A critique of Habermas' theory of practical rationality

Habermas' theory of practical rationality is a significant theoretical attempt to preserve both rationality and democracy at the level of political decision making that transcends both technocratic and decisionistic theories of rationality. Habermas' theory of rationality accords with his epistemological, sociological, psychological, and linguistic premises. His theory, however, overlooks the interactions between instrumental action and symbolic interaction, the relevance of professional knowledge of facts for the choice of ends, the conflict between the norms of efficiency and democracy, and the duality of subject and object in historical formation. The rational interest in reproduction of free communication, however, can be used to reformulate Habermas' theory of rationality.     

Can sample-specific simulations help detect low base-rate taxonicity?

The authors examined the role of the sample-specific simulations (SSS; A. M. Ruscio & J. Ruscio, 2002; J. Ruscio & A. M. Ruscio, 2004) procedure in detecting low base-rate taxa that might otherwise prove elusive. The procedure preserved key distributional characteristics for moderate to high base-rate taxa, but it performed inadequately for low base-rate taxa, with low to moderate nuisance covariance, decreasing indicator validity, and increasing average nuisance covariance. Visual inspection of the curves produced by the SSS procedure, combined with the expectation that the inchworm test should produce a clear peak for low base-rate taxonic samples, led to inappropriate conclusions about the suitability of data. The authors speculate that examination of low base-rate taxa using SSS may require other algorithms for generating comparison distributions, consideration of the shape of the whole curve, and/or relaxation of the expectation that a clear peak will emerge with the inchworm test.     

Selective attention determines emotional responses to novel visual stimuli

Distinct complex brain systems support selective attention and emotion, but connections between them suggest that human behavior should reflect reciprocal interactions of these systems. Although there is ample evidence that emotional stimuli modulate attentional processes, it is not known whether attention influences emotional behavior. Here we show that evaluation of the emotional tone (cheery/dreary) of complex but meaningless visual patterns can be modulated by the prior attentional state (attending vs. ignoring) used to process each pattern in a visual selection task. Previously ignored patterns were evaluated more negatively than either previously attended or novel patterns. Furthermore, this emotional devaluation of distracting stimuli was robust across different emotional contexts and response scales. Finding that negative affective responses are specifically generated for ignored stimuli points to a new functional role for attention and elaborates the link between attention and emotion. This finding also casts doubt on the conventional marketing wisdom that any exposure is good exposure.     

Lesions of Periaqueductal Gray Dissociate-Conditioned Freezing From Conditioned Suppression Behavior in Rats

It is commonly assumed that suppression of an ongoing behavior is an indirect measure of freezing behavior. We tested whether conditioned suppression and freezing are the same or distinct conditioned responses. Rats were trained to press a bar for food and then given fear-conditioning sessions in which a tone was paired with a foot shock (two pairings a day for 2 days). They then received either sham or electrolytic lesions of the periaqueductal gray (PAG). Post-training PAG lesions blocked freezing to the conditioned stimulus (CS), but had no effect on the suppression of operant behavior to the same CS. Thus, conditioned suppression and freezing, which both cause a cessation in activity, appear to be mediated by separate processes.     

Sensitivity to initial values in full non‐parametric maximum‐likelihood estimation of the two‐parameter logistic model

Parameters of the two‐parameter logistic model are generally estimated via the expectation–maximization (EM) algorithm by the maximum‐likelihood (ML) method. In so doing, it is beneficial to estimate the common prior distribution of the latent ability from data. Full non‐parametric ML (FNPML) estimation allows estimation of the latent distribution with maximum flexibility, as the distribution is modelled non‐parametrically on a number of (freely moving) support points. It is generally assumed that EM estimation of the two‐parameter logistic model is not influenced by initial values, but studies on this topic are unavailable. Therefore, the present study investigates the sensitivity to initial values in FNPML estimation. In contrast to the common assumption, initial values are found to have notable influence: for a standard convergence criterion, item discrimination and difficulty parameter estimates as well as item characteristic curve (ICC) recovery were influenced by initial values. For more stringent criteria, item parameter estimates were mainly influenced by the initial latent distribution, whilst ICC recovery was unaffected. The reason for this might be a flat surface of the log‐likelihood function, which would necessitate setting a sufficiently tight convergence criterion for accurate recovery of item parameters.     

Mind,consciousness, and cognition: Phenomenology vs. cognitive science

I would like to thank Steven Crowell from Rice University (Philosophy Department) for helpful comments and suggestions about my discussion of Husserl and other phenomenologists, and Edouard Philippe, also from Rice University (Electrical Engineering Department), for offering me the opportunity to formulate my views on cognitive science and artificial intelligence.