The implicit activities of the living body in sports (such as heart rate, involuntary gestures, stress, reflex, emotional regulation and interaction expressions) emerge in the consciousness of the lived body without our voluntary control. We demonstrate physiological emersion, and how, including in dramaturgical perception, physiological flows and processes collide with the image of a whole body. In this paper, we introduce corporeal non-property as the missing (?) link between phenomenology and neuroscience, renewed by research on the cerebral unconscious and the (...) perception of their lived body. Rather than mindfulness, physical activity obliges the subject to learn the unconscious and his motor skills from his living body: a new psychoanalysis of sport is thus established by studying what emerges from the activity of the living body up to the level of the conscious description of motor action. In this paper, we explain why that awareness occurs, and why it matters for the understanding of unconscious activity of the athlete’s living body. This is potentially interesting, although it needs, as a theory, to overcome the obvious reliance of the body on unconscious or habitual/automated physiological processes. But the incorporation of body techniques forms a habitus. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics are digital technologies that will have significant impact on the development of humanity in the near future. They have raised fundamental questions about what we should do with these systems, what the systems themselves should do, what risks they involve, and how we can control these. - After the Introduction to the field (§1), the main themes (§2) of this article are: Ethical issues that arise with AI systems as objects, i.e., tools made and used (...) by humans. This includes issues of privacy (§2.1) and manipulation (§2.2), opacity (§2.3) and bias (§2.4), human-robot interaction (§2.5), employment (§2.6), and the effects of autonomy (§2.7). Then AI systems as subjects, i.e., ethics for the AI systems themselves in machine ethics (§2.8) and artificial moral agency (§2.9). Finally, the problem of a possible future AI superintelligence leading to a “singularity” (§2.10). We close with a remark on the vision of AI (§3). - For each section within these themes, we provide a general explanation of the ethical issues, outline existing positions and arguments, then analyse how these play out with current technologies and finally, what policy consequences may be drawn. (shrink)

In this paper it is argued that existing ‘self-representational’ theories of phenomenal consciousness do not adequately address the problem of higher-order misrepresentation. Drawing a page from the phenomenal concepts literature, a novel self-representational account is introduced that does. This is the quotational theory of phenomenal consciousness, according to which the higher-order component of a conscious state is constituted by the quotational component of a quotational phenomenal concept. According to the quotational theory of consciousness, phenomenal concepts help to account for the (...) very nature of phenomenally conscious states. Thus, the paper integrates two largely distinct explanatory projects in the field of consciousness studies: (i) the project of explaining how we think about our phenomenally conscious states, and (ii) the project of explaining what phenomenally conscious states are in the first place. (shrink)

PIERRE-YVES MONIN. — Que dit la chanson?JULIETTE. — La chanson ne dit rien. Et la chanson peut tout dire. Cela doit dépendre de la bouche qui la fredonne et l’invente. Elle reflète peut-être le monde, la société qui l’a vue naître. Elle reflète peut-être aussi la Vérité, la vraie, celle qui sort, toute nue, de son puits. Mais elle...

Why do thoughts involving harm and damage trigger guilt in certain individuals and not in others? The significance of this question comes into view when considering the medical and psychological literature on patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Patients with OCD feel guilt in response to having certain recurring, negative thoughts whose content evoke scenarios of harm and damage. This, however—at least in most readings of what those thoughts consist of—is puzzling. The transition from having a thought about being the source (...) of harm popping up in one’s mind to feeling guilty is not straightforward, and it calls for explanation. Indeed, OCD appears to challenge a traditional picture of what guilt is all about... (shrink)

