Functional belief and judgmental belief

Synthese - A division between functional (animal) belief, on the one hand, and judgmental (reflective) belief, on the other, is central to Sosa’s two-tier virtue epistemology. For Sosa, mere...     

Compositionality and sandbag semantics

It is a common view that radical contextualism about linguistic meaning is incompatible with a compositional explanation of linguistic comprehension. Recently, some philosophers of language have proposed theories of ‘pragmatic’ compositionality challenging this assumption. This paper takes a close look at a prominent proposal of this kind due to François Recanati. The objective is to give a plausible formulation of the view. The major results are threefold. First, a basic distinction that contextualists make between mandatory and optional pragmatic processes needs to be revised. Second, the pragmatic theory can with stand a Davidsonian objection only by rejecting the importance of a distinction between primitive and non-primitive semantic items. Thirdly, however, the theory is now open to a worry about how it should be understood: either the theory consists in a very broad functionalist generalization about communication, which makes it explanatorily inert, or it boils down to a highly particularist view about linguistic meaning. Finally, I argue that Recanati’s notion of ‘occasion meaning’ is problematic and suggest replacing it with the notion of speaker meaning, which is explanatorily more basic.     

“无神论”与“信仰”

无神论对应的是完全否定任何超自然的存在（包括上帝与灵魂等）的观念体系,作为一种世界观．它的根基是唯物主义。“信仰”属于非理性范畴而与唯物主义风马牛不相及。马克思主义是科学而不是信仰。不幸的是多年来我们有些政治家和理论家把共产主义必然实现的政治信念也表述为‘‘信仰”。以致混淆了科学与宗教的区别。60年的治国经验提供给我们的重要教训之一就是：决不能引导或者放任某种政治信念异化为“信仰”。共产主义者根本不需要诉诸“信仰”来维持对既定目标的遵循。认为无神论者不能离开“信仰”的那些号称共产党员又拒绝承认自己信教．以及一方面追逐着金钱一方面又指责“信钱”就是“没有任何崇高信仰的人”的学者应该重温马克思恩格斯的有关论述。执政党处理与宗教界关系的现行原则是“政治上团结合作,信仰上互相尊重”：信教和不信教以及所信宗教不同的信徒之间在根本利益上是完全一致的：世界观上的差别是“形而上”的问题．将长期存在,应该在民主法制层面保证各自的公民权利,最终由社会文明的发展逐步融解。某些研究宗教问题的专家把“信仰”直接归入“精神价值层面”．必然使一些完全违反道德和法律的“信仰”不能不获得“尊重”．以致“信仰上互相尊重’’这个表述成为鸡肋。建议改用不会产生歧义的说法——“政治上团结合作。世界观上互相尊重”。     

Moore-paradoxical belief, conscious belief and the epistemic Ramsey test

Chalmers and Hájek argue that on an epistemic reading of Ramsey??s test for the rational acceptability of conditionals, it is faulty. They claim that applying the test to each of a certain pair of conditionals requires one to think that one is omniscient or infallible, unless one forms irrational Moore-paradoxical beliefs. I show that this claim is false. The epistemic Ramsey test is indeed faulty. Applying it requires that one think of anyone as all-believing and if one is rational, to think of anyone as infallible-if-rational. But this is not because of Moore-paradoxical beliefs. Rather it is because applying the test requires a certain supposition about conscious belief. It is important to understand the nature of this supposition.     

Cognitive biases explain religious belief,paranormal belief,and belief in life’s purpose

Cognitive theories of religion have postulated several cognitive biases that predispose human minds towards religious belief. However, to date, these hypotheses have not been tested simultaneously and in relation to each other, using an individual difference approach. We used a path model to assess the extent to which several interacting cognitive tendencies, namely mentalizing, mind body dualism, teleological thinking, and anthropomorphism, as well as cultural exposure to religion, predict belief in God, paranormal beliefs and belief in life’s purpose. Our model, based on two independent samples (N = 492 and N = 920) found that the previously known relationship between mentalizing and belief is mediated by individual differences in dualism, and to a lesser extent by teleological thinking. Anthropomorphism was unrelated to religious belief, but was related to paranormal belief. Cultural exposure to religion (mostly Christianity) was negatively related to anthropomorphism, and was unrelated to any of the other cognitive tendencies. These patterns were robust for both men and women, and across at least two ethnic identifications. The data were most consistent with a path model suggesting that mentalizing comes first, which leads to dualism and teleology, which in turn lead to religious, paranormal, and life’s-purpose beliefs. Alternative theoretical models were tested but did not find empirical support.     

How language does (and does not) relate to theory of mind: A longitudinal study of syntax,semantics, working memory and false belief

Forty‐four children (mean 3.8 years) were given three false belief, a working memory, and four language tasks (each designed to tap a different aspect of syntax or semantics), and were tested again 6 months later. Once the range of scores in the language and false belief tasks were equated, there was a bidirectional relation between language and theory of mind. There was no evidence for syntax playing a unique role in the contribution of language to theory of mind. No one measure of syntax or semantics was more likely than any other to predict later false belief. Nor was false belief related more to one aspect of later language (syntax vs. semantics) than another. Our data, taken with other findings, are consistent with the idea that both syntax and semantics contribute to false belief understanding. Working memory did not mediate the relation between language and theory of mind, nor did it facilitate later false belief.