scholarly journals The restrictor view, without covert modals

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivano Ciardelli
Keyword(s):  
State Parameter ◽  
Epistemic Modals ◽  
Standard View ◽  
Plausible Assumption ◽  
Information State ◽  
General Account

AbstractThe view that if-clauses function semantically as restrictors is widely regarded as the only candidate for a fully general account of conditionals. The standard implementation of this view assumes that, where no operator to be restricted is in sight, if-clauses restrict covert epistemic modals. Stipulating such modals, however, lacks independent motivation and leads to wrong empirical predictions. In this paper I provide a theory of conditionals on which if-clauses are uniformly interpreted as restrictors, but no covert modals are postulated. Epistemic if-clauses, like those in bare conditionals, restrict an information state parameter which is used to interpret an expressive layer of the language. I show that this theory yields an attractive account of bare and overtly modalized conditionals and solves various empirical problems for the standard view, while dispensing with its less plausible assumption.

scholarly journals Epistemic Modals and Alternative Possibilities

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Turri
Keyword(s):  
Epistemic Modals ◽  
Alternative Possibilities ◽  
Standard View ◽  
Quantification Theory ◽  
Epistemic Modal ◽  
Probabilistic Information ◽  
Knowledge Based ◽  
Ordinary Meaning ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Available Information

Indicative judgments pertain to what is true. Epistemic modal judgments pertain to what must or might be true relative to a body of information. A standard view is that epistemic modals implicitly quantify over alternative possibilities, or ways things could turn out. On this view, a proposition must be true just in case it is true in all the possibilities consistent with the available information, and a proposition might be true just in case it is true in at least one possibility consistent with the available information. I report three experiments testing this view of epistemic modals. The results show that although modal judgments are sensitive to information about alternative possibilities, the standard quantification theory mischaracterizes the ordinary meaning of modals. I then report two more experiments testing the hypothesis that epistemic modals express willingness to attribute knowledge based on the available information. The results support this hypothesis. The results also show that the difference between “inside” and “outside” probabilistic information, familiar from the judgment and decision-making literature, affects epistemic modal judgments.

The case for probabilistic assertion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Moss
Keyword(s):  
Probabilistic Models ◽  
Epistemic Modals ◽  
Collective Actions ◽  
Probabilistic Theory ◽  
Adequate Account ◽  
Standard View ◽  
Probabilistic Beliefs

This chapter develops and defends the thesis that we can assert probabilistic contents. The chapter begins by recounting some familiar arguments against the standard view that we only ever assert propositions. A probabilistic theory of assertion is then defended with three novel arguments. These arguments are less empirical than familiar arguments against the standard view, and more foundational in character. It is argued that probabilistic contents of assertion provide a unified account of how we communicate probabilistic beliefs and full beliefs, a unified account of belief and assertion, and an adequate account of how probabilistic beliefs can figure in joint reasoning and guide our collective actions. The chapter concludes with some remarks about probabilistic models of communication, as well as remarks about the conclusions that we should draw from contemporary debates about the semantics of epistemic modals.

scholarly journals Presuppositions, probabilities and belief

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Edward Schueler ◽  
Brian Reese
Keyword(s):  
State Parameter ◽  
Information State ◽  
Complex Sentences ◽  
Probabilistic Information ◽  
Attitude Reports ◽  
1 John ◽  
Satisfaction Theory

The proviso problem concerns presuppositions of complex sentences that seem stronger than predicted by satisfaction-type thoeries of projection such as Heim's (1983). We propose a probabilistic account, similar to Lassiters's (2012) for coordinated and conditional sentences, for the case of embedded attitude reports. For example, in (1), the satisfaction theory predicts that only (1a) is presupposed, but (1b) is usually inferred as well.<br /><br />(1) John believes that it stopped raining<br />a. John believes that it was raining.<br />b. It was raining.<br /><br />Our account includes a standard semantics for belief, but employs a probabilistic information state parameter whose value is dynamically updated.

Elements for a General Organology

Derrida Today ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 72-94
Author(s):  
Bernard Stiegler
Keyword(s):  
Organic Matter ◽  
Planetary Scale ◽  
General Account ◽  
Inorganic Matter ◽  
History Of

These lectures outline the project of a general organology, which is to say an account of life when it is no longer just biological but technical, or when it involves not just organic matter but organized inorganic matter. This organology is also shown to require a modified Simondonian account of the shift from vital individuation to a three-stranded process of psychic, collective and technical individuation. Furthermore, such an approach involves extending the Derridean reading of Socrates's discussion of writing as a pharmakon, so that it becomes a more general account of the pharmacological character of retention and protention. By going back to Leroi-Gourhan, we can recognize that this also means pursuing the history of retentional modifications unfolding in the course of the history of what, with Lotka, can also be called exosomatization. It is thus a question of how exteriorization can, today, in an epoch when it becomes digital, and in an epoch that produces vast amounts of entropy at the thermodynamic, biological and noetic levels, still possibly produce new forms of interiorization, that is, new forms of thought, care and desire, amounting to so many chances to struggle against the planetary-scale pharmacological crisis with which we are currently afflicted.