This book closely examines our commonly held beliefs about human suffering, and offers unique insights into God's role in why we suffer. Dr. Perri critically examines what it means to be human from a Judeo-Christian perspective, and extrapolates from the work of Carl Gustav Jung showing a deeply complex development of human transcendence in human suffering. On an interpersonal level, Dr. Perri elaborates on the work of Martin Buber and Emanuel Levinas and shows how our suffering can be shared and (...) lessened by our unconditionality and presence for the other. Scriptural passages are quoted from both the Hebrew and New Testament texts, and are used to depict the suffering of humankind as seen in the face of Job. It was this face, according to Perri, that Jesus saw in the faces of those He came to redeem, and that ultimately brought Him to the crucifix of redemption. Dr. Perri challenges Sartre's position that our existence precedes our essence, and draws on the work of Abraham Joshua Heschel and Christian theology in this regard. He further elaborates a neurodevelopmental paradigm that creates essence as the basis of our freedom to choose. This book can be read and studied by both professionals in the helping and healing professions, and lay persons seeking to better understand our suffering, and how to better help those who suffer. Dr. Perri offers specific ways in how to be present for those who suffer, how to read and receive the hidden language of human suffering, and how to use silence as a communication skill. (shrink)

This paper investigates the prospects of Rodney Brooks’ proposal for AI without representation. It turns out that the supposedly characteristic features of “new AI” (embodiment, situatedness, absence of reasoning, and absence of representation) are all present in conventional systems: “New AI” is just like old AI. Brooks proposal boils down to the architectural rejection of central control in intelligent agents—Which, however, turns out to be crucial. Some of more recent cognitive science suggests that we might do well to dispose of (...) the image of intelligent agents as central representation processors. If this paradigm shift is achieved, Brooks’ proposal for cognition without representation appears promising for full-blown intelligent agents—Though not for conscious agents. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a digital technology that will be of major importance for the development of humanity in the near future. AI has raised fundamental questions about what we should do with such systems, what the systems themselves should do, what risks they involve and how we can control these. - After the background to the field (1), this article introduces the main debates (2), first on ethical issues that arise with AI systems as objects, i.e. tools made and (...) used by humans; here, the main sections are privacy (2.1), manipulation (2.2), opacity (2.3), bias (2.4), autonomy & responsibility (2.6) and the singularity (2.7). Then we look at AI systems as subjects, i.e. when ethics is for the AI systems themselves in machine ethics (2.8.) and artificial moral agency (2.9). Finally we look at future developments and the concept of AI (3). For each section within these themes, we provide a general explanation of the ethical issues, we outline existing positions and arguments, then we analyse how this plays out with current technologies and finally what policy conse-quences may be drawn. (shrink)

In recent years, Charles Sanders Peirce has emerged, in the eyes of philosophers both in America and abroad, as one of America’s major philosophical thinkers. His work has forced us back to philosophical reflection about those basic issues that inevitably confront us as human beings, especially in an age of science. Peirce’s concern for experience, for what is actually encountered, means that his philosophy, even in its most technical aspects, forms a reflective commentary on actual life and on the world (...) in which it is lived. In Charles S. Peirce: On Norms and Ideals, Potter argues that Peirce’s doctrine of the normative sciences is essential to his pragmatism. No part of Peirce’s philosophy is bolder than his attempt to establish esthetics, ethics, and logic as the three normative sciences and to argue for the priority of esthetics among the trio. Logic, Potter cites, is normative because it governs thought and aims at truth; ethics is normative because it analyzes the ends to which thought should be directed; esthetics is normative and fundamental because it considers what it means to be an end of something good in itself. This study shows that pierce took seriously the trinity of normative sciences and demonstrates that these categories apply both to the conduct of man and to the workings of the cosmos. Professor Potter combines sympathetic and informed exposition with straightforward criticism and he deals in a sensible manner with the gaps and inconsistencies in Peirce’s thought. His study shows that Peirce was above all a cosmological and ontological thinker, one who combined science both as a method and as result with a conception of reasonable actions to form a comprehensive theory of reality. Peirce’s pragmatism, although it has to do with "action and the achievement of results, is not a glorification of action but rather a theory of the dynamic nature of things in which the "ideal" dimension of reality – laws, nature of things, tendencies, and ends – has genuine power for directing the cosmic order, including man, toward reasonable goals. (shrink)

Will future lethal autonomous weapon systems (LAWS), or ‘killer robots’, be a threat to humanity? The European Parliament has called for a moratorium or ban of LAWS; the ‘Contracting Parties to the Geneva Convention at the United Nations’ are presently discussing such a ban, which is supported by the great majority of writers and campaigners on the issue. However, the main arguments in favour of a ban are unsound. LAWS do not support extrajudicial killings, they do not take responsibility away (...) from humans; in fact they increase the abil-ity to hold humans accountable for war crimes. Using LAWS in war would probably reduce human suffering overall. Finally, the availability of LAWS would probably not increase the probability of war or other lethal conflict—especially as compared to extant remote-controlled weapons. The widespread fear of killer robots is unfounded: They are probably good news. (shrink)

‘From now on, I'll describe the cities to you’, the Khan had said, ‘in your journeys you will see if they exist.’ But the cities visited by Marco Polo were always different from those thought of by...

