Spatial and temporal properties of stereoscopic surface interpolation

It is well established that under a wide range of conditions when a sparse collection of texture elements varies smoothly in depth, the spaces between the elements are assigned depth values. This disparity interpolation process has been studied in an effort to define some of its fundamental spatial and temporal constraints. To assess disparity interpolation we employed two tasks: a novel task that relies on the bisection of illusory boundaries created when subjective stereoscopic surfaces intersect, and one that relies on a 3-D shape discrimination. The results of both experiments show that there is no improvement in performance when texture density is increased from near 0.20 to 0.85 or when exposure duration is increased from 50-100 to 1000 ms. This lack of dependence on the addition of features that define the interpolated surface, along with the abrupt decline in performance below a critical value, is consistent with the view that surface interpolation is an important function of human stereoscopic vision.     

Understanding Narratively,Understanding Alterity

Phenomenology's systematic exploration of how a world comes into existence for knowers – knowers who are often conceptualized as individual and ostensibly isolated – requires that it provide some account of the constitution of alterity. In this paper, I address this issue by arguing that we apperceive alterity in terms of the intentionality of behavior. A corollary of this argument is that the apperception of an alter as specifically human is a secondary attribution, following the primary apperception of intention. I further argue that the intentionality of behavior is understood through the projection of a narrative frame, or a “protonarrative,” onto the alter's behavior. I suggest that protonarrativity is the form that experience takes as its ontological condition. Our living is not simply known to us reflectively as protonarrative; rather, experience is lived as protonarrative.This essay is based on a paper presented at the annual conference of the Society for Phenomenology and the Human Sciences, Memphis, Tennessee, October 28–30, 2004.     

Haptic face identification activates ventral occipital and temporal areas: an fMRI study

Many studies in visual face recognition have supported a special role for the right fusiform gyrus. Despite the fact that faces can also be recognized haptically, little is known about the neural correlates of haptic face recognition. In the current fMRI study, neurologically intact participants were intensively trained to identify specific facemasks (molded from live faces) and specific control objects. When these stimuli were presented in the scanner, facemasks activated left fusiform and right hippocampal/parahippocampal areas (and other regions) more than control objects, whereas the latter produced no activity greater than the facemasks. We conclude that these ventral occipital and temporal areas may play an important role in the haptic identification of faces at the subordinate level. We further speculate that left fusiform gyrus may be recruited more for facemasks than for control objects because of the increased need for sequential processing by the haptic system.     

Predicting literacy at age 7 from preliteracy at age 4

Early literacy experience and preliteracy knowledge have been shown to predict later literacy outcomes. Using a representative sample of 3,052 same-sex twin pairs (6,104 children) in the United Kingdom, we explored phenotypic and etiological interrelationships among early literacy experience, preliteracy knowledge, and school-based literacy outcomes (reading and writing). Both literacy experience and preliteracy knowledge at age 4 significantly and independently predicted literacy at age 7. Both measures also showed genetic influence that significantly predicted literacy at age 7, although genetic mediation was stronger for preliteracy knowledge than for early literacy experience. However, for both measures, shared environmental factors explained most of the association with literacy at age 7.     

Modulation of anxiety circuits by serotonergic systems

Anxiety is a complex emotional state associated with sustained heightened autonomic and behavioral arousal and an increase in avoidance behavior. Anxiety-related behavior is a form of risk assessment behavior that is associated with a level of uncertainty or unpredictability regarding the outcome of emotionally salient events, often when both rewarding and aversive outcomes are possible. In this review, we highlight recent advances in our understanding of the neural circuits regulating anxiety states and anxiety-related behavior with an emphasis on the role of brainstem serotonergic systems in modulating anxiety-related circuits. In particular, we explore the possibility that the regulation of anxiety states and anxiety-related behavior by serotonergic systems is dependent on a specific, topographically organized mesolimbocortical serotonergic system that originates in the mid-rostrocaudal and caudal parts of the dorsal raphe nucleus.     

The role of item extremity in the emergence of keying-related factors: an exploration with the life orientation test

Keying-related factors in psychological scales are variously interpreted substantively or as products of violations of the assumptions underlying item keying. The present study investigated whether the extremity of the wording of items may contribute to the emergence of item-keying factors in a commonly used psychological scale. Respondents (N = 277) completed the Life Orientation Test (M. F. Scheier & C. S. Carver, 1985) in either its original or modified, more moderately worded form. Results indicate that the interaction of item extremity and item keying significantly affected subscale means and, more important, that the more moderately worded scale was substantially more unidimensional. Results are explained partially through the association of lesser and greater extremity with the tendency for some respondents to agree or disagree with items irrespective of keying direction. These results, although demonstrated in only 1 scale, have potential relevance to any scale comprising positive and negative items.     

The non-monotonicity of the psychometric function in recognition memory

The technique of using the signal detectability theory parameter d’ as a measure of trace strength in recognition memory is extended in a decision-making model that predicts that a S’s psychometric function lp(Y/s) plotted against stimulus intensity / will have a peak for intermediate values of trace strength when the S has a bias towards a “Yes” response. An experiment is reported where Ss were required to recognize previously presented nonsense syllables under a number of pay-off conditions designed to give different groups of Ss different response biases. The predictions of the model were confirmed. It is suggested that a S’s discriminability and response bias parameters may not be as stable as previous studies, that pool large samples of data, have indicated, and the results also provide support for a two-stage model of recognition, where a preliminary estimate of the trace strength of an item is obtained before the location of the response criterion is decided.     

To Think and to Speak of the Living God: Katherine Sonderegger's Systematic Theology,Volume 2

This review of the second volume of Katherine Sonderegger's Systematic Theology reflects upon its several extraordinary features before exploring in some detail the theological account of Scripture integrated into its argument. The possibility of unfolding a metaphysically robust account of God's immanent triune life on the basis of the biblical witness turns upon a highly distinctive view of the Bible and its relation to God's own being.     

What Does it Mean to call God Good?

Contemporary expositions of God's goodness commonly err either (1) by subjecting God to moral laws, which is to question His sovereignty, or (2) by failing to establish that God will always act in accordance with moral principles, which removes the theist's ability to appeal to God's goodness in response to problems of evil. Current attempts at intermediate positions which avoid these two problems fall short. In this paper, I aim to construct a better intermediate position and account of God's goodness. I do this by claiming that God's ability to create is best explained in terms of God's self-love. Since God, as the greatest possible being, must be able to create, He must love Himself. I argue that this in turn entails that God loves all things, since by loving Himself, God loves the pre-existent ideas of everything that will come to exist, and by extension the things themselves. This, I argue, allows us to have confidence that God will act in accordance with moral principles, but without subjecting Him to moral laws.