Men often make riskier decisions than women across a wide range of real-life behaviors. Whether this sex difference is accentuated, diminished, or stable under stressful conditions is, however, contested in the scientific literature. A critical blind spot lies amid this contestation: Most studies use standardized, laboratory-based, cognitive measures of decision making rather than complex real-life social simulation tasks to assess risk-related behavior. To address this blind spot, we investigated the effects of acute psychosocial stress on risk decision making in men (...) and women using a standardized cognitive measure and a novel task that simulated a real-life social situation. Participants were exposed to either an acute psychosocial stressor or an equivalent control condition. Stressor-exposed participants were further characterized as high- or low-cortisol responders. Results confirmed that the experimental manipulation was effective. On the IGT, participants characterized as low-cortisol responders made significantly riskier decisions than those characterized as high-cortisol responders. Similarly, in the online chatroom, participants characterized as low-cortisol responders were, relative to those in the Non-Stress group, significantly more likely to make risky decisions. Together, these results suggest that at lower levels of cortisol both men and women tend to make riskier decisions in both economic and social spheres. (shrink)

Sackris and Beebe (2014) report the results of a series of studies that seem to show that there are cases in which many people are willing to attribute knowledge to a protagonist even when her belief is unjustified. These results provide some reason to conclude that the folk concept of knowledge does not treat justification as necessary for its deployment. In this paper, we report a series of results that can be seen as supporting this conclusion by going some way (...) towards ruling out an alternative account of Sackris and Beebe’s results—the possibility that the knowledge attributions that they witnessed largely stem from protagonist projection, a phenomenon in language use and interpretation in which the speaker uses words that the relevant protagonist might use to describe her own situation and the listener interprets the speaker accordingly. With that said, we do caution the reader against drawing the conclusion too strongly, on the basis of results like those reported here and by Sackris and Beebe. There are alternative possibilities regarding what drives the observed knowledge attributions in cases of unjustified true belief that must be ruled out before, on the basis of such results, we can conclude with much confidence that the folk concept of knowledge does not treat justification as necessary for its deployment. (shrink)

A variety of studies show that parental absence early in life leads to deleterious effects on the developing CNS. This is thought to be largely because evolutionary-dependent stimuli are necessary for the appropriate postnatal development of the young brain, an effect sometimes termed the “experience-expectant brain,” with parents providing the necessary input for normative synaptic connections to develop and appropriate neuronal survival to occur. Principal among CNS systems affected by parental input are the monoamine systems. In the present study,N= 434 (...) rhesus monkeys (233 males, 201 females) were reared in one of two conditions: as mother-reared controls (MR;n= 269) or without adults with 24-h access to same-aged peers (PR;n= 165). When subjects were six-months-old, they underwent a separation paradigm involving 4, sequential, four-day social separations from their mothers or peers, with each separation followed by three-day reunions with their mothers or their peers. Prior to the separation paradigm, baseline cisternal CSF samples were obtained, as well as at the end of each the four social separations, and after final separation, during a recovery period. CSF was assayed for concentrations of monoamine metabolites and a blood sample was genotyped for the serotonin transporter (5-HTT) genotype. Replicating earlier landmark findings, PR subjects with thesallele exhibited lower baseline concentrations of the serotonin metabolite 5-hydroxyindoleacetic acid (5-HIAA), when compared to PR subjects homozygous for theLallele. MR subjects were undifferentiated by genotype. PR subjects exhibited lower CSF 5-HIAA concentrations during baseline, but higher CSF 5-HIAA during social separations, when compared to MR subjects. There were rearing effects for the dopamine metabolite homovanillic acid (HVA) and for the norepinephrine metabolite 3-methoxy-4-hydroxyphenylglycol (MHPG), with PR subjects showing higher HVA and lower MHPG when compared to MR subjects. These findings indicate that there are long-term deficits in the response of monoamines following early maternal absence. The results of this study confirm and extend earlier findings that early parental absence has deleterious consequences for the development of the monoamine systems, and that these consequences are modulated by the 5-HTT genotype. (shrink)

Jennifer Blumenthal-Barby (2024) argues that “[i]t is time for bioethics to end talk about personhood” (11). The author calls on the field to ask different kinds of normative questions about the mo...

