The paper examines Amartya Sen’s seminal work Development and Freedom (1999) in relation to his underlying conception of justice and particularly in relation to the tension that arises in the correlation between basic freedom and basic goods. The idea is to address the question as to which of the two elements (basic goods or basic freedoms) takes precedence to the enactment of global justice. The paper advances a particular distinction between a foundational approach and a functional approach when addressing the (...) question of the priority and primacy of any of the two elements and sheds light on a contentious answer, namely, that basic goods are foundationally primary in relation to basic freedoms and that such a primacy does not rule out the functional priority of basic freedoms. (shrink)

El artículo examina una serie de tensiones y conflictos propios del así llamado cosmopolitismo institucional y su correlato: la idea de la justicia global. Se persiguen dos tipos de reflexión, a saber, una reflexión propositiva respecto del sentido de la idea de justicia global y su vínculo con la justicia doméstica (nacional), y, por otro lado, una reflexión defensiva y dirigida a los escépticos respecto de la posibilidad de una teoría de la justicia conglomerante, según lo denomina Amartya Sen. Se (...) dibujarán las líneas argumentativas básicas en defensa del cosmopolitismo institucional, desde las cuales se hace posible capturar, sin contradicción, las demandas de la así llamada justicia social doméstica, esto es, la justicia en el contexto estricto de los Estado-nación particulares. (shrink)

In a recent paper in this Journal, one of us argued against placing He above Be in Mendeleiev’s system of the elements. In it the goal was to dispute the notion that in Mendeleiev’s system of the elements the location of He should in fact lie above Be, which has a very similar electronic configuration, rather than above the noble gas column. That paper was based on rather old, Hartree–Fock limit studies on the strikingly limited non-additive contributions in the He3 (...) and He4 systems in contrast with the much larger non-additivity obtained for the Be3, Be4 and Be5 oligomers. In a recent benchmark multireference Averaged Quadratic Coupled Cluster results on Be2 and Be3 we showed that the delocalized non-additive contribution comprises 94 % of the binding energy of Be3. Here we use this and other pertinent information (drawn from the same paper) to conclude that He may not be associated with Be in Mendeleiev’s Table, despite their quite similar spectroscopic ground states. Furthermore, we use the new results to show that the large non-additivity implies that less than 2 % of the Be3 binding is located in each Be pair contained within the Be trimer. The rest of the interaction energy is necessarily delocalized over all three Be atoms. This might actually announce the bulk properties (i.e. “the electron gas”) that in solid-state physics explain the large electric and heat conduction for the solid Be metal. Thus, in the case of beryllium the metallic characteristics are already evident in Be3, a far cry from the monoatomic helium gas. (shrink)

In his 1985 book on philosophy and atheism, the Canadian thinker Kai Nielsen, a prolific writer on the subject, wonders why the philosophy of religion is ‘so boring’, and concludes that it must be ‘because the case for atheism is so strong that it is difficult to work up much enthusiasm for the topic.’ Indeed, Nielsen even regards most of the contemporary arguments for atheism as little more than ‘mopping up operations after the Enlightenment’ which, on the whole, add little (...) to the socio-anthropological and socio-psychological accounts of religion provided by thinkers like Feuerbach, Marx and Freud, as any ‘reasonable person informed by modernity’ will readily acknowledge. On this view, the answer to Kant's question – ‘What may we hope?’ – does not gesture towards a resurrection and personal immortality, but instead to the death of religious discourse itself: I think, and indeed hope, that God-talk, and religious discourse more generally, is, or at least should be, dying out in the West, or more generally in a world that has felt the force of a Weberian disenchantment of the world. This sense that religious convictions are no longer a live option is something which people who think of themselves as either modernists or post-modernists very often tend to have. (shrink)

: In this essay, Solis contemplates how queercrip—both homosexual and disabled—readings of four editions of "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" might be used to destabilize "normative" sexual identities. His goal is to argue against secrecy and for disclosure; thus, a main question guides the analysis: How might we (for example, parents, teachers, counselors) use picture books to reevaluate human sexuality in all its varied manifestations to avoid condemning to the closet all those who do not approximate a prescribed "norm"?

In this essay, Solis contemplates how queercrip-both homosexual and disabled-readings of four editions of "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" might be used to destabilize "normative" sexual identities. His goal is to argue against secrecy and for disclosure; thus, a main question guides the analysis: How might we use picture books to reevaluate human sexuality in all its varied manifestations to avoid condemning to the closet all those who do not approximate a prescribed "norm"?

