How Are Basic Belief‐Forming Methods Justified?

In this paper, we present an account of in virtue of what thinkers are justified in employing certain basic belief-forming methods. The guiding idea is inspired by Reichenbach's work on induction. There are certain projects in which thinkers are rationally required to engage. Thinkers are epistemically justified in employing a belief-forming method that is indispensable for successfully engaging in such a project. We present a detailed account based on this intuitive thought, and address objections to it. We conclude by commenting on the implications that our account may have for other important epistemological debates.     

THE PRECURSORS AND PRODUCTS OF JUSTICE CLIMATES: GROUP LEADER ANTECEDENTS AND EMPLOYEE ATTITUDINAL CONSEQUENCES

Drawing on the organizational justice, organizational climate, leadership and personality, and social comparison theory literatures, we develop hypotheses about the effects of leader personality on the development of 3 types of justice climates (e.g., procedural, interpersonal, and informational) and the moderating effects of these climates on individual-level justice–attitude relationships. Largely consistent with the theoretically derived hypotheses, the results showed that leader (a) Agreeableness was positively related to procedural, interpersonal, and informational justice climates; (b) Conscientiousness was positively related to a procedural justice climate; and (c) Neuroticism was negatively related to all 3 types of justice climates. Further, consistent with social comparison theory, multilevel data analyses revealed that the relationship between individual justice perceptions and job attitudes (e.g., job satisfaction, commitment) was moderated by justice climate such that the relationships were stronger when justice climate was high.     

Language use in the Adult Attachment Interview: Evidence for attachment‐specific emotion regulation

Adult attachment classification is traditionally based on qualitative coding of participants' discourse about their attachment history. Word count‐based analyses have proven useful for assessing emotional states from narrative. To expand the understanding of how language is used in emotion regulation processes related to attachment, the authors assess 102 college‐aged adults' language on the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). Autonomous adults use more emotion words and, in particular, negative emotion words. Preoccupied adults use more anger words. Disorganized adults use more experientially connected language and more death/dying words, but also use more second‐person pronouns when discussing loss. Language use during the AAI explains variability in self‐reported emotional distress above and beyond attachment classifications. Results are discussed in terms of their relevance to emotion and attachment.     

Cherish the good times: Relational savoring in parents of infants and toddlers

Savoring, or prolonging emotions associated with positive events, improves emotion and life satisfaction; little work, however, focuses on the savoring of interpersonal experiences, termed relational savoring. In a sample of 435 parents, the authors evaluated the impact of relational savoring on emotion and parent–child relationship satisfaction compared to a personal savoring and neutral control condition. Two years later, the authors reassessed parents' feelings of closeness with their children in a subsample of the original participants (n = 64). Both savoring conditions resulted in higher positive emotion for all parents, whereas the effects on negative emotion, relationship satisfaction, and closeness were only present for those higher in attachment avoidance. This study opens new avenues of investigation in both relational savoring and parent–child relationships.     

Literature and Thought Experiments

Like works of literature, thought experiments present fictional narratives that prompt reflection in their readers. Because of these and other similarities, a number of philosophers have argued for a strong analogy between works of literary fiction and thought experiments, some going so far as to say that works of literary fiction are a species of thought experiment. These arguments are often used in defending a cognitivist position with regard to literature: thought experiments produce knowledge, so works of literary fiction can too. This article concedes that works of literary fiction can be put to use in thought experiments, but not in a way that is helpful to the cognitivist. In particular, it draws three disanalogies in the ways we engage critically with thought experiments and with literary fictions. First, we use thought experiments to make arguments; second, we read thought experiments in strongly allegorical terms; and third, the terms of criticism we apply to thought experiments and to works of literature differ. Although these disanalogies present problems for the cognitivist position, they also give us a sharper picture of the distinctive educative potential of works of literary fiction.     

Relationships Among Cooperative Learning Experiences,Social Interdependence,Children's Aggression,Victimization, and Prosocial Behaviors

This study examined the relationships among cooperative experiences, social interdependence predispositions, harm‐intended aggression, victimization, and prosocial behaviors with 217 elementary school children from 3^rd to 5^th grade. Path analysis using LISREL indicates that cooperative experiences predicted cooperative predispositions, the absence of individualistic predispositions, and prosocial behaviors. Cooperative predisposition predicted prosocial behaviors and the absence of harm‐intended aggression. Competitive predisposition predicted harm‐intended aggression. These findings validate social interdependence theory and partially support theories related to social dominance. Providing frequent cooperative learning experiences may be an important tool to increase students' cooperativeness and thereby reduce the frequency of harm‐intended aggression, increase the frequency of prosocial behaviors, and reduce students' individualistic predispositions.     

Does Vagueness Exclude Knowledge?

On two standard views of vagueness, vagueness as to whether Harry is bald entails that nobody knows whether Harry is bald—either because vagueness is a type of missing truth, and so there is nothing to know, or because vagueness is a type of ignorance, and so even though there is a truth of the matter, nobody can know what that truth is. Vagueness as to whether Harry is bald does entail that nobody clearly knows that Harry is bald and that nobody clearly knows that Harry is not bald. But it does not entail that nobody knows that Harry is bald or that nobody knows that Harry is not bald. Hence, the two standard views of vagueness are mistaken.     

LANGUAGE AND HUMAN NATURE:KURT GOLDSTEIN'S NEUROLINGUISTIC FOUNDATION OF A HOLISTIC PHILOSOPHY

Holism in interwar Germany provides an excellent example for social and political influences on scientific developments. Deeply impressed by the ubiquitous invocation of a cultural crisis, biologists, physicians, and psychologists presented holistic accounts as an alternative to the “mechanistic worldview” of the nineteenth century. Although the ideological background of these accounts is often blatantly obvious, many holistic scientists did not content themselves with a general opposition to a mechanistic worldview but aimed at a rational foundation of their holistic projects. This article will discuss the work of Kurt Goldstein, who is known for both his groundbreaking contributions to neuropsychology and his holistic philosophy of human nature. By focusing on Goldstein's neurolinguistic research, I want to reconstruct the empirical foundations of his holistic program without ignoring its cultural background. In this sense, Goldstein's work provides a case study for the formation of a scientific theory through the complex interplay between specific empirical evidences and the general cultural developments of the Weimar Republic.