Stuffed Cabbage in the Old New School Cafeteria

The purpose of this lecture is to celebrate the memory of Aron Gurwitsch by examining and enlarging the domain of phenomenological clarification of some elements of what Gurwitsch called the logic of reality. Chief among those elements are the nature of the taken-for-grantedness of our existential belief, the difference between presentive and non-presentive indices of reality and the ground for the self-illumination of the world of working.     

Philosophie der Arrieregarde

Bulgarian philosophical life is particularly poor and fruitless. As well as in all communist countries the development of Bulgarian Marxism-Leninism was marked by some very sharp controversies between dogmatics and revisionists. Bulgarian Orthodoxes are particularly militant and intolerant and on the contrary, revisionists are in reality very moderate and rather conservative. Therefore the deviations are insignificant and the degree of the destalinization is very small.     

Kenneth Strike on Liberalism,Citizenship and the Private Interest in Schooling

After indicating a number of points of agreement with the argument 0eveloped by Kenneth Strike in his article Liberalism, Citizenship and the Private Interest in Schooling, this article identifies and explores a number of queries and criticisms which arise in relation to that argument. These queries and criticisms relate especially to the nature and extent of the expansiveness involved in Strike's conception of public or common educational influence, and to the implications and justification of the claim that private educational interests enjoy a greater salience and recognition on Strike's view of public or common educational influence than on some alternative views.     

Quantum Mechanical Unbounded Operators and Constructive Mathematics – a Rejoinder to Bridges

As argued in Hellman (1993), the theorem of Pour-El and Richards (1983) can be seen by the classicist as limiting constructivist efforts to recover the mathematics for quantum mechanics. Although Bridges (1995) may be right that the constructivist would work with a different definition of closed operator, this does not affect my point that neither the classical unbounded operators standardly recognized in quantum mechanics nor their restrictions to constructive arguments are recognizable as objects by the constructivist. Constructive substitutes that may still be possible necessarily involve additional incompleteness in the mathematical representation of quantum phenomena. Concerning a second line of reasoning in Hellman (1993), its import is that constructivist practice is consistent with a liberal stance but not with a radical, verificationist philosophical position. Whether such a position is actually espoused by certain leading constructivists, they are invited to clarify.     

Mathematical modeling of the effects of ‘capability’ and ‘intent’ on the stability of a competitive international system

In international relations theory, there is a long history of Richardson-like modeling of the evolution of military capability. Usually, such models are deterministic and predictive and do not allow for the representation of the transition from competitive peace to shooting war. More recently, models have been developed which attempt to represent the evolution of relationship between nations. The relationship between nations, varying from friendship to hostility, is taken to be synonymous with the intent of nations towards each other, varying from good will to malice. Generally, these relationship models do not include capability though common sense would indicate that capability and mutual intent should profoundly influence each other. A model is presented here which combines these two fundamental attributes of international relations and attempts to represent the outbreak of war in the world system by the onset of deterministic chaos in the extended model.On leave 1994–95 at U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Washington, D.C. 20451, U.S.A.     

Die Entwicklung der Diskussion um die formale Logik in der Sowjetunion

Ohne ZusammenfassungDie Literatur zur Logik in der Sowjetunion ist sehr bescheiden. Nebst einigen Kapiteln in grösseren Werken sind es folgende Schriften: Bochénski, I. M., Soviet Logic,SST, 1, 29–38. — Dahm, H., Renaissance der formalen Logik,Ost-Probleme, 1957,8, 254–267. — Philipov, A.,Logic and Dialectic in the Soviet Union, New York 1952, XI+89 pp. — Winkelmann, A., Die Stellung der formalen Logik im Sowjet-system,Scholastik, 1956,1, 85–89.     

Causal condition,causal asymmetry,and the counterfactual analysis of causation

In a recent paper Causal Asymmetry, Douglas Ehring has proposed an intriguing solution to the vexing problem of causal asymmetry. The aim of this paper is to show that his theory is not satisfactory. Moreover, the examples that I use in showing the defect of Ehring's theory also indicate that the counterfactual analysis of causation has a problem that cannot be remedied by Marshall Swain's suggested refinement of the counterfactual analysis of causation in Causation and Distinct Events.     

The relationship between perceived surface-lightness and perceived illumination

Summary An attempt was made to specify the relationship between perceived surface lightness and perceived illumination under the stimulus conditions where different combinations of albedo and illuminance gave 10 approximately equal-luminance levels of a test field (TF) on three different (black-, gray- and white-appearing) backgrounds. Two types of category judgments for TF-lightness and overall illumination were made on the total of 94 TFs by 5 Ss. The results indicated that under the condition where achromatic surface colors appear, the perceptual scission which produces two different perceptual dimensions (lightness and perceived illumination) from one sort of stimulation (luminance) was clearly observed. The relation between the two judgments was consistent with the lightness-illumination invariance hypothesis: As lightness judgments (A) changed from darker to lighter, illumination judgments (I) shifted form brighter to dimmer, the sum of A and I being kept nearly invariant for a given luminance of the TF; the psychological relationship between lightness and illumination, A+I, changed as a linear function of the photometric combination of albedo and illuminance, log A+log I. It was also found that the albedo of the background was an important factor determining the extent of perceptual scission between lightness and illumination.     

