Parallel action: Concurrent dynamic logic with independent modalities

Regular dynamic logic is extended by the program construct, meaning and executed in parallel. In a semantics due to Peleg, each command is interpreted as a set of pairs (s,T), withT being the set of states reachable froms by a single execution of, possibly involving several processes acting in parallel. The modalities << and [] are given the interpretations<>A is true ats iff there existsT withsRT andA true throughoutT, and[]A is true ats iff for allT, ifsRT thenA is true throughoutT, which make <> and [] no longer interdefinable via negation, as they are in the regular case.We prove that the logic defined by this modelling is finitely axiomatisable and has the finite model property, hence is decidable. This requires the development a new theory of canonical models and filtrations for reachability relations.     

Computer content analysis of sex differences in the language of children

This study presents empirical procedures for the collection and content analysis of the oral language of kindergarten children. The analysis technique used material and machines available to most researchers. The results of the analysis of language samples of 144 randomly selected children from the entire kindergarten class of the Ithaca, New York, school system showed that boys produced significantly more language than did the girls as well as significantly more references to aggression, self, time, space, quantity, fears, good, act of oral communication, negation, and affirmation, and asked more questions of the examiner than did the girls. The girls made significantly more female references than did the boys. Implications for future research are discussed.     

The analysis of experience: John Dewey and Elsie Ripley Clapp on desire and thinking, 1911

Unpublished correspondence with Elsie Ripley Clapp, along with extensive notes for a 1911 course, The Analysis of Experience, provide the context for a consideration of John Dewey's discussion of the relation between desire and thinking. Dewey's philosophic point of view is portrayed as it was developing in his own mind. The unity of thought and desire, the necessity of making objects of inquiry, the identification of thinking and acting, are themes in these materials which would appear in their published form in such works as Essays in Experimental Logic, Democracy and Education, and Human Nature and Conduct. In the unpublished materials, Dewey is seen as a naturalist at work in his laboratory, reworking his ideas and acknowledging Clapp's assistance in getting Dewey to connect practical situations in life with the philosophic distinctions under development. The 1911 materials are an excellent connection between problematics in Dewey's earlier writings on ethics, epistemology, and logic, and his later writings, on the same subjects in the 1920's and 1930's.     

Alfred Schutz: Philosopher and Social Scientist

Aron Gurwitsch's critique of Schutz's essay The Stranger is the starting point for this consideration of Schutz's relationship with phenomenology. This relationship is based on Schutz's emphasis on the value of the average as a phenomenological structure. In opposing sociology to philosophy, Gurwitsch takes this value as inferior in comparison with what he sees as cardinal issues of transcendental phenomenology. What Gurwitsch finds incompatible with phenomenological inquiry – the idea and practice of the natural attitude within the social sphere – Schutz turns into the core of his philosophy. The phenomenology of the natural attitude is as essentially philosophical as any reflectively practiced human science. The problem of how everydayness is constituted requires a phenomenological insight that leads the explorer – through reconstructing the meaning in terms of the mundane – straight to the origin.     

“Some more” notes,toward a “third” sophistic

Historians of rhetoric refer to two Sophistics, one in the 5th century B.C. and another c. 2nd century A.D. Besides these two, there is a 3rd Sophistic, but it is not necessarily sequential. (The 3rd is counter to counting sequentially.) Whereas the representative Sophists of the 1st Sophistic is Protagoras, and the second, Aeschines, the representative sophists of the 3rd are Gorgias (as proto-Third) and Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean-François Lyotard, Michel Foucault, Jacques Lacan, and Paul de Man.To distinguish between and among Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, and then Protagoras, Gorgias, and Lacan, the author determines how far each of these personages can count. The model of counting, used semiotically across the topoi of possible/impossible, is that of the people of New Guinea: one thing, two things, many things. It is determined (generally) that the philosophers, including Aristotle, count to one; the Sophists to two; and Gorgias, Lacan, and Lyotard, et al. count to many things, thereby breaking up a monism or binarism. The ancient philosophers employ a substratum of probability to hold together the contraries of possible/impossible; the Sophists employ anti/logic, which keeps the contraries/antitheses separate and therefore without synthesis, but which eventually threatens the integrity of the substratum, or the law of non-contradiction; and Gorgias, Lacan, Lyotard et al. theorize about the impossibility/Resistance of the Logos (reason, logic, law, argumentation, history) to Theory/Totalization, because of the Gorgian Kairos and the Lacanian Real — both of which enter the Logos and break up the cycle of the antitheses and create something new, irrational (Untersteiner).This breaking up has a negative/positive influence on Protagoras's man-measure doctrine, which in turn has a similar influence on the problem of the ethical subject. The subject/agent not only no longer knows (by way of Logos) but also no longer acts (as independent agent); the subject becomes a function of Logos as determined by Kairos/Real; it moves from a hypotaxis/syntaxis of one and two to a radical parataxis/paralogy of some more.From the Impossibility/tragedy of knowledge, however, comes the Possible, or Possibilisms, which allows for the new (though divided) ethical subject to reclaim its position as individual. Such a reclamation of the subject, however, has a profound effect on argumentation, and especially the notion of consensus. What is wanted, then, in a Third Sophistic ethical — as opposed to a political — rhetoric is dissensus through radical parataxes and paralogies.     

