Solger and Hegel: Negation and Privation

Abstract

This paper has two related goals. Firstly, after briefly clarifying the theoretical core of Solger’s thought, it will analyse his metaphysics from Hegel’s point of view, emphasizing that sacrifice is, for Solger, the fundamental structure of the relationship between the finite and the Infinite. Secondly, it will investigate the main reasons behind Hegel’s criticism of Solger, showing that they have different conceptions of privation and negation and concluding that Solger and Hegel have different aims. Hegel’s aim consists in recomposing the unity of finite and infinite, whereas Solger’s thought is structured on the rupture between these two.     

Phasic auditory alerting improves visual conscious perception

Attention is often conceived as a gateway to consciousness (Posner, 1994). Although endogenous spatial attention may be independent of conscious perception (CP) (Koch Tsuchiya, 2007), exogenous spatial orienting seems instead to be an important modulator of CP ( [Chica et al., 2010] and Chica, Lasaponara, et al., 2011). Here, we investigate the role of auditory alerting in CP in normal observers. We used a behavioral task in which phasic alerting tones were presented either at unpredictable or at predictable time intervals prior to the occurrence of a near-threshold visual target. We find, for the first time in neurologically intact observers, that phasic alertness increases CP, both objectively and subjectively. This result is consistent with evidence showing that phasic alerting can ameliorate the spatial bias exhibited by visual neglect patients (Robertson, Mattingley, Rorden, & Driver, 1998). The alerting network may increase the activity of fronto-parietal networks involved in top-down amplification required to bring a stimulus into consciousness (Dehaene, Changeux, Naccache, Sackur, & Sergent, 2006).     

A virtual training institute in Eastern Europe

This is a short outline of the development of psychoanalysis and of analytic training in Eastern Europe after the fall of the Iron Curtain. The Han Groen Prakken Psychoanalytic Institute for Eastern Europe was founded by the IPA and the EPF in 2002 to organize and coordinate this. The activity of such an unusual training institute, virtual and time-limited up to the birth of new IPA study groups, is described with the problems it has had to face, from shuttle analysis to research of this unusual training, from initial outreach activity to formation of new analytic groups, from unavoidable plurality of analytic approaches of an international staff to the need for systematic teaching, from criteria for selection of candidates in such a large area with many languages, cultures and histories, to the integration of new analysts and groups in the international analytic community. These problems are part of the challenge implicit in the globalization, with its unavoidable push to enlarge to the whole humanity the psychoanalytic theory and praxis. Such an experience is now used in Latin America, but may also soon have its application in other continents. Freedom of mind is a basic need of all humans and psychoanalysis still has much to say about this.     

Testing the effects of an expectancy-based intervention among adolescents: Can placebos be used to enhance physical health?

It has been suggested that the well-known health benefits associated with exercise can be explained by a placebo effect, and that greater effort should be given to convince people that their current behaviors have desirable health consequences. The overall purpose of this study was to test the efficacy of this "mind-set matters" hypothesis through the use of an expectancy-based intervention with adolescents. The study involved a four week randomized controlled trial with 348 Grade 9 adolescents (M (age)?=?14.07 yrs, SD?=?0.30), from four high schools, taking part in either a placebo-intervention condition (n?=?188) or a control condition (n?=?160). Participants in the placebo-intervention condition were informed that what they are already doing in school physical education lessons fulfills current recommendations for an active lifestyle. Participants in the control condition were not given this information. Four weeks after the intervention, adolescents in the placebo-intervention condition did not demonstrate significant changes in physiological health-related measures (diet, weight, body mass index, percentage body fat, heart rate, mean arterial pressure). The findings question the external validity of the "mind-set matters" hypothesis with adolescents, and suggest that simply encouraging adolescents to believe that they are healthy may not enable them to respond with improved indicators of physical health.     

Paraconsistent Informational Logic

We introduce a Paraconsistent Informational Logic that formalizes the idea of conjectures which are acceptable as to the quality and the variety of the information that they convey with respect to a given theory T, even if they are classically inconsistent with T. The work constitutes an extension of a previously developed Informational Logic for classical frameworks, where a new notion of logical entropy measure H on formulas and on proofs plays a central role.     

Judgements of Deontic Relevance in Reasoning: A Reply to Jackson and Griggs

Facilitation on abstract versions of the selection task can be produced by deontic content. Jackson and Griggs (1990) claimed that this finding depends on the presence of an explicit negative on the not-q card. We hypothesized that the removal of the explicit negative from this card made its deontic status ambiguous. Experiment 1 demonstrated that a not-q card presenting implicit negative is not selected, and most subjects select the only card that appears to be relevant from a deontic point of view (i.e. the p card). Experiments 2 and 3 showed that the presence of the explicit negative on the not-q card is not necessary for producing facilitation, provided that the form of this card makes it clear that the not-q individual is a potential violator. Experiment 4 showed that a high success rate can be obtained even with a not-q card presenting an implicit negative. The results are discussed in terms of the specificity of reasoning in the deontic domain.