José Emilio Pacheco es un autor mexicano de suma importancia en el ámbito de las letras. No solo ha ganado reconocimientos internacionales como el Premio Cervantes 2009, sino que ha producido una extensa obra donde destacan las novelas cortas y sus cuentos, como también sus libros de poesía, principalmente. A continuación, se propone realizar un recorrido por la obra tanto poética como narrativa del escritor mexicano, con el objetivo de develar el funcionamiento de algunas de las temáticas más recurrentes de (...) sus escritos, tales como el valor del secreto o lo oculto y el uso de los géneros de lo privado y lo íntimo, esto en concordancia con el tono reflexivo y crítico de sus escritos. (shrink)

Resumen: El corpus, siendo una herramienta eficaz, se está empleando en múltiples ámbitos, entre los que se encuentran los estudios de traducción. Sin embargo, dicho recurso no se utiliza con mucha frecuencia en las investigaciones traductológicas cuando una de las lenguas en cuestión es chino clásico (la lengua escrita empleada antiguamente en China), y autores que sí hacen estas investigaciones suelen no mencionar los pasos a seguir cuando se trata un corpus paralelo ad hoc. El objetivo del presente artículo es (...) presentar cómo se elabora un corpus paralelo chino clásico-español tomando como ejemplo la novela histórica Romance de los Tres Reinos y sus traducciones al español. Para ello, hemos descrito la problemática de creación y explotación de este tipo de corpus, siguiendo el orden de las fases del proceso. Resulta que algunas fases del proceso son universales, mientras que otras son propias de lenguas clásicas y de la combinación lingüística chino-otra lengua, en cuyo caso sí faltan aplicaciones eficaces. Con el trabajo, esperamos deparar información a los estudiosos que quieran realizar y profundizar las investigaciones basadas en corpus paralelo y en las obras clásicas de China. Abstract: The corpus, being an effective tool, is utilized in multiple fields. One of them is the Translation. However, this resource isn´t used frequently in translation studies when one of the languages in question is classical chinese (written language used anciently in China). And when it comes to an ad hoc parallel corpus, the steps of how to create it are usually omitted by researchers who make such investigations. The objective of this article is to present how to elaborate a classic Chinese-Spanish parallel corpus taking as example the historic novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms and its two translations into Spanish. To reach the objective, we have described the problem of creation and exploitation of this type of corpus, following the order of the phases of the process. We’ve found that some of the phases are universal while other phases are unique for old languages and for the linguistic combination Chinese-other language. And in this latter case, there’s a lack of effective applications. With the current work, we hope to offer useful information to those scholars who are willing to carry out their own investigations based on self-built parallel corpus and at the same time related to the classic Chinese works. (shrink)

What is the scope of our conscious mental agency, and how do we acquire self-knowledge of it? Both questions are addressed through an investigation of what best explains our inability to form judgemental thoughts in direct response to practical reasons. Contrary to what Williams and others have argued, it cannot be their subjection to a truth norm, given that our failure to adhere to such a norm need not undermine their status as judgemental. Instead, it is argued that we cannot (...) form judgements at will because we subjectively experience them as responses to epistemic reasons, and because this is incompatible with our experiential awareness of direct mental actions, such as instances of imagining. However, this latter awareness does not extend to indirect agency, which relies on epistemic or causal processes as means. Judging may therefore still count as an indirect action - just like, say, breaking a window by throwing a stone. (shrink)

In this chapter, I argue against empiricist positions which claim that empirical evidence can be sufficient to defeasibly justify aesthetic judgements, or judgements about the adequacy of aesthetic judgements, or sceptical judgements about someone's capacity to form adequate aesthetic judgements. First, empirical evidence provides neither inferential, nor non-inferential justification for aesthetic opinions. Second, while empirical evidence may tell us how we do respond aesthetically to artworks, it cannot tell us how we should respond to them. And, third, empirical insights into (...) the irrationality of many of our aesthetic judgements do not warrant the sceptical conclusion that we ought to refrain from forming aesthetic opinions. As a consequence of these limitations to aesthetic empiricism, we should endorse the rationalist position that aesthetic criticism is largely a matter of reasoning and, moreover, a collective undertaking. (shrink)

