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2912949.346468
This paper challenges a false dichotomy between subjectivity and objectivity in understanding the nature of human social relationships. I argue that social relationships are composed of both subjective and objective components, which are inherently interdependent. They are influenced by biological properties and subject to evolutionary processes, yet they cannot be reduced to them. I use emerging research on kinship as an example that showcases the appeal of this integrated approach. This paper takes a step in the direction of a unified account of sociality, contributing to a more comprehensive understanding of human social behavior.
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2944599.346556
The debate over whether cognitive science is committed to the existence of neural representations is usually taken to hinge on the status of representations as theoretical posits: it depends on whether or not our best-supported scientific theories commit us to the existence of representations. Thomson and Piccinini (2018) and Nanay (2022) seek to reframe this debate to focus more on scientific experimentation than on scientific theorizing. They appeal to arguments from observation and manipulation to propose that experimental cognitive neuroscience gives us non-theoretical reasons to be ontologically committed to representations. In this paper, I challenge their claims about observation and manipulation, and I argue that the question of whether we are ontologically committed to representations is still best understood as a question about the level of support we have for our representation-positing scientific theories.
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2944622.346577
Clark (2006) proposes that a standard challenge to the hypothesis of extended cognition can be avoided in the case of linguistically structured cognition, because the role played by our public manipulation of linguistic artifacts is irreducible to the role played by the brain’s operations over internal representations. I demonstrate that Clark’s argument relies on a view of the brain’s cognitive architecture to which he no longer subscribes. I argue that on Clark’s later view of the brain as engaged in ‘predictive processing’, his earlier defense of extended cognition from this challenge is no longer an eJective strategy. I explore the implications of this for Clark’s attempts to reconcile his previous arguments for extended cognition with his characterization of the predictive-processing brain.
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2970215.346591
On Wednesday May 14, 2025 I’ll be giving a talk at 2 pm Pacific Time, or 10 pm UK time. The talk is for physics students at the Universidade de São Paulo in Brazil, organized by Artur Renato Baptista Boyago. …
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2970607.346602
The cognitive sciences, especially at the intersections with computer science, artificial intelligence, and neuroscience, propose ‘reverse engineering’ the mind or brain as a viable methodology. We show three important issues with this stance: 1) Reverse engineering proper is not a single method and follows a different path when uncovering an engineered substance versus a computer. 2) These two forms of reverse engineering are incompatible. We cannot safely reason from attempts to reverse engineer a substance to attempts to reverse engineer a computational system, and vice versa. Such flawed reasoning rears its head, for instance, when neurocognitive scientists reason about what artificial neural networks and brains have in common using correlations or structural similarity. 3) While neither type of reverse engineering can make sense of non-engineered entities, both are applied in incompatible and mix-and-matched ways in cognitive scientists’ thinking about computational models of cognition. This results in treating mind as a substance; a methodological manoeuvre that is, in fact, incompatible with computationalism. We formalise how neurocognitive scientists reason (metatheoretical calculus) and show how this leads to serious errors. Finally, we discuss what this means for those who ascribe to computationalism, and those who do not.
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2970628.346611
In recent work, Nina Emery has defended the view that, in the context of naturalistic metaphysics, one should maintain the same epistemic attitude towards science and metaphysics. That is, naturalists who are scientific realists ought to be realists about metaphysics as well; and naturalists who are antirealists about science should also be antirealists about metaphysics. We call this the ‘parity thesis’. This paper suggests that the parity thesis is widely, albeit often implicitly, accepted among naturalistically inclined philosophers, and essentially for reasons similar to Emery’s. Then, reasons are provided for resisting Emery’s specific inference from scientific realism to realism about metaphysics. The resulting picture is a more nuanced view of the relationship between science and metaphysics within the naturalistic setting than the one which is currently most popular. Keywords: meta-metaphysics; metaphysics and science; naturalistic metaphysics; realism and antirealism.
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2970660.346622
Prominent phenomenological accounts of schizophrenia have long implicated disturbances in temporality as a central characteristic of the disorder (Minkowski, 1923; Stanghellini et al., 2016; Martin et al., 2019). Early clinical phenomenologists such as Minkowski posited that schizophrenia is defined by a fundamental alteration to the patient’s temporal experience, describing phenomena such as a “blocked future” and “fragmented time” that disrupts continuity between past, present, and future. Minkowski's notion of trouble générateur highlighted the incapacity to resonate with reality, marking a profound disconnect from shared temporal and existential structures. This view remains influential in contemporary research where scholars continue to explore temporal disintegration as a core feature of schizophrenia (Fuchs, 2010; Stanghellini et al., 2016). However, the more fundamental nature of this temporal disintegration has begun to be reinterpreted in clinical phenomenology.
