Weak Rejection

Linguistic evidence supports the claim that certain, weak rejections are less specific than assertions. On the basis of this evidence, it has been argued that rejected sentences cannot be premisses and conclusions in inferences. We give examples of inferences with weakly rejected sentences as premisses and conclusions. We then propose a logic of weak rejection which accounts for the relevant phenomena and is motivated by principles of coherence in dialogue. We give a semantics for which this logic is sound and complete, show that it axiomatizes the modal logic KD45 and prove that it still derives classical logic on its asserted fragment. Finally, we defend previous logics of strong rejection as being about the linguistically preferred interpretations of weak rejections.     

Der “dritte Weg” der “neo-eurasischen” Zeitschrift “Elementy” -- zurück ins Dritte Reich?

Studies in East European Thought - Articulated in the twenties, the doctrines of the exiled Russian ‘Evrazijstvo’ movement are undergoing a renaissance in Russia today. As the...     

A European Initiative: Irigaray,Marx, and Citizenship

This article presents Irigaray as a philosopher committed to sociopolitical change by discussing her political thought and her engagement with the European Parliament. It traces her recent work with the ex‐Communist Party in Italy back to her early critique of Marx and her subsequent attraction to Hegel's civil definition of the person. The failure of her European Parliament initiative suggests that her thinking is in advance of its possible realization.     

Culture and decision‐making: Investigating cultural variations in the East Asian and North American online decision‐making processes

Research in cross‐cultural psychology suggests that East Asians hold holistic thinking styles whereas North Americans hold analytic thinking styles. The present study examines the influence of cultural thinking styles on the online decision‐making processes for Hong Kong Chinese and European Canadians, with and without time constraints. We investigated the online decision‐making processes in terms of (1) information search speed, (2) quantity of information used, and (3) type of information used. Results show that, without time constraints, Hong Kong Chinese, compared to European Canadians, spent less time on decisions and parsed through information more efficiently, and Hong Kong Chinese attended to both important and less important information, whereas European Canadians selectively focused on important information. No cultural differences were found in the quantity of information used. When under time constraints, all cultural variations disappeared. The dynamics of cultural differences and similarities in decision‐making are discussed.     

Does the Traditional Treatment of Enthymemes Rest on a Mistake?

In many actual arguments, the conclusion seems intuitively to follow from the premisses, even though we cannot show that it follows logically. The traditional approach to evaluating such arguments is to suppose that they have an unstated premiss whose explicit addition will produce an argument where the conclusion does follow logically. But there are good reasons for doubting that people so frequently leave the premisses of their arguments unstated. The inclination to suppose that they do stems from the belief that the only way in which an argument's conclusion can follow definitely from its premisses is to follow logically. I argue that this belief is mistaken. I propose a revision of the current generic conception of logical consequence, and its variant specifications, to avoid the paradoxes of strict implication. The revised conception can then be naturally extended to include also what we might call 'enthymematic consequence'. This concept is a kind of consequence, whose properties merit investigation.     

Negation,anti-realism,and the denial defence

Here is one argument against realism. (1) Realists are committed to the classical rules for negation. But (2) legitimate rules of inference must conserve evidence. And (3) the classical rules for negation do not conserve evidence. So (4) realism is wrong. Most realists reject 2. But it has recently been argued that if we allow denied sentences as premisses and conclusions in inferences we will be able to reject 3. And this new argument against 3 generates a new response to the anti-realist argument: keep 1 and 2, avoiding 4 by rejecting 3. My aim in this paper is to see how much work in the fight against anti-realism this new response can really do. I argue that there is a powerful objection to the response: 2 is in tension with the claim that denied sentences can be premisses and conclusions in inferences. But I show that, even given this objection, the new response has an important role to play.     

