On modal μ-calculus with explicit interpolants

This paper deals with the extension of Kozen's μ-calculus with the so-called “existential bisimulation quantifier”. By using this quantifier one can express the uniform interpolant of any formula of the μ-calculus. In this work we provide an explicit form for the uniform interpolant of a disjunctive formula and see that it belongs to the same level of the fixpoint alternation hierarchy of the μ-calculus than the original formula. We show that this result cannot be generalized to the whole logic, because the closure of the third level of the hierarchy under the existential bisimulation quantifier is the whole μ-calculus. However, we prove that the first two levels of the hierarchy are closed. We also provide the μ-logic extended with the bisimulation quantifier with a complete calculus.     

Aversive CSs suppress lever pressing for food but not the eating of free food

Forty rats received CER acquisition, half “on the baseline” (response lever present), half “off the baseline.” During initial CER extinction, Ss received: (a) normal CER extinction (lever available), (b) free food during CSs only (no lever), (c) free food during non-CSs only (no lever), or (d) free food during both CS and non-CS periods (no lever). While normal extinction Ss were highly suppressed in the presence of the CS, all free food groups readily ate but did not differ in eating latencies. On subsequent CER extinction trials on the baseline, those Ss which received free food during the CSs were no less suppressed than other Ss. These data offer no support for Estes' (1969) reciprocal inhibition explanation of CER and punishment, nor do they support a fear interpretation of CER.     

Cognitive and projective measures of differentiation and their relationship to empathy

The present investigation compared cognitive and projective methods of assessing “differentiation,” Witkin's Embedded Figures Test (EFT) and Blatt's Concept of the Object Scale (COS), and reexamined expectations concerning the relationship between level of differentiation and capacity for empathy. Whether lesser or greater differentiation would promote empathy was of specific interest. Two forms of empathy were investigated, an “affective” form assessed by the Mehrabian Empathy Scale and a “cognitive” form assessed by the Hogan Empathy Scale. Expected sex differences in differentiation and empathy were also investigated. Results demonstrated consonance between COS and EFT measures of differentiation within the male sample only (p < .05). Individuals classified by EFT as relatively less differentiated (“field dependent”) produced more part object responses (p < .02) and those classified as more differentiated (“field independent”) showed a trend toward more whole object responses (p < .10) on the COS. Associations between measures of differentiation and empathy reached significance or showed trends in the male group only. Men with relatively lesser differentiation on the EFT (“field dependent”) showed greater “affective empathy” (p < .10) and men with greater differentiation on the COS showed greater “cognitive” empathy (p < .05). Women demonstrated higher levels of “affective” empathy than men (p < .001).     

Conditional probability judgments: Effects of imagining vs experiencing the conditioning event

Applications of Bayesian conditionalization often involve two temporal aspects: a probability judgment is based on knowledge at a point in time and is revised over time in light of added information. Let t, t′, and t″ designate three chronological points in time. E designates a target event which occurs or not at t″, and C designates a conditioning event which occurs or not at t′. Suppose that an individual judges P(EC) at t. If C occurs, Bayesian conditionalization requires that a judgment of P(E) at t′ is equal to the earlier judgment of P(EC). However, inconsistencies may result because a judgment of P(EC) at t is based on imagining C, while a judgment of P(E) at t′ is based on experiencing C. This study examines two sources of such inconsistencies. First, C normally is an abstraction of what might happen between t and t′. What actually happens may differ, such that an individual observes extraconditional information which affects a judgment of P(E) at t′. Second, experiencing C may change an individual's affective state, leading to greater optimism or pessimism about the occurrence of E. We report an experiment which documents both effects.     

Voice onset time production and perception in apraxic subjects

This study explored the relationship between the perception and production of voice onset time (VOT) in apraxic subjects. Spectrograms of the words, “bees” and “peas” spoken by apraxic subjects were acoustically analyzed to obtain a measure of VOT. The subjects also identified the initial cognate (“b” or “p”) from synthetically generated speech spanning a voiced to voiceless time continuum. The results suggest that apraxic subjects have production as well as perceptual errors in the voicing feature but no significant relationship was found between the two measures.     

The “Poffenberger” and “Dimond” Paradigms: Interrelated Approaches to the Study of Interhemispheric Dynamics?

