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15Masses of Formal Philosophy (edited book)Automatic Press/VIP. 2006.Masses of Formal Philosophy is an outgrowth of Formal Philosophy. That book gathered the responses of some of the most prominent formal philosophers to five relatively open and broad questions initiating a discussion of metaphilosophical themes and problems surrounding the use of formal methods in philosophy. Including contributions from a wide range of philosophers, Masses of Formal Philosophy contains important new responses to the original five questions.
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59What can neuroscience explain?Brain and Mind 2 (2): 243-248. 2001.Horgan’s perceptive discussion of Freudian psychology, Prozac and evolutionary biology cannot mitigate the problems that seriously weaken his book (Horgan, 1999). While he certainly manages to deflate some of the more outrageous hype surrounding the scientific and often not-so-scientific study of the mind, his criticism of the brain and behavioral sciences contains a number of flaws, some of which I will address below. My response focuses on his discussion of neuroscience. As we shall see, the t…Read more
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57How Computational Models Predict the Behavior of Complex SystemsFoundations of Science 18 (4): 809-821. 2013.In this paper, we argue for the centrality of prediction in the use of computational models in science. We focus on the consequences of the irreversibility of computational models and on the conditional or ceteris paribus, nature of the kinds of their predictions. By irreversibility, we mean the fact that computational models can generally arrive at the same state via many possible sequences of previous states. Thus, while in the natural world, it is generally assumed that physical states have a…Read more
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10Daniel Dennett (edited book)Routledge. 2014.SPECIAL INTRODUCTORY PRICE! Daniel Dennett has been one of the central voices in the philosophy of mind for at least the past forty years. Unlike most philosophers of his generation, Dennett’s work has resonated far and wide. It has powerfully influenced the development of cognitive science, robotics, developmental psychology, and artificial intelligence. Indeed, his work has led to many new lines of inquiry. For example, he has developed a theory of consciousness which provides an approach to n…Read more
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28Logic, epistemology and the unity of science: An encyclopedic project in the spirit of Neurath and DiderotIn S. Rahman J. Symons (ed.), Logic, Epistemology, and the Unity of Science, Kluwer Academic Publisher. pp. 3--15. 2004.
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151Systems of Visual Identification in Neuroscience: Lessons from Epistemic LogicPhilosophy of Science 70 (1): 89-104. 2003.The following analysis shows how developments in epistemic logic can play a nontrivial role in cognitive neuroscience. We argue that the striking correspondence between two modes of identification, as distinguished in the epistemic context, and two cognitive systems distinguished by neuroscientific investigation of the visual system (the "where" and "what" systems) is not coincidental, and that it can play a clarificatory role at the most fundamental levels of neuroscientific theory
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39Ontology and Methodology in Analytic PhilosophyIn Roberto Poli & Johanna Seibt (eds.), Theory and Applications of Ontology: Philosophical Perspectives, Springer Verlag. pp. 349--394. 2010.
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82Epistemic logic is the logic of knowledge and belief. It provides insight into the properties of individual knowers, has provided a means to model complicated scenarios involving groups of knowers and has improved our understanding of the dynamics of inquiry.
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17The analytic tradition is sometimes criticized as being narrowly focused on language, logic or conceptual analysis to the detriment of deeper investigations into ontological, metaphysical or moral questions.1 More specifically, analytic philosophy has been associated with a positivist attitude which favored replacing the philosophy’s traditional focus on fundamental questions with an obsequiously deferential relationship to mathematics and the natural sciences. While this line of criticism obscu…Read more
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255Where’s the Bridge? Epistemology and Epistemic LogicPhilosophical Studies 128 (1): 137-167. 2006.Epistemic logic begins with the recognition that our everyday talk about knowing and believing has some systematic features that we can track and re‡ect upon. Epistemic logicians have studied and extended these glints of systematic structure in fascinating and important ways since the early 1960s. However, for one reason or another, mainstream epistemologists have shown little interest. It is striking to contrast the marginal role of epistemic logic in contemporary epistemology with the centrali…Read more
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317Intuition and philosophical methodologyAxiomathes 18 (1): 67-89. 2008.Intuition serves a variety of roles in contemporary philosophy. This paper provides a historical discussion of the revival of intuition in the 1970s, untangling some of the ways that intuition has been used and offering some suggestions concerning its proper place in philosophical investigation. Contrary to some interpretations of the results of experimental philosophy, it is argued that generalized skepticism with respect to intuition is unwarranted. Intuition can continue to play an important …Read more
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112The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Psychology (edited book)Routledge. 2009._The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Psychology, Second Edition_ is an invaluable guide and major reference source to the major topics, problems, concepts and debates in philosophy of psychology and is the first companion of its kind. A team of renowned international contributors provide forty-nine chapters organised into six clear parts: Historical background to Philosophy of Psychology Psychological Explanation Cognition and Representation The biological basis of psychology Perceptual Exp…Read more
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12Formal Philosophy (edited book)Automatic Press/VIP. 2005.Formal Philosophy is a collection of short interviews based on 5 questions presented tosome of the most influential and prominent scholars in formal philosophy.
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6was a detailed analysis of the methodology of biological investigation. The dissertation examined case studies involving enzymes, proteins, catalysis and other matters apparently far removed from his later work on Mexican and Chicano thought. However, Haddox’s existential engagement with basic philosophical questions is evident throughout this work.
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4On DennettWadsworth/Thompson Learning. 2001.This brief text assists students in understanding Dennett's philosophy and thinking so they can more fully engage in useful, intelligent class dialogue and improve their understanding of course content. Part of the Wadsworth Notes Series, (which will eventually consist of approximately 100 titles, each focusing on a single "thinker" from ancient times to the present), ON DENNETT is written by a philosopher deeply versed in the philosophy of this key thinker. Like other books in the series, this …Read more
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25Reply to Angius and Primiero on Software Intensive SciencePhilosophy and Technology 27 (3): 491-494. 2014.This paper provides a reply to articles by Nicola Angius and Guiseppe Primiero responding to our paper “Software Intensive Science”
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Semantics for epistemologyIn Sven Bernecker & Duncan Pritchard (eds.), Routledge Companion to Epistemology, Routledge. 2010.
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58An asymmetry between the demands at the computational and algorithmic levels of description furnishes the illusion that the abstract profile at the computational level can be multiply realized, and that something is actually being shared at the algorithmic one. A disembodied rendering of the situation lays the stress upon the different ways in which an algorithm can be implemented. However, from an embodied approach, things look rather different. The relevant pairing, I shall argue, is not betwe…Read more
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26Information, representation, and the dynamic systems approach to languageBehavioral and Brain Sciences 25 (5): 640-641. 2002.Shanker & King (S&K) provide a criticism of information-theoretic approaches to language, but the real obstacle to their dynamicist approach is the argument that representations are an indispensable part of any cognitive theory. Since the dynamicist approach has a prima facie anti-representationalist bent, the authors must show why dynamicist views can provide adequate explanations of intelligent behavior.
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34Emergence and reflexive downward causationPrincipia 6 (1): 183-202. 2002.This paper responds to Jaegwon Kim's powerful objection to the very possibility of genuinely novel emergent properties. Kim argues that the incoherence of reflexive downward causation means that the causal power of an emergent phenomenon is ultimately reducible to the causal powers of its constituents. I offer a simple argument showing how to characterize emergent properties m terms of the effects of structural relations an the causal powers of that. constituents
Lawrence, Kansas, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Science, Logic, and Mathematics |
Metaphysics and Epistemology |
Areas of Interest
Science, Logic, and Mathematics |
Metaphysics and Epistemology |