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47707.405545
The article offers a novel reconstruction of Hilbert’s early metatheory of formal axiomatics. His foundational work from the turn of the last century is often regarded as a central contribution to a “model-theoretic” viewpoint in modern logic and mathematics. The article will re-assess Hilbert’s role in the development of model theory by focusing on two aspects of his contributions to the axiomatic foundations of geometry and analysis. First, we examine Hilbert’s conception of mathematical theories and their interpretations; in particular, we argue that his early semantic views can be understood in terms of a notion of translational isomorphism between models of an axiomatic theory. Second, we offer a logical reconstruction of his consistency and independence results in geometry in terms of the notion of interpretability between theories.
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67656.406236
The notion of shape space was introduced in the second half of the 20th Century as a useful analytical tool for tackling problems related to the intrinsic spatial configuration of material systems. In recent years, the geometrical properties of shape spaces have been investigated and exploited to construct a totally relational description of physics (classical, relativistic, and quantum). The main aim of this relational framework—originally championed by Julian Barbour and Bruno Bertotti—is to cast the dynamical description of material systems in dimensionless and scale-invariant terms only. As such, the Barbour-Bertotti approach to dynamics represents the technical implementation of the famous Leibnizian arguments against the reality of space and time as genuine substances. The question then arises about the status of shape space itself in this picture: Is it an actual physical space in which the fundamental relational dynamics unfolds, or is it just a useful mathematical construction? The present paper argues for the latter answer and, in doing so, explores the possibility that shape space is a peculiar case of a conceptual space.
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67697.406252
The paper revisits Janssen’s seminal proposal of Common Origin Inferences (COIs), a powerful and scientifically fruitful inference pattern that (causally) traces striking coincidences back to a common origin. According to Janssen, COIs are a decisive engine for rational theory change across disciplines and eras. After a careful reconstruction of Janssen’s central tenets, we critically assess them, highlighting three key shortcomings: its strong realist and ontological commitments, its restriction to (or strong penchant for) causal/ontic explanations, and its intended employment for conferring evidential-epistemic status. To remedy these shortcomings, we moot a natural generalisation and amelioration of Janssen’s original conception—COI*s: Constraint-Omnivorous Inferences. COI*s warrant inference to pursuit-worthy hypotheses: it’s rational to further study, work on, elaborate/refine or test hypotheses that account for multiple constraints in one fell swoop. As a demonstration of the utility of COI*- reasoning, we finally show how it sheds light on, and dovetails, the three most significant breakthroughs in recent cosmology: the Dark Matter hypothesis, the Dark Energy postulate, and the theory of cosmic inflation.
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67721.406259
This paper outlines an approach to analysing minimal cognition that brings out its social and historical dimensions. It proposes a model, the coordinated systems approach (CSA), which understands cognition as a coordinated coalition of loosely autonomous processes responsible for goal-directedness in a system. On this view, even individual cognition has something of a social flavour to it. The central concept of the paper is stigmergy: a process where the material trace of actions of system elements in their environment is a sign that coordinates a group of semi-autonomous processes in future actions – this is the social dimension. The historical dimension refers to longer term processes which establish the coordinative power of the sign and endow it with normative force. According to this proposal, a full explanation of cognitive capabilities should reference both dimensions. In the second half of the paper the CSA is let loose on some puzzles in 4E cognition. Can the model deal with old problems such as that of cognitive bloat, or new problems such as the supposed external memory of the slime mould Physarum polycephalum? Potentially, the approach could be used to analyse minimal cognitive phenomena over a range of scales from bacteria to human beings.
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67766.406265
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a topic of major interest to philosophers of science. Among the issues commonly discussed is AI’s opacity. To remedy opacity, scientists have provided methods commonly subsumed under the label ‘eXplaibable Artificial Intelligence’ (XAI) that aim to make AI and its outputs ‘interpretable’ and ‘explainable’. However, there is little interaction between developments in XAI and philosophical debates on scientific explanation. We here improve on this situation and argue for a descriptive and a normative thesis: (i) When suitably embedded into scientific research processes, XAI methods’ outputs can facilitate genuine scientific understanding. (ii) In order for XAI outputs to fulfill this function, they should be made testable. We will support our theses by building on recent and long-standing ideas from philosophy of science, by comparing them to a recent framework from the XAI community, and by showcasing their applicability to case studies from the life sciences.
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67789.406271
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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99439.406277
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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99462.406289
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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125447.406297
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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125468.406303
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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125521.406314
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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125542.40632
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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125568.406326
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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240835.406331
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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284321.406337
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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298511.406342
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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298546.406349
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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298607.406354
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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357556.40636
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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471616.406366
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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471642.406371
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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471670.40638
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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531430.406389
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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618083.406397
The puzzle of aphantasia concerns how individuals reporting no visual imagery perform more-or-less normally on tasks presumed to depend on it [1]. In his splendid review, Zeman [2] canvasses four “cognitive explanations”: (i) differences in description; (ii) “faulty introspection”; (iii) “unconscious or ‘sub-personal’ imagery”; and (iv) total lack of imagery. Difficulties beset all four. To make progress, we must recognize that imagery is a complex and multi-dimensional capacity and that aphantasia typically reflects partial imagery loss with selective sparing. Specifically, I propose that aphantasia commonly involves a lack of visual-object imagery (explaining subjective reports and objective correlates) but selectively spared spatial imagery (explaining preserved task performance) [3,4].
