不同历史时期谬误研究的特点

本文主要讨论了不同时期逻辑学家对逻辑谬误研究的特点。古希腊时期对谬误作出全面系统研究的是亚里士多德。亚里士多德对谬误的解决方法一般地说是经验的,没有形成一套行之有效的规则。文艺复兴时期,培根等人批判经院哲学,探讨了人类产生谬误的根源。这时期的谬误研究特点是：一是重视在归纳法的应用中产生的谬误;二是突出逻辑问题。现代逻辑学家如柯比等人则在前人的基础上,对谬误作出了更全面、更精确的分类,并且对各种谬误的解释和举例也更确切,从而使谬误理论更好地为实践服务。     

Epistemic instrumentalism,exceeding our grasp

In the concluding chapter of Exceeding our Grasp Kyle Stanford outlines a positive response to the central issue raised brilliantly by his book, the problem of unconceived alternatives. This response, called "epistemic instrumentalism", relies on a distinction between instrumental and literal belief. We examine this distinction and with it the viability of Stanford's instrumentalism, which may well be another case of exceeding our grasp.     

Human content in affect-inducing stimuli: A secondary analysis of the international affective picture system

We report a secondary analysis of the international affective picture system (IAPS), the broadest available standardized sample of emotional stimuli, which confirmed our prediction that the distribution of slides across the valence and arousal dimensions would be related to human versus inanimate slide content. Pictures depicting humans are over-represented in the high arousal/positive and high arousal/negative areas of affective space as compared to inanimate pictures, which are especially frequent in the low arousal/neutral valence area. Results pertaining to dominance ratings and gender differences in valence and arousal ratings further suggest that there are qualitative differences between emotional reactions to animal or human slide content and responses to nonsocial still photos. Researchers need to be mindful of this distinction when selecting affect-inducing stimuli.

认知神经科学视角的催眠研究述评

催眠被广泛的应用在临床心理治疗中, 但是, 关于催眠方面的研究却相当匮乏, 而且相当模糊。近年来, 随着fMRI, ERP和PET等技术的引入, 我们对催眠引导和催眠暗示有了更加深入的理解。对于疼痛和幻觉的研究表明, 至少对于高暗示性被试而言, 催眠暗示可以引起与真实刺激同样的大脑皮层的激活; 而催眠后暗示对于注意策略的调控, 可以使原有的认知过程发生改变, 其中之一是使用催眠后暗示来抑制“Stroop效应”语义加工过程; 催眠后遗忘更是实现了内隐记忆和外显记忆遗忘的分离。未来研究者将继续从探讨催眠本身的神经属性和催眠暗示所引起的认知过程的改变两个角度去认识催眠, 揭开催眠的实质。     

Philosophy of science in Estonia

This paper presents a survey of the philosophy of science in Estonia. Topics covered include the historical background (science at the 17th century Academia Gustaviana, in the 19th century, during the Soviet period) and an overview of the current situation and main areas of research (the problem of demarcation, a critique of the traditional understandings of science, φ-science, classical and non-classical science, the philosophy of chemistry, the problem of induction, the sociology of scientific knowledge, semiotics as a methodology).     

Use of a differential observing response to expand restricted stimulus control

This study extends previous work on the use of differential observing responses (DOR) to remediate atypically restricted stimulus control. A participant with autism had high matching-to-sample accuracy scores with printed words that had no letters in common (e.g., cat, lid, bug) but poor accuracy with words that had two letters in common (e.g., cat, can, car). In the DOR intervention, she matched the distinguishing letters of the overlapping words (e.g., t, n, r) immediately prior to matching the whole words. Accuracy scores improved, and accuracy remained high when DOR requirements were withdrawn.     

Structure and strength in causal induction

We present a framework for the rational analysis of elemental causal induction-learning about the existence of a relationship between a single cause and effect-based upon causal graphical models. This framework makes precise the distinction between causal structure and causal strength: the difference between asking whether a causal relationship exists and asking how strong that causal relationship might be. We show that two leading rational models of elemental causal induction, DeltaP and causal power, both estimate causal strength, and we introduce a new rational model, causal support, that assesses causal structure. Causal support predicts several key phenomena of causal induction that cannot be accounted for by other rational models, which we explore through a series of experiments. These phenomena include the complex interaction between DeltaP and the base-rate probability of the effect in the absence of the cause, sample size effects, inferences from incomplete contingency tables, and causal learning from rates. Causal support also provides a better account of a number of existing datasets than either DeltaP or causal power.     

Overt head movements moderate the effect of depressive symptoms on mood regulation

A dysfunction in the regulation of negative mood states is one of the core symptoms of depression. Research has found that levels of depression are associated with the intensity of the mood-regulation deficit. The present study aimed to explore the role the body plays in mood-regulation processes. More specifically, we studied whether head movements can influence mood persistence in dysphoric states. Subsequent to a sad-mood induction, participants were presented with a set of positive pictures immediately after performing either vertical (i.e., nodding) or lateral (i.e., shaking) head movements. We considered changes in mood from before to after the experimental task as an index of the effectiveness of mood regulation. As expected, the results showed that higher initial levels of depressive symptoms were associated with greater persistence of sad mood. More importantly, this association was present in participants who shook their heads, but not in those who nodded. These results show that body movements can contribute to mood-regulation processes, thus expanding our knowledge of the psychopathology of mood disorders.     

Effect of affect on social cost bias in social anxiety disorder

Abstract

The cognitive model of social anxiety disorder (SAD) assumes that cognitive biases are important maintaining factors of the disorder. Research and theory have highlighted the impact of cognitive self-regulatory processes on affect, but have not sufficiently focused on the influence of affect on self-regulatory cognitions. The present study examined the influence of affect on cognitive self-regulatory mechanisms in SAD by focusing on one critical cognitive bias, estimated social cost. Individuals with SAD (N=48) and non-anxious controls (N=48) were randomly assigned to one of three experimental, affect induction conditions (negative, positive, or neutral) before giving a 10-minute impromptu, videotaped speech. As expected, the affect manipulation resulted in changes in estimated social cost. However, this effect was not specific to individuals with SAD. Participants in the positive affect condition in both groups had the highest social cost estimates post-speech challenge. These results suggest that social cost bias is dependent on the affective state in both individuals with SAD and controls.     

Chain-Arguments and the Sorites Paradox

A finite chain of valid arguments can never lead from truth to falsehood. Call this the concatenation principle, or CP. Some propose to reject CP in response to the sorites paradox. I offer a justification of a restricted version of CP based on intuitively-appealing principles, all of which are already assumed in mathematics. The restricted version excludes soritical cases, but covers intuitively correct applications of CP in mathematics and elsewhere. The upshot is that the cost of rejecting the unrestricted CP is much lower than is often assumed.