A neurally plausible model of how the process of visually perceiving a letter in the context of a word is learned, and how such processing occurs in adults is proposed. The model consists of a collection of abstract letter feature detector neurons and their interconnections. The model also includes a learning rule that specifies how these interconnections evolve with experience. The interconnections between neurons can be interpreted as representing the spatially redundant, sequentially redundant, and transgraphemic information in letter string displays. (...) Anderson, Silverstein, Ritz, and Jones's (1977) “Brain‐State‐in‐a‐Box” (BSB) neural mechanism is then used to implement the proposed model. The resulting system makes explicit qualitative predictions using both letter recognition accuracy and reaction time as dependent measures. In particular, the model offers an integrated explanation of some experiments involving manipulations of orthographic regularity, masking, case alternations, and experience with words. The similarities and differences between the model and models proposed by Adams (1979) and McClelland and Rumelhart (1981) are also discussed. (shrink)

_341_ _Objectives: _In patients with multivessel disease both the detection of the culprit lesion and the exact allocation are important preconditions for sufficient treatment and improved outcome. In a vessel based approach the combination of quantitative coronary angiography and fractional flow reserve measured by a pressure wire should be advantageous compared to myocardial SPECT, as morphological and functional information is delivered simultaneously. Therefore our aim was to evaluate MS in the detection and allocation of hemodynamically significant stenoses obtained by the (...) combined gold standard QCA plus FFR in patients with multivessel disease. _Methods: _FFR and QCA of 95 vessels in 80 patients have been evaluated. Hemodynamically significant target lesions were defined as intermediate stenoses between 50 and 75% with an FFR. (shrink)

Richard T. Ely was one of the most important architects of the administrative welfare state in the United States. His astonishingly influential career was the product of a fundamental re-thinking of the origin and nature of the state. Repudiating the social compact theory of the American founding in favor of a self-consciously “new,” “German,” and frankly “social” conception of the state ordered toward the realization of a collective vision of human perfection, Ely conceived the task of social reform as (...) extending social control over the hereditary and environmental determinants of human character. In the early 1930s, Ely’s vision of social reform would inspire some of his boldest students, especially M. L. Wilson, to formulate a sweeping vision of social planning that would not only inform his little known and rather coyly named Division of Subsistence Homesteads, but also his efforts at the National Resources Board —the nation’s first ever agency for comprehensive national planning. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:William Thomas Jones 1910–1998Charles M. YoungWilliam Thomas Jones, a friend and supporter of this journal since its inception, died on September 30, 1998, in Claremont, California, at the age of eighty-eight. Born in Natchez, Mississippi, Will was educated at Swarthmore, Oxford (as a Rhodes scholar), and Princeton. After a legendary teaching career spanning nearly fifty years, thirty-four at Pomona College and another fifteen at the California Institute (...) of Technology, Will retired in 1985. He published a host of articles and books, among them the highly regarded five-volume A History of Western Philosophy, now in its fourth edition. Will received numerous awards and honors, including Lippincott, Procter, Ford Faculty, and Guggenheim Fellowships; he was also a Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar, and twice a Resident Scholar with the Rockefeller Foundation at Villa Servelloni. In 1969–70, he was President of the American Philosophical Association’s Pacific Division.In 1961, Will joined Karl Aschenbrenner, John D. Goheen, Paul O. Kristeller, Oskar Piest, Benson Mates, Ernest Moody, Richard H. Popkin, Herbert W. Schneider, and E. W. Strong (as chair) to form the Executive Committee (now Board of Directors) of the Journal of the History of Philosophy. The first issue of the JHP appeared some two years later. Will provided much valuable counsel and support in the turbulent early years of the JHP, helping in particular in securing much needed financial support from the Claremont Colleges. We join Will’s family, friends, colleagues, and students in mourning the loss of a fine historian, philosopher, and teacher.Copyright © 1999 Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:William Thomas Jones 1910–1998Charles M. YoungWilliam Thomas Jones, a friend and supporter of this journal since its inception, died on September 30, 1998, in Claremont, California, at the age of eighty-eight. Born in Natchez, Mississippi, Will was educated at Swarthmore, Oxford (as a Rhodes scholar), and Princeton. After a legendary teaching career spanning nearly fifty years, thirty-four at Pomona College and another fifteen at the California Institute (...) of Technology, Will retired in 1985. He published a host of articles and books, among them the highly regarded five-volume A History of Western Philosophy, now in its fourth edition. Will received numerous awards and honors, including Lippincott, Procter, Ford Faculty, and Guggenheim Fellowships; he was also a Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar, and twice a Resident Scholar with the Rockefeller Foundation at Villa Servelloni. In 1969–70, he was President of the American Philosophical Association’s Pacific Division.In 1961, Will joined Karl Aschenbrenner, John D. Goheen, Paul O. Kristeller, Oskar Piest, Benson Mates, Ernest Moody, Richard H. Popkin, Herbert W. Schneider, and E. W. Strong (as chair) to form the Executive Committee (now Board of Directors) of the Journal of the History of Philosophy. The first issue of the JHP appeared some two years later. Will provided much valuable counsel and support in the turbulent early years of the JHP, helping in particular in securing much needed financial support from the Claremont Colleges. We join Will’s family, friends, colleagues, and students in mourning the loss of a fine historian, philosopher, and teacher.Copyright © 1999 Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

