Primitivism and the Analogy between Colors and Values

The analogy between colors and values is strongly interlinked with the idea that these properties are by nature dispositions or response‐dependent properties. Indeed, that colors are essentially visible, and values are inherently motivational, cries out for a dispositional or a response‐dependent account. Recently, Primitivism has challenged the viability of the dispositional account of colors, taking the apple, for instance, to be “gloriously, perfectly, and primitively red.” Unsurprisingly, the attack on the dispositional account of colors has found a moral analogue in the view that values are sui generis irreducibly primitive properties. The question this article addresses is whether given Primitivism the analogy between colors and values is preserved; or in other words, whether Primitivism breaks the bond between the dispositional account and the analogy between colors and values.     

Knowledge ascriptions and the psychological consequences of changing stakes

One of the many ways that ‘deflationary’ and ‘inflationary’ theories of truth are said to differ is in their attitude towards truth qua property. This difference used to be very easy to delineate, with deflationists denying, and inflationists asserting, that truth is a property, but more recently the debate has become a lot more complicated, owing primarily to the fact that many contemporary deflationists often do allow for truth to be considered a property. Anxious to avoid inflation, however, these deflationists are at pains to point out that the truth property, on their view, is not a property of any significant interest. Correspondingly, inflationists have seen this as an opportunity to refine what kind of property they think truth is, which—according to them—moves their views beyond deflationism. The upshot of this is that there are number of different accounts in the literature of what distinguishes an inflationary truth property from a deflationary one, or—as it is sometimes put—what distinguishes a ‘substantive’ property from an ‘insubstantive’ one. This has made it hard to pin down exactly what is at issue at the metaphysical level between deflationists and inflationists, which makes it increasingly hard to see how debates between them are properly phrased. Given that these positions represent the two central attitudes towards truth in contemporary debates, this makes for a serious obstacle for the project of discerning the correct theory of truth. The aim of this paper is to discern the best way to distinguish between substantive and insubstantive properties, and thus to restore some focus to these debates. I argue that the three central distinctions in the literature fail, and offer what I take to be a more promising distinction in terms of a graded distinction between abundant and sparse properties.     

Assessment of dispositional forgiveness in adolescence: a contribution to the Italian validation of the Forgiveness Likelihood Scale

ABSTRACT

The current study investigated the factor structure, factorial invariance, and reliability of the Italian version of the Forgiveness Likelihood Scale (FLS) among 604 adolescents in Italy (217 boys and 387 girls) with a mean age of 16.6 years (SD?=?1.3). The FLS is a 10-item Likert-type scale created to assess the predisposition to forgive across situations. The sample was randomly split into two subsamples to investigate the FLS structure. Results indicated a unidimensional structure, and factorial invariance was found for the factor solution across gender. Scale reliability was adequate, revealing appropriate internal consistency (α?=?.75). Evidence for convergent validity was also found. The results suggested that the Italian version of the FLS can be reliably used to measure forgiveness among Italian adolescents. Practice implications and future research directions are discussed.     

Formation of yittrium oxide in cemented carbides

Rare-earth (RE) elements are helpful in improving the mechanical properties of cemented carbides. In this work, the formation of Y₂O₃ in functionally graded cemented carbides is investigated using transmission electron microscopy. The results indicate that Y₂O₃ can stabilize the Co phase with the face-centred cubic structure (α-Co), since it has a cubic structure similar to the high-temperature Co phase. The α-Co phase has a higher plasticity than ε-Co, and this suggests a possible mechanism for the role of RE elements in toughening cemented carbides.     