Is Heidegger an Orientalist or an Occidentalist European Philosopher? Disclosing the Political Factor behind Heidegger’s Representation of Chinese Thinking

Though Heidegger became a kind of conceptual companion of comparative philosophers, and a methodological example for interpreters of Daoist philosophy claiming that Zhuangzi or Laozi embodied the overcoming of Western “onto-theology,” Heidegger himself not only stressed his disbelief in the notion that Asian thinking could save the West from its “civilizational crisis” but also clearly claimed that Western thinking could emerge only through its distinction from the “mythical East.” However, at the same time, Heidegger criticized the decadence of the West, claimed the necessity of cultural rejuvenation, and then, with the failure of Germany to perform this task, seemed to turn to Chinese sources to find alternative solutions. How to understand Heidegger’s complex relationship with China? Is Heidegger an Orientalist or an Occidentalist European philosopher? Moreover, how to understand the subtle and troubling connections between Heidegger’s complex relationship with China and Heidegger’s highly “problematic” (to say the least) intellectual engagement with Nazi ideology? To what extent are Orientalism and Occidentalism are linked to Heidegger’s belief in the Nationalist-Socialists’ claims about “saving” the “European spirit”?     

Natural Doubts: Williams's Diagnosis Of Scepticism

Michael Williams believes that scepticism about the externalworld seems compelling only because the considerations that underpin it are thoughtto be ``mere platitudes' about e.g., the nature and source of human knowledge, and hence,that if it shown through a ``theoretical diagnosis' that it does not rest upon suchplatitudes, but contentious theoretical considerations that we are no means bound toaccept, we can simply dismiss the absurd sceptical conclusion. Williams argues thatscepticism does presuppose two extremely contentious doctrines, however, he admits thatif these doctrines are themselves motivated by ``platitudes' then scepticism follows. Iaddress Williams's arguments for thinking scepticism must presuppose these doctrines,and argue that he overlooks a way that they can be seen as motivated by mere platitudes.Thus, I conclude that William's novel rejection of scepticism fails.     

儒家哲学的现代转型及其在21世纪的价值

面对各种挑战,儒家哲学的现代转型问题仍需要作切实的严肃的思考。儒学已不可能恢复其历史上的“独尊”地位,但它要恢复其活力,成为现代社会多元哲学中的“一元”,就必须完成其现代转型,成为一种现代的“合乎理性的完备性学说”．承担起“人类各种价值的总协调”这一哲学使命。新儒学需要与其他学说进行积极的对话和良性的互动,不仅在“正德”方面突出其价值,而且在“利用”(经济)、“厚生”(生活)、“致知”(科学)和“立制”(政治)等方面与其他学说逐渐达成“重叠的共识”。人类在21世纪将更加提升“交往理性”,更加重视“正德”．儒学在2l世纪将彰显其价值。     

From Ousia to Sophia: The Patristic and Classical Background to Twentieth‐Century Essentialism and Personalism

Both Classical Greek philosophy and the early Christian theology that often drew upon it reflected a tension in their understanding of essence (ο?σ?α). Was it a concrete thing, something that could assume agency and be related to, or did it refer only to the shared characteristics that reflect things and persons of a common kind? In this article I first establish that this question pertains, mutatis mutandis, to the Platonic forms, as well as to Christian concepts of essence and nature. I then argue that the Christian theology of the conciliar period sided against the reification of essence/nature, noting that their misplaced concreteness resulted in problematic doctrines. In conclusion I briefly explore how this same dynamic plays out in twentieth‐century Orthodox theology, as expressed by Sergius Bulgakov, Vladimir Lossky and John Zizioulas.     

A formal account of Socratic-style argumentation

In traditional mathematical models of argumentation an argument often consists of a chain of rules or reasons, beginning with premisses and leading to a conclusion that is endorsed by the party that put forward the argument. In informal reasoning, however, one often encounters a specific class of counterarguments that until now has received little attention in argumentation formalisms. The idea is that instead of starting with the premisses, the argument starts with the propositions put forward by the counterparty, of which the absurdity is illustrated by showing their (defeasible) consequences. This way of argumentation (which we call S-arguments) is very akin to Socratic dialogues and critical interviews; it also has applications in modern philosophy. In this paper, various examples of S-arguments are provided, as well as a treatment of the problems that occur when trying to formalize them in existing formalisms. We also provide general guidelines that can serve as a basis for implementing S-arguments into various existing formalisms. In particular, we show how S-arguments can be implemented in Pollock's formalism, how they fit into Dung's abstract argumentation approach and how they are related to the issue of self-defeating arguments.     

