Sind die klassische Mechanik und die spezielle Relativitätstheorie kommensurabel?

In its first part, this paper shows why a recently made attempt to reduce the special theory of relativity to Newtonian kinematics is bound to fail. In the second part, we propose a differentiated notion of incommensurability which enables us to amend the contention that the special theory of relatively and Newtonian kinematics are incommensurable.     

Models of Public Engagement: Nanoscientists’ Understandings of Science–Society Interactions

This paper explores how scientists perceive public engagement initiatives. By drawing on interviews with nanoscientists, it analyzes how researchers imagine science–society interactions in an early phase of technological development. More specifically, the paper inquires into the implicit framings of citizens, of scientists, and of the public in scientists’ discourses. It identifies four different models of how nanoscientists understand public engagement which are described as educational, paternalistic, elitist, and economistic. These models are contrasted with the dialog model of public engagement promoted by social scientists and policymakers. The paper asks if and in what ways participatory discourses and practices feed back into scientists’ understandings, thus co-producing public discourses and science.     

Sufficiency and Satiable Values

This article identifies value‐satiability sufficientarianism as a distinctive version of the sufficiency view, which has been ignored in the literature on distributive justice. This is unfortunate because value‐satiability sufficientarianism is much better equipped than alternative sufficiency views to cope with the standard objections against sufficiency. Most often, sufficientarianism refers to satiability as a feature of moral principles and reasons. But value‐satiability sufficientarianism also invokes satiability in the space of value‐theory, as it determines the sufficiency threshold at the point where justice‐relevant values have been completely fulfilled. The article gives examples of how this view is widely apparent in the literature, and it provides some reasons in its favour. It then presents the two standard objections against sufficientarianism – the threshold objection and the indifference objection – and argues that these critiques do not apply to value‐satiability sufficientarianism. The general argument of the article therefore proves sufficientarianism more difficult to refute than is commonly credited.     

On Usnadze's volume illusion

Summary Contrary to what was expected, subjects overestimated the volume in heavier objects, when making estimations with no visual cues available (a positive volume illusion). This finding contradicts the result of Usnadze. He found, that the heavier of two spheres, equal in volume, was perceived as the smaller by most subjects, with their eyes closed.The stimuli used were spheres and cylinders of different weights and volumes. In four experiments, the subjects reported their volume ratings with the help of two direct scaling methods, magnitude estimation or ratio estimation. Lifting stimuli with one sphere in each hand gave, as a result, a difference between hands. This difference was interpreted to imply, that the subjects did not just follow a strategy to give higher volume estimates to heavier objects.The positive volume illusion phenomenon, that appeared in all four experiments, was affected by such sources of variation as time (trial number), and size-weight interaction, defined as a stimulus context variable. Neither a strategy which assumes that the subjects judge density instead of volume, nor any other sizeweight interaction model is effective in explaining the volume illusion. The search for such a model was suggested as a line for future research, though.

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Zusammenfassung Gegensatz zur Erwartung scheinen schwerere Versuchskörper größeres Volumen zu haben als die leichteren, wenn Vpn die Volumina vergleichen, ohne sie anzusehen (eine positive Volumtäuschung). Dieses Resultat stimmt nicht mit den Ergebnissen von Usnadze. Er fand, daß wenn man zwei verschieden schwere, im übrigen aber ganz gleichartige Körper mit geschlossenen Augen, bloß tastend, auf ihre Größe vergleicht, so erscheint der Schwere kleiner, der Leichtere größer.Die Versuchskörper waren Kugeln und Zylinder verschiedenen Gewichtes und Volumens. In vier Versuchen schätzen die Vpn das Volumen mit Hilfe von zwei direkten Schätzmethoden, Magnitudenschätzung (magnitude estimation) und Verhältnisschätzung (ratio estimation), jedoch ohne die Versuchskörper sehen zu dürfen. Das Heben der Versuchskörper mit einer Kugel in jeder Hand gab als Resultat einen Unterschied zwischen den Händen. Dieser Unterschied schien zu bedeuten, daß die Vpn nicht automatisch schweren Körpern ein größeres Volumen gaben.Die positive Volumtäuschung, die in allen vier Versuchen erschien, war durch solche Faktoren wie Zeit (Nummer der Vergleichsfälle), und Größe-Gewichtwechselwirkung, definiert in der Verschiedenheit der vorhandenen Versuchskörper, beeinflußt. Die Versuchsdaten stützen nicht die Hypothese, daß die Vpn versuchten die Dichte der Versuchskörper zu schätzen. Auch wurde kein brauchbares Modell für die Wechselwirkung gefunden um die Volumtäuschung zu illustrieren. Ein solches Modell wurde doch für zukünftige Forschung vorgeschlagen.

     

Perceived Conflict and Leader Dominance: Individual and Contextual Factors Behind Preferences for Dominant Leaders

Recent research finds that political candidates and leaders with dominant, masculine physical features are more preferred under conditions of conflict than of cooperation. Importantly, however, methodological limitations of past research have hindered the identification of whether this effect reflects that voters intuitively view (1) dominant leaders as more competent in solving problems of conflict, (2) nondominant leaders as more competent in solving problems of cooperation, or (3) both. In this article, we utilize recent advances in evolutionary psychology to form precise predictions on the nature of the underlying psychology and employ an unprecedented array of data types—including highly controlled experiments, natural experiments, and behavioral measures—to investigate the validity of these predictions. Using large approximately nationally representative surveys of 2,009 Poles and Ukrainians fielded during the Crimea crisis in 2014, we find that preferences for leader dominance are exclusively driven by the intuition that dominant leaders are better able to facilitate aggressive responses during social conflict and that these preferences are regulated by contextual conditions and individual predispositions related to such responses.     

Effects of white noise and irrelevant information on speeded classification: A developmental study

The study examined how well subjects were able to ignore the presence of irrelevant stimulus information in noise and in silence, as a function of age. Children aged six and nine, and adults, performed speeded card-sorting tasks with one binary dimension relevant and zero or two dimensions irrelevant. The presence of irrelevant information interfered with performance, the magnitude of interference declining with age. The interfering effects of irrelevant information were greater when it was (relatively) more salient than when it was less salient, but there was no interaction between relative salience and the effects of noise. Noise (95 dB(A)) slowed down sorting performance of adult subjects in all conditions, it slightly improved the performance of nine-year-old children, and it improved the performance of six-year-old children significantly when irrelevant information was present. The effects of noise on attentional control are discussed, mainly with reference to inhibitory effects of noise on subvocal activity.