Brown and Jeeves (1993) found that an evoked potential estimate of interhemispheric transfer time, from the left to the right hemisphere, correlated negatively with a bilateral field advantage (BFA) in a response-choice letter matching task. We implemented a go no-go dot size matching task to determine whether the crossed-uncrossed difference (CUD) in reaction time, commission errors and omission errors (estimates of the “cost” of interhemispheric transfer) would correlate with BFAs in data from the same experiment and whether the type of decision (“same” versus “different”) would modulate the CUDs and/or BFAs. Sixteen normal right-handed subjects were tested. The CUDs were negatively correlated with the BFAs. Canonical correlation analysis of this set of relations was highly significant (r= .95). Estimates of left-to-right relay were far more strongly related to BFA (p= .0001) than were estimates of right-to-left relay (p= .03). “Same” decisions yielded a unilateral field advantage and “different” decisions a bilateral field advantage in omission error data, this crossed interaction reaching significance. More efficient interhemispheric relay favored BFAs, i.e., strongly suggesting in such cases an advantage of interhemispheric over intrahemispheric integration. This effect appeared to be markedly asymmetric. Furthermore, resource sharing within and between the hemispheres was a function of the “same” versus “different” dimensions of the decision to be made, especially in omission errors. The opposite dissociation occurred less markedly in the reaction times, this double dissociation reaching significance, revealing presence of a subtle speed–accuracy trade-off in interhemispheric dynamics.     

The relationship between child-report, parent self-report, and partner report of perceived parental rearing behaviors and anxiety in children and parents

This study investigated the relationship between child anxiety, parental anxiety, and perceived current parental rearing practices, using a multiple informants approach, that is, by aggregating the perception of the child, parent and partner on parental rearing behaviors. Unselected children aged 9–12 (n=75) and both their biological parents filled in the SCARED-C to measure child anxiety, and parents completed the SCARED-A to measure parental anxiety. In addition, child report, parental self-report, and partner report of the rearing dimensions “autonomy-encouragement versus overprotection”, “acceptance versus rejection”, and “psychological control” of both parents was assessed. Results showed that the homogeneity of some rearing dimensions using a single informant was insufficient, but sufficient when using multiple informants. Inter-informant agreement was low (M=0.29). Three-informants' aggregates yielded good generalizability (M=0.54), and the generalizability of six-informants' aggregates (combining both parents) was impressive (M=0.76). Using multiple informants, parental autonomy granting versus overprotection was substantially related to child anxiety (r=−0.41, p<0.001), as well as to parental anxiety (r=−0.45, p<0.001). More precisely, paternal autonomy–overprotection was predominantly related to child anxiety, whereas maternal autonomy–overprotection was predominantly related to maternal anxiety. Acceptance versus rejection and psychological control were only modestly related to child and parental anxiety.     

Theodor Meynert′s Contribution to Classical 19th Century Aphasia Studies

Carl Wernicke (1848-1905) is traditionally considered the first to have described the features of, and the brain pathology underlying, impaired auditory comprehension and related symptoms. Although Wernicke (1874) clearly and repeatedly indicates his indebtedness to Theodor von Meynert (1833-1892). this is usually understood as an acknowledgment that Meynert taught Wernicke neuroanatomy (Eggert, 1977); Wernicke′s own words in part support this interpretation. A more sophisticated historical analysis notes that, prior to Wernicke, both Johann Schmidt in 1871 and Charlton Bastian in 1869 had described the concept of receptive aphasia, but neither had supported their analyses with autopsy evidence as did Wernicke, thus not dislodging Wernicke′s claim of priority. However, a virtually unknown work by Theodor von Meynert, published in 1866, has recently been rediscovered by us ["Ein Fall von Sprachstörung, anatomisch begründet." Medizinische Jahrbücher. XII Band der Zeitschrift der K. K. Gesellleschaft der Ärzte in Wien, 22.Jahr. Pp. 152-189]. In this paper Meynert analyzes the anatomical basis for localizing the comprehension of language in the superior temporal gyros, he argues that lesions in this area should (by analogy to Broca′s earlier observations on language expression) cause impairments in language comprehension, and he presents a case of receptive aphasia with autopsy evidence of destruction of the superior temporal gyros in the left hemisphere. The patient′s aphasia was classic: impaired auditory comprehension, and fluent speech with paraphasias. It is clear that Meynert should be given historical credit for his work.     