Aristotle on a Puzzle about Logical Consequence: Necessity of Being vs. Necessity of Saying

In the Posterior Analytics (I 6, 75a18–27) Aristotle discusses a puzzle which endangers the possibility of inferring a non-necessary conclusion. His solution relies on the distinction between the necessity of the conclusion's being the case and the necessity of admitting the conclusion once one has admitted the premisses. The former is a factual necessity, whereas the latter is meant to be a normative or deontic necessity that is independent of the facts stated by the premisses and the conclusion. This paper maintains that Aristotle resorts to this distinction because he thinks that, as long as it is conceived as a factual relation, logical consequence cannot exist independently of the facts expressed by the premisses and the conclusion. As a corollary, the necessity of such a consequence relation always requires the necessity of these facts. Aristotle holds this factual conception of logical consequence responsible for the puzzle, since it cannot account for valid syllogisms with contingent or false premisses. The alternative conception of necessity is then introduced by him in order to make good this deficiency. The distinction between the necessity of being and the necessity of saying was revived by the Oxford logician E. W. B. Joseph, and taken over by Frank Ramsey in his seminal Truth and Probability, but has not received attention from recent interpreters of Aristotle's logic. This paper, however, argues that, in spite of its intrinsic interest, the distinction bore no significant fruit in Aristotle's logical doctrine.     

The Impact of Culture on the Creative Potential of American,Russian, and Iranian College Students

This study presents evidence for the impact of sociocultural environment on creative potential. The divergent thinking performance of American, Russian, and Iranian college students was compared on the Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults. The study revealed that, compared to the Iranians, Americans and Russians have superior abilities to consider a problem from different perspectives and to generate original solutions to a problem. The performance differences on the originality measure of the representatives of the Western and Eastern countries calls for the possible revisions of the traditional definition of creativity as a construct emphasizing originality in thinking. Although originality and innovation are inherent properties of creative behavior in the Western thought, it might have lesser value in the East.     

Stripped of illusions? Exploring system justification processes in capitalist and post‐Communist societies

Sociologists and political scientists have often observed that citizens of Central and Eastern Europe express high levels of disillusionment with their social, economic and political systems, in comparison with citizens of Western capitalist societies. In this review, we analyze system legitimation and delegitimation in post‐Communist societies from a social psychological perspective. We draw on system justification theory, which seeks to understand how, when and why people do (and do not) defend, bolster and justify existing social systems. We review some of the major tenets and findings of the theory and compare research on system‐justifying beliefs and ideologies in traditionally Capitalist and post‐Communist countries to determine: (1) whether there are robust differences in the degree of system justification in post‐Communist and Capitalist societies, and (2) the extent to which hypotheses derived from system justification theory receive support in the post‐Communist context. To this end, we summarize research findings from over 20 countries and cite previously unpublished data from a public opinion survey conducted in Poland. Our analysis confirms that there are lower levels of system justification in post‐Communist countries. At the same time, we find that system justification possesses similar social and psychological antecedents, manifestations and consequences in the two types of societies. We offer potential explanations for these somewhat complicated patterns of results and conclude by addressing implications for theory and research on system justification and system change (or transition).     

Contemporary Studies on the Concept of Creativity: the East and the West

This article reviews contemporary studies on the concept of creativity across two cultures—Eastern (Asian) cultures and Western (American and European) cultures — by examining two bodies of literature. One is on people's implicit theories of creativity across different cultures and the other is on cross‐cultural studies of creativity. Studies on implicit theories of creativity in the East suggest that many Asians have similar but not identical conceptions of creativity to many people in the West. Cross‐cultural studies of creativity reveal that Easterners and Westerners differ, on average, in their divergent‐thinking performance and creative expressions. A view of creativity as relatively culture‐specific is presented and the appropriateness of using divergent‐thinking tests to measure creativity is discussed.     