Traditionally, discussions of moral participation – and in particular moral agency – have focused on fully formed human actors. There has been some interest in the development of morality in humans, as well as interest in cultural differences when it comes to moral practices, commitments, and actions. However, until relatively recently, there has been little focus on the possibility that nonhuman animals have any role to play in morality, save being the objects of moral concern. Moreover, when nonhuman cases are (...) considered as evidence of moral agency or subjecthood, there has been an anthropocentric tendency to focus on those behaviors that inform our attributions of moral agency to humans. For example, some argue that the ability to evaluate the principles upon which a moral norm is grounded is required for full moral agency. Certainly, if a moral agent must understand what makes an action right or wrong, then most nonhuman animals would not qualify (and perhaps some humans too). However, if we are to understand the evolution of moral psychology and moral practice, we need to turn our attention to the foundations of full moral agency. We must first pay attention to the more broadly normative practices of other animals. Here, we begin that project by considering evidence that great apes and cetaceans participate in normative practices. (shrink)

L'étude des formes, celle des thèmes figurés sur les vases grecs ne sont pas sépara ble· d'une connaissance aussi précise que possible des lieux et des conditions de trouvaille des documents considérés. On donnera ici l'exemple des cratères corinthiens dont l'iconographie aristocratique s'explique par le type de vie et l'idéologie funéraire des clients privilégiés de cette série de vases, les notables de Cerveteri.

Le lécythe à épaule, qui apparaît pour la première fois à Athènes peu avant le milieu du VIe siècle, n'est pas une forme empruntée à des modèles corinthiens. Ses analogies avec la forme Β des « lécythes samiens » en font l'héritier direct. A l'origine des séries on trouve les vases à parfum présents en Lydie et dans les cités d'Éolide et d'Ionie au temps d'Alyatte et de Crésus.

How does doubt come about? What are the mechanisms responsible for our inclinations to reassess propositions and collect further evidence to support or reject them? In this paper, I approach this question by focusing on what might be considered a distorting mirror of unreasonable doubt, namely the pathological doubt of patients with obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD). Individuals with OCD exhibit a form of persistent doubting, indecisiveness, and over-cautiousness at pathological levels (Rasmussen and Eisen in Psychiatr Clin 15(4):743–758, 1992; Reed in Obsessional (...) experience and compulsive behaviour: a cognitive-structural approach, Academic Press, Cambridge, 1985; Tolin et al. in Cogn Ther Res 27(6):657–669, 2003). I argue that the failure in OCD is of an affective nature, involving both excessive epistemic anxiety and hyperactive feelings of uncertainty. I further argue that our adaptive disposition to inquire about the right matters—that is, about propositions which are both epistemically risky and imply harmful possibilities—might depend on these affective mechanisms. (shrink)

Ce texte a déjà paru dans Anabases. Traditions et réceptions de l'Antiquité, n° 20, 2014. Nous remercions Pascal Payen, la revue Anabases et Juliette Lormier de nous avoir autorisé à le reproduire ici. Résumé : Cet article propose d'analyser deux entreprises de traduction en hexamètres français : celle des Travaux et des Jours d'Hésiode par Jean-Antoine de Baïf dans ses Étrénes de poézie fransoeze an vers mezurés, et celle de l'Iliade d'Homère par Philippe Brunet. Il s'agit de resituer ces (...) - Poétique et Études littéraires – GALERIE – Nouvel article. (shrink)

This article analyses a recent discourse of responsibility that accompanies states’ foreign aid provision. States adopt this discourse of National Social Responsibility to show their complian...