Se aborda la literatura homosexual en México desde una perspectiva político-social en el que el auge de la literatura hispanoamericana, retoma los principios de la lucha del reconocimiento de derechos homosexuales, en un contexto histórico de cambios, partiendo de un análisis crítico que permitirá al lector, dar cuenta de los hechos libertarios de un movimiento que, aunque no es nuevo en nuestro país, sí se postula como un momento de concientización social que rompe estereotipos y esquemas tradicionales de la libertad (...) sexual. (shrink)

Der Fokus dieser theologischen Analyse der ethischen Argumentationen und Positionen der deutschen Ärzteschaft seit 1945 liegt auf den Grenzen des Lebens und den entsprechenden Richtlinien und Stellungnahmen der Bundesärztekammer (BÄK). Welche Positionen und Begründungsmuster haben sich gewandelt - welche nicht? Was waren aktuelle Auslöser - welche Tendenzen zeichnen sich für das ärztliche Ethos ab? Welche Parallelen und Differenzen zu anderen Institutionen ergeben sich? Im Zentrum stehen zwei methodische Herangehensweisen: Eine detaillierte Analyse der historischen...

Este trabajo analiza los patrones de desambiguación de presuposiciones que se pueden considerar anafóricas y son generadas por partículas indexicales. En contraste con teorías recientes sobre la presuposición que privilegian la información lexical proponemos un análisis perspectivo de la presuposición según el cual la inferencia por defecto sobre este tipo de información hace uso de la perspectiva de los hablantes. En dos estudios exploramos el patrón de desambiguación de oraciones que contienen la palabra ‘también’ en contextos donde se usa el (...) indéxico ‘yo’. Los resultados confirman nuestra hipótesis y se discuten a la luz las principales ideas sobre presuposición y anáfora. A partir de estos resultados sugerimos algunas direcciones futuras de investigación. (shrink)

En su comentario a la Isagoge, Duns Escoto se pregunta dónde se halla el universal: ¿en las cosas o en el intelecto? Caracterizando al universal como universal lógico y accidente intencional de la esencia, en su respuesta se articulan la dimensión ontológica y la dimensión semántica del universal: con el intelecto que lo causa y con la cosa que denomina. Analizaremos estas dos relaciones y las implicaciones que se siguen en el orden de la predicación a partir del ejemplo propuesto (...) por Escoto: «hombre es universal». In his Questions on Porphyry’s Isagoge, Scotus asks about the place of inherence of the universal: ¿is it in the things or in the intellect? Being established the universal as logical universal and intentional accident of the essence, in Scotus’s answer the ontological and the semantical dimensions of the universal are articulated: with the intellect which causes it and with the thing it designates. We will analyse both of these relations and their implications in the order of predication taking into account Scotus’s example «man is universal». (shrink)

Begründet und entfaltet wird ein Begriff des Spiels, der sich um Lockungen und Drohungen des Unerwarteten dreht. Das Autorenduo ordnet seine Theorie der ludischen Aktion in klassische Konzepte des Spiels ein sowie in den aktuellen Diskurs der Game Studies. Die phänomenale Mannigfaltigkeit des Spiels wird in historischer Perspektive skizziert und in systematischer Weise gegliedert. Die Autoren erläutern medientechnische und kommunikative Voraussetzungen des Booms der Computerspiele und reflektieren die Diskussion über Eskalationen ludischer Gewalt. Kritisch ausgeleuchtet werden Instrumentalisierungen des Spiels, die sich (...) unter dem Stichwort Gamification wachsender Beliebtheit erfreuen. Die auffällige Inflation der Spielmetapher wird in Zusammenhang gebracht mit ludischen Anmutungen in den sozialen Strukturen der modernen und digitalen Gesellschaft. Fabian Arlt, M. A., hat Medienmanagement studiert und promoviert im Studiengang Gesellschafts- und Wirtschaftskommunikation der Universität der Künste (UdK) in Berlin. Prof. Dr. Hans-Jürgen Arlt ist Sozialwissenschaftler und Publizist, er lehrt am Institut für Theorie und Praxis der Kommunikation der Universität der Künste (UdK) in Berlin. (shrink)

Theodor W. Adorno inspired much of Germany’s 1960s student movement, but he came increasingly into conflict with this movement about the practical implications of his critical theory. Others – including his friend and colleague Herbert Marcuse – also accused Adorno of a quietism that is politically objectionable and in contradiction with his own theory. In this article, I recon- struct, and partially defend, Adorno’s views on theory and (political) praxis in Germany’s 1960s in 11 theses. His often attacked and maligned (...) stance during the 1960s is based on his analysis of these historical circumstances. Put provocatively, his stance consists in the view that people in the 1960s have tried to change the world, in various ways; the point – at that time – was to interpret it. (shrink)

Este trabajo reconstruye la comprensión ontológica que de fondo actúa en la tematización diferente del fenómeno de la caída en Heidegger y Marcuse. Se sostiene que la extensión de la “diferencia ontológica” es esencialmente distinta dada la “corrección dialéctica” de la fenomenología exigida por Marcuse. Frente a una comprensión originariamente temporea del ser se sitúa otra que introduce en el desenvolvimiento temporeo del ser una dimensión normativa. Con ello se impone una comprensión fundamentalmente diferente de la caída. Las indicaciones acerca (...) de esta problemática son elaboradas desde la recepción particular de la filosofía hegeliana que cada uno lleva a cabo. (shrink)

Philosophy &Public Affairs, Volume 51, Issue 2, Page 166-190, Spring 2023.

In this paper, I describe and discuss two mental phenomena which are somewhat neglected in the philosophy of mind: focused daydreaming and mind-wandering. My aim is to show that their natures are rather distinct, despite the fact that we tend to classify both as instances of daydreaming. The first difference between the two, I argue, is that, while focused daydreaming is an instance of imaginative mental agency, mind-wandering is not—though this does not mean that mind-wandering cannot involve mental agency at (...) all. This personal-level difference in agency and purposiveness has, furthermore, the consequence that instances of mind-wandering do not constitute unified and self-contained segments of the stream of consciousness—in stark contrast to focused daydreams. Besides, the two kinds of mental phenomena differ in whether they possess a narrative structure, and in how we may make sense of the succession of mental episodes involved. (shrink)

A growing body of evidence in cognitive psychology and neuroscience suggests a deep interconnection between sensory-motor and language systems in the brain. Based on recent neurophysiological findings on the anatomo-functional organization of the fronto-parietal network, we present a computational model showing that language processing may have reused or co-developed organizing principles, functionality, and learning mechanisms typical of premotor circuit. The proposed model combines principles of Hebbian topological self-organization and prediction learning. Trained on sequences of either motor or linguistic units, the (...) network develops independent neuronal chains, formed by dedicated nodes encoding only context-specific stimuli. Moreover, neurons responding to the same stimulus or class of stimuli tend to cluster together to form topologically connected areas similar to those observed in the brain cortex. Simulations support a unitary explanatory framework reconciling neurophysiological motor data with established behavioral evidence on lexical acquisition, access, and recall. (shrink)