Perfect validity,entailment and paraconsistency

This paper treats entailment as a subrelation of classical consequence and deducibility. Working with a Gentzen set-sequent system, we define an entailment as a substitution instance of a valid sequent all of whose premisses and conclusions are necessary for its classical validity. We also define a sequent Proof as one in which there are no applications of cut or dilution. The main result is that the entailments are exactly the Provable sequents. There are several important corollaries. Every unsatisfiable set is Provably inconsistent. Every logical consequence of a satisfiable set is Provable therefrom. Thus our system is adequate for ordinary mathematical practice. Moreover, transitivity of Proof fails upon accumulation of Proofs only when the newly combined premisses are inconsistent anyway, or the conclusion is a logical truth. In either case Proofs that show this can be effectively determined from the Proofs given. Thus transitivity fails where it least matters — arguably, where it ought to fail! We show also that entailments hold by virtue of logical form insufficient either to render the premisses inconsistent or to render the conclusion logically true. The Lewis paradoxes are not Provable. Our system is distinct from Anderson and Belnap's system of first degree entailments, and Johansson's minimal logic. Although the Curry set paradox is still Provable within naive set theory, our system offers the prospect of a more sensitive paraconsistent reconstruction of mathematics. It may also find applications within the logic of knowledge and belief.     

South‐East European Regional Conference of Psychology, 2009, Sofia,Bulgaria

The first South‐East European Regional Conference of Psychology was held in Sofia, Bulgaria, from 30 October to 1 November 2009, under the Patronage of the President of Bulgaria and the auspices of the International Association of Applied Psychology (IAAP), the International Union of Psychological Science (IUPsyS), and the International Association for Cross‐Cultural Psychology (IACCP), with further financial support provided by the European Federation of Psychologists’ Associations (EFPA) and the European Health Psychology Society (EHPS). The conference was hosted by the Bulgarian Psychological Society under the Conference Presidency of Dr Plamen Dimitrov, who was supported by Professor Sava Djonev as Chair of the Scientific Program Committee. It attracted over 350 participants from 25 countries, including 14 countries from the SEE region and its immediate neighbours. The Scientific Program explored ways and means to promote the role of psychology individually and institutionally at regional and international levels. Planning is already under way to organize a second regional conference in three years’ time.     

The satanic novel: A philosophical dialogue on blasphemy and censorship

This dialogue is concerned with the problems raised by the Rushdie affair for Western intellectuals, whose thought on social issues derives either from the Christian or the Western liberal tradition. This has brought to a head the many difficulties which beset a Western European country as it develops into a multicultural one. Since the concern of the dialogue is with a crisis in the thinking of Western intellectuals about free speech, censorship, tolerance, etc., the four participants are university teachers of philosophy in a British university. They are: Ambrose Taylor, a self‐styled defender of ‘British’ and ‘Christian’ values, Archie Runciman, a progressive Christian or religious eclectic, Freddie Stuart Hill, a committed Mill type liberal and Jenny Spring, whose liberalism is tempered by the belief that the state should take a positive role in promoting certain values. The author should not be identified with any of the speakers.     

Toward a Culturally Responsive Model of Mental Health Literacy: Facilitating Help‐Seeking Among East Asian Immigrants to North America

Studies have consistently found that East Asian immigrants in North America are less likely to use mental health services even when they experience levels of distress comparable to Euro‐Americans. Although cultural factors that may prevent East Asian immigrants from seeking mental health care have been identified, few studies have explored ways to foster appropriate help‐seeking and use of mental health services. Recent work on mental health literacy provides a potential framework for strategies to increase appropriate help‐seeking and use of services. This paper reviews the literature on help‐seeking for mental health problems among East Asian immigrants living in Western countries to critically assess the relevance of the mental health literacy approach as a framework for interventions to improve appropriate use of services. Modifications needed to develop a culturally responsive framework for mental health literacy are identified.