Two Points Against Naturalized Epistemology

1998 ◽  
pp. 70-80
Author(s):  
Bahaa Darwish
Keyword(s):  
Naturalized Epistemology ◽  
Scientific Domain ◽  
Traditional Problem ◽  
Naturalistic Account ◽  
Scientific Questions

My aim is to raise two points against naturalizing epistemology. First, against Quine’s version of naturalizing epistemology, I claim that the traditional questions of epistemology are indispensable, in that they impose themselves in every attempt to construct an epistemology. These epistemological questions are pre- and extra-scientific questions; they are beyond the scientific domain of research, thus, for a distinct province of inquiry. Second, I claim that no naturalistic account can be given as an answer to the traditional question of justification. I take Goldman’s and Haack’s accounts as examples to support my claim. The traditional demand of justification is to start from nowhere. Naturalizing justification is to start form somewhere. The two approaches are, thus, necessarily incompatible with each other. So, the accounts given by the naturalists are not answers to the traditional problem of justification. To remain compatible with themselves, the naturalists should have conceded that the problem of justification is illegitimate or incoherent. The fact that they did not I take as additional evidence to support my claim that the traditional questions of epistemology are indispensable: they impose themselves and are, thus, hard to eliminate.

Conventions and temporal differences in painted faces: A study of posture and color distribution

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (11) ◽  
pp. 267-1-267-8
Author(s):  
Mitchell J.P. van Zuijlen ◽  
Sylvia C. Pont ◽  
Maarten W.A. Wijntjes
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Community ◽  
Human Face ◽  
Art Galleries ◽  
Art Collections ◽  
Color Distribution ◽  
Scientific Domain ◽  
The Face ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Changes Over Time ◽  
Over Time

The human face is a popular motif in art and depictions of faces can be found throughout history in nearly every culture. Artists have mastered the depiction of faces after employing careful experimentation using the relatively limited means of paints and oils. Many of the results of these experimentations are now available to the scientific domain due to the digitization of large art collections. In this paper we study the depiction of the face throughout history. We used an automated facial detection network to detect a set of 11,659 faces in 15,534 predominately western artworks, from 6 international, digitized art galleries. We analyzed the pose and color of these faces and related those to changes over time and gender differences. We find a number of previously known conventions, such as the convention of depicting the left cheek for females and vice versa for males, as well as unknown conventions, such as the convention of females to be depicted looking slightly down. Our set of faces will be released to the scientific community for further study.

Universal Concepts and Particular Processes

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald C. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Physical World ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Constant Flux ◽  
Traditional Problem

This chapter is a continuing discussion on the topic of the ontology of universals, but with special focus on process and change in reality. The traditional problem of change is posed in terms of how the constant flux of the physical world can be grasped in clear, static, and intelligible ways. The theory of universals that was sketched in Chapter 3 is taken up and elaborated. It is argued that the problem of change and an explanation for how the flux can be grasped using universal concepts can be had by a trope-theoretic account of universals. The legitimacy of the intellect and of universal concepts can thereby be upheld without positing a Platonic realm of objects.

How Content Explains

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas Shea
Keyword(s):  
Research Programme ◽  
Causal Efficacy ◽  
Explanatory Role ◽  
Content Determination ◽  
Explanatory Relevance ◽  
Tight Connection ◽  
Personal Level ◽  
Naturalistic Account ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Semantic Properties

The varitel accounts of content allow us to see how the practice of representational explanation works and why content has an explanatory role to play. They establish the causal-explanatory relevance of semantic properties and are neutral about causal efficacy. Exploitable relations give the accounts an advantage over views based only on outputs. Content does valuable explanatory work in areas beyond psychology, but it need not be explanatorily valuable in every case. The varitel accounts illuminate why there should be a tight connection between content and the circumstances in which a representation develops. The accounts have some epistemological consequences. Representations at the personal level are different in a variety of ways that are relevant to content determination. Naturalizing personal-level content thus becomes a tractable research programme. Most importantly, varitel semantics offers a naturalistic account of the content of representations in the brain and other subpersonal representational systems.

Oxford Studies in Epistemology Volume 6

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Theory ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Formal Epistemology ◽  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
Naturalized Epistemology ◽  
New Developments ◽  
The Status ◽  
Important Field ◽  
Belief Justification

Oxford Studies in Epistemology is a biennial publication offering a regular snapshot of state-of-the-art work in this important field. Under the guidance of a distinguished editorial board composed of leading epistemologists in North America, Europe and Australasia, it publishes exemplary papers in epistemology, broadly construed. Topics within its purview include: (a) traditional epistemological questions concerning the nature of belief, justification, and knowledge, the status of skepticism, the nature of the a priori, etc.; (b) new developments in epistemology, including movements such as naturalized epistemology, feminist epistemology, social epistemology, and virtue epistemology, and approaches such as contextualism; (c) foundational questions in decision-theory; (d) confirmation theory and other branches of philosophy of science that bear on traditional issues in epistemology; (e) topics in the philosophy of perception relevant to epistemology; (f) topics in cognitive science, computer science, developmental, cognitive, and social psychology that bear directly on traditional epistemological questions; and (g) work that examines connections between epistemology and other branches of philosophy, including work on testimony, the ethics of belief, etc. Topics addressed in volume 6 include the nature of perceptual justification, intentionality, modal knowledge, credences, epistemic supererogation, epistemic and rational norms, expressivism, skepticism, and pragmatic encroachment. The various writers make use of a variety of different tools and insights, including those of formal epistemology and decision theory, as well as traditional philosophical analysis and argumentation.

Rationality in Naturalized Epistemology

1984 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 64-78
Author(s):  
Edward P. Stabler,
Keyword(s):  
Naturalized Epistemology

scholarly journals AMBITION – comet nucleus cryogenic sample return

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Bockelée-Morvan ◽  
Gianrico Filacchione ◽  
Kathrin Altwegg ◽  
Eleonora Bianchi ◽  
Martin Bizzarro ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Giant Planet ◽  
Building Blocks ◽  
Cometary Nucleus ◽  
Comet Nucleus ◽  
Surface Layers ◽  
International Context ◽  
Rosetta Mission ◽  
Nucleus Surface ