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Review of the book The philosophy of mathematics education (review)Science & Education 3 7-85. 1994.
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55Fictionalism and the informativeness of identityPhilosophical Studies 106 (3). 2001.Identity claims often look nonsensical because they apparently declare distinct things to be identical. I argue that this appearance is not just an artefact of grammar. We should be fictionalists about such claims, seeing them against the background of speakers' pretense that their words secure reference to a plurality of objects that are then declared to be identical from within the pretense. I argue that it is the resulting interpretative tension – arising from the fact that two things can nev…Read more
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71Ramsification, reference fixing and incommensurabilityIn Paul Hoyningen-Huene & Howard Sankey (eds.), Incommensurability and Related Matters, Kluwer Academic Publishers. pp. 91--121. 2001.
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83Characterization and existence in modal meinongianismGrazer Philosophische Studien 86 (1): 23-34. 2012.
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102Is the brain a quantum computer?Cognitive Science 30 (3): 593-603. 2006.We argue that computation via quantum mechanical processes is irrelevant to explaining how brains produce thought, contrary to the ongoing speculations of many theorists. First, quantum effects do not have the temporal properties required for neural information processing. Second, there are substantial physical obstacles to any organic instantiation of quantum computation. Third, there is no psychological evidence that such mental phenomena as consciousness and mathematical thinking require expl…Read more
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75Emotional consensus in group decision makingMind and Society 5 (1): 85-104. 2006.This paper presents a theory and computational model of the role of emotions in group decision making. After reviewing the role of emotions in individual decision making, it describes social and psychological mechanisms by which emotional and other information is transmitted between individuals. The processes by which these mechanisms can contribute to group consensus are modeled computationally using a program, HOTCO 3, which has been used to simulate simple cases of emotion-based group decisio…Read more
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2Review: Kit Fine, First-Order Modal Theories I--Sets; Kit Fine, First-Order Modal Theories; Kit Fine, First-Order Modal Theories III--Facts (review)Journal of Symbolic Logic 53 (4): 1262-1269. 1988.
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17Towards Non-Being: the Logic and Metaphysics of Intentionality, by Graham PriestDisputatio 295-301. 2005.019-11.
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13Introduction to the Philosophy of Mathematics (review)Philosophical Studies (Dublin) 30 393-396. 1984.
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57Gottlob Frege: Philosophical and Mathematical Correspondence (review)Philosophical Studies (Dublin) 28 390-391. 1981.
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2Names, plans, and descriptionsIn David Braddon-Mitchell & Robert Nola (eds.), Conceptual Analysis and Philosophical Naturalism, Mit Press. 2009.
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80On an argument against existentialismPhilosophical Studies 55 (2). 1989.EXISTENTIALISM IN PHILOSOPHICAL LOGIC IS THE DOCTRINE THAT STATES OF AFFAIRS, PROPOSITIONS AND PROPERTIES INVOLVING OBJECTS INCLUDE THESE OBJECTS AS DIRECT CONSTITUENTS IN AT LEAST THE SENSE THAT THE NONEXISTENCE IN A WORLD w OF SOCRATES, SAY, IMPLIES THE NONEXISTENCE IN w OF SOCRATES' BEING SNUB-NOSED. JOHN POLLOCK HAS RECENTLY ARGUED (IN "THE FOUNDATIONS OF PHILOSOPHICAL SEMANTICS") THAT SUCH AN EXISTENTIALISM HARBOURS AN INCONSISTENCY. THE PRESENT PAPER REBUTS POLLOCK'S ARGUMENT BY ARGUING TH…Read more
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38The intrinsic difficulty of recursive functionsStudia Logica 56 (3). 1996.This paper deals with a philosophical question that arises within the theory of computational complexity: how to understand the notion of INTRINSIC complexity or difficulty, as opposed to notions of difficulty that depend on the particular computational model used. The paper uses ideas from Blum's abstract approach to complexity theory to develop an extensional approach to this question. Among other things, it shows how such an approach gives detailed confirmation of the view that subrecursive h…Read more
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13Terms and truth: Reference direct and anaphoricAustralasian Journal of Philosophy 82 (2). 2004.Book Information Terms and Truth: Reference Direct and Anaphoric. Terms and Truth: Reference Direct and Anaphoric Alan Berger , Bradford; Cambridge MA: MIT Press , 2002 , xvii + 234 , US$35 ( cloth ) By Alan Berger. Bradford; Cambridge MA: MIT Press. Pp. xvii + 234. US$35 (cloth:).
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40On a complexity-based way of constructivizing the recursive functionsStudia Logica 49 (1). 1990.Let g E(m, n)=o mean that n is the Gödel-number of the shortest derivation from E of an equation of the form (m)=k. Hao Wang suggests that the condition for general recursiveness mn(g E(m, n)=o) can be proved constructively if one can find a speedfunction s s, with s(m) bounding the number of steps for getting a value of (m), such that mn s(m) s.t. g E(m, n)=o. This idea, he thinks, yields a constructivist notion of an effectively computable function, one that doesn't get us into a vicious circl…Read more
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12Contingency and the a posterioriAustralasian Journal of Philosophy 60 (1). 1982.This Article does not have an abstract
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31On a Moorean solution to instability puzzlesAustralasian Journal of Philosophy 68 (4). 1990.This Article does not have an abstract
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66Intentional Objects, Pretence, and the Quasi-Relational Nature of Mental Phenomena: A New Look at Brentano on IntentionalityInternational Journal of Philosophical Studies 21 (3): 377-393. 2013.Brentano famously changed his mind about intentionality between the 1874 and 1911 editions of Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint (PES). The 1911 edition repudiates the 1874 view that to think about something is to stand in a relation to something that is within in the mind, and holds instead that intentionality is only like a relation (it is ‘quasi-relational’). Despite this, Brentano still insists that mental activity involves ‘the reference to something as an object’, much as he did in th…Read more
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University of AucklandDepartment of Philosophy
Areas of Specialization
Philosophy of Language |
Logic and Philosophy of Logic |
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
General Philosophy of Science |