Reasoning about Durations

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (11) ◽  
pp. 2103-2116
Author(s):  
Laura Jane Kelly ◽  
Sangeet Khemlani ◽  
P. N. Johnson-Laird

A set of assertions is consistent provided they can all be true at the same time. Naive individuals could prove consistency using the formal rules of a logical calculus, but it calls for them to fail to prove the negation of one assertion from the remainder in the set. An alternative procedure is for them to use an intuitive system (System 1) to construct a mental model of all the assertions. The task should be easy in this case. However, some sets of consistent assertions have no intuitive models and call for a deliberative system (System 2) to construct an alternative model. Formal rules and mental models therefore make different predictions. We report three experiments that tested their respective merits. The participants assessed the consistency of temporal descriptions based on statements using “during” and “before.” They were more accurate for consistent problems with intuitive models than for those that called for deliberative models. There was no robust difference in accuracy between consistent and inconsistent problems. The results therefore corroborated the model theory.

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henri de Jongste

Abstract This paper investigates how a mental-model theory of communication can explain differences in humorous texts and how aesthetic criteria to evaluate humour are dependent on the way mental models are exploited. Humour is defined as the deliberate manipulation by speakers of their private mental models of situations in order to create public mental models which contain one or more incongruities. Recipients can re-construct this manipulation process and thereby evaluate its nature and its quality. Humorous texts can be distinguished in terms of ownership of the manipulated mental model, the relationship between the speakers’ private and their public (humorous) mental model, as well as the speed required in the humorous mental model construction. Possible aesthetic criteria are the quality of the mental model manipulation, the pressure under which the humorously manipulated mental models have been constructed and the quality of the presentation of humorous mental models.


Author(s):  
Daphna Lewinsohn-Zamir ◽  
Eyal Zamir ◽  
Ori Katz

The threat of sanctions is often insufficient to ensure compliance with legal norms. Recently, much attention has been given to nudges – choice-preserving measures that take advantage of people’s automatic System 1 thinking – as a means of influencing behaviour without sanctions, but nudges are often ineffective and controversial. This article explores the provision of information about the reasons underlying legal norms, as a means to enhance compliance, primarily through deliberative System 2 thinking. While the idea that legal norms should be accompanied by explanatory preambles – to complement the law’s threat of sanctions with persuasion – goes back to Plato, this technique is not commonly used nowadays, and scholars have failed to systematically consider this possibility. The article argues that reason giving can enhance compliance and reduce the need for costly enforcement mechanisms. The theoretical part of the article comprises three parts. It first describes the mechanisms through which reasons may influence people’s behaviour. It then distinguishes between reason giving as a means to enhance compliance and as a means to attain other goals and between reason giving and related means to enhance compliance. Finally, it discusses various policy and pragmatic considerations that bear on the use of reason giving. Following the theoretical discussion, the empirical part of the article uses vignette studies to demonstrate the feasibility and efficacy of the reason-giving technique. The results of these new studies show that providing good reasons for legal norms enhances people’s inclination to comply with them, in comparison to not providing the reasons underlying the norms. However, whereas persuasive reasons may promote compliance, questionable reasons might reduce it. We call on scholars and policy makers to pay more attention to this readily available measure of enhancing compliance with norms.


1995 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 671-687 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karl Christoph Klauer ◽  
Klaus Oberauer

Johnson-Laird, Byrne, and Schaeken (1992) present a theory of propositional reasoning by mental models. The present study provides a comprehensive test of the predictions of that theory for the difficulty of simple disjunctive and conditional inferences. The results are largely consistent with the complex pattern of predictions. They are discussed in the light of recently proposed modifications of the original theory.


Author(s):  
Miguel López Astorga ◽  
Leyla Danae Torres-Bravo

The mental model theory is an approach with clear psychological, linguistic, and cognitive consequences. This paper delves into some of the epistemological conclusions that can be drawn from it. In particular, it addresses the process why knowledge acquisition can modify the inferences people tend to make. That process is described by means of an example based on a well-known logical schema related to the conditional: Modus Tollendo Tollens.


2003 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 131-137 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paolo Legrenzi ◽  
Vittorio Girotto ◽  
P.N. Johnson-Laird

This article presents a theory of how individuals detect whether descriptions of an entity are consistent or inconsistent. The theory postulates that individuals try to construct a mental model of the entity in which all the propositions are true. If they succeed, they infer that the description is consistent; otherwise, they infer that it is inconsistent. We report three experiments that corroborated the theory. Experiment 1 confirmed that evaluating consistency is easier when an initial model suffices than when reasoners have to find an alternative model. Experiment 2 established the occurrence of illusory inferences about the properties of entities. Experiment 3 showed that the illusions correspond to mental models of the assertions, even when these models are wrong because they fail to represent what is false.