Haunting us with such unforgettable stories as The Shining, Shawshank Redemption, Salem s Lot, Carrie, The Green Mile, and Pet Semetary, Stephen King has been an anchor of American horror, science fiction, psychological thrillers, and suspense for over forty years. His characters have brought chills to our spines and challenged our notions of reality while leaving us in awe of the perseverance of the human spirit. As the first book in the new Great Authors and Philosophy series, Stephen (...) King and Philosophy reveals some of the deeper issues raised by King s work. From retribution, freedom, and moral relativity, to death and insanity, the chapters of this book expose how King s stories access the questions and fears that nag each of us in the middle of night.". (shrink)

I am deeply grateful to Nicole Roughan for overseeing this symposium and to Alon Harel, Stephen Riley, Julian Sempill, Alec Stone Sweet, and Ionna Tourkochoriti for their insightful engagements wit...

In Dimensions of Private Law, Professor Stephen Waddams describes the obstacles that an adequate classification of private law must overcome. The purpose of this essay is to offer a theoretical account of legal classification that explains how these obstacles can be overcome and what the resulting classification of private law might look like. I begin with the catalogue of obstacles that Waddams presents and argue that, because they are rooted in misconceptions about the classificatory project, they pose no threat (...) to an adequate conception of legal classification. In search of such a conception, I consider how three great legal theorists – Aristotle, Kant, and Hegel – answer three fundamental classificatory questions about private law. First, what is the unitythat underlies the seemingly chaotic array of legal instances? Second, what is the principle of differentiationthat applies to this unity? Third, how are legalinstancessubsumed under this differentiated unity? The focus of this essay is the enduring significance of Kant’s conception of legal classification, which provides an alternative to Waddams’ conception and offers a set of coherent answers to the fundamental classificatory questions. In contrast, both Aristotle and Hegel respond to the fundamental classificatory questions by providing a conception of the unity of private law that fails to cohere with their ensuing accounts of its differentiation. (shrink)

n one of the numerous movie versions of A Christmas Carol , Ebenezer Scrooge, mounting the steps to visit his dying partner, Jacob Marley, encounters a dignified gentleman sitting on a landing. "Are you the doctor?" Scrooge inquires. "No," replies the man, "I'm the undertaker; ours is a very competitive business." The cutthrought world of intellectuals must rank a close second, and few events attract more notice than a proclamation that popular ideas have died. Darwin's theory of natural selection has (...) been a perennial candidate for burial. (shrink)

Hegel’s Science of Logic is not usually thought to make a significant — or indeed any — contribution to logic. It is more often conceived as a work of outdated.

In this essay, I reply to the above four critics of In Defense of Kant’s Religion (IDKR). In reply to George di Giovanni, I highlight the interpretive differencesthat divide the authors of IDKR and di Giovanni, and argue that di Giovanni’s atheist reading of Kant does not follow, even granting his premises. In reply to Pamela Sue Anderson, I show that if her reading of Kant is accurate, Kant’s own talk of God becomes empty and contemptible by his own lights, (...) and I then show how her empirical bias prompts a significant misreading of IDKR. In reply to Stephen Palmquist, I expose four fallacious maneuvers in his paper, which comprise the bulk of his essay. And in reply to Michalson, I address a series of minor concerns raised in his essay, and then set the record straight on the motives behind IDKR in general and my own take on Kant’s compatibility (or lack thereof) with Christianity in specific. (shrink)

This is a brief response to comments by Struan Jacobs and Peter Blum on The Calling of Social Thought, Rediscovering the Work of Edward Shils, a recent collection of essays edited by Christopher Adair-Toteff and Stephen Turner. It identifies a distinctive contribution of Shils to the larger problem of the tacit.

