HOBBES AND GAME THEORY REVISITED: ZERO‐SUM GAMES IN THE STATE OF NATURE

The aim of this paper is to critically review the game‐theoretic discussion of Hobbes and to develop a game‐theoretic interpretation that gives due attention both to Hobbes's distinction between “moderates” and “dominators” and to what actually initiates conflict in the state of nature, namely, the competition for vital goods. As can be shown, Hobbes's state of nature contains differently structured situations of choice, the game‐theoretic representation of which requires the prisoner's dilemma and the assurance game and the so‐called assurance dilemma. However, the “state of war” ultimately emerges from situations that cannot be described by any of these games because they represent zero‐sum games in which the outcome of mutual cooperation does not exist.     

EXPERIENCE AND THE WATER-LEVEL TASK REVISITED:

Abstract— A recently published study (Hecht & Proffitt, 1995) reported that adults in Munich, Germany, whose occupations involved considerable experience with liquids in containers, were less accurate on Piaget's water-level task than were comparable adults in other occupations. The present study attempted to replicate that experiment with a North American sample, but using lighter controls. The resulting data and conclusions contrast with those of the original study and indicate instead, that individuals in occupations that provide much experience with liquids in containers (bartenders, waiters and waitresses) are, in fact, more accurate on two versions of the water level task than individuals of equivalent gender, age, and education in control occupations (salespeople, clerical worker). The data are discussed in terms of both the impact and the limit s of experience on spatial-task performance.     

THE LOGIC OF IDEAS AND THE LOGIC OF THINGS: A REPLY TO CHAPPELL

Abstract: A continuation of the debate over the intelligibility, and plausibility, of Yolton's reading of Locke's account of perception. Here, the issue turns on the de‐reification of ideas and its implications for the putative axioms of symmetry and transitivity governing the identity of ideas. The issue is illustrated by what Locke says about confused ideas.     

COSMIC PURPOSE AND THE CONTINGENCY OF HUMAN EVOLUTION

Some understand the evolutionary process as more or less predictable; others stress its contingency. I argue that both Christian evolutionists who have assumed that the purposes of the Creator can be realized only through more or less predictable processes as well as those who infer from the contingency of the evolutionary process to the lack of purpose in the universe generally, are mistaken if the Creator escapes from the limits imposed on the creature by temporality, as the traditional Augustinian account supposes. The notion of “purpose” must itself be reinterpreted in such a case. It makes no difference whether the appearance of Homo sapiens is the inevitable result of a steady process of complexification stretching over billions of years, or whether it comes about through a series of coincidences that would have made it entirely unpredictable from the (causal) human standpoint. Either way, the outcome is of God's making, and from the biblical standpoint may appear as part of God's plan.     

THE RELATION BETWEEN SCIENCE AND THEOLOGY: THE CASE FOR COMPLEMENTARITY REVISITED

Abstract. Donald MacKay has suggested that the logical concept of complementarity is needed to relate scientific and theological thinking. According to Ian Barbour, this concept should only be used within, not between, disciplines. This article therefore attempts to clarify that contrast from the standpoint of cognitive process. Thinking in terms of complementarity is explicated within a structuralist-genetic, interactive-constructivist, developmental theory of the neo- and post-Piagetian kind, and its role in religious development is indicated. Adolescents'complementary views on Creation and on the corresponding scientific accounts serve as an illustration. After further analysis of parallel and circular complementarity, it is shown under which conditions complementarity of science and theology can be better justified and may be potentially more fruitful than is apparent from Barbour's or even MacKay's considerations.     

CONTINGENCY SPACES AND MEASURES IN CLASSICAL AND INSTRUMENTAL CONDITIONING1

The contingency between conditional and unconditional stimuli in classical conditioning paradigms, and between responses and consequences in instrumental conditioning paradigms, is analyzed. The results are represented in two- and three-dimensional spaces in which points correspond to procedures, or procedures and outcomes. Traditional statistical and psychological measures of association are applied to data in classical conditioning. Root mean square contingency, ø, is proposed as a measure of contingency characterizing classical conditioning effects at asymptote. In instrumental training procedures, traditional measures of association are inappropriate, since one degree of freedom—response probability—is yielded to the subject. Further analysis of instrumental contingencies yields a surprising result. The well established “Matching Law” in free-operant concurrent schedules subsumes the “Probability Matching” finding of mathematical learning theory, and both are equivalent to zero contingency between responses and consequences.     

COMMUNISM AND THE TRAUMA OF ITS COLLAPSE REVISITED

This paper focuses on the intertwinement of society and the psyche as a consequence of 70 years of Communist rule and the trauma of its collapse in the 90’s. The trauma had profound effects on the psyche. An empirical study that was carried out in 1996/1997, which compared the personality structure of adolescents from Russia and Austria, and a research dialogue in 1999, has been re-evaluated in the light of current political events. One aim that we had was to find out whether we could discover characteristic personality features, resulting from the Communist totalitarian society in Russia, as well as from the trauma of its collapse. This led to the development of the concepts of the “impersonal self” and the “denial mode”. The Russians seemed to be frozen in a protective shell with “flat” affects. They were anxious, conflict avoidant, and somewhat lost. Ideas about missing adolescence and the importance of privacy are discussed. Society was shown to not only have intruded into the individual psyche, but also into the members of the intercultural research team in the form of projective identification. The importance of the interaction between society and the individual as a basic psychoanalytic concept dating back to Freud is elaborated. Finally, considerations pertaining to mental health and democracy are presented.