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2970681.346635
Richard Dawkins is widely celebrated as a key figure in contemporary evolutionary biology, but his intellectual legacy resists simple classification. While he is often framed as a hardline defender of empirical science and naturalism, the structure of his contributions reveals a more ambivalent posture—one that is deeply philosophical, even as it disavows philosophy. This essay argues that Dawkins’ enduring influence derives not from experimental discoveries or novel data, but from his role as a conceptual architect: a theorist who reshapes how we think about genes, selection, and organismal design. Through close examination of his major works, public statements, and the epistemic frameworks he deploys, I suggest that Dawkins’ authority operates through what might be termed a “rhetorical empiricism”—a stance that foregrounds science while covertly engaging in metaphysical and conceptual argumentation. The central irony is that Dawkins embodies a form of philosophy he explicitly rejects: a speculative, systematizing, and normatively charged philosophy of biology.
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2970702.346644
We present a new ψ-ontology theorem demonstrating that the quantum wave function is ontic (real) rather than epistemic (representing knowledge) in single-world unitary quantum theories (SUQTs). By leveraging a protocol of repeated reversible measurements on a single quantum system, we show that any two distinct quantum states produce different statistical distributions of (erased) measurement outcomes. This theoretical distinguishability implies that different quantum states correspond to different physical realities, supporting the ontic nature of the quantum state. Unlike previous ψ-ontology theorems, such as the Pusey-Barrett-Rudolph theorem, our proof relies solely on the unitary evolution and Born rule of SUQTs, without additional assumptions like preparation independence. This strengthens its implications for quantum foundations, particularly in restricting non-ψ-ontic interpretations like QBism without assuming an underlying ontic state and its dynamics. The theorem applies to any pair of distinct states in a finite-dimensional Hilbert space, with extensions to infinite-dimensional systems, offering a robust and general argument for the reality of the quantum state.
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2970728.346654
In previous papers, we demonstrated that an ontology of quantum mechanics, described in terms of states and events with internal phenomenal aspects (a form of panprotopsychism), is well suited to explain consciousness. We showed that the combination problems of qualities, structures and subjects in panpsychism and panprotopsychism stem from implicit hypotheses based on classical physics regarding supervenience, which are not applicable at the quantum level. Within this view, consciousness arises in entangled quantum systems coupled to the neural network of the brain. In entangled systems, the properties of individual parts disappear, giving rise to an exponential number of emergent properties and states. Here, we analyze self-consciousness as the capacity to view oneself as a subject of experience. The causal openness of quantum systems provides self-conscious beings the ability to make independent choices and decisions, reflecting a sense of self-governance and autonomy. In this context, the issue of personal identity takes a new form free from the problems of the simple view or the reductive approaches.
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2989043.346663
Arithmetical truth-value realists hold that any proposition in the language of arithmetic has a fully determined truth value. Arithmetical truth-value necessists add that this truth value is necessary rather than merely contingent. …
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3085972.346673
This paper argues that the lack of a shared evidence base in the policy debate around alcohol control, and the failure to acknowledge this fact, creates a tendency to dismiss key bodies of evidence as irrelevant, to the detriment of public health approaches. Using examples from three policy processes, it shows that proponents of opposed positions deploy rival conceptualizations of “problem alcohol use” as the object of policy intervention. Using analytic tools from the philosophy of science, it argues that these conceptualizations correspond to distinct bodies of evidence, which are treated as incompatible. Finally, it points to institutional mechanisms through which the problem can be mitigated.
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3085995.346682
Alzheimer’s disease emerged around the 1900s as a rare disease that became synonymous with common dementia by the 1980s. In the 2010s, in vivo biomarkers of Alzheimer’s pathophysiology then led researchers to emphasize the presymptomatic biology of Alzheimer’s biomarkers, thus decentering dementia. Three consensus definitions were elaborated around biomarkers, and were rearticulated in 2024: biomarker-determined Alzheimer’s disease; biomarker-informed “clinical-biological” Alzheimer’s disease; and biomarker-independent, “all-cause” dementia. I consider their differences to hinge on the questionable legitimacy of the Alzheimer “biomarkerization” of aging. I encourage a focus on the actionable concept of brain health beyond Alzheimer’s to motivate equitable health promotion.
