John von Neumann and the Evolutionary Growth of Complexity: Looking Backward, Looking Forward

2000 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 347-361 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry McMullin
Keyword(s):  
Subsequent Development ◽  
Early Death ◽  
Problem Situation ◽  
John Von Neumann ◽  
Von Neumann ◽  
Comprehensive Theory ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
To Come ◽  
Evolutionary Growth

In the late 1940s John von Neumann began to work on what he intended as a comprehensive “theory of [complex] automata.” He started to develop a book length manuscript on the subject in 1952. However, he put it aside in 1953, apparently due to pressure of other work. Due to his tragically early death in 1957, he was never to return to it. The draft manuscript was eventually edited, and combined for publication with some related lecture transcripts, by Burks in 1966. It is clear from the time and effort that von Neumann invested in it that he considered this to be a very significant and substantial piece of work. However, subsequent commentators (beginning even with Burks) have found it surprisingly difficult to articulate this substance. Indeed, it has since been suggested that von Neumann's results in this area either are trivial, or, at the very least, could have been achieved by much simpler means. It is an enigma. In this paper I review the history of this debate (briefly) and then present my own attempt at resolving the issue by focusing on an analysis of von Neumann's problem situation. I claim that this reveals the true depth of von Neumann's achievement and influence on the subsequent development of this field, and further that it generates a whole family of new consequent problems, which can still serve to inform—if not actually define—the field of artificial life for many years to come.

Game Theory vs. Business Ethics

2015 ◽  
pp. 1849-1872
Author(s):  
Ben Tran
Keyword(s):  
Game Theory ◽  
Business Ethics ◽  
Emerging Economies ◽  
Moral Philosopher ◽  
John Von Neumann ◽  
Von Neumann ◽  
Economic Behaviour ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Moment ◽  
The Relationship

In 1954, the British philosopher Richard Braithwaite gave his inaugural lecture, Theory of Games as a Tool for the Moral Philosopher. Braithwaite predicted game theory would fundamentally change moral philosophy. However, in hindsight, John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern's publication of Theory of Games and Economic Behaviour was the moment modern game theory entered the discipline of ethics. The purpose of this chapter is to analyze the relationship between game theory and business ethics. In other words, this chapter explains how game theory plays a role in business ethics and affects business ethics for emerging economies and covers in detail: 1) the history of game theory; 2) types of/definition(s) of games; 3) business ethics; 4) business; and 5) ethics. The chapter concludes with the role that game theory and business ethics play in emerging economies.

Deputation to the Lord Advocate in Regard to the Lunacy Law

1878 ◽  
Vol 23 (104) ◽  
pp. 611-612
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Similar Nature ◽  
The Public ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
To Come ◽  
Do So

On Friday, 2nd November, a deputation of asylum superintendents, members of district boards, and managers of Royal Asylums, waited on the Lord Advocate at his chambers, Edinburgh, with the view of bringing under the notice of his Lordship an omission in the Scotch lunacy law, there being no provisions at present for granting pensions to old and deserving officers in the Scotch district and parochial asylums, as in England and Ireland. The deputation consisted of Professor Balfour, Professor Maclagan, Dr. Fraser, ex-Bailie Miller, Mr. D. Scott Moncrieff, W.S., Mr. Cowan, of Beeslack, Dr. Cameron, Lochgilphead; Dr. Jamieson, Aberdeen; Dr. Anderson, Rosewell; Dr. Grierson, Melrose; Dr. Wallace, Greenock; Dr. Makintosh, Murthly; Dr. Rutherford, Lenzie; Dr. Ireland, Larbert; Dr. Clouston, Morningside; Dr. Rorie, Dundee; Dr. Howden, Montrose, &c. The deputation were introduced by Professor Maclagan, who strongly supported the views of the deputation. Dr. Mackintosh, addressing his Lordship, said—The reasons which have caused the medical and other officers of the public asylums of Scotland to come before you are, I think, fairly set forth in the petition which was placed in your Lordship's hands some months ago. I need not, therefore, refer to them in detail, but would only draw your attention to the anomalous (and at the same time, disadvantageous) conditions in which such officials are placed when contrasted with their brethren in England and Ireland. Most of us had hoped that the matter would, ere this, have been taken up by the General Board of Lunacy for Scotland, but the Board (who received a deputation last February in the most courteous manner) has no intention of moving in this or any other legislation at present. Moreover, the Commissioners thought that the best course was that now adopted—via., to bring the subject before you ourselves. The service which we have the honour to represent is as much a public service as the army and navy, or as the civil and parochial services, and perhaps it is not exceeded by any of them in the increasing attention which is necessary, or by the harassing nature of the duties. It therefore seems the more reasonable (besides being a simple act of justice) to place the service on a footing in regard to superannuation allowances similar to that occupied by the public asylums of England and Ireland. In urging upon your Lordship the great need for as speedy a solution of the question as possible, we do so in the knowledge that several special amendments of a similar nature have been made. Moreover, we are satisfied that the insertion of such a clause as that indicated in the petition as an amendment into the Act, will be an important day in the history of such institutions, both as regards the efficiency and stability of the staff, and the comfort of the inmates. Mr. Cowan, of Beeslack, as a member of a district lunacy board, also urged the injustice and impolicy of the present law. The Lord Advocate said that he would give the subject his most favourable consideration. It seemed a very proper matter to have been brought before him, the only question being when he could get an opportunity of introducing a clause to remedy the present defect.