2000 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 283-284 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean-Baptiste van der Henst

Johnson-Laird & Byrne (1991; 1993) present a theory of human deductive reasoning based on the notion of mental models. Unfortunately, the theory is incomplete. The present commentary argues that pragmatic considerations, particularly of the type discussed in Sperber and Wilson (1995), can complement the theory.


Animals ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 264
Author(s):  
Kathryn E. Ritz ◽  
Bradley J. Heins ◽  
Roger D. Moon ◽  
Craig C. Sheaffer ◽  
Sharon L. Weyers

Organic dairy cows were used to evaluate the effect of two organic pasture production systems (temperate grass species and warm-season annual grasses and cool-season annuals compared with temperate grasses only) across two grazing seasons (May to October of 2014 and 2015) on milk production, milk components (fat, protein, milk urea nitrogen (MUN), somatic cell score (SCS)), body weight, body condition score (BCS), and activity and rumination (min/day). Cows were assigned to two pasture systems across the grazing season at an organic research dairy in Morris, Minnesota. Pasture System 1 was cool-season perennials (CSP) and Pasture System 2 was a combination of System 1 and warm-season grasses and cool-season annuals. System 1 and System 2 cows had similar milk production (14.7 and 14.8 kg d−1), fat percentage (3.92% vs. 3.80%), protein percentage (3.21% vs. 3.17%), MUN (12.5 and 11.5 mg dL−1), and SCS (4.05 and 4.07), respectively. Cows in System 1 had greater daily rumination (530 min/day) compared to cows in System 2 (470 min/day). In summary, warm-season annual grasses may be incorporated into grazing systems for pastured dairy cattle.


1997 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur C. Graesser

Researchers in the field of discourse processing have investigated how mental models are constructed when adults comprehend stories. They have explored the process of encoding various classes of inferences “on-line” when these mental microworlds are constructed during comprehension. This commentary addresses the extent to which these inferences and mental microworlds are “embodied.”


Plant Disease ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 85 (8) ◽  
pp. 895-900 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. M. Wu ◽  
K. V. Subbarao ◽  
A. H. C. van Bruggen ◽  
S. T. Koike

Lettuce growers in coastal California have relied mainly on protective fungicide sprays to control downy mildew. Thus, timing of sprays before infection is critical for optimal results. A leaf-wetness-driven, infection-based advisory system, previously developed, did not always perform satisfactorily. In this study, the advisory system was modified by incorporating a pathogen survival component (system 1) or both survival and sporulation components (system 2). These systems were then evaluated in commercial lettuce fields in coastal California during 1996-1998. Three or four treatments were carried out in each field: (i) no spray; (ii) sprays as scheduled by the growers; (iii) sprays following modified system 1; and (iv) sprays following the original advisory system (1996) or modified system 2 (1998). Downy mildew incidence was evaluated every 2 to 9 days. In fields with drip irrigation, the number of fungicide applications was reduced by one or two regardless of the advisory system used compared to the grower's calendar-based schedule, although one unnecessary spray was recommended in 1996 at Soledad and 1997 at Salinas. Under all three systems, disease levels were low (incidence <25% and about 1 lesion per plant) for fields with drip irrigation, but not for fields with sprinklers (incidence up to 100% and 5 to 10 lesions per plant). For the first time, we established that survival and sporulation components are not needed for a lettuce downy mildew forecasting system. Instead, a threshold with a shorter period of morning leaf wetness and high temperatures were found to have potential for improving forecasting efficiency.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mizuho Mori ◽  
Yoshiko Ariji ◽  
Motoki Fukuda ◽  
Tomoya Kitano ◽  
Takuma Funakoshi ◽  
...  

Abstract Objectives The aim of the present study was to create and test an automatic system for assessing the technical quality of positioning in periapical radiography of the maxillary canines using deep learning classification and segmentation techniques. Methods We created and tested two deep learning systems using 500 periapical radiographs (250 each of good- and bad-quality images). We assigned 350, 70, and 80 images as the training, validation, and test datasets, respectively. The learning model of system 1 was created with only the classification process, whereas system 2 consisted of both the segmentation and classification models. In each model, 500 epochs of training were performed using AlexNet and U-net for classification and segmentation, respectively. The segmentation results were evaluated by the intersection over union method, with values of 0.6 or more considered as success. The classification results were compared between the two systems. Results The segmentation performance of system 2 was recall, precision, and F measure of 0.937, 0.961, and 0.949, respectively. System 2 showed better classification performance values than those obtained by system 1. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve values differed significantly between system 1 (0.649) and system 2 (0.927). Conclusions The deep learning systems we created appeared to have potential benefits in evaluation of the technical positioning quality of periapical radiographs through the use of segmentation and classification functions.


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