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3129481.346692
Summary: We humans are diverse. But how to understand human diversity in the case of cognitive diversity? This Element discusses how to properly investigate human behavioural and cognitive diversity, how to scientifically represent, and how to explain cognitive diversity. Since there are various methodological approaches and explanatory agendas across the cognitive and behavioural sciences, which can be more or less useful for understanding human diversity, a critical analysis is needed. And as the controversial study of sex and gender differences in cognition illustrates, the scientific representations and explanations put forward matter to society and impact public policy, including policies on mental health. But how to square the vision of human cognitive diversity with the assumption that we all share one human nature? Is cognitive diversity something to be positively valued? The author engages with these questions in connection with the issues of neurodiversity, cognitive disability, and essentialist construals of human nature.
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3143640.346701
The view that epistemic peers should conciliate in cases of disagreement—the Conciliatory View—had been an important view in the early days of the peer disagreement debate. Over the years, however, the view has been the target of severe criticism; an “obituary” was already written for the view, and, as a recent proclamation has it, there is “no hope” for it. In this paper, I will argue that we should keep the hope alive by defending the Conciliatory View of peer disagreement. The primary strategy of my defense will be to separate the claims made by the view specific to peer disagreement and claims that concern higher-order evidence more generally. This separation allows us to see which problems cannot be addressed in the context of peer disagreement alone. As I will argue, the upshot of making this distinction is that although the jury is still out on whether higher-order evidence should affect our first-order doxastic states, the Conciliatory View likely follows if it does.
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3143671.346711
This article examines the role of imagination and fiction in Otto Neurath’s work, particularly in his scientific utopianism. Using contemporary philosophical tools to understand different senses of the concept of imagination, this article argues that scientific utopianism proposes to employ scientific data and data analysis to construct imaginary social arrangements, and then to shift our attitude toward these constructions so that utopias can be compared as technological projects. This shift in attitude toward imaginary constructions is typical of utopia as a literary genre.
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3143706.346722
Probability is distinguished into two kinds: physical and epistemic, also, but less accurately, called objective and subjective. Simple postulates are given for physical probability, the only novel one being a locality condition. Translated into no-collapse quantum mechanics, without hidden variables, the postulates imply that the elements in any equiamplitude expansion of the quantum state are equiprobable. Such expansions therefore provide ensembles of microstates that can be used to deBine probabilities in the manner of frequentism, in von Mises’ sense (where the probability of ? is the frequency of occurrence of ? in a suitable ensemble). The result is the Born rule. Since satisfying our postulates, and in particular the locality condition (meaning no action-at-a-distance), these probabilities for no-collapse quantum mechanics are perfectly local, even though they violate Bell inequalities. The latter can be traced to a violation of outcome independence, used to derive the inequalities. But in no-collapse theory that is not a locality condition; it is a criterion for entanglement, not locality.
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3143767.346731
This paper explores zero and infinity as dual scalar operators that shape mathematical and physical structures across scales. From Cantorian set theory to black hole thermodynamics and fractal geometry, we argue that 0 and ∞ are not opposites but mirrors—reciprocally defining limits within a scalable universe.
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3202716.346741
Writing iambic pentameter is hard. Well maybe it’s easy for you, but we can at least agree that it’s not trivial: not just any ten-syllable line counts. There are rules! A theory of meter, whatever else it is, is an attempt to state those rules (for iambic and all other meters). …
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3262269.346751
Very short summary: In this essay, I discuss various recent controversial cases in Europe where political institutions have been criticized for making “undemocratic” decisions (Romania, Germany, France) to ask under which conditions the median voter’s views should rule. …
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3298855.34676
In Ontology Made Easy (2015), I defend the idea that there are ‘easy’ inferences that begin from uncontroversial premises and end with answers to disputed ontological questions. But what do easy inferences really get us? Bueno and Cumpa (this journal, 2020) argue that easy inferences don’t tell us about the natures of properties—they don’t tell us what properties are. Moreover, they argue, by accepting an ontologically neutral quantifier we can also resist the conclusion that properties or numbers exist. Here I address these two issues in turn—in ways that help clarify both the scope and results of easy ontology. First, it is important to see that easy inferences were never intended to address modal questions. Modal questions are addressed by a different part of the total deflationary view—modal normativism. So understood, metaphysical modal questions nonetheless do not provide a remaining area for serious metaphysical inquiry. Second, I argue that we have reason to resist adopting an ontologically neutral quantifier, if we aim to answer ontological questions (without begging the question). Addressing these issues helps to clarify both what does (and does not) follow from easy inferences, and how they form part of a larger deflationary metametaphysical view.