This essay offers constructive criticism of the book “In Defense of Kant’s Religion” (2008), by Chris L. Firestone and Nathan Jacobs. Follow the link given here to see the published version of this article. In the same journal issue where that version appeared (Faith & Philosophy 29.2), Jacobs and Firestone each published essays that claimed to respond to my criticisms of their book; but for the most part they merely skirted around the points my article makes, often avoiding (...) the key issues (e.g., by imputing alleged "fallacies" to my paper and using these as excuses to avoid discussing the genuine issues), sometimes making claims that were simply false in the process. In Faith and Philosophy 29.3 (July 2012):340-346, I published a general response to the whole debate over their book, without going into the sad details of the tactics they employed. But in a footnote (p.342n) I referred the reader to a detailed, point-by-point rebuttal to their (non-)arguments, as an addendum to that article, that would be uploaded here on my academia. edu site. This version of my original paper uploaded here contains the identical text for the paper itself (i.e., the first 15 pages of the original typescript have not been changed); but I have added an Appendix (starting on p.16) that responds, point-by-point to the Firestone and Jacobs essays. Warning to the faint-hearted: this discussion should not be read by anyone who is considering giving up their study of philosophy on the grounds that philosophers typically waste their time merely talking past each other, because for such a person, reading the Appendix to the version of the paper uploaded here could be the straw that breaks the camel's back! As I wrote it, I found myself sometimes wishing I had not published a promise to provide such material, because it is an embarrassment to philosophy that philosophers sometimes treat each other in the way illustrated by the two essays I am responding to. I only hope that taking the trouble to publish such a detailed response will help some readers recognize how important it is to give one's interlocuter the benefit of the doubt wherever possible (as I have tried to do here, for Firestone and Jacobs--and I would welcome their detailed explanations, if they think I have not done so). In any case, I hope the (unpublished) Appendix, uploaded here, will illustrate the fact that there are more important values to consider, when conducting a philosophical argument, than merely persuading others that "I’m right!". (shrink)

This paper gives a detailed analysis of four seed lists in the journals of John Locke. These lists provide a window into a fascinating open network of botanical exchange in the early 1680s which included two of the leading botanists of the day. Pierre Magnol of Montpellier and Jacob Bobart the Younger of Oxford. The provenance and significance of the lists are assessed in relation to the relevant extant herbaria and plant catalogues from the period. The lists and associated correspondence (...) provide the main evidence for Locke's own important, through modest contribution to early modern botany, a contribution which he would have regarded as a small part of the broader project of constructing a natural history of plants. They also provide a detailed case study of the sort of open and informal network of knowledge exchange in the early modern period that is widely recognised by historians of science, but all too rarely illustrated. (shrink)

Cook (1995) criticizes the work of Jacobs and Kosslyn (1994) on spatial relations, shape representations, and receptive fields in neural network models on the grounds that first‐order correlations between input and output unit activities can explain the results. We reply briefly to Cook's arguments here (and in Kosslyn, Chabris, Marsolek, Jacobs & Koenig, 1995) and discuss how new simulations can confirm the importance of receptive field size as a crucial variable in the encoding of categorical and coordinate spatial (...) relations and the corresponding shape representations; such simulations would testify to the computational distinction between the different types of representations. (shrink)

This is a brief response to comments by Struan Jacobs and Peter Blum on The Calling of Social Thought, Rediscovering the Work of Edward Shils, a recent collection of essays edited by Christopher Adair-Toteff and Stephen Turner. It identifies a distinctive contribution of Shils to the larger problem of the tacit.

Freemasonry was the most widespread form of secular association in eighteenth-century England, providing a model for other forms of urban sociability and a stimulus to music and the arts. Many members of the Royal Society and the Society of Antiquaries, for instance, were Freemasons, while historians such as Margaret Jacob have argued that Freemasonry was inspired by Whig Newtonianism and played an important role in European Enlightenment scientific education. This paper illustrates the importance of natural philosophy in Masonic rhetoric and (...) utilizes material from Masonic histories, lodge records and secondary works to demonstrate that scientific lectures were indeed given in some lodges. It contends, however, that there were other sources of inspiration for Freemasonry besides Newtonianism, such as antiquarianism, and that many other factors as well as the prevalence of Masonic lodges determined the geography of English scientific culture. Although the subject of Freemasonry and natural philosophy has great potential, as Jacob has demonstrated so well, much further work, especially in the form of prosopographical studies of provincial lodges, is required before the nature of the relationship between the two can be fully appreciated. (shrink)