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644585.406403
One challenge to relationism in general relativity is that the metric field is underdetermined by the stress-energy tensor. This is manifested in the existence of distinct vacuum solutions to Einstein’s field equations. In this paper, I reformulate the problem of underdetermination as a problem from vacuum solutions. I call this the vacuum challenge and identify the gravitational degrees of freedom (associated with the Weyl tensor) as the “source” of the challenge. The Weyl tensor allows for gravitational effects that something outside of a system exerts on the system. I provide a relationist response to the vacuum challenge.
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644608.406409
This article offers a critical engagement with Jurgen Renn’s historio-graphical approach, with particular focus on The Evolution of Knowledge and The Einsteinian Revolution (co-authored with Hanoch Gutfreund). It explores how Renn reinterprets Albert Einstein’s contributions to modern physics, especially special and general relativity, not primarily as the product of individual insight, but as emergent from broader epistemic structures and long-term knowledge systems. The discussion centers on key concepts such as “challenging objects,” “epistemic matrices,” “mental models,” and “borderline problems,” and situates Renn’s framework within broader debates involving Thomas Kuhn, Ludwik Fleck, and Mara Beller. While recognizing the historiographical strengths of Renn’s structuralist approach, the article raises questions about its implications for understanding individual agency, conceptual creativity, and the philosophical dimensions of scientific change. The paper contends that a balanced account of scientific innovation must preserve both the historical embeddedness of knowledge and the originality of conceptual breakthroughs.
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644629.406415
This paper examines the role of perspectivism in Relational Quantum Mechanics, situating it within the broader landscape of quantum interpretations and the scientific realism debate. We argue that, while interpretations such as QBism embrace strong forms of perspectivism, Relational Quantum Mechanics adopts a “soft” perspectivism, limiting the observer’s role to selecting experimental contexts without compromising its realist framework. We also explore the historical roots of Relational Quantum Mechanics, showing that relational ideas in the works of Bohr and other pioneers similarly avoided strong perspectivist commitments. By analyzing both contemporary and historical perspectives, we argue that Relational Quantum Mechanics offers a minimalist yet robust relational interpretation, distinct from more subjectivist approaches.
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644650.406425
In a small book entitled Ondes et Mouvements [1], published in February 1926, Louis de Broglie described the wave, now known as the de Broglie wave, as a modulation or beating effect of undulatory form induced in the structure of the particle by the failure of simultaneity. Considered in this way, the de Broglie wave is neither ontologically distinct, nor in any way separate, from the particle, but like the Fitzgerald-Lorentz contraction is a distortion in the structure of the particle itself. So understood, the de Broglie wave is a physically real phenomenon, capable of describing for the particle, a well-de…ned and physically realistic trajectory. In comparison, and as I argue in this paper, the wave functions that emerge as solutions to the Schrödinger and Klein-Gordon equations are better regarded as mathematical constructs, albeit constructs of signi…cant utility, identifying the wave number and frequency that the particle would have at each point of space if it were in fact at that point of space. A particular concern of this paper will be to show that the de Broglie wave would emerge as such a distortion of structure in certain sonic quasiparticles proposed in the context of analogue gravity for the purpose of simulating the Lorentz transformation.
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644695.406431
Noether’s first theorem demonstrates that continuous symmetries give rise to conserved quantities (under appropriate conditions). This fact tempts many to hold that symmetry principles explain conservation laws. Yet there is a puzzle: the derivation goes both ways. So why does symmetry explain conservation when the derivation is bidirectional? Lange (2007, 2009) provides an answer: symmetry principles are meta-laws, and meta-laws explain first-order laws just as first-order laws explain facts. Using a “non-standard” Lagrangian, Smith (2008) claims that conservation of angular momentum can hold without rotational symmetry, providing a counter-example to Lange. In this paper, I show that Smith’s non-standard Lagrangian fails to serve as a counterexample. However, that doesn’t leave Lange’s account unchallenged. I argue that the debate between Lange and Smith ultimately revolves around an ambiguity which, once clarified, leads to a dilemma. Which symmetry principle explains? Is it the symmetry of the action or the symmetry of equations of motion? If the former, then the symmetry is no more stable than conservation laws. Hence, we lose the desired explanatory direction. If the latter, the symmetry lacks explanatory relevance and fails to exhibit greater stability than conservation laws. However one disambiguates ‘symmetry’, it remains mysterious why symmetry principles explain conservation laws.
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644718.40644
Scientists often find themselves in disagreement with their peers, yet continue to hold fast to their views. While Conciliationism, a prominent position in the epistemology of disagreement, condemns such steadfastness as epistemically irrational, philosophers of science often defend it as rationally permissible—indeed, even beneficial for scientific progress. This tension gives rise to what we call the puzzle of scientific disagreement.