Anatomical Specialization of the Anterior Motor Speech Area: Hemispheric Differences in Magnopyramidal Neurons

The lateralization of motor speech function to the left hemisphere is supported by multiple lines of evidence, but relatively little is known about the anatomical basis of that specialization. In a preliminary study, we recently reported that area 45 of the left hemisphere (Broca′s area) contained a subpopulation of magnopyramidal neurons which were significantly larger than any seen in the homotopic region of the right hemisphere (Hayes and Lewis, 1993a). In the present study we examined a larger sample of cases in order to determine how consistently this difference is present in the population, if it is specific to Broca′s area or is a general feature of cortical regions mediating lateralized functions, and whether the subpopulation of large magnopyramidal neurons in left area 45 can be distinguished by their chemical phenotype. In Nissl-stained sections from 19 human brains, the mean (±SD) cross-sectional area of the largest layer III pyramidal neurons in area 45 was significantly (p < .0001) greater in the left hemisphere (522.1 ± 128.3 μm²) than in the right (454.1 ± 121.5 μm²). This interhemispheric difference appeared to be a unique characteristic of the largest neurons, since the mean size of all layer III pyramids in this area was not significantly different in the left (206.2 ± 93.5 μm²) and right (213.3 ± 103.9 μm²) hemispheres. In contrast to area 45, there was no interhemispheric difference in the mean cross-sectional area of the largest layer III pyramids in another lateralized region, primary motor cortex. in addition, in area 46, a region of prefrontal association cortex not known to be functionally lateralized, the mean somal size of the largest layer III pyramidal neurons was significantly (p < .001) smaller in the left hemisphere (402.4 ± 84.9 μm²) than in the right (437.8 ± 88.3 μm²). Finally, although the large layer III pyramids in area 45 were immunoreactive for nonphosphorylated neurofilament protein in both hemispheres, the mean cross-sectional area of the largest labeled neurons was significantly larger (p < .002) in the left hemisphere (525.2 ± 149.0 μm²) than in the right (490.3 ± 154.1 μm²). These findings demonstrate that layer III of Broca′s area contains a distinctive subpopulation of neurons that may play an important role in the specific functional architecture of this region.     

Peirce on Education: Nurturing the First Rule of Reason

Through an exegetic reading of Peirce’s minor texts on higher education, I find that Peirce’s conception of a “Liberal Education” is close to the Herbartian conception of Bildung. Peirce calls for a general education with the ambition of qualifying critical thinkers with the capacity to go beyond the strict rules and narrow borders of the artes liberales, – the different subject matters or sciences taught at a university. Thus, Peirce’s conception of a liberal education is closely linked to his interpretation of common sense – or sensis communis – as a critical commonsensism. To him, it is urgent to educate and nurture “the first rule of reason,” described as a will to learn, a curiosity, a dissatisfaction of what you already incline to think, and an intense desire to find things out. The nurturing of this “first rule of reason” is thus about educating an intellectual community of critical thinkers who are able to question authoritative beliefs, knowing how to debunk them, and how to turn away from obiter dictum.     

The Meaning of Meaning-Fallibilism

Much discussion of meaning by philosophers over the last 300 years has been predicated on a Cartesian first-person authority (i.e. “infallibilism”) with respect to what one’s terms mean. However this has problems making sense of the way the meanings of scientific terms develop, an increase in scientific knowledge over and above scientists’ ability to quantify over new entities. Although a recent conspicuous embrace of rigid designation has broken up traditional meaning-infallibilism to some extent, this new dimension to the meaning of terms such as “water” is yet to receive a principled epistemological undergirding (beyond the deliverances of “intuition” with respect to certain somewhat unusual possible worlds). Charles Peirce’s distinctive, naturalistic philosophy of language is mined to provide a more thoroughly fallibilist, and thus more realist, approach to meaning, with the requisite epistemology. Both his pragmatism and his triadic account of representation, it is argued, produce an original approach to meaning, analysing it in processual rather than objectual terms, and opening a distinction between “meaning for us”, the meaning a term has at any given time for any given community and “meaning simpliciter”. the way use of a given term develops over time (often due to a posteriori input from the world which is unable to be anticipated in advance). This account provocatively undermines a certain distinction between “semantics” and “ontology” which is often taken for granted in discussions of realism.     