Early in the first volume of his Ideen zu einer reinen Phiinomeno logie und phiinomenologischen Philosophie, Edmund Husserl stated concisely the significance and scope of the problem with which this present study is concerned. When we reflect on how it is that consciousness, which is itself absolute in relation to the world, can yet take on the character of transcendence, how it can become mundanized, We see straightaway that it can do that only by means of a certain participation in (...) transcendence in the first, originary sense, which is manifestly the transcendence of material Nature. Only by means of the experiential relation to the animate organism does consciousness become really human and animal (tierischen), and only thereby does it achieve a place in the space and in the time of Nature. l Consciousness can become "worldly" only by being embodied within the world as part of it. In so far as the world is material Nature, consciousness must partake of the transcendence of material Nature. That is to say, its transcendence is manifestly an embodiment in a material, corporeal body. Consciousness, thus, takes on the characteristic of being "here and now" (ecceity) by means of experiential (or, more accurately, its intentive) relation to that corporeal being which embodies it. Accordingly, that there is a world for consciousness is a conse quence in the first instance of its embodiment by 2 that corporeal body which is for it its own animate organism. (shrink)

Ethics and the Clinical Encounter explores the moral dimensions of clinical medicine and the phenomenon of illness, to determine what ethics must be in order to be fully responsive to clinical encounters. Written in a lively and conversational style with minimal technical terminology, and enhanced by actual experience or real clinical situations, this volume lays out a clinical ethics methodology both in practical and theoretical terms. Here's what the experts had to say: Professor Zaner has provided us with a remarkably (...) lucid and trenchant discussion of the interface of philosophy and the field of medicine. He brings into play an extraordinary range of historial knowledge, extensive observations based on firsthand experience with medical practices, and an acute sense of philosophical argumentation. This is a work that will be an exemplary and indispensable text in the philosophy of medicine for years to come. -- Calvin Schrag... it is a highly original contribution usable in a number of fields.... It really has no competition.... The genius of Zaner's approach is to ground ethics from the 'bottom up' and to direct us to the concrete particulars of therapeutic encounters wherein lie moral and ethical matters... meaty, challenging, and ultimately rewarding.... -- Paul R. Dokecki Richard M. Zaner founded the Center for Clinical and Research Ethics at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Having established Vanderbilt's first Hospital Ethics Committee (1985), he served as co-chair of VUMC's Ethics Committee since its inception in 1990. Zaner has published five original books, edited ten, and translated four more, and has published more than 100 sections of books and professional journals. (shrink)

Richard M Weaver, a thinker and writer celebrated for his unsparing diagnoses and realistic remedies for the ills of our age, is known largely through a few of his works that remain in print. This new collection of Weaver's shorter writings, assembled by Ted J Smith III, Weaver's leading biographer, presents many long-out-of-print and never-before-published works that give new range and depth to Weaver's sweeping thought. Included are eleven previously unpublished essays and speeches that were left in near-final form (...) at the time of Weaver's death in 1963. In all, there are some one hundred and twenty-six essays, speeches, book reviews, and editorials. (shrink)

In this volume, fourteen scholars, many of them contemporaries of Professor Frank, engage with his legacy with important and seminal works which take some of ...

