D. Z. Phillips’ contemplations on religion and literature

This paper critically discusses D. Z. Phillips’ use of literary works as a resource for philosophical reflection on religion. Beginning by noting Phillips’ suggestion, made in relation to Waiting for Godot, that the possibilities of meaning that we see in a literary work can reveal something of our own religious sensibility, I then proceed to show what we learn about Phillips from his readings of certain works by Larkin, Tennyson, and Wharton. Through exploring alternative possible readings, I argue that, although Phillips’ discussions are of considerable philosophical interest, they undermine his claim to be deploying a purely contemplative hermeneutical method.     

“Ningún Iroqués era Mohicano”: La influencia del contenido en las tareas de razonamiento lógico

Resumen

Este estudio se centra en la influencia del contenido de la tarea en problemas de razonamiento deductivo. Se utilizaron cuatro tareas diferentes: de razonamiento proposicional, usando deferentes tipos de conectivas lógicas, silogismos lineales o series de tres términos, silogismos categoriales y la tarea selección de Wason. Para cada una de las tareas se diseñaron dos versiones: una con material temático concreto, diferente para cada tarea y una segunda versión con material abstracto, sin contenido temático concreto. Ambas versiones de la misma tarea eran isomóificas. Se administraron ambas versiones de las cuatro tareas, en el mismo orden comentado, a dos grupos de sujetos: un grupo realizó siempre primero la versión concreta y luego la abstracta y otro grupo realizó siempre la abstracta y después la concreta. Los sujetos fueron alumnos de enseñanza secundaria (3.^er año), 37 y 38 sujetos respectivamente, con una media de edad de 17 años.

Los resultados confirman que no se produce un único efecto facilitador o dificultador del contenido. En una tarea la versión de contenido resulta más fácil, en otra más dificil y en otras dos no hay diferencias. El efecto mayor se produce en aquella tarea en que los sujetos parecen disponer de un «esquema de permiso» muy claro sobre el contenido temático de la tarea. Los resultados se interpretan en base a una hipótesis de doble procesamiento sintáctico y semántico. En cuanto al efecto facilitador del orden de presentación (abstracto-concreto; concreto-abstracto) los resultados indican que la versión concreta facilita la abstracta pero que la abstracta dificulta la ejecución en la concreta. Estos resultados irían en la línea de presuponer una primacía de procesamiento semántico sobre el sintáctico.     

SHOULD A B‐THEORETIC ATHEIST FEAR DEATH?

This article discusses Robin Le Poidevin's proposal that a commitment to the B‐theory of time provides atheists with a reason to relinquish the fear of death. For the purposes of the article, I grant Le Poidevin's assertion that the B‐theory gives us a sense in which our lives are ‘eternally real’; but I deny that the B‐theorist is entitled to regard this as sufficient to furnish a reason to cease fearing death. This is because, according to the most prevalent B‐theoretic conception of our emotional attitudes, A‐theoretic (and not B‐theoretic) beliefs are sufficient to ground these attitudes. I discuss this B‐theoretic account of our emotions, which I call the Mellor–MacBeath model, and explain how it relates to the fear of death. I argue that, according to this model, the fear of death – in so far as it is a fear of one's personal annihilation – is warranted, and hence that, if Le Poidevin's proposal is to stand, then we must be given either a new B‐theoretic account of the connection between beliefs and emotions, or an account of why the fear of death is unlike other emotional attitudes.     

Test adaptation to other cultures: a practical approach

The aim of this study was to show the practical steps to be followed in the adaptation of instruments for measuring psychological constructs across cultures. For this purpose, the adaptation process of the NEO PI-R from Spanish into Basque is thoroughly described. In order to avoid the sources of error that researchers could encounter during the adaptation process, established guidelines are followed. In the stage which focuses on the empirical validation of the instrument to be used, four studies are described that examine the following aspects: dimensionality, convergent and differential validity, internal consistency of each dimension, and the possible differential item functioning with regard to gender and life stage (youth or adulthood). In the light of the results obtained, we conclude that the Basque version of NEO PI-R guarantees an adequate assessment of personality from the Big Five viewpoint. These studies illustrate how to obtain evidence about the degree of validity of the adapted version of a test, which is the key feature of any adaptation process.     

Immortality and boredom: a response to Wisnewski

This article contributes to the ongoing debate initiated by Bernard Williams’ claim that, due to the non-contingent finitude of the categorical desires that give meaning to our lives, an immortal life would necessarily become intolerably boring. Jeremy Wisnewski has argued that even if immortality involves periods in which our categorical desires have been exhausted, this need not divest life of meaning since some categorical desires are revivable. I argue that careful reflection upon the thought-experiments adduced by Wisnewski reveals that they do not substantiate his proposal, and hence that a plausible reason for rejecting Williams’ position has not been provided.     

On the facilitatory effects of cognate words in bilingual speech production

There is a growing body of evidence showing that a word's cognate status is an important dimension affecting the naming performance of bilingual speakers. In a recent article, Kohnert extended this observation to the naming performance of an aphasic bilingual (DJ). DJ named pictures with cognate names more accurately than pictures with non-cognate names. Furthermore, having named the pictures in Spanish helped the subsequent retrieval (with a delay of one week between the two tests) of the same pictures' names in English, but only for pictures with cognate names. That is, there was a language transfer but only for those translation words that were phonologically similar. In this article we first evaluate the conclusions drawn from these results by Kohnert, and second we discuss the theoretical implications of the facilitatory effects of cognate words for models of speech production in bilingual speakers.     

Narrative philosophy of religion: apologetic and pluralistic orientations

International Journal for Philosophy of Religion - Recent decades have witnessed a growing interest in narrative both in certain areas of philosophy and in the study of religion. The philosophy of...