Levels of experienced dimensionality in children and adults

This work presents a new conceptualization of the contrast between holistic and differentiated perception of multidimensional stimuli. Specifically, two hypotheses about the experiential status of dimensions within holistic perception are proposed and tested as explanations of young children's general perceptual mode and adults' integral mode. The major result is that three levels of dimensional status are realized: (1) the hypothesis of nonprimary axes characterizes adult “integral” perception of saturation and brightness relations, (2) the hypothesis of primary but not mandatory axes characterizes kindergarteners' “integral” perception of size and shade relations, and (3) the notion of mandatory axes characterizes adults' separable perception of size and shade relations. These results indicate a new interpretation of the integrality-separability distinction and the derivative developmental hypothesis. It is specifically hypothesized that the developmental history of most dimensional combinations includes these three levels.     

Variability in response criteria affects estimates of conscious identification and unconscious semantic priming

Three experiments examined the role of response criteria in a masked semantic priming paradigm using an exclusion task. Experiment 1 used on-line prime-report (“report the prime if you saw it”) and exclusion instructions in which participants were told to avoid completing a word stem (e.g. mo—) with a word related to a prime (e.g. cash) flashed for 0, 38 or 212 ms. Semantic priming (i.e. exclusion failure) was significant in the items analysis, but was moderated by peoples’ ability to report the prime in the participant analysis. Prime-report thresholds in Experiment 2 were made more liberal by instructing participants to guess on every trial. Prime-report increased from Experiment 1 as exclusion failures were eliminated. Experiment 3 clarified the relationship between awareness and prime identification using an on-line measure of confidence and different liberal prime report instructions. The current findings suggest that the ability to act upon (via exclusion performance) and report information in a masked prime is determined by a variable response criterion, which can be manipulated as an independent variable.     

Hindsight bias redefined: It’s about time

Four experiments introduced a new conceptual and methodological approach to hindsight bias, traditionally defined as the tendency to exaggerate the a priori predictability of outcomes after they become known. By examining likelihood estimates rooted to specific time points during an unfolding event sequence (videos and short text stories), judged both in foresight and hindsight, we conceptualized hindsight bias as a contrast between two “inevitability curves,” which plotted likelihood against time. Taking timing into account, we defined three new indicators of accuracy: linear accuracy (how well hindsight judgments capture the linear trend of foresight judgments over time), rate accuracy (how well hindsight judgments reflect the slope of foresight judgments over time), and temporal accuracy (how well hindsight judgments specify the overall timing of the full envelope of foresight judgments). Results demonstrated that hindsight judgments showed linear and rate accuracy, but were biased only in terms of lack of temporal accuracy. The oft-used catchphrase “knew it all along effect” was found to be a misnomer, in that participants were well aware in hindsight that their earlier foresight judgments reflected uncertainty. The current research therefore points to one way in which retrospective judgments can be considered biased, yet simultaneously suggests that considerable accuracy exists when people render such judgments.     

Second order propositional operators over cantor space

We consider propositional operators defined by propositional quantification in intuitionistic logic. More specifically, we investigate the propositional operators of the formA* :p q(p A(q)) whereA(q) is one of the following formulae: (¬¬q q) V ¬¬q, (¬¬q q) (¬¬q V ¬q), ((¬¬q q) (¬¬q V ¬q)) ((¬¬q q) V ¬¬q). The equivalence ofA*(p) to ¬¬p is proved over the standard topological interpretation of intuitionistic second order propositional logic over Cantor space.We relate topological interpretations of second order intuitionistic propositional logic over Cantor space with the interpretation of propositional quantifiers (as the strongest and weakest interpolant in Heyting calculus) suggested by A. Pitts. One of the merits of Pitts' interpretation is shown to be valid for the interpretation over Cantor space.Presented byJan Zygmunt     

Interhemispheric functional relationships in auditory agnosia : An analysis of the preconditions and a conceptual model

A statistical analysis revealed the following concerning auditory agnosia. (1) Bilateral temporal lobe lesions prevailed; in a minority of cases unilateral lesions were verified. (2) The syndrome occurred as a result of repeated insults. (3) There was a statistically significant correlation between the side of the first insult and the predilective type of the syndrome, i.e., agnosia preferably for linguistic with respect to nonlinguistic material. On the basis of these results we discuss the principle of contralateral compensation and the hypothesis of lesional interference. In doing so a conceptual model of interhemispheric functional relationships is developed. We made use of a set theory-oriented interpretation of Kinsbourne's “attention-model” (M. Kinsbourne, 1970, Acta Psychologica 33, 193–201).     