Benoîte Groult n’aime pas la bande dessinée. « Le neuvième art », qu’elle associe aux albums illustrés de son enfance, évoque à ses yeux des récits conventionnels et peu féministes, dont le parangon est Bécassine. Ce « préjugé » constitue l’un des leitmotivs de la bande dessinée que Catel Muller, illustratrice et scénariste, consacre à l’essayiste et romancière féministe Benoîte Groult. Co-auteure avec José-Louis Bocquet, d’une « bio graphique » d’Edith Piaf (2005), de Kiki de Montparnasse (2...

Dans un autoportrait en diptyque réalisé en 2020 et intitulé Couch Ditpych (huile sur toile, 1,80 m x 3 m), la peintre Joan Semmel, alors âgée de 88 ans, se représente assise sur un canapé dans une posture de détente, relâchée, le corps entièrement nu livré à la vue du spectateur ou de la spectatrice. Entre le volet gauche et le volet droit du diptyque, sa position évolue légèrement : l’un de ses genoux, d’abord plié, est ensuite déplié ; l’avant-bras, (...) d’abord levé devant les yeux, descend en... (shrink)

Depuis les années 2009-2010, plusieurs revues de sciences sociales en langue française ont donné une visibilité à des enquêtes en cours articulant études sur le genre et la sexualité et sociologie du vieillissement et des parcours de vie. L’ouvrage collectif coordonné par Monique Legrand et Ingrid Voléry qui réunit des contributions de sociologues, et en nombre plus limité, de chercheuses et chercheurs en psychologie, sciences de l’information et de la communication et anthropologie, particip...

What does it mean to be a good thinker? Which virtues work together in someone who possesses good intellectual character? Although recent research on virtues has highlighted the benefits of individual intellectual virtues, being an excellent thinker is likely a function of possessing multiple intellectual virtues. Specifically, a good thinker would both recognize one’s intellectual shortcomings and possess an eagerness to learn driven by virtues such as love of knowledge, curiosity, and open-mindedness. Good intellectual character may only successfully manifest when (...) individuals possess not just one or a few intellectual virtues, but a larger set of such virtues to different degrees. However, little is currently known about what combination of virtues are necessary for good thinking. We argue that it is important to identify and clarify the nature of the good thinker and outline a profile methodology for achieving this goal. This approach characterizes the good thinker in terms of a profile of multiple intellectual virtues. Understanding this profile can allow greater insight into the extent to which people possess such a profile, and the potential for societal benefits of educating for these qualities. (shrink)

Cet ouvrage propose de retracer le parcours intellectuel et spirituel de l’écrivain roumain d’expression française Emil Cioran (1911-1995). Le texte s’appuie sur une approche biographique pour saisir les enjeux philosophiques et identitaires de la vie et de l’oeuvre de Cioran. Tout d’abord son enfance imprégnée de culture allemande où liberté et insouciance cèdent vite la place à l’ennui ; sa fascination pour les thèses ultra-nationalistes pendant sa jeunesse studieuse et angoissée ; la volonté d’aveuglement que lui inspire ensuite son mépris (...) des affaires humaines ; la fuite de la Roumanie pendant la Guerre et l’affirmation de son incertitude identitaire et intellectuelle ; l’abandon finalement de son pays et de sa langue comme refus de sa propre histoire. L’ouvrage tente d’apporter un regard nouveau sur l’homme et son oeuvre pour résoudre les contradictions inhérentes à son renversement identitaire: bien que la mémoire soit au centre de sa pensée, Cioran se dirigea toujours plus vers la nécessité de l’oubli. La démarche de Vincent Piednoir démontre que cette volonté d’oubli a inscrit le philosophe dans la mémoire collective. De nombreux livres ont commenté la pensée de Cioran. L’originalité de celui-ci est de s’étendre, sans esprit de polémique mais sans tabou, sur sa jeunesse roumaine et profasciste. (shrink)

