ENCOUNTERS WITH EMERGENT DEITIES: ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN SCIENCE FICTION NARRATIVE

In the mid-twentieth century, theorists began seriously forecasting possibilities for artificial intelligence (AI). As related research gathered momentum and resources, the topic made impressions on public discourse. One effect was increasingly pointed emphasis on AI in popular narratives. Although considerably earlier thematic examples may be located, we can observe swelling and generally pessimistic threads of speculation in science fiction of the 1950s and 1960s. This discussion identifies some pertinent science fiction texts from that period, alongside public discussion arising from contemporary research. One consistent theme is human receptiveness to the numinous, and the capacity to ascribe personality and even divinity to sufficiently impressive manifestations, even artificial ones. Science fiction has long contemplated such reactions, prefiguring today's anticipations of AIs that might abruptly develop themselves beyond any possible human comprehension or control. This body of exploratory projections is a useful resource for the engineers and philosophers currently grappling with realistic prospects for Western humanity's shifting conception of itself.     

Errors in children's subtraction

Many of the errors that occur in children' subtraction are due to the use of incorrect strategies rather than to the incorrect recall of number facts. A production system is presented for performing written subtraction which is consistent with an earlier analysis of the nature of such a cognitive skill. Most of the incorrect strategies used by schoolchildren can be accounted for in a principled way by simple changes in the production system, such as the omission of individual rules or the inclusion of rules appropriate to other arithmetical tasks. The production system model is evaluated against a corpus of over 1500 subtraction problems done by 10-year olds and is shown to account for about two-thirds of the (nonnumber fact) errors. It also provides an alternative, simpler interpretation of the subtraction errors analysed by Brown and Burton (1978). Some implications for teaching are discussed.     

Graphical regression models for polytomous variables

When modeling the relationship between two nominal categorical variables, it is often desirable to include covariates to understand how individuals differ in their response behavior. Typically, however, not all the relevant covariates are available, with the result that the measured variables cannot fully account for the associations between the nominal variables. Under the assumption that the observed and unobserved variables follow a homogeneous conditional Gaussian distribution, this paper proposesRC(M) regression models to decompose the residual associations between the polytomous variables. Based on Goodman's (1979, 1985)RC(M) association model, a distinctive feature ofRC(M) regression models is that they facilitate the joint estimation of effects due to manifest and omitted (continuous) variables without requiring numerical integration. TheRC(M) regression models are illustrated using data from the High School and Beyond study (Tatsuoka & Lohnes, 1988). This article was accepted for publication, when Willem J. Heiser was the Editor ofPsychometrika. This research was supported by grants from the National Science Foundation (#SBR96-17510 and #SBR94-09531) and the Bureau of Educational Research at the University of Illinois. We thank Jee-Seon Kim for comments and computational assistance.     

Psychotherapy as a skilled practice

While psychotherapy is related to both science and art, it is primarily a craft activity requiring the development of skilful practice, epitomized by the discipline of the analytic attitude. In terms of the forms of knowledge outlined by Aristotle, this places psychotherapy in the realm of ‘technê’ (arts and craft) rather than epistêmê (science). In particular, the technê of psychotherapy is concerned with the development of phronesis (practical wisdom) in both patient and analyst and its ultimate aim is concerned with the promotion of eudaimonia, a state of well-being considered by Aristotle to be definitive of ‘the good life’. It is therefore fundamentally an ethical endeavour. The nature of psychotherapeutic skill is illustrated by analogy with three other forms of technê – music, meditation and pottery. Clinical examples illustrate the crafting of interpretations and the art of patient holding.     

Henry M. Sheffer and Notational Relativity

Charles L. Dodgson's reputation as a significant figure in nineteenth-century logic was firmly established when the philosopher and historian of philosophy William Warren Bartley, III published Dodgson's ‘lost’ book of logic, Part II of Symbolic Logic, in 1977. Bartley's commentary and annotations confirm that Dodgson was a superb technical innovator. In this paper, I closely examine Dodgson's methods and their evolution in the two parts of Symbolic Logic to clarify and justify Bartley's claims. Then, using more recent publications and unpublished letters, I argue that Dodgson approached the elimination problem in class logic differently than his contemporaries, and in doing so, anticipated several important concepts and techniques in automated deductive reasoning. These materials also provide additional insight into his reasons for writing this book.     

The Platonic model: statement,clarification and defense

I defend Gary Watson's Platonic Model of free agency against two arguments by counterexample, one by J. David Velleman and the other by Michael Bratman. I claim that these arguments are unconvincing for three reasons. First, they do not accurately target the Platonic Model. Second, they do not convincingly present cases of self-governed action. Third, they call attention to issues about theoretical commitments that are not fit to be settled by appeal to cases. On the basis of this discussion, I draw some general lessons for the debate about which theory of self-governance is the best.     

Effects of visual complexity and sublexical information in the occipitotemporal cortex in the reading of Chinese phonograms: a single-trial analysis with MEG

We employ a linear mixed-effects model to estimate the effects of visual form and the linguistic properties of Chinese characters on M100 and M170 MEG responses from single-trial data of Chinese and English speakers in a Chinese lexical decision task. Cortically constrained minimum-norm estimation is used to compute the activation of M100 and M170 responses in functionally defined regions of interest. Both Chinese and English participants’ M100 responses tend to increase in response to characters with a high numbers of strokes. English participants’ M170 responses show a posterior distribution and only reflect the effect of the visual complexity of characters. On the other hand, the Chinese participants’ left hemisphere M170 is increased when reading characters with high number of strokes, and their right hemisphere M170 is increased when reading characters with small combinability of semantic radicals. Our results suggest that expertise with words and the decomposition of word forms underlies processing in the left and right occipitotemporal regions in the reading of Chinese characters by Chinese speakers.     

Developmental changes in the linguistic performance correlates of reading achievement

The present study evaluated the hypothesis that measures of linguistic skills differentially contribute to the variability in reading achievement at different ages. Linguistic skills that develop earlier and are more important for earlier phases of reading were predicted to contribute more to the variability of reading achievement at earlier ages (5–7) than at older ages (10–12). Conversely, linguistic skills that develop later and are more important for later phases of reading were predicted to contribute more to the variability in reading achievement at older ages (10–12) than at younger ages (5–7). To test these developmental hypotheses, measures of language skills with different developmental rates were administered to cross-sectional samples of disabled and nondisabled readers at three mean ages: 5.5, 8.5, and 11 years. Reading group differences were apparent at each age on measures assumed to develop earlier, thus failing to confirm the first prediction. However, these measures may not have been sensitive to linguistic skills important for beginning reading. Reading group differences on measures of later developing language skills were apparent only for older readers, thus confirming the second prediction. The latter age-dependent relationships provided additional evidence for developmental changes in the linguistic correlates of reading achievement.     

The Black Foe: Being Towards Death1

The ontology of death is universal, hence archetypal. Nowhere do we witness any organic creature escape its talons. Analytical psychology has had an intimate relationship to death for the simple fact that it contemplates the soul, the numinous, and an afterlife. From Hegel to Heidegger, Freud and Jung, death was an existential force that sustained and transformed life, the positive significance of the negative. Rather than merely a destructive phenomenon, death informs Being, the power of nothingness that dialectically drives life. In this paper, I will introduce the notion of what I call the omega principle, the psychological orientation and trajectory of our being towards death, which we may say is a universal preoccupation and recapitulation of the collective unconscious that subsumes our personal relation to death, an eternal return of the objective psyche constellated as esse in anima.