We report the identification of a recurrent, 520-kb 16p12.1 microdeletion associated with childhood developmental delay. The microdeletion was detected in 20 of 11,873 cases compared with 2 of 8,540 controls and replicated in a second series of 22 of 9,254 cases compared with 6 of 6,299 controls. Most deletions were inherited, with carrier parents likely to manifest neuropsychiatric phenotypes compared to non-carrier parents. Probands were more likely to carry an additional large copy-number variant when compared to matched controls. The clinical (...) features of individuals with two mutations were distinct from and/or more severe than those of individuals carrying only the co-occurring mutation. Our data support a two-hit model in which the 16p12.1 microdeletion both predisposes to neuropsychiatric phenotypes as a single event and exacerbates neurodevelopmental phenotypes in association with other large deletions or duplications. Analysis of other microdeletions with variable expressivity indicates that this two-hit model might be more generally applicable to neuropsychiatric disease. © 2010 Nature America, Inc. All rights reserved. (shrink)

The text quoted above each note is that of the edition of Seneca's tragedies by Otto Zwierlein , OCT 1986; numerous passages are discussed in his Kritischer Kommentar zu den Tragüdien Senecas , Stuttgart, 1986; various textual suggestions were made in a correspondence with Zw. by B. Axelson . Other works on Seneca's tragedies, referred to by the scholar's name only, are: Text and translation: F. J. Miller, Loeb, 1917; L. Herrmann, Budé, 1924–6. Text with commentary: R. J. Tarrant, Agamemnon (...) , and Thyestes ; J. G. Fitch, Hercules Furens . Text with commentary and translation: Elaine Fantham, Troades ; A. J.Boyle, Phaedra. (shrink)

Originally published in Proceedings of the British Academy 60 (1974), 339-359.

J.L. Ackrill's work on Plato and Aristotle has had a considerable influence upon ancient philosophical studies in the late twentieth century. This volume collects the best of Ackrill's essays on the two greatest philosophers of antiquity. With philosophical acuity and philological expertise he examines a wide range of texts and topics--from ethics and logic to epistemology and metaphysics--that continue to be in the focus of debate.

In a single volume intended for philosophy students of all levels as well as their teachers, this reader provides modern, accurate translations of the texts necessary for a careful study of most aspects of Aristotle's philosophy. Professor Ackrill has drawn on his broad experience of teaching graduate classes in selecting the texts, and his choice reflects issues of current philosophical interest as well as the perennial themes. Only recent translations which achieve a high level of accuracy have been chosen: the (...) aim is to place the reader without Greek, as nearly as possible, in the position of a reader of Greek. As an aid to study, a valuable guide to the key topics covered is also suppied, giving references to works or passages contained in the reader, an indication of their interrelation, and a currnet bibliography. (shrink)

J. L. Ackrill; VIII*—Aristotle's Definitions of Psuche, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 73, Issue 1, 1 June 1973, Pages 119–134, https://doi.org.

_The Foundations of Arithmetic_ is undoubtedly the best introduction to Frege's thought; it is here that Frege expounds the central notions of his philosophy, subjecting the views of his predecessors and contemporaries to devastating analysis. The book represents the first philosophically sound discussion of the concept of number in Western civilization. It profoundly influenced developments in the philosophy of mathematics and in general ontology.

On Kratzer’s canonical account, modal expressions (like “might” and “must”) are represented semantically as quantifiers over possibilities. Such expressions are themselves neutral; they make a single contribution to determining the propositions expressed across a wide range of uses. What modulates the modality of the proposition expressed—as bouletic, epistemic, deontic, etc.—is context.2 This ain’t the canon for nothing. Its power lies in its ability to figure in a simple and highly unified explanation of a fairly wide range of language use. Recently, (...) though, the canon’s neat story has come under attack. The challenge cases involve the epistemic use of a modal sentence for which no single resolution of the contextual parameter appears capable of accommodating all our intuitions.3 According to these revisionaries, such cases show that the canonical story needs to be amended in some way that makes multiple bodies of information relevant to the assessment of such statements. Here I show that how the right canonical, flexibly contextualist account of modals can accommodate the full range of challenge cases. The key will be to extend Kratzer’s formal semantic account with an account of how context selects values for a modal’s.. (shrink)

One of the more interesting counter-intuitive findings in organizational research is that success breeds failure. This counter-intuitive has been described in termsof core rigidities, core incompetencies, and even the Icarus Paradox. The literature on these topics has concluded that success yields overconfidence and myopia in firms and their managers, and this eventually causes failure. We augment this literature by suggesting that success breeds not only internal pathologies that cause firms to misuse their established resources over time, but also external pathologies (...) that cause firms to lose access to new resources. In particular, success influences stakeholders’ perceptions of firms, causing firms to lose the benefits of underdog status and gain the problems of overlord status. We term this notion that success warps images of the successful, leading to their decline over time, the Helios Paradox, and suggest that dominant firms must counter natural tendencies to succumb to both the Icarus and Helios Paradoxes if they are to remain successful over time. (shrink)

J. L. Ackrill; VIII*—Aristotle's Definitions of Psuche, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 73, Issue 1, 1 June 1973, Pages 119–134, https://doi.org.

