PERSONS AND THE EXTENDED-MIND THESIS

The extended-mind thesis (EM) is the claim that mentality need not be situated just in the brain, or even within the boundaries of the skin. Some versions take "extended selves" be to relatively transitory couplings of biological organisms and external resources. First, I show how EM can be seen as an extension of traditional views of mind. Then, after voicing a couple of qualms about EM, I reject EM in favor of a more modest hypothesis that recognizes enduring subjects of experience and agents with integrated bodies. Nonetheless, my modest hypothesis allows subpersonal states to have nonbiological parts that play essential roles in cognitive processing. I present empirical warrant for this modest hypothesis and show how it leaves room for science and religion to coexist.     

应重视对马克思主义人生观的理论研究

马克思主义的人生观和世界观在马克思主义的历史唯物主义中是统一的。历史唯物主义明确反对从“抽象的人”、“人的当下存在”出发理解人生的有关问题,但这并不一定意味着坚持历史唯物论就要排斥从个体生命的视角研究人生的问题。我们的马克思主义理论研究和建设工作,应重视对马克思主义人生观理论的发掘和整理,为社会主义精神文明建设和和谐社会的构建作出贡献。     

Averaging Effects In The Study Of Fixed-ratio Response Patterns

Three rats were exposed to multiple fixed-ratio schedules in which large and small ratios alternated in an irregular order. Over a series of training phases, one ratio was held constant as the second ratio was increased to higher values. On average, postreinforcement pauses increased in duration as the ratio size was increased. Pausing was controlled by the size of the upcoming ratio; the previous ratio had smaller and less consistent effects. However, more detailed consideration of the aggregated data indicated that the pause distributions were positively skewed and that changes in average performances were more a consequence of increased skew rather than shifts of the entire distributions. Moreover, the distributions of pauses from condition to condition overlapped, and brief pauses were common even at the highest ratios. These results demonstrated that depictions of pausing based on aggregated data can be misleading without corresponding information about variations in the distribution on which the averages are based.     

在不同注意定向条件下是否出现返回抑制的知觉优先

返回控制中的知觉优先是指相对于非线索化位置,线索化位置的刺激被优先知觉到的现象。研究采用时序判断方法对不同注意定向下返回抑制的知觉优先现象进行了两个实验。实验１采用连续线索化的安排,发现当注意从线索化位置移开后知觉优先仍然存在;实验２采用同时呈现双线索的安排发现知觉优先也存在。     

Short-term memory in the pigeon: the previously reinforced response

Eighteen pigeons served in a discrete-trials short-term memory experiment in which the reinforcement probability for a peck on one of two keys depended on the response reinforced on the previous trial: either the probability of reinforcement on a trial was 0.8 for the same response reinforced on the previous trial and was 0.2 for the other response (Group A), or, it was 0 or 0.2 for the same response and 1.0 or 0.8 for the other response (Group B). A correction procedure ensured that over all trials reinforcement was distributed equally across the left and right keys. The optimal strategy was either a winstay, lose-shift strategy (Group A) or a win-shift, lose-stay strategy (Group B). The retention interval, that is the intertrial interval, was varied. The average probability of choosing the optimal alternative reinforced 80% of the time was 0.96, 0.84, and 0.74 after delays of 2.5, 4.0, and 6.0 sec, respectively for Group A, and was 0.87, 0.81, and 0.55 after delays of 2.5, 4.0, and 6.0 sec, respectively, for Group B. This outcome is consistent with the view that behavior approximated the optimal response strategy but only to an extent permitted by a subject's short-term memory for the cue correlated with reinforcement, that is, its own most-recently reinforced response. More generally, this result is consistent with “molecular” analyses of operant behavior, but is inconsistent with traditional “molar” analyses holding that fundamental controlling relations may be discovered by routinely averaging over different local reinforcement contingencies. In the present experiment, the molar results were byproducts of local reinforcement contingencies involving an organism's own recent behavior.     

在公正价值观上青少年学生公众观的一项研究--关于公正价值观者的特征

以211名大学生为被试、用开放式问卷作了预调查,筛选后得到了公正价值观者的7l项特征。正式调查以432名大学、高中、初中三个学龄段学生为被试,对这些特征项作重要性评价。结果表明：对公正价值观者,青少年学生心目中认为最应该具有的特征是守信、诚实、责任心、人格健康、明辨是非5项;因素分析表明,“亲和凝聚”、“严明公平”、“学识历练”、“生活态度”、“处事方式”和“个性特征”是公正价值观者的6个品质因素,其中“亲和凝聚”品质因素最为特出,在“学识历练”品质因素上初、高中学生比大学生更为重视,在“生活态度”品质因素上初中生比高中生、大学生更为重视。     

Holding points of view does not amount to knowledge

I argue that knowing and having points of view are fundamentally different epistemic states if we assume that having justified true beliefs is necessary for knowledge. Knowers necessarily possess justified true beliefs, but persons holding points of view may, for example, lack justification, have false beliefs, or both. I examine these differences and expose other crucial differentiating patterns between the structure of knowledge and points of view that make the latter more likely to lead to disagreements. I hypothesize that these patterns remain invariant in alternative views of knowledge like contextualism as long as we preserve the classical structure. Yet there is much research to be done on the multiple and contrasting properties that emerge if we consider non-classical analyses of knowledge and points of view.     

Consequences of Ethical Relativism

The aim of this paper is to investigate the temporal content of perceptual experience. I argue for a view according to which we must recognize the existence of perceptions the content of which cannot be spelled out simply by looking at what is the case at an isolated instant. Acts of apprehension can cover a succession of events. Howev er, a subject who has such perceptions can still fall short of having a concept of time. I compare this with arguments which have been put forward to show that a subject who has spatial perceptions can fall short of having a concept of space. In both cases, it is the fact that perception is from a point of view which stands in the way of it constituting an exercise of a concept of how things are objectively. However, I also show that the way in which perception is perspectival takes a different form in each of the two cases.     

Reviews

A.W. Moore, Points of View
Monique Canto-Sperber, Jonathan Barnes, Luc Brisson, Jacques Brunschwig, and Gregory Vlastos, Philosophie grecque
Nancy Sherman, Making a Necessity of Virtue: Aristotle and Kant on Virtue
Robin Le Poidevin, Arguing for Atheism: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion
Paul Griffiths, What Emotions Really Are
Quassim Cassam, Self and World     

A PERSONAL APPRECIATION

Abstract. My primary relation to Barbour's work is that of indebtedness and appreciation. He has reassured me that despite the vast changes in physics, the Whiteheadian perspective that has been so important to me as a Christian believer provides a valid way of understanding the physical world. If there is a difference between us, it is my greater emphasis on perspective and on the challenge of the Whiteheadian perspective to the ones that now dominate the sciences.