Relevance of the listener’s motor system in recalling phrases enacted by the speaker

Memory for series of action phrases improves in listeners when speakers accompany each phrase with congruent gestures compared to when speakers stay still. Studies reveal that the listeners’ motor system, at encoding, plays a crucial role in this enactment effect. We present two experiments on gesture observation, which explored the role of the listeners’ motor system at recall. The participants listened to the phrases uttered by a speaker in two conditions in each experiment. In the gesture condition, the speaker uttered the phrases with accompanying congruent gestures, and in the no-gesture condition, the speaker stayed still while uttering the phrases. The participants were then invited, in both conditions of the experiments, to perform a motor task while recalling the phrases proffered by the speaker. The results revealed that the advantage of observing gestures on memory disappears if the listeners move at recall arms and hands (same motor effectors moved by the speaker, Experiment 1a), but not when the listeners move legs and feet (different motor effectors from those moved by the speaker, Experiment 1b). The results suggest that the listeners’ motor system is involved not only during the encoding of action phrases uttered by a speaker but also when recalling these phrases during retrieval.     

Indicative conditionals: probabilities and relevance

Philosophical Studies - We propose a new account of indicative conditionals, giving acceptability and logical closure conditions for them. We start from Adams’ Thesis: the claim that the...     

The original sin of proof-theoretic semantics

Proof-theoretic semantics is an alternative to model-theoretic semantics. It aims at explaining the meaning of the logical constants in terms of the inference rules that govern their behaviour in proofs. We argue that this must be construed as the task of explaining these meanings relative to a logic, i.e., to a consequence relation. Alas, there is no agreed set of properties that a relation must have in order to qualify as a consequence relation. Moreover, the association of a consequence relation to a logical calculus is not as straightforward as it may seem. We show that these facts are problematic for the proof-theoretic project but the problems can be solved. Our thesis is that the consequence relation relevant for proof-theoretic semantics is the one given by the sequent-to-sequent derivability relation in Gentzen systems.

     

Natural law and history in Locke's theory of distributive justice

According to the tradition of natural law justice is inherent to, and should always be observed in, all interpersonal relations: the science of natural law is nothing more or less than the expression of such principles of justice. The theoretical peculiarities that crop up regarding the lawfulness of appropriation are determined by the indirect interpersonal relations that take place within the process of appropriation: though appropriation is an action directed not towards another person or his property, but towards tangible external goods, this action may have important consequences for other people. Therefore Locke's theory of appropriation is a theory of justice.Locke's solution is made possible by the methodological improvement which allows a clear separation between the natural law and the historical and empirical conditions of its application: this improvement is a consequence of the distinction between modes and substances established in Locke's Essay.Locke's theory can be considered an extensive re-elaboration, in polemic against Filmer, of the anti-monopolistic principle characteristic of the whole of Scholastic social thought: this principle is intimately connected with the principle of man's natural liberty.Locke maintains a negative and formal conception of justice: justice prohibits interference with others' liberty of appropriation. Alongside the justice is the positive and conditional obligation of charity which prescribes the transfer of some of one's own goods to others who need them in order to survive. But for Locke there are precise limits on the obligation of charity: the application of charity suspends the application of justice only when the immediate physical survival is at stake; in all other cases justice leaves no room for charity.The Lockian negative conception of justice, which allows unlimited liberty of appropriation, is dependent on the empirical and historical condition of the incommensurability of the main resource. The widespread use of money acts as an accelerating element in the process of exhaustion of the incommensurability of land-resources but, at the same time, it renders self-preservation and appropriation almost completely independent of the natural environment. Money creates an infinite number of opportunities for the outlay of labour irrespective of the availability of land, that is, it renders labour the principal resource of the civilized world, and labour is an incommensurable and infinitely reproducible resource. The incommensurability of the labour resource thus supports the Lockian theory of negative distributive justice; but over the Lockian solution already loomed the threatening shadow of pauperism.The subject of this essay is further dealt with in my book on Locke's political and social philosophy Nel crepuscolo della probabilitá, Bibliopolis, Napoli, 1983. There I develop further the interpretation of Locke's theory of justice presented here and analyse his theoretical and historical presuppositions.