Knowledge-how, true indexical belief, and action

Intellectualism is the doctrine that knowing how to do something consists in knowing that something is the case. Drawing on contemporary linguistic theories of indirect interrogatives, Jason Stanley and Timothy Williamson have recently revived intellectualism, proposing to interpret a sentence of the form ‘DP know how to VP’ as ascribing to DP knowledge of a certain way w of VPing that they could VP in w. In order to preserve knowledge-how’s connection to action and thus avoid an overgeneration problem, they add that this knowledge must be had under a “practical” mode of presentation of w. I argue that there can be non-knowledgeable true beliefs under a practical mode of presentation and that some such beliefs would nevertheless be sufficient to establish knowledge-how’s characteristic connection to action, and thus count as knowledge-how. If so, Stanley and Williamson’s account is faced with a serious undergeneration problem. Moreover, the structural features on which the argument relies make it likely to present a quite general challenge for intellectualist strategies.     

Imagining,Recognizing and Discriminating: Reconsidering the Ability Hypothesis1

According to the Ability Hypothesis, knowing what it is like to have experience E is just having the ability to imagine or recognize or remember having experience E. I examine various versions of the Ability Hypothesis and point out that they all face serious objections. Then I propose a new version that is not vulnerable to these objections: knowing what it is like to experience E is having the ability to discriminate imagining or having experience E from imagining or having any other experience. I argue that if we replace the ability to imagine or recognize with the ability to discriminate, the Ability Hypothesis can be salvaged.     

Linking Genes and Political Orientations: Testing the Cognitive Ability as Mediator Hypothesis

Recent research has demonstrated that genetic differences explain a sizeable fraction of the variance in political orientations, but little is known about the pathways through which genes might affect political preferences. In this article, we use a uniquely assembled dataset of almost 1,000 Swedish male twin pairs containing detailed information on cognitive ability and political attitudes in order to further examine the genetic and environmental causes of political orientations. Our study makes three distinct contributions to our understanding of the etiology of political orientations: (1) we report heritability estimates across different dimensions of political ideology; (2) we show that cognitive ability and political orientations are related; and (3) we provide evidence consistent with the hypothesis that cognitive ability mediates part of the genetic influence on political orientations. These findings provide important clues about the nature of the complex pathways from molecular genetic variation to political orientations.     

The Lateralized Linguistic Cerebellum: A Review and a New Hypothesis

During the past 2 decades the collaboration across disciplines and the methodologic and conceptual advances of contemporary neuroscience have brought about a substantial modification of the traditional view of the cerebellum as a mere coordinator of autonomic and somatic motor functions. Growing insights in the neuroanatomy of the cerebellum and its interconnections, evidence from functional neuroimaging and neurophysiological research, and advancements in clinical and experimental neuropsychology have established the view that the cerebellum participates in a much wider range of functions than conventionally accepted. This increase of insight has brought to the fore that the cerebellum modulates cognitive functioning of at least those parts of the brain to which it is reciprocally connected. This article reviews the recently acknowledged role of the cerebellum in cognition and addresses in more detail experimental and clinical data disclosing the modulatory role of the cerebellum in various non-motor language processes such as lexical retrieval, syntax, and language dynamics. In agreement with the findings indicating a topographical organization of the cerebellar structures involved in language pathology we advance the concept of a "lateralized linguistic cerebellum." In our view crossed cerebral diaschisis processes, reflecting a functional depression of supratentorial language areas due to reduced input via cerebellocortical pathways, might represent the relevant pathomechanism for linguistic deficits associated with cerebellar pathology.     

The Convergence-Divergence Hypothesis

I propose a hypothesis, called the systems convergence-divergence hypothesis, which attempts to explain how the existence and evolution of supraindividual systems (social, political or economic) might be predicted from an analysis of the basic structures that make up their individual entities (molecules and cells) and how, reciprocally, study of these individuals and of their evolution might be approached from knowledge of such systems.     

The Innateness Hypothesis and Mathematical Concepts

In historical claims for nativism, mathematics is a paradigmatic example of innate knowledge. Claims by contemporary developmental psychologists of elementary mathematical skills in human infants are a legacy of this. However, the connection between these skills and more formal mathematical concepts and methods remains unclear. This paper assesses the current debates surrounding nativism and mathematical knowledge by teasing them apart into two distinct claims. First, in what way does the experimental evidence from infants, nonhuman animals and neuropsychology support the nativist hypothesis? Second, granting that infants have some elementary mathematical skills, does this mean that such skills play an important role in the development of mathematical knowledge?     

The Double Bind Hypothesis and the Parents of Schizophrenics

This paper is a report of an investigation in which the interaction of parents of schizophrenics, in response to a double bind situation, was compared with that of parents of delinquents, ulcerative colitis patients, and controls. Differences in the parental transactions that are related to the offsprings' pathology are reported. The parents of schizophrenics were also exposed to a non-double-binding situation and significant differences in their interaction are described. The results support the double bind hypothesis as a theory of the current family situation of the schizophrenic.     

基于文献的科学假说

科学假说是形成和发展科学理论的必经途径.探讨了一种从非相关文献间的隐含联系中建立假说的方法,对其研究背景、哲学基础及建立假说的模式作了介绍.     