This paper examines folk theories of algorithmic recommendations on Spotify in order to make visible the cultural specificities of data assemblages in the global South. The study was conducted in Costa Rica and draws on triangulated data from 30 interviews, 4 focus groups with 22 users, and the study of “rich pictures” made by individuals to graphically represent their understanding of algorithmic recommendations. We found two main folk theories: one that personifies Spotify and another one that envisions it as a (...) system full of resources. Whereas the first theory emphasizes local conceptions of social relations to make sense of algorithms, the second one stresses the role of algorithms in providing a global experience of music and technology. We analyze why people espouse either one of these theories and how these theories provide users with resources to enact different modalities of power and resistance in relation to recommendation algorithms. We argue that folk theories thus offer a productive way to broaden understanding of what agency means in relation to algorithms. (shrink)

In this paper we will demonstrate that a computational system can meet the criteria for autonomy laid down by classical enactivism. The two criteria that we will focus on are operational closure and structural determinism, and we will show that both can be applied to a basic example of a physically instantiated Turing machine. We will also address the question of precariousness, and briefly suggest that a precarious Turing machine could be designed. Our aim in this paper is to challenge (...) the assumption that computational systems are necessarily heteronomous systems, to try and motivate in enactivism a more nuanced and less rigid conception of computational systems, and to demonstrate to computational theorists that they might find some interesting material within the enactivist tradition, despite its historical hostility towards computationalism. (shrink)

When adopting a sound logical system, reasonings made within this system are correct. The situation with reasonings expressed, at least in part, with natural language is much more ambiguous. One way to be certain of the correctness of these reasonings is to provide a logical model of them. To conclude that a reasoning process is correct we need the logical model to be faithful to the reasoning. In this case, the reasoning inherits, so to speak, the correctness of the logical (...) model. There is a weak link in this procedure, which I call the faithfulness problem: how do we decide that the logical model is faithful to the reasoning that it is supposed to model? That is an issue external to logic, and we do not have rigorous formal methods to make the decision. The purpose of this paper is to expose the faithfulness problem (not to solve it). For that purpose, we will consider two examples, one from the geometrical reasoning in Euclid’s Elements and the other from a study on deductive reasoning in the psychology of reasoning. (shrink)

In line with Allen Newell's challenge to develop complete cognitive architectures, and motivated by a recent proposal for a unifying subsymbolic computational theory of cognition, we introduce the cognitive control architecture SEMLINCS. SEMLINCS models the development of an embodied cognitive agent that learns discrete production rule-like structures from its own, autonomously gathered, continuous sensorimotor experiences. Moreover, the agent uses the developing knowledge to plan and control environmental interactions in a versatile, goal-directed, and self-motivated manner. Thus, in contrast to several well-known (...) symbolic cognitive architectures, SEMLINCS is not provided with production rules and the involved symbols, but it learns them. In this paper, the actual implementation of SEMLINCS causes learning and self-motivated, autonomous behavioral control of the game figure Mario in a clone of the computer game Super Mario Bros. Our evaluations highlight the successful development of behavioral versatility as well as the learning of suitable production rules and the involved symbols from sensorimotor experiences. Moreover, knowledge- and motivation-dependent individualizations of the agents’ behavioral tendencies are shown. Finally, interaction sequences can be planned on the sensorimotor-grounded production rule level. Current limitations directly point toward the need for several further enhancements, which may be integrated into SEMLINCS in the near future. Overall, SEMLINCS may be viewed as an architecture that allows the functional and computational modeling of embodied cognitive development, whereby the current main focus lies on the development of production rules from sensorimotor experiences. (shrink)

The autopoietic theory and the enactive approach are two theoretical streams that, in spite of their historical link and conceptual affinities, offer very different views on the nature of living beings. In this paper, we compare these views and evaluate, in an exploratory way, their respective degrees of internal coherence. Focusing the analyses on certain key notions such as autonomy and organizational closure, we argue that while the autopoietic theory manages to elaborate an internally consistent conception of living beings, the (...) enactive approach presents an internal tension regarding its characterization of living beings as intentional systems directed at the environment. (shrink)

Building on the original formulation of the autopoietic theory (AT), extended enactivism argues that living beings are autopoietic systems that extend beyond the spatial boundaries of the organism. In this article, we argue that extended enactivism, despite having some basis in AT’s original formulation, mistakes AT’s definition of living beings as autopoietic entities. We offer, as a reply to this interpretation, a more embodied reformulation of autopoiesis, which we think is necessary to counterbalance the (excessively) disembodied spirit of AT’s original (...) formulation. The article aims to clarify and correct what we take to be a misinterpretation of AT as a research program. AT, contrary to what some enactivists seem to believe, did not (and does not) intend to motivate an extended conception of living beings. AT’s primary purpose, we argue, was (and is) to provide a universal individuation criterion for living beings, these understood as discrete bodies that are embedded in, but not constituted by, the environment that surrounds them. However, by giving a more explicitly embodied definition of living beings, AT can rectify and accommodate, so we argue, the enactive extended interpretation of autopoiesis, showing that although living beings do not extend beyond their boundaries as autopoietic unities, they do form part, in normal conditions, of broader autopoietic systems that include the environment. (shrink)

In this essay, Solis contemplates how queercrip—both homosexual and disabled—readings of four editions of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” might be used to destabilize “normative” sexual identities. His goal is to argue against secrecy and for disclosure; thus, a main question guides the analysis: How might we use picture books to reevaluate human sexuality in all its varied manifestations to avoid condemning to the closet all those who do not approximate a prescribed “norm”?