Precise spatiotemporal control of gene expression during normal development and cell differentiation is achieved by the combined action of proximal (promoters) and distal (enhancers) cis‐regulatory elements. Recent studies have reported that a subset of promoters, termed Epromoters, works also as enhancers to regulate distal genes. This new paradigm opened novel questions regarding the complexity of our genome and raises the possibility that genetic variation within Epromoters has pleiotropic effects on various physiological and pathological traits by differentially impacting multiple proximal and (...) distal genes. Here, we discuss the different observations pointing to an important role of Epromoters in the regulatory landscape and summarize the evidence supporting a pleiotropic impact of these elements in disease. We further hypothesize that Epromoter might represent a major contributor to phenotypic variation and disease. (shrink)

Sufficientarian theories of distributive justice are often considered to be vulnerable to the ‘blindness to inequality and other values objection’. This objection targets their commitment to holding the moral irrelevance of requirements of justice above absolute thresholds of advantage, making them insufficiently sensitive to egalitarian moral concerns that do have relevance for justice. This paper explores how sufficientarians could reply to this objection. Particularly, I claim that, if we accept that the force of the aforementioned objection comes from relational, and (...) not distributive, inequalities, different strategies are open for sufficientarians in order to be sensitive to these concerns. Drawing on recent literature about the relation between distributive and relational egalitarianism, and the possibility of reducing one to the other, strategies of ‘internalizing’ and ‘externalizing’ relational egalitarian concerns to a distributive sufficientarian framework are explored. In turn, I suggest that both strategies fail in their standard versions, but argue that a particular ‘hybrid view’ about justice is an attractive candidate for the sufficientarian theorist. (shrink)

Emotions might contribute to our being rational cognitive agents. Anxiety – and more specifically epistemic anxiety – provides an especially interesting case study into the role of emotion for adaptive cognition. In this paper, I aim at clarifying the epistemic contribution of anxiety, and the role that ill-calibrated anxiety might play in maladaptive epistemic activities which can be observed in psychopathology. In particular, I argue that this emotion contributes to our ability to adapt our cognitive efforts to how we represent (...) the practical factors relevant to the task at hand, by sig- naling the need for increased cognitive processing and evidence gathering in high- stakes situations. I hypothesize that dysfunctional or ill-calibrated epistemic anxiety might play an important role in the motivation driving persons with obsessive- compulsive disorder (OCD) to invest high amounts of cognitive resources into the resolution of apparently simple and innocuous questions. As I argue, OCD might be conceived as a case in which epistemic anxiety is inappropriately elicited, represent- ing these as high-stakes questions, and inadequately signaling a need for cognition. In this paper, I thus make use of the concept of (epistemic) anxiety as developed in the philosophy of emotion and in epistemology, to propose an account of the role of anxiety in the pathological doubt that is central to obsessive-compulsive disorder. (shrink)

This article provides the first extensive study of Emanuel Swedenborg’s (1688–1772) views on Africans and slavery. Although significant scholarship has been devoted to Swedenborg’s influence on the British abolitionist movement in the 1780s-1790s, comparably little has been written on the ideas and context which inspired this influence in the first place. This article explores Swedenborg’s ties to networks and debates about African evangelization, colonization, and slavery during the neglected period of the Swedish Age of Liberty (1719–1772). It shows that Swedenborg (...) was the first Swede to condemn slavery, as early as 1741, explains why he regarded slavery as a divine punishment in the afterlife for European missionaries, and why he presented sub-Saharan Africans as superior, in contrast to the dominant dismissive views of Linnaeus, Bäck, Kant, or Buffon. Like most Lutherans of his time, Swedenborg did not advocate the abolition of slavery, yet within a generation his provocative views about African superiority and spiritual emancipation were used by his followers to articulate their abolitionist agenda. Swedenborg’s millenarian doctrines more broadly re-harnessed biblical traditions about Africa and tropes about the bon sauvage, in a counter-example to narratives about the trope’s decline in the second half of the eighteenth century. (shrink)

Is the capacity to experience hope central to our ability to entertain desirable future possibilities in thought? The ability to project oneself forward in time, or to entertain vivid positive episodic future thoughts, is impaired in patients with clinical depression. In this article, I consider the causal relation between, on the one hand, the loss of the affective experience of hope in depressed patients, and on the other hand, the reduced ability to generate and entertain positive episodic future thinking. I (...) suggest that findings in the philosophy of emotion may shed light on this causal relation. (shrink)

Ce volume collectif traite des relations entre philosophie et pouvoir politique dans l’Antiquité, des sophistes jusqu’aux néoplatoniciens, dans huit contributions issues pour la plupart du Hannah Arendt and Reiner Schürmann Symposium in Political Philosophy - Tyrants, Kings, Emperors, and Philosophers : Philosophy and Political Power in Antiquity à la New School for Social Research à New York en mai 2013. Les éditeurs rappellent dans l’introduction l’invention de la philosophie politique par...