Introduction

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
Kathryn D. Temple
Keyword(s):  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Historical Study ◽  
History Of Emotions ◽  
Legal Studies ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Law And Justice ◽  
To Come ◽  
Law And Humanities

This chapter establishes Blackstone's prominence, discusses his influence on Enlightenment thought about law and justice, and reveals his investment in legal emotions as related to harmonic justice. In a reading of his early poem “The Lawyer's Farewel,” it introduces Blackstone's poetics and illustrates methods of both close and surface reading common to literary analysis. The chapter argues that although Blackstone has been the subject of historical study, both Law and Humanities and history of emotions approaches can further illuminate Blackstone's method and impact. The chapter argues for a curatorial approach to Blackstone's work that takes into account his exercise of affective aesthetics and its impact on the history of emotions in law. It closes with a summary of the chapters to come and an argument in favor of foregrounding aesthetics and emotion in legal studies.

Deputation to the Lord Advocate in Regard to the Lunacy Law

1878 ◽  
Vol 23 (104) ◽  
pp. 611-612
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Similar Nature ◽  
The Public ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
To Come ◽  
Do So

On Friday, 2nd November, a deputation of asylum superintendents, members of district boards, and managers of Royal Asylums, waited on the Lord Advocate at his chambers, Edinburgh, with the view of bringing under the notice of his Lordship an omission in the Scotch lunacy law, there being no provisions at present for granting pensions to old and deserving officers in the Scotch district and parochial asylums, as in England and Ireland. The deputation consisted of Professor Balfour, Professor Maclagan, Dr. Fraser, ex-Bailie Miller, Mr. D. Scott Moncrieff, W.S., Mr. Cowan, of Beeslack, Dr. Cameron, Lochgilphead; Dr. Jamieson, Aberdeen; Dr. Anderson, Rosewell; Dr. Grierson, Melrose; Dr. Wallace, Greenock; Dr. Makintosh, Murthly; Dr. Rutherford, Lenzie; Dr. Ireland, Larbert; Dr. Clouston, Morningside; Dr. Rorie, Dundee; Dr. Howden, Montrose, &c. The deputation were introduced by Professor Maclagan, who strongly supported the views of the deputation. Dr. Mackintosh, addressing his Lordship, said—The reasons which have caused the medical and other officers of the public asylums of Scotland to come before you are, I think, fairly set forth in the petition which was placed in your Lordship's hands some months ago. I need not, therefore, refer to them in detail, but would only draw your attention to the anomalous (and at the same time, disadvantageous) conditions in which such officials are placed when contrasted with their brethren in England and Ireland. Most of us had hoped that the matter would, ere this, have been taken up by the General Board of Lunacy for Scotland, but the Board (who received a deputation last February in the most courteous manner) has no intention of moving in this or any other legislation at present. Moreover, the Commissioners thought that the best course was that now adopted—via., to bring the subject before you ourselves. The service which we have the honour to represent is as much a public service as the army and navy, or as the civil and parochial services, and perhaps it is not exceeded by any of them in the increasing attention which is necessary, or by the harassing nature of the duties. It therefore seems the more reasonable (besides being a simple act of justice) to place the service on a footing in regard to superannuation allowances similar to that occupied by the public asylums of England and Ireland. In urging upon your Lordship the great need for as speedy a solution of the question as possible, we do so in the knowledge that several special amendments of a similar nature have been made. Moreover, we are satisfied that the insertion of such a clause as that indicated in the petition as an amendment into the Act, will be an important day in the history of such institutions, both as regards the efficiency and stability of the staff, and the comfort of the inmates. Mr. Cowan, of Beeslack, as a member of a district lunacy board, also urged the injustice and impolicy of the present law. The Lord Advocate said that he would give the subject his most favourable consideration. It seemed a very proper matter to have been brought before him, the only question being when he could get an opportunity of introducing a clause to remedy the present defect.

Contributions to the History of Psychology: XXXII. On Living with a Specter: The Story of Anomalistic Psychology

1982 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 683-694
Author(s):  
Leonard Zusne
Keyword(s):  
Human Behavior ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Psychical Research ◽  
Basic Principles ◽  
Academic Psychology ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Difference ◽  
To Come ◽  
The Relationship

The subject matter of anomalistic psychology is human behavior and experiences for which paranormal or occult causation is claimed and which appear to violate some of the basic principles on which nature is known to operate. The ambivalence and skepticism of American psychologists concerning paranormal and occult matters are examined historically, as is the relationship between academic psychology, psychical research and parapsychology, and anomalistic psychology. The difference between parapsychology and anomalistic psychology in terms of two contrasting orientations is stressed. The reasons for the persistence of beliefs in ESP and related phenomena are examined, and the need for psychology to come to grips with them is stated.

