2016, eLS. electronic Encyclopedia of the Life Sciences
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Added by: Björn Freter, Contributed by: Robin AttfieldAbstract: The Gaia theory of James Lovelock proposes that the Earth is a self-regulating system, or super-organism, maintaining conditions hospitable to contemporary planetary biota. Objections to this theory, concerning its alleged untestability and circularity, are considered and countered. Favourable evidence includes Lovelock’s daisyworld model of a planet regulating its own temperatures and thus maintaining homeostasis, and his discoveries of actual regulatory mechanisms such as the biological generation of dimethyl sulphide, which removes sulphur from the oceans and seeds clouds whose albedo reduces solar radiation (a negative feedback mechanism). After some decades of scepticism, sections of the scientific community have partially endorsed Gaia theory, accepting that the Earth system behaves as if self-regulating. Whether or not this theory is acceptable in full, it has drawn attention to the need for preserving planetary biological cycles and for the planetary dimension to be incorporated in ethical decision-making, and thus for a planetary ethic.Comment: This interdisciplinary survey of the Gaia hypothesis, its critics and its supporters, could be used in Philosophy of Science or Philosophy of Biology classes to clarify the concept of Gaia, which is often presented too vaguely by those who have not considered issues such as whether this hypothesis is falsifiable or not; it could also be used in Ethics classes because of its section on Gaian ethics. We show how Lovelock has devised indirect ways of testing this hypothesis (or better, the Gaia theory), how a critic (Kirchner) has presented it as either falsifiable but unsurprising or unfalsifiable and thus useless, and how a supporter, Tim Lenton has sought to explain how it can be reconciled with Darwinian evolution. Finally we show how elements of the theory have been endorsed by a scientific conference, but other aspects, such as the purposiveness of Gaia, were not endorsed.
Aybüke Özgün, Tom Schoonen. The Logical Development of Pretense Imagination
2022, Erkenntnis 89: 2121–2147.
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Added by: Viviane FairbankAbstract:
We propose a logic of imagination, based on simulated belief revision, that intends to uncover the logical patterns governing the development of imagination in pretense. Our system complements the currently prominent logics of imagination in that ours in particular formalises (1) the algorithm that specifies what goes on in between receiving a certain input for an imaginative episode and what is imagined in the resulting imagination, as well as (2) the goal-orientedness of imagination, by allowing the context to determine, what we call, the overall topic of the imaginative episode. To achieve this, we employ well-developed tools and techniques from dynamic epistemic logic and belief revision theory, enriched with a topicality component which has been exploited in the recent literature. As a result, our logic models a great number of cognitive theories of pretense and imagination [cf. Currie and Ravenscroft (Recreative minds, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002); Nichols and Stich (Mindreading: an integrated account of pretence, self-awareness, and understanding other minds, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2003); Byrne (The rational imagination, The MIT Press, London, 2005); Williamson (The philosophy of philosophy, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, 2007); Langland-Hassan (Philos Stud 159:155–179, 2012, in: Kind and Kung (eds) Knowledge through imaginaion, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2016].
Ayhan, Sara. Queer feminist logic and contradictions: Or how logic and feminism can be relevant to each other
2025, Synthese 206: 179
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Added by: Viviane FairbankAbstract:
Work in the field of feminist logic is still rather scarce and the field itself remains a contested area of study, but still, it is developing. One approach concentrates on analyzing logical systems with respect to structural features that may perpetuate sexism and oppression or, on the other hand, features that may be helpful for resist-ing and opposing these social phenomena. Upon this assumption, I want to inves-tigate possible applications of queer feminist views on (philosophy of) logic with respect to a very specific group, namely contradictory logics, i.e., logical systems containing contradictions in their set of theorems. I want to show that, on the one hand, the formal set-up of contradictory logics makes them well-suited from the perspectives of feminist logic and, on the other hand, that queer feminist theories provide a relevant, and so far undeveloped, conceptual motivation for contradictory logics. Thus, bringing together contradictory logics and queer feminist theories may prove fruitful both as a ‘real-life’ motivation for these peripheral logical systems and as a formal basis for a philosophical field that is still characterized by a distrust of formalism.Comment: This paper would be appropriately included in any course concerned with formal approaches in feminist philosophy or feminist philosophy of logic. It serves as a useful example of how certain feminist insights might motivate the pursuit of specific formal logical projects, and it provides a clear introduction to the philosophy and formal systems of contradictory logics.
Ayim, Maryann. Passing Through the Needle’s Eye: Can a Feminist Teach Logic?