Este estudo pretende compreender a emblemática expressão «cultura do encontro», no marco do magistério e testemunho do Papa Francisco. Desde o início de seu pontificado, a categoria «encontro» recebe destaque em seus pronunciamentos e, principalmente, nos seus gestos. Em diversos momentos da história de Israel, as palavras e os gestos foram a forma escolhida por Deus para se revelar ao seu povo, especialmente por intermédio dos profetas. Pretende-se assim, também considerar a dimensão profética de seus ensinamentos e testemunho e, dessa (...) forma constatar como a cultura do encontro é uma atualização e epifania do Reino de Deus para os nossos dias. A abordagem consistirá em analisar como Francisco explica, descreve e propõe a cultura do encontro em seus pronunciamentos para identificar seu dinamismo. E, por fim, verificar como o próprio pontífice se exercita e promove a «cultura do encontro» mediante a consideração de suas 27 viagens apostólicas fora da Itália. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to link empirical findings concerning environmental inequalities with different normative yard-sticks for assessing whether these inequalities should be deemed unjust, or not. We argue that such an inquiry must necessarily take into account some caveats regarding both empirical research and normative theory. We suggest that empirical results must be contextualised by establishing geographies of risk. As a normative yard-stick we propose a moderately demanding social-egalitarian account of justice and democratic citizenship, which we take to (...) be best suited to identify unjust as well as legitimate instances of socio-environmental inequality. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungDie Geschichte der genetischen Pränataldiagnostik ist bislang als Teil der Geschichte der Humangenetik und deren Neuorientierung als klinisch-laborwissenschaftliche Disziplin in der zweiten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts betrachtet worden. Anhand neuen Quellenmaterials soll in diesem Beitrag gezeigt werden, dass das Interesse an der Pränataldiagnostik in Westdeutschland auch im Kontext von Forschungen entstand, die sich mit Gefahren für den Menschen in der Umwelt befassten. Anhand der Debatten um die Einrichtung des DFG-Schwerpunktprogramms „Pränatale Diagnostik genetischer Defekte“ 1970 untersuchen wir, wie die Technik der (...) Amniozentese in Westdeutschland von einer interdisziplinären Forschungsgruppe eingeführt wurde, die sich mit Schädigungen des Organismus durch Strahlen, Arzneimittel und andere Gebrauchsstoffe und Konsumgüter befasste. In einer als ökologische Wende bezeichneten Zeit wachsenden Umweltbewusstseins, so unsere These, sollte durch die Förderung der Pränataldiagnostik eine wahrgenommene Lücke in der Prävention umweltbedingt auftretender genetischer Anomalien geschlossen werden. Für die Pränataldiagnostik als „Schutzmaßnahme“ sprach unter anderem ihre erwartete Finanzierung als Krankenkassenleistung im Zuge der Reform des Abtreibungsrechts. Erst in einem zweiten Schritt führten Veränderungen von Strukturen der Forschung, vor allem aber Erfahrungen in der gynäkologischen Praxis zu einer Neuausrichtung auf die Diagnostik und Prävention mehrheitlich erblicher oder spontan auftretender Anomalien. Die Pränataldiagnostik, so wie sie schließlich in Westdeutschland ab den frühen 1980er Jahren routinemäßig Einsatz fand, hatte mit Fragen der „Umwelt“ kaum noch zu tun. Diese Fallstudie zur Frühgeschichte der genetischen Pränataldiagnostik handelt von dem noch wenig untersuchten Verhältnis von humangenetischer Forschung, klinischer Praxis und Umweltforschung und hat zum weiteren Ziel, den bisher in anderen Kontexten beschriebenen Wandel von Perspektiven in der Vorsorge um 1970 zu beleuchten. (shrink)

The problem of algorithmic fairness is typically framed as the problem of finding a unique formal criterion that guarantees that a given algorithmic decision-making procedure is morally permissible. In this paper, I argue that this is conceptually misguided and that we should replace the problem with two sub-problems. If we examine how most state-of-the-art machine learning systems work, we notice that there are two distinct stages in the decision-making process. First, a prediction of a relevant property is made. Secondly, a (...) decision is taken based (at least partly) on this prediction. These two stages have different aims: the prediction is aimed at accuracy, while the decision is aimed at allocating a given good in a way that maximizes some context-relative utility measure. Correspondingly, two different fairness issues can arise. First, predictions could be biased in discriminatory ways. This means that the predictions contain systematic errors for a specific group of individuals. Secondly, the system’s decisions could result in an allocation of goods that is in tension with the principles of distributive justice. These two fairness issues are distinct problems that require different types of solutions. I here provide a formal framework to address both issues and argue that this way of conceptualizing them resolves some of the paradoxes present in the discussion of algorithmic fairness. (shrink)