[Stephen Yablo] The usual charge against Carnap's internal/external distinction is one of 'guilt by association with analytic/synthetic'. But it can be freed of this association, to become the distinction between statements made within make-believe games and those made outside them-or, rather, a special case of it with some claim to be called the metaphorical/literal distinction. Not even Quine considers figurative speech committal, so this turns the tables somewhat. To determine our ontological commitments, we have to ferret out all traces (...) of nonliterality in our assertions; if there is no sensible project of doing that, there is no sensible project of Quinean ontology. /// [Andre Gallois] I discuss Steve Yablo's defence of Carnap's distinction between internal and external questions. In the first section I set out what I take that distinction, as Carnap draws it, to be, and spell out a central motivation Carnap has for invoking it. In the second section I endorse, and augment, Yablo's response to Quine's arguments against Carnap. In the third section I say why Carnap's application of the distinction between internal and external questions runs into trouble. In the fourth section I spell out what I take to be Yablo's version of Carnap. In the last I say why that version is especially vulnerable to the objection raised in the second. (shrink)

The British Cooperative movement offers a curious case of utopianism in which Robert Owen's program for total social and economic transformation finds its most durable, practical expression in a small shop founded by the "Rochdale Pioneers." The success of the Rochdale model created a national, then international, movement that improved the lives of many working-class people, in multiple ways, in the period between 1860 and 1950. However, despite its undeniable success, the British Cooperative movement increasingly adapted to, rather than transformed, (...) the social and economic order within which it operated: a case of utopia stalled or... (shrink)

This chapter defends the property dualism argument. The term “semantic premise” mentioned is used to refers to an assumption identified by Brian Loar that antiphysicalist arguments, such as the property dualism argument, tacitly assume that a statement of property identity that links conceptually independent concepts is true only if at least one concept picks out the property it refers to by connoting a contingent property of that property. It is argued that, the property that does the work in explaining the (...) possibility of a posteriori identities need not be a first-order property of the referent in question. On his view, the property dualism argument requires only a weaker semantic premise, which allows that the property in question be a higher order property. A refined version of the property dualism argument is formulated, which uses the weaker premise, and defends the argument against various objections. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain (...) in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

Postmodernism has evoked great controversy and it continues to do so today, as it disseminates into general discourse. Some see its principles, such as its fundamental resistance to metanarratives, as frighteningly disruptive, while a growing number are reaping the benefits of its innovative perspective. In Political Theory and Postmodernism, Stephen K. White outlines a path through the postmodern problematic by distinguishing two distinct ways of thinking about the meaning of responsibility, one prevalent in modern and the other in postmodern (...) perspectives. Using this as a guide, White explores the work of Heidegger, Foucault, Derrida, Lyotard, and Habermas, as well as 'difference' feminists, with the goal of showing how postmodernism can inform contemporary ethical-political reflection. In his concluding chapter, White examines how this revisioned postmodern perspective might bear on our thinking about justice. (shrink)

Mental causes are threatened from two directions: from below, since they would appear to be screened off by lower-order, e.g., neural states; and from within, since they would also appear to be screened off by intrinsic, e.g., syntactical states. A principle needed to parry the first threat -causes should be proportional to their effects- appears to leave us open to the second; for why should unneeded extrinsic detail be any less offensive to proportionality than excess microstructure? I say that the (...) second threat relies on a perversion of proportionality that would lay waste to all causal relations. (shrink)

Historical introduction -- Human being -- Identity and human incompletion in Sartre -- Identity and human incompletion in Aquinas -- Human understanding -- The subjective nature of objective understanding in Sartre -- The subjective nature of objective understanding in Aquinas -- Human freedom -- Freedom, choice, and the indetermination of reason in Sartre -- Freedom, choice, and the indetermination of reason in Aquinas -- Human fulfillment -- The possibility of human happiness in Sartre -- The possibility of human happiness in (...) Aquinas. (shrink)

'I think, therefore I am' - Descartes..'Such tricks hath strong imagination..That, if it would but apprehend some joy,..It comprehends some bringer of that joy;..Or in the night, imagining some fear,..How easy is a bush supposed a bear?' - Shakespeare..A unique compendium of key texts of psychology, from Aristotle to cutting-edge neuroscience.

Hegel's Philosophy of right concerns ideas on justice, moral responsibility, family life, economic activity and the political structure of the state. He shows how human freedom involves living with others in accordance with publicly recognized rights and laws.