Early in the first volume of his Ideen zu einer reinen Phiinomeno logie und phiinomenologischen Philosophie, Edmund Husserl stated concisely the significance and scope of the problem with which this present study is concerned. When we reflect on how it is that consciousness, which is itself absolute in relation to the world, can yet take on the character of transcendence, how it can become mundanized, We see straightaway that it can do that only by means of a certain participation in (...) transcendence in the first, originary sense, which is manifestly the transcendence of material Nature. Only by means of the experiential relation to the animate organism does consciousness become really human and animal (tierischen), and only thereby does it achieve a place in the space and in the time of Nature. l Consciousness can become "worldly" only by being embodied within the world as part of it. In so far as the world is material Nature, consciousness must partake of the transcendence of material Nature. That is to say, its transcendence is manifestly an embodiment in a material, corporeal body. Consciousness, thus, takes on the characteristic of being "here and now" (ecceity) by means of experiential (or, more accurately, its intentive) relation to that corporeal being which embodies it. Accordingly, that there is a world for consciousness is a conse quence in the first instance of its embodiment by 2 that corporeal body which is for it its own animate organism. (shrink)

Tested the 2-process theory of detection, search, and attention presented by the current authors in a series of experiments. The studies demonstrate the qualitative difference between 2 modes of information processing: automatic detection and controlled search; trace the course of the learning of automatic detection, of categories, and of automatic-attention responses; and show the dependence of automatic detection on attending responses and demonstrate how such responses interrupt controlled processing and interfere with the focusing of attention. The learning of categories is (...) shown to improve controlled search performance. A general framework for human information processing is proposed. The framework emphasizes the roles of automatic and controlled processing. The theory is compared to and contrasted with extant models of search and attention. (shrink)

Our intention here is to present the essential character of classical, sunnī kalām within a strictly formal perspective and to set out its basic aspects. It was conceived by the mutakallimīn as a rational, conceptual, and critical science and, although kalām differed in a number of basic concepts and constructs and in its analytic system, the topical organisation of the major compendia parallels that of metaphysics as understood in the contemporary Aristotelian tradition. The debates between kalām and falsafa need to (...) be examined within this context. Kalām, however, is theological in the strict sense of the term and it is as such that its problematic and its procedures are primarily to be understood. Thus seen, the object of kalām is to rationalise the cognitive content presented to Believers in the symbolic language of the koranic revelation. It has, then, four principal tasks, sc, to conceptualise, to order, to explain, and where possible to justify the primary doctrines of the community whose belief is held to be normative. Within this framework the differences that characterise the major schools as such and the various tendencies of individual masters within each school may readily be brought to light. On se propose ici de présenter, d'un point de vue strictement formel, la nature du kālam classique sunnite et d'identifier ses caractéristiques principales. II avait été conçu par les mutakallimin comme une science rationelle, conceptuelle et critique. L'organisation des matières dans ses traités reprend celle de la métaphysique dans la tradition aristotélicienne de l'époque, bien que le kalām s'en distingue par plusieurs de ses structures et concepts fondamentaux, ainsi que par son système analytique. C'est dans ce contexte qu'il faut considérer les debats qui s'instaurèrent entre kalām et falsafa. Le kalām, cependant, est d'ordre strictement théologique et c'est principalement dans ce cadre qu'il faut comprendre sa problématique et ses procédures. Le kalām a pour fonction de rationaliser le contenu cognitif offert aux croyants dans le langage symbolique de la révélation coranique. Il en résulte quatre tâches principales; il s'agit de conceptualiser, ordonner, expliquer et, dans le mesure du possible, justifier les doctrines principales reconnues par la communauté faisant référence en matière de croyance. Dans ce cadre, il sera possible de mettre en lumière les différences entre les principales écoles, ainsi que les tendances qui distinguent certains de leurs grands maîtres respectifs. (shrink)

This honest, forthright, and beautifully-written book introduces readers to the human variations on medical topics spoken of in abstract in the daily news--euthanasia, assisted suicide, abortion, "extreme procedures", genetic testing, experimental surgeries--and to the people who must agonize over those decisions regarding themselves and their loved ones.