In recent years, there has been a surge in research addressing the question which properties predictive algorithms ought to satisfy in order to be considered fair. Three of the most widely discussed criteria of fairness are the criteria called equalized odds, predictive parity, and counterfactual fairness. In this paper, I will present a new impossibility result involving these three criteria of algorithmic fairness. In particular, I will argue that there are realistic circumstances under which any predictive algorithm that satisfies counterfactual (...) fairness will violate both other fairness criteria, that is, equalized odds and predictive parity. As will be shown, this impossibility result forces us to give up one of four intuitively plausible assumptions about algorithmic fairness. I will explain and motivate each of the four assumptions and discuss which of them can plausibly be given up in order to circumvent the impossibility. (shrink)

En este trabajo se estudia la concepción de la filosofía y el método de la exageración propuesto por Günther Anders en su obra en dos volúmenes La obsolescencia del hombre (1956-1980). Si temáticamente el centro de la obra es la preocupación por la posible autodestrucción de la humanidad en la época atómica; Anders también propone una comprensión de la filosofía y de su método como correlato operatorio de dicha posible aniquilación. Esta revisión de la filosofía y su método constituyen la (...) justificación del tratamiento filosófico de la posibilidad de la autodestrucción de la humanidad. (shrink)

This thesis aims to clarify a number of conceptual aspects of the debate surrounding algorithmic fairness. The particular focus here is the role of causal modeling in defining criteria of algorithmic fairness. In Chapter 1, I argue that in the discussion of algorithmic fairness, two fundamentally distinct notions of fairness have been conflated. Subsequently, I propose that what is usually taken to be the problem of algorithmic fairness should be divided into two subproblems, the problem of predictive fairness, and the (...) problem of allocative fairness. At the core of Chapter 2 is the proof of a theorem that establishes that three of the most popular (predictive) fairness criteria are pairwise incompatible. In particular, I show that under certain conditions, a predictive algorithm that satisfies a criterion called counterfactual fairness will with logical necessity violate two other popular predictive fairness criteria called equalized odds and predictive parity. In Chapter 3, a new predictive fairness criterion is developed using a mathematical framework for causal modeling. This fairness criterion, which I call causal relevance fairness, is a relaxation of another popular fairness criterion, counterfactual fairness, but turns out to be more closely in line with philosophical theories of discrimination. In Chapter 4, another infamous impossibility result in algorithmic fairness is analyzed through the lens of causality. I argue that by using a causal inference method called matching, we can modify the two fairness criteria equalized odds and predictive parity in a way that resolves the impossibility. Lastly, Chapter 5 contains an empirical case study. In it, the fairness of a popular recidivism risk prediction tool is analyzed using the criteria of (predictive) fairness developed earlier. (shrink)

In this paper, we take up two objections Raymond Geuss levels against John Rawls′ ideal theory in Philosophy and Real Politics. We show that, despite their fundamental disagreements, the two theorists share a common starting point: they both reject doing political philosophy by way of applying an independently derived moral theory; and grapple with the danger of unduly privileging the status quo. However, neither Rawls′ characterization of politics nor his ideal theoretical approach as response to the aforementioned danger is adequate (...) or so we argue. Moreover, contrary to received opinion, Geuss′ political philosophy is the more reflective and the more philosophical of the two. In a final section, we highlight another agreement: both think that political philosophers should develop conceptual innovations as a way of clarifying and overcoming practical problems. We demonstrate that Geuss could offer a number of reasons for finding Rawls′ conceptual innovations wanting. (shrink)