Issu du remaniement d’une thèse de doctorat, cet ouvrage prend comme point de départ la critique d’un présupposé commun aux lectures néoplatonicienne et jaegerienne du rapport d’Aristote à Platon. D’un côté, les néoplatoniciens rendaient compatibles Aristote et Platon, tandis que Jaeger entendait montrer qu’Aristote avait progresssivement gagné son autonomie. Il n’en reste pas moins que ces deux démarches procèdent toutes deux à une reconstruction systématique de la philosophie platonicienne...

Actes d’un colloque qui s’est tenu à Copenhague en 2007, l’ouvrage veut combler un manque : traiter du développement de la dialectique de Platon à Aristote, non pas en se focalisant sur la méthode et l’ontologie, mais en se fondant sur le cadre du débat dialectique. Selon J. Fink (p. 2), la dialectique ici signifie d’abord et avant tout argumentation adressée à un interlocuteur. La pratique de l’argumentation dialectique et son extension dans la forme littéraire du dialogue constituent le cœu...

Can we make machines that think and act like humans or other natural intelligent agents? The answer to this question depends on how we see ourselves and how we see the machines in question. Classical AI and cognitive science had claimed that cognition is computation, and can thus be reproduced on other computing machines, possibly surpassing the abilities of human intelligence. This consensus has now come under threat and the agenda for the philosophy and theory of AI must be set (...) anew, re-defining the relation between AI and Cognitive Science. We can re-claim the original vision of general AI from the technical AI disciplines; we can reject classical cognitive science and replace it with a new theory (e.g. embodied); or we can try to find new ways to approach AI, for example from neuroscience or from systems theory. To do this, we must go back to the basic questions on computing, cognition and ethics for AI. The 30 papers in this volume provide cutting-edge work from leading researchers that define where we stand and where we should go from here. (shrink)

A companion volume to On Understanding Understanding, this second edition incorporates corrections to the previous text and includes new readings. The works collected in this volume are mainly from the British Empiricists. The breadth of the selection is not so diverse that the pieces cannot be readily understood by a newcomer to Epistemology, they have a logical progression of development (from Locke to Berkeley to Hume), and all of the philosophers whose work is represented have had great influence on contemporary (...) Anglo-American philosophy. In the Introduction, Potter sets the selections in their historical context and urges the readers to form their own viewpoint in terms of the period's contribution to the advancement of culture, politics, and society. He gives a concise summary of the Enlightenment period, demonstrating how and why Rationalism and Empiricism came about, and challenges the reader not to simply note the points of disparity between the two schools, but to notice the similarities of their common assumptions - both substantive and methodological. Readings in Epistemology, Second Edition is an excellent classroom tool. A biographical note on the philosopher, and list of suggested books for further study, heads each of the readings. Study Questions which stimulate discussion, are at the end of each piece. (shrink)

The globalisation of recent decades has led to a soaring demand for the translation of legal or quasi-legal instruments for national judiciaries and for the corporate sector, performed outside institutions. However, there has been little, if any, downstream impact or risk assessment in this field. The international and interdisciplinary project described in this paper, drawing data, inter alia, from case law and stakeholder reporting, seeks to bring to light the ways in which translated legal documents may be challenged, contested or (...) discredited at the various stages of their ‘lives’, and the repercussions of such challenges on trade and the economy, law enforcement, rights, and legal security. A focus is placed on written legal translation performed outside institutions, given that this is an extremely under-researched area, indeed hardly researched at all. Until now, legal translation studies as an discipline has concentrated on process, context, participants and product, but has not investigated the impact of translated documents as binding or non-binding artefacts on the wider world, or their appearance in litigation. The project described in this paper seeks to fill that gap. (shrink)

