essay I contrast Kant and Hegel on the so-called right of necessity, or distress. The contrast is significant because it summarizes succinctly the difference between their respective philosophies of right. Furthermore, I take the difference to indicate what in Hegel’s philosophy of right makes it preferable to Kant’s. In sum, the issue between the two is whether or not the concept of justice is determined in part by what I term in the paper the vicissitudes of making a (...) worthwhile living. (shrink)

While translating the pseudo-Aristotelian Problems for the Oxford translation of Aristotle, I have frequently found it necessary to refer to the Fragments of Theophrastus , which are obviously the source of many of the Problems, in particular in books II., V., XX., XXIV., and XXVI. The condition of the text of both the Problems and the Fragments of Theophrastus leaves much to be desired, but considerable improvements are possible in those passages where the compiler of the Problems is adapting or (...) copying from Theophrastus. (shrink)

Dire que la question de l'euthanasie est une banalité. Le sujet semble usé, chaque nouvelle réflexion vaine. Il est toutefois possible de l'aborder sous un angle neuf, à condition de sortir du clivage traditionnel entre les tenants du "pour" et les tenants du "contre". Parce qu'à côté des tenants de la légalisation de l'euthanasie et de ses contradicteurs, un très grand nombre de malades, de personnes handicapées, de personnes vieillissantes, de familles, de proches et de professionnels de santé pensent que (...) les choses ne sont pas si évidentes. Il y a là une autre façon de penser l'euthanasie en train de chercher ses mots, ceux de la vulnérabilité humaine, les mots des gens ordinaires de la vie. Ce que chacun a d'important à dire, il est important d'en prendre connaissance, et d'appliquer une éthique attentive aux expressions singulières, aux formes de vie. (shrink)

"I suspect that this will become the book on Schopenhauer's metaphysics for many years to come, and will be required reading for any serious student of Schopenhauer's thought."--David E. Cartwright, University of Wisconsin, Whitewater.

В книге анализируются проблемы творчества с позиции новейших достижений когнитивной науки и неклассической эпистемологии. Предназначено специалистам по философии.

The principled approach to theory building that has been a conspicuous mark of bioethical theory for the past generation has in recent years fallen under considerable critical scrutiny. Although some critics have confined themselves to reordering the dominant principles, others have rejected a principled approach entirely and turned to alternative paradigms. Prominent among critics are antiprin-ciplists, who want to jettison the principle-based approach altogether and adopt a casuistic model, and communitarians, who favor an eclectic model combining features of both the (...) casuistic model and a modified principled approach. Particularly conspicuous in virtually all such critiques is their challenge to the preeminence of the principle of autonomy. Critical barbs have been aimed not only at theories favoring a hierarchical ordering of moral principles that give first place to autonomy, but also at those that include autonomy among a set of ostensibly coequal principles. Though these critics have performed a valued function by displacing bioethical principles from their Olympian perch beyond actual decision-making contexts, some version of the principle of autonomy may, nonetheless, be well worth defending but for very different reasons than those put forward by its supporters. (shrink)

To understand the endogenous components of the event-related brain potential (ERP), we must use data about the components' antecedent conditions to form hypotheses about the information-processing function of the underlying brain activity. These hypotheses, in turn, generate testable predictions about the consequences of the component. We review the application of this approach to the analysis of the P300 component. The amplitude of the P300 is controlled multiplicatively by the subjective probability and the task relevance of the eliciting events, whereas its (...) latency depends on the duration of stimulus evaluation. These and other factors suggest that the P300 is a manifestation of activity occurring whenever one's model of the environment must be revised. Tests of three predictions based on this “context updating” model are reviewed. Verleger's critique is based on a misconstrual of the model as well as a partial and misleading reading of the relevant literature. (shrink)

Despite the bad reputation of the legal profession, law remains king in America. A highly diverse society relies on the laws to maintain a working sense of the dignity and inviability of each individual. And a persistent element in contemporary debates is the fear that naturalistic theories of the human person will erode our belief that we have a dignity greater than that of other natural objects. Thus the endurance of the creation vs. evolution debate is due less to the (...) arguments of creationists, or to the continued influence of the book of Genesis, than to the reading of the evidence provided by Phillip E. Johnson of the University of California, Berkeley, Law School. (shrink)

Introductory essay, translation, updating and bibliography.