Death of the General Account

1996 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-7
Author(s):  
Brian O'Neil
Keyword(s):  
General Account

The Relationship between the Development of Human Capital and the Agricultural Economy in Rural Areas

2020 ◽  
pp. 61-65
Author(s):  
B.A. Voronin ◽  
◽  
I.P. Chupina ◽  
Ya.V. Voronina ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Human Capital ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Agricultural Production ◽  
Agricultural Sector ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Standard View ◽  
Household Factors ◽  
Economic Transformations ◽  
The Relationship

The article discusses a non-standard view of the formation of human capital for work in organizations of the agricultural sector of the economy, in the context of modern socio-economic transformations. In the classical sense, human capital for agriculture should be formed and developed in rural areas. But in real life, this is not always the case, because there are many factors that prevent the classical solution of this problem. First, the demographic factor affects, second, social and household factors, and third, in many rural areas there are no working agricultural organizations where qualified agricultural specialists can work. All these and other circumstances actualize the problem of the quality of human capital in rural areas in relation to the development of agricultural production.

Freedom and Practical Judgement

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Owens
Keyword(s):  
Standard View ◽  
Value Of Knowledge ◽  
Capacity To Act

This chapter develops an intellectualist view of practical freedom according to which practical freedom is a capacity to act on our view of what we ought to do. This view is embodied in a judgement rather than in a belief about what we ought to do. Practical judgement is to be distinguished both from other truth-directed phenomena like believing and guessing and also from non-truth-directed states like imagining and intending. We make practical judgements where we are ignorant of what to do. We also make and act on such judgements where we think we know what to do. This fact suggests a non-standard view of the value of knowledge. It also enables us to defend an intellectualist account of freedom against voluntaristic alternatives.

Gauge Field Theory in Natural Geometric Language

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Canarutto
Keyword(s):  
Particle Physics ◽  
Quantum Physics ◽  
Brst Symmetry ◽  
Natural Extension ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
Arbitrary Spin ◽  
Field Theories ◽  
Quantum Field Theories ◽  
Standard View ◽  
Spinor Bundle

This monograph addresses the need to clarify basic mathematical concepts at the crossroad between gravitation and quantum physics. Selected mathematical and theoretical topics are exposed within a not-too-short, integrated approach that exploits standard and non-standard notions in natural geometric language. The role of structure groups can be regarded as secondary even in the treatment of the gauge fields themselves. Two-spinors yield a partly original ‘minimal geometric data’ approach to Einstein-Cartan-Maxwell-Dirac fields. The gravitational field is jointly represented by a spinor connection and by a soldering form (a ‘tetrad’) valued in a vector bundle naturally constructed from the assumed 2-spinor bundle. We give a presentation of electroweak theory that dispenses with group-related notions, and we introduce a non-standard, natural extension of it. Also within the 2-spinor approach we present: a non-standard view of gauge freedom; a first-order Lagrangian theory of fields with arbitrary spin; an original treatment of Lie derivatives of spinors and spinor connections. Furthermore we introduce an original formulation of Lagrangian field theories based on covariant differentials, which works in the classical and quantum field theories alike and simplifies calculations. We offer a precise mathematical approach to quantum bundles and quantum fields, including ghosts, BRST symmetry and anti-fields, treating the geometry of quantum bundles and their jet prolongations in terms Frölicher's notion of smoothness. We propose an approach to quantum particle physics based on the notion of detector, and illustrate the basic scattering computations in that context.

Hedged Assertion

2019 ◽  
pp. 243-263
Author(s):  
Matthew A. Benton ◽  
Peter van Elswyk
Keyword(s):  
Speech Act ◽  
Epistemic Modals ◽  
Epistemic Position ◽  
Normative Issues

Surprisingly little has been written about hedged assertion. Linguists often focus on semantic or syntactic theorizing about, for example, grammatical evidentials or epistemic modals, but they pay far less attention to what hedging does at the level of action. By contrast, philosophers have focused extensively on normative issues regarding what epistemic position is required for proper assertion, yet they have almost exclusively considered unqualified declaratives. This article considers the linguistic and normative issues side by side. It aims to bring some order and clarity to thinking about hedging, so as to illuminate aspects of interest to both linguists and philosophers. In particular, it considers three broad questions. (1) The structural question: when one hedges, what is the speaker’s commitment weakened from? (2) The functional question: what is the best way to understand how a hedge weakens? And (3) the taxonomic question: are hedged assertions genuine assertions, another speech act, or what?

Migrations and Macro-Regions in Times of Crises

2018 ◽  
pp. 20-36
Author(s):  
Dirk Hoerder
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
North China ◽  
Temporal Analysis ◽  
Forced Labor ◽  
Standard View ◽  
Spatial And Temporal Analysis ◽  
Potential Impact ◽  
Migration Systems ◽  
Actual Relationship

This essay analyzes the actual relationship between natural and manmade crises in longue-durée perspective and questions labels attached by master narrators. It challenges the standard view by differentiating sociologically between groups benefiting or suffering from migration. At the beginning, scales of spatial and temporal analysis are discussed as well as types of migration in relation to their potential impact. Next the elimination of mobility and crises in historiography and political theory regarding Greek and Roman societies are discussed. The following section approaches three distinct mass migrations in terms of push factors perceived, often justly so, as crises: the misnamed “peoples” migrations, migration after the “fall” of the Roman Empire, and settlement of the Yangtze Valley. Then forced labor mass migrations (slaveries) and the migrations in the Atlantic, Indian Ocean, and North China migration systems, self-decided under extreme economic and societal constraints, are analyzed. In conclusion present-day discourses are placed in context.

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