Would Habermas’s “The Entwinement of Myth and Enlightenment” pass muster as coursework in a class on Dialectic of Enlightenment? Using this polemical thought experiment setup as an estrangement device, I critically discuss Habermas’s essay that was pivotal in his repositioning of Critical Theory in the 1980s. I argue that it is philosophically and biographically unreflective; and that he is engaging in underhanded politicking. I sketch an alternative reading of Dialectic of Enlightenment: instead of viewing it as the dead end that (...) Habermas presents it to be, we can see as a self-therapeutical exercise in destabilizing a complacent self-conception whereby modernity is the pinnacle of moral progress—an exercise which might have a certain exemplarity for others in the ongoing quest of making use of our own understanding. The contribution is rounded off with a postscript by a second assessor of Habermas’s essay, discussing both the proposed assessment and the polemical thought experiment. (shrink)

This article considers Theodor W. Adorno’s thesis of the ‘liquidation of the individual’ as a contribution to the critique of political economy insofar as it links structural economic imperatives o...

This book collects published and unpublished work over the last dozen years by one of today's most distinguished and provocative anthropologists. Johannes Fabian is widely known outside of his discipline because his work so often overcomes traditional scholarly boundaries to bring fresh insight to central topics in philosophy, history, and cultural studies. The first part of the book addresses questions of current critical concern. The second part extends the work of critique into the past by examining the beginning of modern (...) ethnography in the exploration of Central Africa during the late nineteenth century: the justification of a scientific attitude and the collecting of ethnographic objects. A final essay examines how the Congolese have returned the 'imperial gaze' of Belgium by the work of critical memory in popular history. The ten chapters are framed by two meditations on the relevance of theory and the irrelevance of the millennium. (shrink)

The uncertainty associated with paradigmatic families has been shown to correlate with their phonetic characteristics in speech, suggesting that representations of complex sublexical relations between words are part of speaker knowledge. To better understand this, recent studies have used two-layer neural network models to examine the way paradigmatic uncertainty emerges in learning. However, to date this work has largely ignored the way choices about the representation of inflectional and grammatical functions in models strongly influence what they subsequently learn. To explore (...) the consequences of this, we investigate how representations of IFS in the input-output structures of learning models affect the capacity of uncertainty estimates derived from them to account for phonetic variability in speech. Specifically, we examine whether IFS are best represented as outputs to neural networks or as inputs by building models that embody both choices and examining their capacity to account for uncertainty effects in the formant trajectories of word final [ɐ], which in German discriminates around sixty different IFS. Overall, we find that formants are enhanced as the uncertainty associated with IFS decreases. This result dovetails with a growing number of studies of morphological and inflectional families that have shown that enhancement is associated with lower uncertainty in context. Importantly, we also find that in models where IFS serve as inputs—as our theoretical analysis suggests they ought to—its uncertainty measures provide better fits to the empirical variance observed in [ɐ] formants than models where IFS serve as outputs. This supports our suggestion that IFS serve as cognitive cues during speech production, and should be treated as such in modeling. It is also consistent with the idea that when IFS serve as inputs to a learning network. This maintains the distinction between those parts of the network that represent message and those that represent signal. We conclude by describing how maintaining a “signal-message-uncertainty distinction” can allow us to reconcile a range of apparently contradictory findings about the relationship between articulation and uncertainty in context. (shrink)

Lukács hat einst provokativ auf seine Frage „Was ist der orthodoxe Marxismus“ geantwortet, dass er in einer bestimmten Methode bestehe. Was aber wenn wir heute fragen, worin orthodoxe kritische Theorie besteht? Meine Antwort ist hierbei nicht eine bestimmte Methode, aber dafür nicht weniger provokant. Was die kritische Theorie kritisch macht ist auch nicht – trotz der vorherrschenden Meinung – ein Begründungsprogram. Im Gegenteil, nur ohne ein Begründungsprogram ist kritische Theorie angemessen kritisch. Ich umreiße meine Antwort mit Rückgriff auf Horkheimers Schriften (...) der ’30er Jahre. Das vorgebrachte Verständnis der kritischen Theorie ist orthodox auch in einem weiteren Sinn: darin, dass es ein bestimmtes Interesse – das Interesse an der Abschaffung von Unrecht, Elend, und Unfreiheit – als konstitutiv für kritische Theorie erachtet, und somit, obwohl nicht religiös, doch etwas mit Strenggläubigkeit zu tun hat. Dieser Ansatz wird zum Schluss skizzenhaft auf die Idee der Sozialpathologie angewendet. (shrink)