Toward an empirical subclassification of “learning disabilitiesℍ: A psychophysiological comparison of “hyperactiveℍ and “nonhyperactiveℍ subgroups

The diagnostic category of learning disabilities is a heterogeneous one, but few empirical attempts have been made to distinguish subgroups. Recent research, however, suggests that it may be meaningful to discriminate between hyperactive and nonhyperactive learning-disabled children. In the present study, 21 learning-disabled children identified as hyperactive through teacher nominations and ratings were compared to 15 learning-disabled children identified as nonhyperactive in the same manner. The two groups differed on rated behavior, birth order, amount of prescribed stimulant medication, amount of psychosocial stress, and Verbal, Performance, and Full Scale WISC-R IQ scores. They did not differ, however, on several demographic variables, the number of perinatal complications, reading achievement, and a number of tonic and phasic measures of autonomie activity. These findings support the distinction between hyperactive and nonhyperactive subgroups of learning-disabled children, but suggest that the two subgroups may have a similar biological substrate.We wish to express our sincere appreciation to Douglas Carmichael, Martha Stewart, Kay Richmond, and the teachers of Clarke County for their kind and sophisticated assistance, and to David Coleman and David Hammer for their technical assistance.     

Ghost Gestures: Phenomenological Investigations of Bodily Micromovements and Their Intercorporeal Implications

This paper thematizes the operative kinaesthetic style of world-experiencing life by turning to the ongoing how of our habitual bodily comportment: to our deeply sedimented way(s) of making a body; to schematic inner vectors or tendencies toward movement that persist as bodily ghost gestures even if one is not making the larger, visible gestures they imply; and to inadvertent isometrics, i.e., persisting patterns of trying, bracing, freezing, etc. All such micromovements witness to our sociality insofar as they are not only socially shaped, but perpetuate certain styles of intercorporeal interaction and sustain certain modes of responsivity. Reactivating the sediment -- retrieving the tacit choreography of everyday life from its anonymity and sensing our ongoing ways of living out the legacy of our communal body -- not only allows one's individual bodily style to shift, but can open new possibilities for healthy interkinaesthetic comportment. Such work can thus contribute to an embodied ethics in both theory and practice.     

Illustrating two complementary enterprises at the interface of psychology and religion through reading Winnicott

Our work at the interface of psychology and religion can proceed in two complementary directions. When reading a psychological theory, (1) we may pay special attention to how certain concepts in particular, and the system of ideas as a whole, are being or might be used to interpret religious phenomena. We may focus on how those ideas may be involved in doing psychology of religion: the psychological interpretation of religious phenomena. Alternatively, (2) we may pay special attention to how certain concepts in particular, and the system of ideas as a whole, are being or might be used, either implicitly or explicitly, to make claims about human nature, about the meaning and purpose of life, about God. We may identify the psychology as religion-theology: psychological ideas potentially functioning in a religious-theological manner. I will illustrate this by: (a) examining D. W. Winnicott's article, Transitional Objects and Transitional Phenomena (1953/1986) in terms of three successive concepts or categories: transitional object, transitional phenomena, and a third intermediate area of experiencing; (b) considering how these categories can be used in psychology of religion; (c) reconsidering how the psychological categories may function as religious-theological. The discussion is intended to illustrate how we might more fully appreciate how and why a psychological theory may work well in doing psychology of religion when we more fully appreciate how that psychology implicitly functions as theology.     

The Origin of the Concept of “Allgemeinbildung” in 18th Century Germany

The German theory of education refers mainly to what is called Bildung. The historical sense of Bildung is not cultivaion, but cultivation for inwardness. This concept has two sources, the neo-platonic inner soul on one hand, pietistic piety on the other hand. The article shows that these sources had been part of European discussions before the development of national cultures after 1750. So the German concept of Bildung, famous for the German Sonderweg in culture and politics, had been composed out of non-German sources. The nationalizaiton of inwardness began at the end of the 18th century and was established in 19th century German Higher Education.     

Variations in use of the term “or”

Two studies showed that adults' responses to questions involving the term or varied markedly depending upon the type of question presented. When presented with various objects (A's and B's) and asked to circle all things which are A or B subjects tended to circle A's as well as B's, whereas when asked to circle all the A's or B's subjects showed a relatively stronger tendency to circle one or the other. Moreover the nature of the sets of objects (As and Bs) influenced behavior as well. There was also evidence that the effects due to question wording or set type transferred.     

A note on the logic of signed equations

A signed -equation is an expression of the form t t or t t, where t and t are -terms (for some ranked set ). We characterize those classes of -algebras which are models of a set of signed -equations. Further we consider the problem of finding a complete deductive system analogous to equational logic for the logical consequence operation restricted to signed equations.     