In this essay, Solis contemplates how queercrip—both homosexual and disabled—readings of four editions of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” might be used to destabilize “normative” sexual identities. His goal is to argue against secrecy and for disclosure; thus, a main question guides the analysis: How might we use picture books to reevaluate human sexuality in all its varied manifestations to avoid condemning to the closet all those who do not approximate a prescribed “norm”?

Machine generated contents note: I. METAPHYSICS -- 1. How Do Realism, Materialism, and Dialectics Fare in Contemporary Science? -- 2. New Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous -- 3. Energy: Between Physics and Metaphysics -- 4. The Revival of Causality -- 5. Emergence and the Mind -- 6 SCIENTIFIC REALISM -- 6. The Status of Concepts -- 7. Popper's Unworldly World 3 --II. METHODOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE -- 8. On Method in the Philosophy of Science -- 9. Induction in Science (...) -- 10. The GST Challenge to the Classical Philosophies of Science -- 11. The Power and Limits of Reduction -- 12. Thinking in Metaphors --III. PHILOSOPHY OF MATHEMATICS -- 13. Moderate Mathematical Fictionism -- 14. The Gap between Mathematics and Reality -- 15. Two Faces and Three Masks of Probability --IV. PHILOSOPHY OF PHYSICS -- 16. Physical Relativity and Philosophy -- 17. Hidden Variables, Separability, and Realism -- 18. Schrodinger's Cat Is Dead --V. PHILOSOPHY OF PSYCHOLOGY -- 19. From Mindless Neuroscience and Brainless Psychology to Neuropsychology -- 20. Explaining Creativity -- VI. PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE -- 21. Analytic Philosophy of Society and Social Science: -- The Systemic Approach as an Alternative to Holism and Individualism -- 22. Rational Choice Theory: A Critical Look at Its Foundations -- 23. Realism and Antirealism in Social Science --VII. PHILOSOPHY OF TECHNOLOGY -- 24. The Nature of Applied Science and Technology -- 25. The Technology-Science-Philosophy Triangle in Its Social Context -- 26. The Technologies in Philosophy --VIII. MORAL PHILOSOPHY -- 27. A New Look at Moral Realism -- 28. Rights Imply Duties --IX. SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY -- 29. Morality Is the Basis of Legal and Political Legitimacy -- 30. Technoholodemocracy: An Alternative to -- Capitalism and Socialism -- Bibliography -- Index of Names -- Index of Subjects. (shrink)

Two concepts of truth as correspondence of ideas with facts are analyzed. One of them is the thought-external fact relation, and the other is the fact-proposition one. The two maps are then composed, and the resulting map is assumed to formalize the concept of truth as adequacy or correspondence of ideas to facts. Besides, some desiderata for a correspondence theory of partial truth are proposed. Finally, the truth criteria employed in science and technology are recalled.

Business Ethics: A European Review, EarlyView.

The received view in philosophical studies of quantum field theory is that Feynman diagrams are simply calculational devices. Alongside this view we have the one that takes virtual quanta to be also simply formal tools. This received view was developed and consolidated in philosophy of physics by Mario Bunge, Paul Teller, Michael Redhead, Robert Weingard, Brigitte Falkenburg, and others. In this article I present an alternative to the received view.

The aim of this article is to elucidate the notions of explanation and mechanism, in particular of the social kind. A mechanism is defined as what makes a concrete system tick, and it is argued that to propose an explanation proper is to exhibit a lawful mechanism. The so-called covering law model is shown to exhibit only the logical aspect of explanation: it just subsumes particulars under universals. A full or mechanismic explanation involves mechanismic law statements, not purely descriptive ones (...) such as functional relations and rate equations. Many examples from the natural, biosocial, and social sciences are examined. In particular, macro-micro-micro-macro social relations are shown to explain other wise puzzling macro-macro links. The last part of the article relates the author's progress, over half a century, toward understanding mechanism and explanation. (shrink)