Formalising the informal?: Dynamic social order, bottom-up social control, and spontaneous normative relations

The right framework for studying normative issues in infosociety and MAS is that of deliberate or spontaneous social order, and intended or unintended, centralised or decentralised forms of social control. For effectively supporting human cooperation it is necessary to “incorporate” social and normative knowledge in intelligent technology; computers should deal with—and thus partially “understand”—permissions, obligations, power, roles, commitments, trust, etc. Here only one facet of this problem is considered: the spontaneous and decentralised norm creation, and normative monitoring and intervention. Cognitive aspects of spontaneous conventions, implicit commitments, tacit agreements, and the bottom-up issuing and spreading of norms are discussed. The transition from “face to face” normative relationships to some stronger constraints on agents' action, and to institutions and authority, and the possibility of a consequent increase of trust, are explored. In particular, I focus on the transition from two party trust, right, permission, and commitment, to three party relationships, where some witness or some enforcing authority is introduced. In this perspective of ‘formalising the informal’, i.e., the interpersonal unofficial normative matter, I discuss (also in order to stress dangers of computer-based formalisation and enforcement of rules) the important phenomenon of functional (collaborative) systematic violation of rules in organisation and cooperation, and the possible emergence of a “convention to violate”.     

Pragmatic reasoning schemas

We propose that people typically reason about realistic situations using neither content-free syntactic inference rules nor representations of specific experiences. Rather, people reason using knowledge structures that we term pragmatic reasoning schemas, which are generalized sets of rules defined in relation to classes of goals. Three experiments examined the impact of a “permission schema” on deductive reasoning. Experiment 1 demonstrated that by evoking the permission schema it is possible to facilitate performance in Wason's selection paradigm for subjects who have had no experience with the specific content of the problems. Experiment 2 showed that a selection problem worded in terms of an abstract permission elicited better performance than one worded in terms of a concrete but arbitrary situation, providing evidence for an abstract permission schema that is free of domain-specific content. Experiment 3 provided evidence that evocation of a permission schema affects not only tasks requiring procedural knowledge, but also a linguistic rephrasing task requiring declarative knowledge. In particular, statements in the form if p then q were rephrased into the form p only if q with greater frequency for permission than for arbitrary statements, and rephrasings of permission statements produced a pattern of introduction of modals (must, can) totally unlike that observed for arbitrary conditional statements. Other pragmatic schemas, such as “causal” and “evidence” schemas can account for both linguistic and reasoning phenomena that alternative hypotheses fail to explain.     

Dissociation of Processes Underlying Spatial S-R Compatibility: Evidence for the Independent Influence of What and Where

The process-dissociation procedure was used to estimate the influence of spatial and form-based processing in the Simon task. Subjects made manual (left/right) responses to the direction of arrows (> or <) presented to the left or right of fixation. Manipulating the proportion of incongruent trails (e.g., a right-pointing arrow presented to the left of fixation) affected both the size and direction of the Simon effect. To account for this pattern of data, we compared process estimates based on three possible relationships between spatial and form-based processing: independence, redundancy, and exclusivity. The independence model provided the best account of the data. Most telling was that independent form-based estimates were superior at predicting observed performance on arrows presented at fixation and did so consistently across conditions (r′s > .80). The results provide evidence that the form ("what") and spatial location ("where") of a single stimulus can have functionally independent effects on performance. They also indicate the existence of two kinds of automaticity—an associative ("implicit learning") component that reflects prior S-R mappings and a nonassociative component that reflects the correspondence between stimulus and response codes.     

Reconceptualizing the Transitive Inference Ability: A Framework for Existing and Future Research

It has often been claimed that to demonstrate transitive inference is to demonstrate a logical ability, and by implication that transitivity as a property is generally a logical entity. Both claims are considered using a theoretically driven analysis together with consideration of relevant existing experimental research and some newly reported findings. This approach suggests an account of transitivity and transitive inferential reasoning that differs not only from the classic Piagetian account, but also from the information processing account so dominant today. We begin by considering one important issue, that the “logical” definitional criterion can only be approached if individuals are required to demonstrate a capacity for transitive inference that is discriminative in nature. This, together with interpretation of findings from existing transitive tasks, leads to the postulate of a three-component psychological system, with the components relying on perceptual, linguistic, and conceptual subprocesses and sensitivity to simple cues. The framework is testable and accommodates important aspects of classic and modern accounts of “transitive development” that until now have been taken to be mutually exclusive. It also readily accommodates both human and nonhuman research, yet neither a formal logical structure nor memory in any general sense need be assigned the primary role.