1995, Argumentation 9: 801-820
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Added by: Franci MangravitiAbstract:
Is it possible for one and the same person to be a feminist and a logician, or does this entail a psychic rift of such proportions that one is plunged into an endless cycle of self-contradiction? Andrea Nye's book, Words of Power (1990), is an eloquent affirmation of the psychic rift position. In what follows, I shall discuss Nye's proscription of logic as well as her perceived alternatives of a woman's language and reading. This will be followed by a discussion more sharply focused on Nye's feminist response to logic, namely, her claim that feminism and logic are incompatible. I will end by offering a sketch of a class in the life of a feminist teaching logic, a sketch which is both a response to Nye (in Nye's sense of the word) and a counter-example to her thesis that logic is necessarily destructive to any genuine feminist enterprise.
Comment: available in this Blueprint
Barcan Marcus, Ruth. Modalities: Philosophical Essays
1995, Oxford University Press.
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Added by: Viviane FairbankAbstract:
This book is a collection of papers by Ruth Barcan Marcus, covering much ground in the development of her thought, and spanning from 1961 to 1990. Many of the papers deal with logical, semantic, metaphysical, and epistemological issues in intensional logic, and in particular, modalities. Some important themes that run through these papers are extensionality, the necessity of identity, the directly referential conception of proper names as “tags,” essentialism, substitutional quantification, and possibilia and possible worlds. What emerges from them is a robust defense of quantified modal logic in the light of a host of objections, particularly from Quine. Modalities also includes two papers on belief, which have consequences for epistemic logic and more widely for theories of rationality; two papers on ethical issues, which have consequences for deontic logic and practical reasoning; and finally, two papers on historical figures, Spinoza and Russell, dealing with the ontological proof of God's existence, and the nature of particularity, identity, and individuation, respectively.Comment: As Barcan Marcus surveys many of the central issues in (the epistemology and metaphysics of) modality and (quantified) modal logic, many of the papers in this collection could be included in survey courses on these topics.
Barrow-Green, June. Historical Context of the Gender Gap in Mathematics
2019, in World Women in Mathematics 2018: Proceedings of the First World Meeting for Women in Mathematics, Carolina Araujo et al. (eds.). Springer, Cham
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Added by: Fenner Stanley TanswellAbstract:
This chapter is based on the talk that I gave in August 2018 at the ICM in Rio de Janeiro at the panel on The Gender Gap in Mathematical and Natural Sciences from a Historical Perspective. It provides some examples of the challenges and prejudices faced by women mathematicians during last two hundred and fifty years. I make no claim for completeness but hope that the examples will help to shed light on some of the problems many women mathematicians still face today.Comment (from this Blueprint): Barrow-Green is a historian of mathematics. In this paper she documents some of the challenges that women faced in mathematics over the last 250 years, discussing many famous women mathematicians and the prejudices and injustices they faced.
Basso, Alessandra, Lisciandra, Chiara, Marchionni, Caterina. Hypothetical models in social science: their features and uses
2017, Springer Handbook of Model-Based Science. Magnani, L. & Bertolotti, T. (eds.). Springer, 413-433
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Added by: Björn Freter, Contributed by: Johanna ThomaAbstract: The chapter addresses the philosophical issues raised by the use of hypothetical modeling in the social sciences. Hypothetical modeling involves the construction and analysis of simple hypothetical systems to represent complex social phenomena for the purpose of understanding those social phenomena. To highlight its main features hypothetical modeling is compared both to laboratory experimentation and to computer simulation. In analogy with laboratory experiments, hypothetical models can be conceived of as scientific representations that attempt to isolate, theoretically, the working of causal mechanisms or capacities from disturbing factors. However, unlike experiments, hypothetical models need to deal with the epistemic uncertainty due to the inevitable presence of unrealistic assumptions introduced for purposes of analytical tractability. Computer simulations have been claimed to be able to overcome some of the strictures of analytical tractability. Still they differ from hypothetical models in how they derive conclusions and in the kind of understanding they provide. The inevitable presence of unrealistic assumptions makes the legitimacy of the use of hypothetical modeling to learn about the world a particularly pressing problem in the social sciences. A review of the contemporary philosophical debate shows that there is still little agreement on what social scientific models are and what they are for. This suggests that there might not be a single answer to the question of what is the epistemic value of hypothetical models in the social sciences.Comment: This is a very useful and accessible overview of hypothetical modelling in the social sciences, and the philosophical debates it has given rise to.
Beebee, Helen. Necessary Connections and the Problem of Induction
2011, Noûs 45(3): 504-527.
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Added by: Laura JimenezSummary: In this paper Beebee argues that the problem of induction, which she describes as a genuine sceptical problem, is the same for Humeans than for Necessitarians. Neither scientific essentialists nor Armstrong can solve the problem of induction by appealing to IBE (Inference to the Best Explanation), for both arguments take an illicit inductive step.Comment: This paper describes in a comprehensible way Armstrong's and the Humean approaches to the problem of induction. Ideal for postgraduate philosophy of science courses, although it could be a further reading for undergraduate courses as well.