Routes to action in reaction time tasks

Summary Two-choice tactile RTs are no faster than 8-choice tasks, implying the existence of a direct route. However, simple tactile RTs are much faster than choice tactile RTs (Leonard, 1959). In Experiment I we show that this is not due to subjects anticipating the stimulus in simple tactile RT tasks. Increasing probability of stimulus occurrence at a particular time led to equally decreased tactile RTs for simple and choice tasks.We suggest that an alternative route is available for simple RTs which is faster than the direct route available for choice tactile RTs. This route is faster because (a) the response can be specified in advance, and (b) the stimulus does not need to be identified. The subject needs merely to register that it has occurred. In Experiment II we show that simple RTs to a visual stimulus are decreased by a simultaneous uninformative tactile stimulus even when this is to the wrong finger. This confirms that exact stimulus identification is not necessary in the fast route. In Experiment III we show that a secondary task slows down simple tactile RTs to the same level as choice tactile RTs while the latter are hardly affected. This suggests that focussed attention is not needed for the direct route, but it is needed for the fast route. We propose that a useful distinction can be made between action largely controlled by external stimuli (the direct route) and action largely controlled by internal intentions of will (the fast route).     

Iconic memory — an artifact of perceptual reconstruction processes?

Summary Two experiments, using a partial vs. whole report procedure to isolate iconic from short-term memory loss, are reported. In the first experiment 10 Ss had to judge the difference between two line lengths in a display of three pairs of lines (in rows). Results showed no significant variation in d' with cue delay in spite of a medium overall performance, and in contrast to preliminary partial/whole report experiments. To counter the possibility that the short-term memory load was too small in this experiment, a second experiment was performed with displays containing nine instead of three pairs, i.e., three pairs per row. Equivalence of performance for all conditions was about the same as before. This was true for both hit- and false-alarm rates. The results are interpreted as evidence against the view of iconic memory as a high capacity store containing a lot of information. An alternative reconstructive theory is put forward to explain both conventional iconic loss and our results. According to this account, partial report measures processed material rather than reflecting an iconic store of uninterpreted sensory events. Some consequences of this model are discussed in the context of some weak effects in our data; and suggestions are put forward for further investigation of visual processing.The experiments to be reported here were made possible by grant Schu 421/1–2 of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft. The main results of Experiment II have already been reported at the European Conference on Visual Perception at Nordwijkerhout, October 1979. I am indebted to Mrs. R. Ledebur, cand. phil, and Dipl.-Psych. G. Gros who collected the data. I also wish to thank Dr. A. Reeves (Dortmund) for helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper. Dr. P. Wolff (Osnabrück) and two anonymous reviewers contributed valuable suggestions concerning the final draft     

Lying and intersubjective truth: A communication based approach to understanding lying

This project was undertaken as a response to a perceived deficiency regarding the role of communication in a large block of the phenomenological discourse on lying. The arguments presented here attempt to make the communication process an explicit, rather than an implicit component of this discussion. First, a lie is explained as a communicative act that is identified by making a simple comparison between two contradictory realities, the reality presented by the lie, and some sort of true reality. Existing discussions of lying are examined and judged to be deficient because they limit their explanations of this true reality to subjective and objective standards of truth. Intersubjectivity is presented as an alternative truth standard, and it is argued that lies can only be discovered and understood through a process of interpretation or negotiation (dialogue) by human interactants.     

Natural deduction rules for English

A system of natural deduction rules is proposed for an idealized form of English. The rules presuppose a sharp distinction between proper names and such expressions as the c, a (an) c, some c, any c, and every c, where c represents a common noun. These latter expressions are called quantifiers, and other expressions of the form that c or that c itself, are called quantified terms. Introduction and elimination rules are presented for any, every, some, a (an), and the, and also for any which, every which, and so on, as well as rules for some other concepts. One outcome of these rules is that Every man loves some woman is implied by, but does not imply, Some woman is loved by every man, since the latter is taken to mean the same as Some woman is loved by all men. Also, Jack knows which woman came is implied by Some woman is known by Jack to have come, but not by Jack knows that some woman came.     

Hypnotic time distortion and free-recall learning — an attempted replication

Summary Krauss, Katzell and Krauss (1974) have presented evidence suggesting that hypnosis can be used to facilitate free-recall learning. Specifically, they report that hypnotised individuals, given special time-distortion instructions, can recall as much in three minutes as waking control subjects can in ten minutes. The present study was an attempt to replicate and extend this main finding of Krauss et al. The results of the present study failed to replicate Krauss et al.'s finding; in fact, the hypnotised subjects did rather worse than waking control groups; also no relationship was found between recall scores and depths of hypnosis. Marked discrepancies were noticed between the scores of the waking control groups used in the present study, and those used by Krauss et al. It was concluded that any facilitatory effect of hypnotic time distortion on free-recall learning still awaits a definitive demonstration.     

