Note on the relation between Kendall's tau and the Cronholm-Revusky test

It is shown that the rank testR proposed by Cronholm and Revusky for comparing the effect of two treatments on a single group ofn subjects is a linear function of Kendall'sτ-coefficient. The asymptotic results of Bennett for the distribution ofR are also applicable to that ofτ under a class of nonnull hypotheses.     

Remarks on Violence and Intersubjectivity

The article connects a sociological perspective on violence to the problem of intersubjectivity. After an overview of sociological and cultural accounts of violence, we turn to a fundamental problem caused by the experience of violence. In dialogue with Frances Chaput Wakslers book on The New Orleans Sniper (2010) we discuss a case in which the problem of intersubjectivity figures prominently. The erratic nature of violent acts committed by an unseen sniper is experienced as existential crisis in which the question of subjectivity loses its certainty for the social actors involved. As a consequence the problem of intersubjectivity but also questions of framing past events are opened up for sociological research.     

Remarks on Wishes and Counterfactuals

A kind of 'isomorphism' is commented on, between the relation of wants to indicative conditionals and the relation of wishes to counter-factual conditionals. Among other things, it is suggested that Richard Jeffrey's theory of decision applies equally to degrees of 'wishedforness'.     

Remarks on aggression

This paper attempts to draw attention to the difference between the states of mind and inner worlds of neurotic, borderline and psychopathic patients, with reference to different types of destructiveness: anger in the neurotic patient; desperate vengeful hatred in the borderline paranoid; and a cold addiction to violence in the psychopath. Discussion focuses on technical issues and the need to meet the psychopathic patient where he really is, in the inner bleak emotional cemetery he may be inhabiting. Although most patients refuse to stay put in the neat schematic categories outlined, they do seem to appreciate and to need the therapist's recognition of the specific quality of these vastly different states of mind.     

Ventriloquism,sensory interaction,and response bias: Remarks on the paper by Choe,Welch, Gilford,and Juola

The arguments on which Choe, Welch, Gilford, and Juola have based their thesis that the various manifestations of ventriloquism are postperceptual effects are critically examined. The application of detection theory to the results of a discrepancy detection experiment, which they claimed allowed them to separate sensory interaction from response bias, is found invalid. It is further argued that an interpretation of ventriloquism exclusively in terms of response processes cannot account (1) for the compelling quality of the effect, and (2) for the occurrence of aftereffects.     

Some Remarks on For-me-ness and Empathy

Abstract

My discussion of Self and Other takes issue with two distinct theses defended by Zahavi. The first concerns Zahavi's argument for the first-personal character of experience and its related thought experiment. My second remark is about Zahavi’s restriction of empathy to direct perception.     

Further Remarks on Truth and Contradiction

We address an issue recently discussed by Graham Priest: whether the very nature of truth (understood as in correspondence theories) rules out true contradictions, and hence whether a correspondence-theoretic notion of truth rules against dialetheism. We argue that, notwithstanding appearances to the contrary, objections from within the correspondence theory do not stand in the way of dialetheism. We close by highlighting, but not attempting to resolve, two further challenges for dialetheism which arise out of familiar philosophical theorizing about truth.     

Remarks on Independence Proofs and Indirect Reference

In the last two decades, there has been increasing interest in a re-evaluation of Frege's stance towards consistency- and independence proofs. Papers by several authors deal with Frege's views on these topics. In this note, I want to discuss one particular problem, which seems to be a main reason for Frege's reluctant attitude towards his own proposed method of proving the independence of axioms, namely his view that thoughts, that is, intensional entities are the objects of metatheoretical investigations. This stands in contrast to more straightforward interpretations, which claim that Frege's hesitancy is mainly due to worries concerning the logical constants or what counts as a logical inference.