Austin takes on the problem of other minds, of how to respond to the question ‘how do you know?’, if this question is raised with regard to the thoughts, feelings, sensations, minds of other creatures. This problem has traditionally been understood as the problem of justifying our belief in the existence of other minds. Austin argues that believing in other persons, in authority and testimony, is an essential part of the act of communicating, and as such is an irreducible part (...) of our experience. While we can state certain advantages of communicative performances, there is no justification for our doing them as such. (shrink)

What considerations place genuine constraints on an adequate semantics for normative and evaluative expressions? Linguists recognize facts about ordinary uses of such expressions and competent speakers’ judgments about which uses are appropriate. The contemporary literature reflects the widespread assumption that linguists don’t rely upon an additional source of data—competent speakers’ judgments about possible disagreement with hypothetical speech communities. We have several good reasons to think that such judgments are not probative for semantic theorizing. Therefore, we should accord these judgments no (...) probative value for the development of a semantics for our moral terms. Such judgments can no longer be presumed to put pressure on theories according to which our moral expressions share a semantics with ordinary, descriptive terms. Many rivals to pure, Descriptivist theories count among their advantages the ability to accommodate these judgments. If these judgments have no probative value, such theories lose an important source of support. (shrink)

On the meta-level, ‘A Plea for Excuses’, sometimes regarded as the manifesto of ordinary language philosophy, illustrates Austin’s method of approaching philosophical issues, by patiently analysing the subtleties of ordinary language, by example. On the object level, the key distinction with regard to human actions that appear to be worthy of blame, Austin holds to be between a justification, which denies that the performed action was wrong, and an excuse, which instead denies that the agent was responsible for performing it. (...) Austin gives careful attention to particular cases of exculpatory speech, including precise word order and varying emphasis, etymological studies, and the special function of adverbial qualifying phrases, and shows how legal precedents and abnormal psychology may also be helpful in understanding why some efforts to excuse fail. In the final analysis, excuses are properly seen as setting limits to the ascription of moral responsibility, by stating explicitly how they differ from the more usual cases. (shrink)

1. Causal knowledge is an indispensable element in science. Causal assertions are embedded in both the results and the procedures of scientific investigation. 2. It is therefore worthwhile to investigate the meaning of causal statements and the ways in which we can arrive at causal knowledge.

In many places and times, and for many people, God's existence has been rather less than a clear fact. According to the hiddenness argument, this is actually a reason to suppose that it is not a fact at all. The hiddenness argument is a new argument for atheism that has come to prominence in philosophy over the past two decades. J. L. Schellenberg first developed the argument in 1993, and this book offers a short and vigorous statement of its central (...) claims and ideas. Logically sharp but so clear that anyone can understand, the book addresses little-discussed issues such as why it took so long for hiddenness reasoning to emerge in philosophy, and how the hiddenness problem is distinct from the problem of evil. It concludes with the fascinating thought that retiring the last of the personal gods might leave us nearer the beginning of religion than the end. (shrink)

Seit dem 2. nachchristlichen Jahrhundert werden die Schriften von Aristoteles kommentiert. Diese Ausgabe enthält griechische Kommentare zu seinem Werk vom 3. bis 8. Jahrhundert n. Chr., u. a. von Alexander von Aphrodiensias, Themistios, Joh. Philoponus, Simplicius in griechischer Sprache.

The late John L. Mackie, formerly of University College, Oxford.

J.L. Schellenberg offers a path to a new kind of religious outlook. Reflection on our early stage in the evolutionary process leads to skepticism about religion, but also offers a new answer to the problem of faith and reason, and the possibility of a new, evolutionary form of religion.

Austin attacks the view that language is referential, based on the simplistic division of utterances into the ‘descriptive’ and ‘evaluative’, using his notion of performative utterances. Such utterances, in the appropriate circumstances, are neither descriptive nor evaluative, but count as actions, i.e., create the situation rather than describing or reporting on it. In saying ‘I promise to go’ one is making a promise, not stating that one is making it. A performative promise is not, and does not involve, the statement (...) that one is promising. It is an act of a distinctive sort, the very sort named by the performative verb. And, according to Austin, making explicit what one is doing is not describing what one is doing or stating that one is doing it. (shrink)

Criticises G. E. Moore’s highly influential proposal that ascriptions of agent ability implying freedom of choice or action, what the agent could do, are analyzable as conditional statements regarding what the agent would do under certain circumstances. Austin objects against Moore that some uses of ‘if’ are non-conditional and goes on to examine the uses of these non-conditional cases. Moore’s proposal also lies at the heart of some compatibilist theories of free will and determinism. Austin argues determinism to be a (...) pseudo-problem, so long as it remains a notion that is not itself clear cut. (shrink)

Some Christian philosophers wonder whether a God really would oppose reasonable nonbelief. Others think the answer to the problem of reasonable nonbelief is that there isn’t any. Between them, Douglas V. Henry and Robert T. Lehe cover all of this ground in their recent responses to my work on Divine hiddenness. Here I give my answers to their arguments.