General intelligence predicts reasoning ability even for evolutionarily familiar content

The existence of general-purpose cognitive mechanisms related to intelligence, which appear to facilitate all forms of problem solving, conflicts with the strong modularity view of the mind espoused by some evolutionary psychologists. The current study assessed the contribution of general intelligence (gt;ggt;) to explaining variation in contextualized deductive reasoning. One hundred and twelve participants solved 70 contextualized reasoning problems in a computerized version of the Wason Card Selection Task that recorded both accuracy and reaction time. Consistent with prior research, in the sample as a whole, precautionary and social exchange reasoning problems were solved more frequently and more quickly than reasoning problems about arbitrary rules. At the individual-differences level of analysis, however, performance on all reasoning tests was significantly correlated and loaded on a single deductive-reasoning accuracy factor. Further, this factor was significantly correlated with gt;ggt;. There was no relation, however, between gt;ggt; and the speed of arriving at the correct answer for any form of deductive reasoning. We discuss the implications of these findings for evolutionary psychology, intelligence, and reasoning.     

A Gricean Interpretation of Nāgārjuna’s Catuṣkoṭi and the No-Thesis View

Nāgārjuna (c. 150–250 CE), the famous founder of the Madhyamika School, proposed the positive gt;catu?ko?igt; in his seminal work, gt;Mūlamadhyamakakārikāgt;: ‘All is real, or all is unreal, all is both real and unreal, all is neither unreal nor real; this is the graded teaching of the Buddha’. He also proposed the negative gt;catu?ko?igt;: ‘“It is empty” is not to be said, nor “It is non-empty,” nor that it is both, nor that it is neither; [“empty”] is said only for the sake of instruction’ and the no-thesis view: ‘No gt;dharmagt; whatsoever was ever taught by the Buddha to anyone’. In this essay, I adopt Gricean pragmatics to explain the positive and negative gt;catu?ko?igt; and the no-thesis view proposed by Nāgārjuna in a way that does not violate classical logic. For Nāgārjuna, all statements are false as long as the hearer understands them within a reified conceptual scheme, according to which (a) substance is a basic categorical concept; (b) substances have gt;svabhāvagt;, and (c) names and sentences have gt;svabhāvagt;.     

The architecture of Fazang’s six characteristics

This paper examines the Huayan teaching of the six characteristics as presented in the Rafter Dialogue from Fazang’s gt;Treatise on the Five Teachingsgt;. The goal is to make the teaching accessible to those with minimal training in Buddhist philosophy, and especially for those who aim to engage with the extensive question-and-answer section of the Rafter Dialogue. The method for achieving this goal is threefold: first, contextualizing Fazang’s account of the characteristics with earlier Buddhist attempts to theorize the relationships between wholes and their parts; second, explicating the meaning Fazang likely attributes to each of the six characteristics; third, situating the characteristics as explicated within Fazang’s broader metaphysical framework.     

A Post-9/11 <Emphasis Type="Italic">Passion</Emphasis>: Review of Mel Gibson’s <Emphasis Type="Italic">The Passion of the Christ</Emphasis>

Gibsong src="/content/k711v7n5137g2422/xxlarge8217.gif" alt="rsquo" align="BASELINE" BORDER="0"&gt;s film extends a long tradition of Euro-American passion plays and martyr dramas, related also to the ritual sacrifice of g src="/content/k711v7n5137g2422/xxlarge8220.gif" alt="ldquo" align="MIDDLE" BORDER="0"&gt;god-actorsg src="/content/k711v7n5137g2422/xxlarge8221.gif" alt="rdquo" align="MIDDLE" BORDER="0"&gt; in other cultures. Yet, the extreme violence of this popular religious movie involves the devotional dangers of cinematic sadomasochism and melodramatic paranoia, with Jews, Romans, and devils as villainous stereotypes–as well as the potential value of tragic catharsis–on a vast scale for todayg src="/content/k711v7n5137g2422/xxlarge8217.gif" alt="rsquo" align="BASELINE" BORDER="0"&gt;s mass-media audience, especially in the post-9/11 context.Mark Pizzato is Associate Professor of Theatre at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. His publications include gt;Edges of Loss: From Modern Drama to Postmodern Theorygt; (Michigan, 1998) and gt;Theatres of Human Sacrifice: From Ancient Ritual to Screen Violencegt; (SUNY, 2004).