On two arguments for the indeterminacy of personal identity

Both arguments are based on the breakdown of normal criteria of identity in certain science-fictional circumstances. In one case, normal criteria would support the identity of person A with each of two other persons, B and C; and it is argued that, in the imagined circumstances, A=B and A=C have no truth value. In the other, a series or spectrum of cases is tailored to a sorites argument. At one end of the spectrum, persons A and B are such that A=B is clearly true; at the other end, A and B are such that the identity is clearly false. In between, normal criteria of identity leave the truth or falsehood of A=B undecided, and it is argued that in these circumstances A=B has no truth value.These arguments are to be understood counterfactually. My claim is that, so understood, neither establishes its conclusion. The first involves a pair of counterfactual situations that are equally possible or tied. If A=B and A=C have no truth value, a counterfactual conditional with one of them as consequent and an antecedent that is true in circumstances in which either is true should have no truth value. Intuitively, however, any such counterfactual is false. The second argument can be seen to invite an analogous response. If this is right, however, there is an important disanalogy between this and the classical paradox of the heap. If the disanalogy is only apparent, the argument shows at most that the existence of persons can be indeterminate.     

Theor of free choice permission

I argue that the conjunctive distribution of permissibility over or, which is a puzzling feature of free-choice permission is just one instance of a more general class of conjunctive occurrences of the word, and that these conjunctive uses are more directly explicable by the consideration that or is a descendant of oper than by reference to the disjunctive occurrences which logicalist prejudices may tempt us to regard as semantically more fundamental. I offer an account of how the disjunctive uses of or may have come about through an intermediate discourse-adverbial use of or, drawing a parallel with but, which, etymologically, is disjunctive rather than conjunctive and whose conjunctive uses seem to represent just such a discourse-adverbial application.     

The Definition of Moral Dilemmas: A Logical Problem

This paper concerns one of the undecided disputes of modern moral philosophy: the possibility of moral dilemmas. Whereas proponents of the possibility of moral dilemmas often appeal to moral experience, many opponents refer to ethical theory and deontic logic. My aim in this paper is to clarify some of the tension between moral experience and ethical theory with respect to moral dilemmas. In Part One I try to show that a number of logical arguments against the possibility of moral dilemmas, though apparently very different, turn out to be basically the same, as they are all based on the following concept of ought: if A ought to be done, doing B is impermissible and doing A itself is permissible. In Part Two I present an overview of several definitions of moral dilemmas that have been given by proponents of moral dilemmas: definitions that define moral dilemmas in terms of oughts and definitions that define them in terms of reasons. I conclude that, while reason is to weak, ought is too strong a concept to define moral dilemmas with. In this way, the arguments from Part One create a logical problem for proponents of the possibility of moral dilemmas to define moral dilemmas.     

Some notes on the nature of methodological indeterminacy

This paper is an attempt to extend the meaning of the concept of indeterminacy for the human sciences. The authors do this by coining the term methodological indeterminacy and arguing that indeterminacy is better understood when linked to specific methodological techniques. Paradoxically, while specific research techniques demonstrate that the issue of indeterminacy is complex, yielding the possibility of types and degrees, it does not eliminate the problem of translation first raised by Quine. However, the authors go on to argue that, from a research perspective, indeterminacy can and must be approached in such a way that it is possible to reduce cases of it, even though never completely eliminating it in the human sciences.     

The array size function in simple visual search tasks: A comparison between “go-no go” and “yes-no” tasks under conditions of high and low target-noise similarity

Summary In research on visual search within a single eye-fixation a number of different tasks are used and referred to interchangeably. Research with other types of tasks suggests that there are possibly important differences between these tasks. In the present study, two types of search tasks were compared under conditions as equal as possible: the go-no go task and the yes-no task. Conditions of low and high target-noise similarity were used. The results obtained showed: a) a steeper slope of the array size function in yes-no tasks than in go-no go tasks on the first day of practice but not on the second: b) a higher intercept value of the same function for yes-no tasks than for go-no go tasks; and c) a greater proportion of errors with yes-no tasks than with comparable go-no go tasks. A tentative model, describing the main features of the results obtained, is briefly sketched.     

What is Psychotherapy for? A Plausible Alternative to Empirically Supported Therapies,Therapy Relationships,and Practice Guidelines

Task forces come up with empirically supported therapies and therapist-client relationships. A careful study of their research provides an empirically supported answer to the long-standing question of what psychotherapy is for. Accordingly, if your way of doing therapy falls outside the empirically based boundary, (a) you can risk declining their practice guidelines; (b) you can develop your own practice guidelines; and (c) you can pursue some exciting implications from having an alternative set of guidelines for how to do psychotherapy. A strategy is proposed as a plausible alternative to the task forces empirically based strategy.