This essay addresses the relationships between prescription and description in legal rules. The analysis will focus on the culture-laden connotations of factual categories implied in all legal sentences and/or provisions. This investigation is spurred by the need to assess the impact of cultural difference in people’s understanding of legal imperatives and, symmetrically, how that impact is to be considered in the application of law. Differences in ways of categorizing the world could position the cultural pre-understanding required by law, and the (...) pluralism recognized and protected by constitutional principles and human/fundamental rights discourse, at a crossroads. Hence, even when we find an illegitimacy or an ignorance about what legal rules do not explicitly state but instead implicitly presuppose, this does not exclude that behind that ignorance there may be something worthy of legal protection. A question emerges: is it legitimate and reasonable to consider the ignorantia facti resulting from differing ways of categorizing the factual world as automatically and uncritically subject to the principle ignoratia legis non excusat? The essay continues with an assessment of the possible consequences of ignorantia facti in the administration of justice in multicultural societies and migration contexts. For this purpose, the opportunity for an intercultural use of law—including within national law—will be considered as a means of avoiding the discriminatory application of ignorantia facti. This topic will be addressed by leveraging both semiotic and cultural-anthropological analytical tools, including the well-known greimasien “contrat de véridiction”. (shrink)

This article addresses the following problems: What is a mechanism, how can it be discovered, and what is the role of the knowledge of mechanisms in scientific explanation and technological control? The proposed answers are these. A mechanism is one of the processes in a concrete system that makes it what it is — for example, metabolism in cells, interneuronal connections in brains, work in factories and offices, research in laboratories, and litigation in courts of law. Because mechanisms are largely (...) or totally imperceptible, they must be conjectured. Once hypothesized they help explain, because a deep scientific explanation is an answer to a question of the form, "How does it work, that is, what makes it tick—what are its mechanisms?" Thus, by contrast with the subsumption of particulars under a generalization, an explanation proper consists in unveiling some lawful mechanism, as when political stability is explained by either coercion, public opinion manipulation, or democratic participation. Finding mechanisms satisfies not only the yearning for understanding, but also the need for control. Key Words: explanation • function • mechanism • process • system • systemism. (shrink)

pt. I. Matter: 1. Philosophy as worldview ; 2. Classical matter: bodies and fields ; 3. Quantum matter: weird but real ; 4. General concept of matter: to be is to become ; 5. Emergence and levels ; 6. Naturalism ; 7. Materialism -- pt. II. Mind: 8. The mind-body problem ; 9. Minding matter: the plastic brain ; 10. Mind and society ; 11. Cognition, consciousness, and free will ; 12. Brain and computer: the hardware/software dualism ; 13. Knowledge: (...) genuine and bogus -- pt. III. Appendices: 14. Appendix A: Objects ; 15. Appendix B. Truths. (shrink)

Predictivists use the no miracle argument to argue that “novel” predictions are decisive evidence for theories, while mere accommodation of “old” data cannot confirm to a significant degree. But deductivists claim that since confirmation is a logical theory-data relationship, predicted data cannot confirm more than merely deduced data, and cite historical cases in which known data confirmed theories quite strongly. On the other hand, the advantage of prediction over accommodation is needed by scientific realists to resist Laudan’s criticisms of the (...) no miracle argument. So, if the deductivists are right, the most powerful argument for realism collapses. There seems to be an inescapable contradiction between these prima facie plausible arguments of predictivists and deductivists; but this puzzle can be solved by understanding what exactly counts as novelty, if novel predictions must support the no miracle argument, i.e., if they must be explainable only by the truth of theories. Taking my cues from the use-novelty tradition, I argue that (1) the predicted data must not be used essentially in building the theory or choosing the auxiliary assumptions. This is possible if the theory and its auxiliary assumptions are plausible independently of the predicted data, and I analyze the consequences of this requirement in terms of best explanation of diverse bodies of data. Moreover, the predicted data must be (2) a priori improbable, and (3) heterogeneous to the essentially used data. My proposed notion of novelty, therefore, is not historical, but functional. Hence, deductivists are right that confirmation is independent of time and of historical contingencies such as if the theorist knew a datum, used it, or intended to accommodate it. Predictivists, however, are right that not all consequences confirm equally, and confirmation is not purely a logical theory-data relation, as it crucially involves background epistemic conditions and the notion of best explanation. Conditions (1)–(3) make the difference between prediction and accommodation, and account for the confirming power of theoretical virtues such as non ad-hocness, non-fudging, non-overfitting, independence and consilience. I thus show that functional novelty (a) avoids the deductivist objections to predictivism, (b) is a gradual notion, in accordance with the common intuition that confirmation comes in degrees, and (c) supports the no miracle argument, so vindicating scientific realism. (shrink)

La percepción de la vida se vincula a la actitud ante la muerte para abrirse a la experiencia estética en torno al Poema de Mio Cid y a las Coplas de Manrique. Los horizontes simbólicos que brotan de la épica y de la lírica acentúan la figura trágica del héroe, del caballero.