Psychometric evaluation of the Dutch Persecutory Ideation Questionnaire (PIQ) and its relation to aggression

Patients with schizophrenia and a violent past more often have persecutory delusions than other types of delusions. The main aim of the present study was to examine the relation between persecutory ideation and self-reported aggression in a community based and clinical population. A second aim was to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Dutch version of the Persecutory Ideation Questionnaire (PIQ; McKay, Langdon, & Coltheart, 2006). From the general population, 269 persons were included as well as 79 inpatients from different psychiatric facilities. In the community based sample, the PIQ appeared to be a reliable and valid instrument to measure persecutory ideation. Evaluation of the PIQ in a sample with patients with a psychotic disorder showed that the PIQ had good criterion validity. In addition, results showed that persecutory ideation was significantly related to self-reported aggression in the community based, and in the clinical sample. Moreover, in the community based sample, this association was higher than that between positive psychopathological experiences in general and aggression in the community based sample. In sum, persecutory ideation can be measured reliably with the PIQ, and there seems a robust relation between persecutory ideation in particular and aggression in both clinical and community based samples.     

相对到达时间任务中飞行员对客体特征与运动特征的分离

相对到达时间任务(RAT)是判断两个运动客体哪个先到达指定目标, 可用来评估个体动态空间能力。采用RAT任务对飞行员与普通被试进行对照研究, 寻求发现两组在运动客体特征和视觉空间运动特征及其相互关系上的处理差异。设计了3个实验分别考察客体颜色、客体大小、运动方向、速率大小、视线方向以及背景特征对判断的影响。结果显示：(1)客体颜色不影响运动客体的相对时间判断, 客体大小、运动方向、速率大小、视线方向以及背景特征影响判断; (2)控制组对显示屏上从左到右的运动客体的相对时间判断好于从右到左任务, 大速率任务判断更好, 对大客体快速行驶而小客体低速行驶时的相对到达时间更易区分, 且与两眼视线方向不一致的运动方向会使控制组判断更难, 运动背景中的目标线特征改变使控制组判断绩效降低; (3)和控制组比, 飞行员反应快正确率高, 其快速判断优势集中体现在从右到左运动以及小速率任务上, 且在不同运动方向和不同速率上的反应时均无差异, 飞行员的处理优势还表现在不受客体大小、视线方向改变和目标线特征改变的影响。结论：飞行员能在变化的空间中准确处理相对速度、相对距离、相对时间等运动信息, 能分离客体大小、背景、运动方向等因素对相对到达时间判断的影响, 在运动空间中飞行员具有较高场独立性认知特征和动态空间处理能力。     

Effect of heat treatment on the microstructure and mechanical properties of spray-formed 7055 aluminium alloy

7055 Al alloys samples were prepared by spray forming and hot-extrusion followed by two different aging treatment procedures. Their different distributions of GP zones, and nanoscale precipitates η′ (MgZn) and η (MgZn₂) are extensively investigated by transmission electron microscope (TEM). The mechanical properties, including tensile strength, Vickers hardness and elongation of both aged 7055 Al alloys, have also been measured and analysed. It is found that T6 and T76 aging treatment results in quite different microstructure and mechanical properties. The outstanding performance of the 7055 Al alloys after T6 aging treatment is attributed to nanoscale semi-coherent dispersion precipitates.     

Panpsychism,The Combination Problem,and Plural Collective Properties

Panpsychism claims that each fundamental entity is conscious, but then faces the problem of how such entities combine to make up our ordinary consciousness. In this paper, I show how panpsychism can avoid this so-called combination problem by taking seriously plural collective properties at the fundamental level.     

Introverted Metaphysics

This paper pulls together three debates fundamental in metaphysics and proposes a novel unified approach to them. The three debates are (i) between bundle theory and substrate theory about the nature of objects, (ii) dispositionalism and categoricalism about the nature of properties, and (iii) regularity theory and production theory about the nature of causation. The first part of the paper suggests that although these debates are metaphysical, the considerations motivating competing approaches in each debate tend to be epistemological. The second part argues that the two underlying epistemological pictures supporting these competing views lead to highly unsatisfying conceptions of the world. The final part proposes an alternative epistemological picture, which I call “introverted empiricism,” and presents the way this alternative provides for a more satisfying grasp of the ultimate nature of objects, properties, and causation. It is a consequence of this alternative picture that there is a kind of intimate self‐understanding that underlies our understanding of the deep nature of reality.