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3298875.346771
Modality has long presented a range of philosophical problems and puzzles. For example, Are there (really) modal properties, modal facts, or possible worlds? If there are modal properties, how could they be related to non-modal properties or relations? If there are modal facts, properties, or possible worlds, how could we come to know about them, given that modal features of the world seem not to be empirically detectable, and that possible worlds seem to be, in principle, causally disconnected from us?
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3298893.346781
The essays in this volume cover the gamut of my work, from its beginnings in work on fiction, through work on the ontology of art and artifacts, social ontology, and work on ordinary objects generally, through more recent work on metametaphysics, modality, and conceptual engineering. On the surface, these themes might seem to have little in common. In this essay, however, I aim to make clear how they have been interconnected, and form parts of a vision of, and for, metaphysics.
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3316776.34679
In his Cambridge Element, The Philosophy of Symmetry, Nicholas J. Teh introduces and systematises the conceptual aspects and significance of physical symmetries—and, in particular, those physical symmetries which only leave a subsystem invariant qua subsystem, but not relative to its environment (e.g., Galileo-ship-type symmetries).
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3316802.3468
This paper focuses on a type of underdetermination that has barely received any philosophical attention: underdetermination of data. I show how one particular type of data — RNA sequencing data, arguably one of the most important data types in contemporary biology and medicine — is underdetermined, because RNA sequencing experiments often do not determine a unique data set. Instead, different ways of generating usable data can result in vastly different, and even incompatible, data sets. But, since it is often impossible to adjudicate among these different ways of generating data, ‘the data’ coming out of such experiments is underdetermined.
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3316830.346809
Science is widely regarded as providing one of our best, most secure, dependable, and reliable kinds of empirical knowledge. Yet, much of this knowledge involves events, processes, mechanisms, and entities that go beyond the limits of what we can directly observe. Consequently, there is a lively debate about the epistemic status of such unobservables and when and under what circumstances (if any) we are justified in believing claims involving them. According to a rather bleak view about scientific knowledge, we aren’t — and never can be — justified in believing such claims. The argument from underdetermination is one of the main arguments that proponents of the bleak view appeal to. Its basic underlying idea is that empirical evidence alone can never single out a particular scientific claim, hypothesis, or theory, since — so the argument goes — there are always competing and incompatible claims that are empirically equivalent, i.e. that can also account for the very same observable evidence. As a result, the evidence alone can never point to one of these many competitors as superior to the others: they are underdetermined by the available empirical evidence.
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3333326.346819
Given a time t and a world w, possible or not, say that w is t-possible if and only if there is a possible world wt that matches w in all atemporal respects as well as with respect to all that happens up to and including time t. For instance, a world just like ours but where in 2027 a square circle appears is 2026-possible but not 2028-possible. …
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3361784.346828
Inner speech arguably plays a central role in human consciousness, and yet, compared to other key psychological phenomena it seems to be somewhat neglected. Two studies were conducted to test the hypothesis that inner speech may be under-cited in the literature and might not have received its share of attention as a research area. Study 1 investigated how frequently inner speech and related terms were mentioned in Introductory Psychology textbooks. Only 7 out of 32 textbooks (21.8%) cited either inner speech, self-talk, private speech, or self-statements in their subject indexes. Study 2 compared citation frequency in PsycINFO for inner speech and related terms to 103 key psychological concepts and phenomena in peer-reviewed journal articles. The average citation frequency for all psychological terms was 1719; by comparison, inner speech was cited 52 times. 84.5% of all terms were cited more often than inner speech. Taken together these observations suggest that inner speech does tend to be overlooked, not so much because it is unimportant but probably because it is taken for granted.
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3376590.346838
I gave a talk last week as part of the VT Department of Philosophy’s “brown bag” series. Here’s the blurb:
What is the Philosophy of Statistics? (and how I was drawn to it)
I give an introductory discussion of two key philosophical controversies in statistics in relation to today’s “replication crisis” in science: the role of probability, and the nature of evidence, in error-prone inference. …
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3404834.34685
I’ve now been blogging for nearly twenty years—through five presidential administrations, my own moves from Waterloo to MIT to UT Austin, my work on algebrization and BosonSampling and BQP vs. PH and quantum money and shadow tomography, the publication of Quantum Computing Since Democritus, my courtship and marriage and the birth of my two kids, a global pandemic, the rise of super-powerful AI and the terrifying downfall of the liberal world order. …