Juliette Roussin | : Cet article a pour objet d’interroger la tendance actuelle des démocraties à s’entourer d’institutions indépendantes au fort degré de compétence en vue de limiter et de corriger les défaillances éventuelles des corps démocratiques élus et représentatifs. La légitimité démocratique de ces institutions contre-majoritaires leur viendrait, selon certains théoriciens de la démocratie, de ce qu’elles offrent la possibilité de contester les décisions collectives lorsque celles-ci sont mauvaises ou injustes, contribuant ainsi à l’amélioration globale des performances du (...) régime démocratique. À partir notamment d’une lecture des travaux de Philip Pettit sur la démocratie contestataire et d’une réflexion sur l’approche épistémique défendue par David Estlund, nous questionnons au contraire le caractère démocratique de ces formes institutionnelles de contestation et montrons que, tant qu’elles ne font pas l’objet d’un contrôle démocratique plus étroit, elles peuvent être interprétées comme des modes de contestation de la démocratie plutôt que comme des instruments de son amélioration. | : This paper investigates a current tendency among democracies to appeal to highly competent independent institutions in order to constrain and amend the potential deficiencies of elected and representative democratic bodies. According to some democratic theorists, these counter-majoritarian institutions enjoy democratic legitimacy because they allow the contestation of ill-devised or unjust collective decisions, and hence contribute to the global improvement of democratic results. Based on a reading of Philip Pettit’s work on contestatory democracy and of David Estlund’s epistemic approach, the paper questions the democratic nature of these institutional forms of contestation and shows that, as long as they are not subjected to tighter democratic control, these institutions can be interpreted as ways of contesting democracy rather than as implements for its improvement. (shrink)

Learning from a text–picture multimedia document is particularly effective if learners can link information within the text and across the verbal and the pictorial representations. The ability to create a mental model successfully and include those implicit links is related to the ability to generate inferences. Text processing research has found that text cohesion facilitates the generation of inferences, and thus text comprehension for learners with poor prior knowledge or reading abilities, but is detrimental for learners with good prior knowledge (...) or reading abilities. Moreover, multimedia research has found a positive effect from adding visual representations to text information, particularly when implementing signaling, which consists of verbal or visual cues designed to guide attention to the pictorial representation of relevant information. We expected that, as with text-only documents, struggling readers would benefit from high text cohesion and that signaling would foster inference generation as well. Further, we hypothesized that better learning outcomes would be observed when text cohesion was low and signaling was present. Our first experimental study investigated the effect of those two factors on three levels of comprehension. Participants were adolescents in prevocational schools, where some of the students are struggling readers. The results showed a trend in favor of high cohesion, but with no significant effect, a significant positive effect of cross-representational signaling on comprehension from local inferences, and no interaction effect. A second experiment focused on signaling only and attention toward the picture, with collection of eye-tracking data in addition to measures of offline comprehension. As this study was conducted with university students, who are expected to have higher reading abilities and thus are less likely to benefit from high cohesion, the material was presented in its low cohesive version. The results showed no effect of conditions on comprehension performances but confirmed differences in processing behaviors. Participants allocated more attention to the pictorial representation in the CRS condition than in the no signaling condition. (shrink)

L’analyse en termes de politique criminelle de la responsabilité pénale contemporaine permet d’observer les mouvements qui la travaillent de l’intérieur, en particulier son éclatement qui l’expose aux incohérences, mais aussi de l’extérieur, spécialement son expansion qui la confronte à ses propres limites.

Rousseau avait tout lieu, dans la controverse qui oppose au xviii e siècle partisans et pourfendeurs des voyages d’éducation, de prendre position contre ces voyages, suivant en cela les déclarations de Béat de Muralt, qu’il approuvait dans une large mesure. Nous constatons pourtant qu’en abordant « la question des voyages », l’auteur de l’Émile se voit obligé, tout en condamnant cette « mode », à la manière de Muralt, d’opérer un glissement théorique et de conférer à l’expérience du voyage, comme (...) expérience critique de la pluralité et de la liberté, une place essentielle dans son système, place rendue nécessaire par sa théorie des affects politiques. (shrink)