Locus of control and causal attribution for positive and negative outcomes on university examinations

One-hundred-five internal and external locus of control subjects attributed responsibility for their positive and negative outcomes on a university examination. Internal and positive outcome subjects attributed responsibility to internal causal factors while external and negative outcome subjects were more external in their causal attributions. Overall ratings of the four causal components ability, effort, task, and luck were not always in accord with the Weiner model two-dimensional classification.     

Clarifying phenomenologies in the study of religion: separating Kristensen and van der Leeuw from Otto and Eliade

One of the most difficult aspects of trying to understand ‘phenomenology' in the study of religion is that proponent and opponent alike cannot seem to agree on what the title actually entails. Yet despite an insistence that ‘phenomenology' does not refer to a monolithic tradition, many scholars still write as if it is, subsuming a range of contradictory figures under the rubric. It is the argument of this paper that Kristensen and van der Leeuw have been victims of this ‘Tyranny of the Same' which has occluded their methodological value. By questioning their relation to Rudolf Otto and Mircea Eliade – common representatives of ‘phenomenology of religion' – the author will argue that each pair represents a different tradition: typological phenomenology and phenomenological history-of-religion. Their erroneous connection, the author argues, has been the product of a third, synthetic tradition: phenomenology-of-religion.     

A case of acquired aphasia and convulsive disorder: some linguistic aspects of recovery and breakdown

Among the cases of acquired aphasia and convulsive disorder several children are reported to have experienced more than one aphasic period. We present such a case in more detail, with emphasis on some characteristics of spontaneous speech. The occurrence of paraphasias, and in particular of neologisms, appeared to be associated with language recovery and breakdown. At the beginning of the period of recovery, a rapid and total disappearance of neologisms was observed, while only literal paraphasias remained. A period of language breakdown was preceded by the return of neologisms. The process was not influenced by drug therapy.     

Finite and infinite state confusion models

A confusion model is defined as a model that decomposes response probabilities in stimulus identification experiments into perceptual parameters and response parameters. Historically, confusion models fall into two groups. Models in Group I, which includes Townsend's (Perception and Psychophysics, 1971, 9, 40–50) overlap model, were developed on the basis of the notion that stimulus identification is mediated by a finite number of internal states. We call the general class of models that have this processing interpretation finite state confusion models. Models in Group II, which includes Luce's (R. O. Luce et al., Eds., Handbook of Mathematical Psychology (Vol. I), New York: Wiley, 1963) biased choice model, were not developed on the basis of an explicit processing interpretation. It is shown here that models in Group II are not finite state confusion models. We prove in addition that except for Falmagne's (Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1972, 9, 206–224) simply biased model models in Group II belong to a certain class of infinite state confusion models, namely, models asserting that stimulus identification is mediated by a continuous space of vectors representing detector activation levels.     

Thought-experiment intuitions and truth in fiction

What sorts of things are the intuitions generated via thought experiment? Timothy Williamson has responded to naturalistic skeptics by arguing that thought-experiment intuitions are judgments of ordinary counterfactuals. On this view, the intuition is naturalistically innocuous, but it has a contingent content and could be known at best a posteriori. We suggest an alternative to Williamson’s account, according to which we apprehend thought-experiment intuitions through our grasp on truth in fiction. On our view, intuitions like the Gettier intuition are necessarily true and knowable a priori. Our view, like Williamson’s, avoids naturalistic skepticism.     

The Metaphorical Conception of Scientific Explanation: Rereading Mary Hesse

Summary  In 1997, five decades after the publication of the landmark Hempel-Oppenheim article “Studies in the Logic of Explanation”([1948], 1970) Wesley Salmon published Causality and Explanation, a book that re-addresses the issue of scientific explanation. He provided an overview of the basic approaches to scientific explanation, stressed their weaknesses, and offered novel insights. However, he failed to mention Mary Hesse’s approach to the topic and analyze her standpoint. This essay brings front and center Hesse’s approach to scientific explanation formulated in the 1960s and argues that rereading Hesse’s account one can overcome the criticisms addressed towards another influential theory of explanation that of Bas van Fraassen’s. Furthermore, it could bring the traditional philosophy of science into a fruitful conversation with science and technology studies and gender studies in science, technology and medicine.     

Groping for the greats: the strange musical claims of Nathan Ausubel

Nathan Ausubel (1898–1986) achieved unprecedented popularity as a compiler and translator of Jewish folklore during the 1940s and 1950s. Beneath the inspiring stories and charming sayings was a leftist ideologue preoccupied with the demise of Jewish life in Europe and the loss of Jewish identity to capitalist forces in the United States. Ausubel's agenda is elucidated in his polemical essays, which advocate using folklore as a means of bolstering Jewish pride and solidarity. Part of his strategy involved exaggerating the influence of Jewish culture on famous non-Jews, including Bach, Beethoven, and Schubert. This article examines these dubious musical claims and how they furthered Ausubel's activist agenda.     

Stances and Epistemology: Values,Pragmatics, and Rationality

Bas van Fraassen has argued that many philosophical positions should be understood as stances rather than factual beliefs. This paper discusses the vexed question of whether and how such stances can be rationally justified. It argues that stances may be justified pragmatically, in terms of both their epistemic fruits and their coherence with our values, both epistemic and non‐epistemic. It also examines van Fraassen's version of epistemological voluntarism, which has received considerable attention of late, and shows that it provides a theoretical framework, and approach to epistemology, within which the pragmatic and value‐based forms of justification appropriate to stance choice find a natural home.