scholarly journals Croonian lecture : The respiratory process in muscle and the nature of muscular motion

1917 ◽  
Vol 89 (619) ◽  
pp. 444-467 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Animal Cell ◽  
Chemical Processes ◽  
Specific Chemical ◽  
Cell Life ◽  
History Of ◽  
Living Substance ◽  
Intimate Knowledge ◽  
The Subject ◽  
To Come ◽  
Chief Interest

Mr. President and Fellows: —We are keenly sensible of the honour done to us in our being called to lecture on this occasion, and in making this acknowledgment we would express our special gratification in being so enabled to pay this act of piety to the memory of William Croone, whom we commemorate to-day. The Croonian Lecture was founded through his generosity in order to encourage the study of muscular motion, but some sixteen years have now passed since that subject was last treated by the Lecturer. During those years many additions have been made to our knowledge of the subject, and great changes have resulted in our views of it. It is a pleasure to us that we have now the opportunity of taking up again the broken thread of the series, and of turning to-day to the chosen subject of Croone’s own enquiries and chief interest. We could wish that a time more free from other occupations and anxieties than the present had allowed us to do this less unworthily. Croone found in muscle the chief immediate hope of studying the energy discharges of living elements, and it was surely an enlightened instinct which led him to foresee, however dimly then, what we must recognise as still true after this lapse of two and a half centuries. We still must look to the study of muscular motion as the most fruitful, and perhaps for some time to come the only, avenue to intimate' knowledge of the modes of energy discharge by the living cell, and of their relation to the specific chemical processes of life. More than this, it is the study of muscle activity which has so far given us all we know of the meaning of respiration as the accompaniment of life. The study of respiratory exchanges in the lungs and in the blood of mammals has given us valuable lessons, and has unfolded attractive stories of animal adaptation to environment. That study takes its place in the natural history of the Vertebrates, and has a living value for the purposes of human medicine. It is describing to us the modes in which oxygen reaches and carbon dioxide leaves the cell under the anatomical conditions of the vertebrate animal, but it does not attack the intimate problems of respiration as a process of animal cell life in general. Croone, of Cambridge, was too close in time and sympathy to the genius of Mayow, and to the work of his other contemporaries at Oxford, not to realise that in the study of muscle lay probably the first path to knowledge of the inner processes of life within the living substance itself.

Game Theory and the History of Ideas about Rationality: An Introductory Survey

1993 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 101-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann E. Cudd
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Game Theory ◽  
Instrumental Rationality ◽  
History Of Ideas ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
John Von Neumann ◽  
Von Neumann ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Rational Interaction

Although it may seem from its formalism that game theory must have sprung from the mind of John von Neumann as a corollary of his work on computers or theoretical physics, it should come as no real surprise to philosophers that game theory is the articulation of a historically developing philosophical conception of rationality in thought and action. The history of ideas about rationality is deeply contradictory at many turns. While there are theories of rationality that claim it is fundamentally social and aims at understanding and molding all facets of human psychological life, game theory takes rationality to be essentially located in individuals and to concern only the means to achieve predetermined ends. Thus, there are some thinkers who have made important contributions to this history who do not appear in the story of game theory at all, among them, Plato, Kant, and Hegel. There is, however, a clear trail to follow linking theories of instrumental rationality from Aristotle to the nineteenth-century marginalist economists and ultimately to von Neumann and Morgenstern and contemporary game theorists, that historically grounds game theory as a model of rational interaction.

The Chatsworth Head

1938 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-95
Author(s):  
A. J. B. Wace
Keyword(s):  
Fifth Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Asia Minor ◽  
Work Of Art ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Western Asia ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
To Come

Mrs. Strong in her publication of this head has described it fully and has discussed its place, as a work of art, in the history of Greek scuplture, and it is not my intention to discuss the head from those aspects. It is to be dated, as she has shown, to the second quarter of the fifth century, probably between 470 and 460. It probably represents an Apollo, and chronologically belongs to the group which includes the originals of the Cassel Apollo and the Terme Apollo, both marble copies of bronze originals. As to its stylistic kinship with these or other works, any discussion would be fruitless, for it would be impossible to arrive at any degree of probability in attempting to attribute either the Chatsworth head or the two Apollos mentioned to any one of the Greek artists of that age whose names are known, for we have little or no evidence for their style.The head was acquired by the sixth Duke of Devonshire at Smyrna from H. P. Borrell in 1838, and, according to a note from the vendor, was reported to have been found at Salamis in Cyprus. It would be a natural presumption that a head in the market at Smyrna would have been more likely to come from one of the Greek sites of Western Asia Minor. On the other hand, the mere fact that an unlikely, rather than a likely, provenance was given to the head is in its favour, for there would presumably be no reason to give it an unlikely provenance unless it was correct. So the head may really have come from Salamis in Cyprus. Further excavation at that site may throw more light on the subject. In any case, in the later years of the decade 470-460 B.C. there was a renaissance of Greek influence, especially Attic, in Cyprus after the battle of the Eurymedon.

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