Chance and the Continuum Hypothesis

This paper presents and defends an argument that the continuum hypothesis is false, based on considerations about objective chance and an old theorem due to Banach and Kuratowski. More specifically, I argue that the probabilistic inductive methods standardly used in science presuppose that every proposition about the outcome of a chancy process has a certain chance between 0 and 1. I also argue in favour of the standard view that chances are countably additive. Since it is possible to randomly pick out a point on a continuum, for instance using a roulette wheel or by flipping a countable infinity of fair coins, it follows, given the axioms of ZFC, that there are many different cardinalities between countable infinity and the cardinality of the continuum.     

Wittgenstein and the Dream Hypothesis

The paper deals with Wittgenstein’s treatment of radical skepticism. He holds from his earliest work to his last that skepticism is senseless and therefore no rebuttal, such as G.E. Moore offered, is necessary.     

《黄老帛书》成书年代的新假说

关于《黄老帛书》的成书年代，学界有五种意见。分别是“战国早中期之际说”、“战国说”、“战国末年说”、“秦汉之际说”和“汉初说”。比较各家考证过程，尽管结论不同，但在前提性的假设、目标追求和基本方法上却具有内在的一致性。前提性假设的相同。表现为考证者都设定：帛书代表着黄老学派的起点；目标追求上的共同性，在于考稽者都试图将帛书的成书时间框限在某个相对狭窄的时段内；在考证的方法上，各家都运用了比勘法和推测法。笔者认为，考证帛书的成书时间，必须打破上述三个方面的执著。帛书可能是自战国早中期之际到秦汉间，经过多人整理充实而形成的。本文于此谨就其成书于秦汉间的可能作两点补充论证。第一，帛书中对复国封国现象的肯定可能反映着秦汉间列国关系；第二，帛书中的黄帝形象在政治方面不排除影射秦汉问某些或某个历史人物的可能。     

假设形成与检验的神经机制

假设形成与检验是解决任何复杂问题的重要思维工具, 是人们发现规则, 形成概念, 建立假说, 获得知识的基础。为进一步考察这一思维能力的神经机制, 本项目在已有行为及脑电研究的基础上以“类别概括－规则发现”为研究范式, 给被试提供包含多个知觉维度的刺激, 要求被试通过知觉观察与反馈学习发现基于类别的规则(假设)。本项目重点考察被试在此任务中选择与收敛假设,以及加工否定(冲突)信息的脑机制, 并尝试揭示假设形成与检验的个体发展特征。     

The Levels Hypothesis: A Re-Examination and Reorientation

The levels-hypothesis appears to be derived from psychoanalytic theory, and in its most popular interpretation is concerned with levels of consciousness. However, it is argued that a gradient of consciousness has no application to projective techniques, essentially because there are no principles of differentiation. It is for this reason that the studies which have been done have concerned themselves with such concepts as pathology, concepts which have a tenuous relation to the original levels-hypothesis. The paper has proposed that consciousness in the sense of awareness can more meaningfully be applied to projective material, and that when it is used in this sense a levels-hypothesis can be derived which is both testable and has an adequate rationale.     

The Dumbledore Hypothesis of Cognitive Aging

ABSTRACT— Cognitive aging is often characterized as a process in which two competing forces determine individual development: a genetically driven senescence process that engenders declines in mental mechanics; and an accumulation of life experience that augments cultural, pragmatic, and knowledge-based competence. The considerable variability in the level and rate of change in complex intellectual activities (e.g., language understanding) is often accounted for in terms of individual differences in abilities associated with these forces. I argue that choice in how effort is allocated may be an essential determinant of cognitive change over the life span—both directly, in the form of attentional engagement, and indirectly, as it sculpts neural substrates that give rise to component abilities.     

Against the Indifference Hypothesis: The Holocaust and the Enthusiasts for Murder

This essay takes issue with what is known as the "indifference" hypothesis regarding the murder of Jews during the Holocaust. The Germans' fear of typhus, their perception of the Jew as poisonous, biological matter, "life unworthy of life," created a group state of mind in which many individual Germans, particularly those in the professions, enthusiastically participated in the logistics, machinery, ideology and legitimation of mass murder.     

The J-Curve Hypothesis of Conforming Behavior

Abstract

We examined fear of crime in the residential environment from a theoretical and social psychological perspective by constructing a model that relates feelings of unsafety to attributions about self, the potential criminal, and the situation in which the criminal act might occur. Using data from a questionnaire field survey of 440 residents in four urban neighborhoods, the model was compared with a socio-demographic alternative (comprising such variables as gender, age, and educational level). LISREL, a relatively new method of analysis that takes measurement error into account, indicated that the model has superior explanatory power and greater in-terpretability. Multiple regression analyses confirmed these results and point to ways in which operationalization of the theoretical model might be improved.     

智力结构的分化假设

该文探讨了智力结构随能力、年龄等个体差异而变化的可能性。认知分化假设认为,能力水平更高的人有“更多”的智力,其智力结构中g因素的作用随IQ水平的增加而递减。年龄分化假设指出,从童年期到青年早期,g因素在认知能力中的作用随年龄的增加而减小;相反,从青年早期到成年晚期,g因素的作用递增,智力结构中其他因素的数量和重要性则递减。该领域未来的研究应当解决测量和评估工具的问题,扩大被试的能力水平和年龄范围