The pastor as enabler

Out of a personal struggle to understand and help a chronically ill friend the writer evolves a view of the pastor as enabler. The definition of enable, the role of the enabler, and the problems which prevent many from being enabled, are discussed. These definitions are illuminated by the Biblical perspective of Elihu in the book ofJob. The pastor who sees himself as enabler is able to bring perspective, clarity, empathy, compassion, and concrete help to the person in need.Chaplain Rusnak is a graduate of The Luthern School of Theology at Chicago.     

The elimination of de re formulas

It is shown that de re formulas are eliminable in the modal logic S5 extended with the axiom scheme x x.     

Theorizing Gender for Experimental Game Theory: Experiments with “Sex Status” and “Merit Status” in an Asymmetric Game

In experimental game-theoretic research, to the extent that sex has been considered at all, the approach has been to focus on the individual level of analysis. This paper reports the results of experiments designed to focus on sex/gender and to expand the level of analysis to include the institutional level. An asymmetric game was designed such that players in the male and female institutional locations had 3 and 2 alternatives, respectively. Players earned the institutional locations based on a test, so that top and bottom scorers respectively merited the 3- and 2-alternatives locations. Game-theoretic understandings of sex-of-player were compared to the expectations states theory concept of sex status; that is, men expect and are expected to perform more competently than women. Results indicated that top-scorer men and women behave similarly; bottom-scorer men resist their low merit status (behaving the most rationally of all player groups); bottom-scorer women accept their low merit status (behaving the most irrationally of all player groups). Whereas game theory cannot provide a coherent understanding of these findings, the concept of sex status helps to interpret the behavior of all four player groups and shows how judgments about rationality and irrationality depend critically on the interpretive framework used.     

Developmental study of the comprehension and production of the pronoun “it”

Forty-two English-speaking children aged 3,3 to 7,0 were asked to act out instructions of the type There is clay on the table, give it to me, where the pronoun it occurs in object position and refers to a collective noun, or to a count noun, or to a noun (chocolate) which can be either. They were also asked to describe actions performed by the experimenter and to repeat the experimenter's instructions. A hierarchical pattern of behavior emerged and unexpected errors were noted. The results do not appear to be interpretable from the purely linguistic point of view; it is argued that analogous observations have been made in problem-solving tasks and that therefore cognitive development in general must play an important part.     

Matching attidudes towards cartoons across evaluative judgments and nonverbal evaluative behavior

Summary Attitude responses and behavior were theoretically treated as two modalities in a psychophysical matching task. The total response pattern was expected to vary in terms of (a) covariation between modalities and (b) shifts in central tendencies within modalities. Subjects watched a series of humorous and disgusting cartoons on nonsense and women-related topics and evaluated each cartoon using an attitude rating scale. Their facial expressions were secretly videotaped. The tapes were content-analyzed by raters for the amount of nonverbal mirth and of disgust. Independent variables were: (1) Instruction for self-observation (yes/no), (2) Instructions to identify the kind of cartoon (yes/no), (3) Sex of subject (male/female), and (4) Kind of cartoon (nonsense or women-related). The correlation across the total set of cartoons between the two modalities was r=0.88. Self-observation and kind of cartoon affected the strength of covariation of the modalities: sex of subjects and kind of cartoon had a biasing influence on the central tendency of responses.     

The group member's view of inner and outer reality: The Janus phenomenon applied to the group

This paper surveys some theoretical aspects of psychodynamic group treatment from the vantage point of the Janus phenomenon. This focus may provide some clarification in understanding how group therapy facilitates growth, especially in the relationships between inner realities and the realities of the external world. The paper explores and seeks bridges and connections between the dynamics of the group and intrapsychic dynamics. The inner view may be understood as intimately connected with intrapsychic concerns, whereas the issues for patients in groups do, to a degree, concern interpersonal processes in and projections onto the external world. The paper concludes that, thus far, we must accept less than perfect integration of theory and settle for limited domain reasoning (Scheidlinger, 1982). Erlebnis is the term coined by Paul Federn (1952) to refer to subjective experience of the self.     

Stereotyped connotations of masculine and feminine names

This study was designed to provide a basis to understand better antifeminine stereotyped attitudes that occur in association with a stimulus no more informative about a person than her first name. College students, mostly freshmen and sophomores, ascribed connotative meanings to common and uncommon masculine and feminine first names while imagining either real or ideal persons. The results from 48 subjects disclosed that the semantic dimension of potency (e.g., strength and bravery) is likely to be a fundamentally important connotation associated more with masculine names than with feminine names. Two findings very much supported this conclusion. Thus, the potency dimension was the only one of five dimensions of semantic meaning that: (a) yielded any masculine-feminine difference in the ideal condition, and (b) showed a disfavorable connotation for feminine names in comparison to masculine names in either the real or ideal condition.