This paper aims to make a proposal to govern the Peruvian State under the umbrella of management cybernetics, following the paths of the viable system model, proposed by Prof. Stafford Beer, enriched with other soft and hard systemic methodologies and technologies, to cover the soft and hard issues that are part of the complex Peruvian reality at different levels of recursion. For doing this, four defined perspectives were adopted to understand the complexity of Peru: the sectoral view, the regions view, (...) the river basins view and the macroregions view. Peru is seen as a system in focus, defining, for each of these four perspectives, the five systems that VSM has. The application of the VSM in each perspective serves to apply it in two modes: diagnosis and design, according to the respective perspective. Then an integrative analysis and reflection is done considering the four perspectives, to analyze the viability of the VSM approach in the governance of the Peruvian State to establish some conclusions and recommendations in relation to the proposal, appearing at the end of the paper. (shrink)

Mental capacity and autonomy are often understood to be normatively neutral? the only values or other norms they may presuppose are those the assessed person does or would accept. We show how mental disorder threatens normatively neutral accounts of autonomy. These accounts produce false positives, particularly in the case of disorders (such as depression, anorexia nervosa and schizophrenia) that affect evaluative abilities. Two normatively neutral strategies for handling autonomy-undermining disorder are explored and rejected: a blanket exclusion of mental disorder, and (...) functional tests requiring consistency, expression of identity, reflective non-alienation or lack of compulsion. Finally, we suggest ways in which substantivist alternatives to neutrality can be made more promising through increased transparency, democratic contestability of conditions for capacity and autonomy, and a historically sensitive caution concerning restrictions of liberty. (shrink)

According to Karen Neander’s causal-informational teleosemantics, the contents of perceptual states depend on the etiological response functions of sensory-perceptual systems. In this paper, I argue that this theory is, despite its virtues, unable to explain how humans and other animals are capable of perceiving properties with which no sensory-perceptual system has ever been confronted. After rejecting Neander’s own proposal in terms of second-order similarity and a proposal inspired by Ruth Millikan in terms of simplicity, I offer a solution which equates (...) functions with manifestations of dispositions that made a difference to evolutionary success. My suggestion is able to generate determinate and plausible contents for new perceptual states while still preserving the idea that etiological functions explain evolutionary success. (shrink)

The measure of what can be considered “new” is what is already known. What is “new” – be it a (technical) invention, a new method, or a newly discovered natural phenomenon – must distinguish itself...

A REALIDADE DAS SERRAS CENTRAIS POTIGUARES E A QUESTÃO DO DESENVOLVIMENTO REGIONAL SOB A PERSPECTIVA DO DIREITO, DESENVOLVIMENTO E SUSTENTABILIDADE.

Cutting across boundaries of art and science, evolution is a fundamental process that has beguiled thinkers through the ages. This collection draws together world renowned thinkers and communicators with their own intriguing insights. In these essays they offer a feast of dazzling thoughts and ideas to challenge and enthrall the reader. Why and how do civilisations and societies change over time? Why do our cells develop the way they do? Why are some villages still villages while others have grown into (...) vast cities? Can we learn from our evolutionary past to plan a better future for our health and society? Tracing a line from the history of biological evolution, through the evolution of cultures, society, science and the universe, Evolution brings together intriguing parallels from all levels of life. From the evolution of the developing embryo to the evolution of a developing star, common threads develop into a fascinating story. (shrink)