The present study seeks to lay out the most basic elements of the ontology of classical Aš‘arite theology. In several cases this requires a careful examination of the traditional and the formal lexicography of certain key expressions. The topics primarily treated are: how they understood “Being/ existence” and “being/existent” and essential natures; the systematic exploitation of the equivocities of certain expressions within a general context in which other than words there are no universals proves to be elegant as well as (...) insightful; the basic categories of primary entities: independant beings and nonindependant beings, created and uncreated, the equivocity of “being/existent” as predicated of contingent entities on the one hand and of God and His attributes on the other, and certain problems that arise because of the rigid application of the system's underlying analytic principles. Nous essayons ici de presenter les éléments fondamentaux de l'ontologie de l'aš‘arisme classique. Pour quelques expressions, il a fallu examiner la lexicographie et ordinaire et technique pour bien comprendre leur emploi et leur signification. Les sujets examinés sont: le sens de “Etre/existence” et de “être/existant” et le concept de réalité essentielle; l'emploi nuancé des équivocités de quelques expressions dans un contexte où les seuls universaux sont des mots, emploi qui se révèle philosophiquement élégant; les catégories fondamentales des êtres: êtres indépendants et êtres non-indépendants, soit créés soit incréés, l'équivocité de “être/existant” dit des êtres contingents d'une part, de Dieu et ses attributs d'autre part, et enfin quelques difficultiés qui résultent de l'application rigide des principes analytiques du système. (shrink)

This article reviews the historical and current controversies about the nature of clinical ethics consultation, as a way to focus on the place and responsibility of ethics consultants within the context of clinical conversation — interpreted as a form of dialogue. These matters are approached through a particularly compelling instance of the controversy that involves several major figures in the field. The analysis serves to highlight very significant questions of the nature and constraints of clinical situations, and the moral responsibility (...) and legal accountability that are especially important for clinical ethics consultants. (shrink)

There has been in recent years a plethora of defences of theism from analytical philosophers: Richard Gale's important book is a critical response to these writings. New versions of cosmological, ontological, and religious experience arguments are critically evaluated, along with pragmatic arguments to justify faith on the grounds of its prudential or moral benefits. In considering arguments for and against the existence of God, Gale is able to clarify many important philosophical concepts including exploration, time, free will, personhood, actuality, (...) and the objectivity of experience. (shrink)

I agree with Norris et al. that feedback to a phonemic level is never necessary, but disagree strongly with their reason why this is true. I believe the available evidence indicates that there is no feedback because there is no phonemic level employed in the perceptual processing of speech.

The target article suggests that taste is not based on the traditional four basic tastes, but rather is a continuum subserved by cross-fiber integration. This commentary describes evidence indicating that the traditional concept is valid, and that with suitable precautions, it is possible to match natural substances using mixtures representing fundamental tastes.

After writing my response to the commentaries, I sat back and reflected on the fascination and frustration of work on this topic. There is the ancient fascination of trying to understand the nature of the sensory bridge linking us to the external world. Also, discussing the measurability of sensation brings to the surface concepts we use and take for granted when we are working in other areas of psychology; and it holds them before us for critical examination. The frustration lies (...) chiefly in the difficulty of formulating concepts clearly, in a way understood by all. At least when constructing the original Tower of Babel, workers hearing strange words knew that communication was not occurring. The psychophysical Tower of Babel sometimes has workers using the same words, but with different meanings. Much of my response is based on attempts to clarify concepts and clear up confusions. (shrink)

Block has attempted to reduce the confusion and controversy concerning the term “consciousness” by suggesting that there are two forms or types of consciousness, each of which has several characteristics or properties. This suggestion appears to further becloud the topic, however. Perhaps consciousness cannot be defined adequately and should not be considered as a topic that can be studied scientifically.

This paper is devoted to an examination of the discovery, characterization, and analysis of the functions of microRNAs, which also serves as a vehicle for demonstrating the importance of exploratory experimentation in current (post-genomic) molecular biology. The material on microRNAs is important in its own right: it provides important insight into the extreme complexity of regulatory networks involving components made of DNA, RNA, and protein. These networks play a central role in regulating development of multicellular organisms and illustrate the importance (...) of epigenetic as well as genetic systems in evolution and development. The examination of these matters yields principled arguments for the historicity of the functions of key biological molecules and for the indispensability of exploratory experimentation in contemporary molecular biology as well as some insight into the complex interplay between exploratory experimentation and hypothesis-driven science. This latter result is not only important for philosophy of science, but also of practical importance for the evaluation of grant proposals, although the elaboration of this latter claim must be left for another occasion. (shrink)