Bell, Macalester. Against Simple Removal: A Defence of Defacement as a Response to Racist Monuments
2021, Journal of Applied Philosophy, 39(5): 778-792
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Added by: Ten-Herng LaiAbstract:
In recent years, protesters around the world have been calling for the removal of commemorations honouring those who are, by contemporary standards, generally regarded as seriously morally compromised by their racism. According to one line of thought, leaving racist memorials in place is profoundly disrespectful, and doing so tacitly condones, and perhaps even celebrates, the racism of those honoured and memorialized. The best response is to remove the monuments altogether. In this article, I first argue against a prominent offense-based account of the wrong of simply leaving memorials in place, unaltered, before offering my own account of this wrong. In at least some cases, these memorials wrong insofar as they express and exemplify a morally objectionable attitude of race-based contempt. I go on to argue that the best way of answering this disrespect is through a process of expressively “dehonouring” the subject. Removal of these commemorations is ultimately misguided, in many cases, because removal, by itself, cannot adequately dishonour, and simple removal does not fully answer the ways in which these memorials wrong. I defend a more nuanced approach to answering the wrong posed by these monuments, and I argue that public expressions of contempt through defacement have an ineliminable role to play in an apt dishonouring process.Comment (from this Blueprint): Two things should be noted in this paper. First, many have discussed the importance of stopping or blocking the harm of objectionable commemorations. This paper goes a step further and discusses the importance of “answering” the wrong done by these monuments. Second, the paper engages with a “negative” emotion, namely, contempt, that is present at both racist monuments and the effort to confront them. It allows us to see the legitimate role this negative emotion may play in the struggle for equality: contempt can be apt towards inapt contempt expressed through racist monuments. It also nicely spells out the potential practical implications of taking this negative emotion seriously.
Bergmann, Merrie. An Introduction to Many-Valued and Fuzzy Logic: Semantics, Algebras, and Derivation Systems
2008, Cambridge University Press.
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Added by: Berta GrimauPublisher's note: This volume is an accessible introduction to the subject of many-valued and fuzzy logic suitable for use in relevant advanced undergraduate and graduate courses. The text opens with a discussion of the philosophical issues that give rise to fuzzy logic - problems arising from vague language - and returns to those issues as logical systems are presented. For historical and pedagogical reasons, three valued logical systems are presented as useful intermediate systems for studying the principles and theory behind fuzzy logic. The major fuzzy logical systems - Lukasiewicz, Godel, and product logics - are then presented as generalizations of three-valued systems that successfully address the problems of vagueness. Semantic and axiomatic systems for three-valued and fuzzy logics are examined along with an introduction to the algebras characteristic of those systems. A clear presentation of technical concepts, this book includes exercises throughout the text that pose straightforward problems, ask students to continue proofs begun in the text, and engage them in the comparison of logical systems.Comment: This book is ideal for an intermediate-level course on many-valued and/or fuzzy logic. Although it includes a presentation of propositional and first-order logic, it is intended for students who are familiar with classical logic. However, no previous knowledge of many-valued or fuzzy logic is required. It can also be used as a secondary reading for a general course on non-classical logics. In the words of the author: 'The truth-valued semantic chapters are independent of the algebraic and axiomatic ones, so that either of the latter may be skipped. Except for Section 13.3 of Chapter 13, the axiomatic chapters are also independent of the algebraic ones, and an instructor who chooses to skip the algebraic material can simply ignore the latter part of 13.3. Finally, Lukasiewicz fuzzy logic is presented independently of Gödel and product fuzzy logics, thus allowing an instructor to focus solely on the former. There are exercises throughout the text. Some pose straightforward problems for the student to solve, but many exercises also ask students to continue proofs begun in the text, to prove results analogous to those in the text, and to compare the various logical systems that are presented.' This book is ideal for an intermediate-level course on many-valued and/or fuzzy logic. Although it includes a presentation of propositional and first-order logic, it is intended for students who are familiar with classical logic. However, no previous knowledge of many-valued or fuzzy logic is required. It can also be used as a secondary reading for a general course on non-classical logics. In the words of the author: 'The truth-valued semantic chapters are independent of the algebraic and axiomatic ones, so that either of the latter may be skipped. Except for Section 13.3 of Chapter 13, the axiomatic chapters are also independent of the algebraic ones, and an instructor who chooses to skip the algebraic material can simply ignore the latter part of 13.3. Finally, Lukasiewicz fuzzy logic is presented independently of Gödel and product fuzzy logics, thus allowing an instructor to focus solely on the former. There are exercises throughout the text. Some pose straightforward problems for the student to solve, but many exercises also ask students to continue proofs begun in the text, to prove results analogous to those in the text, and to compare the various logical systems that are presented.'
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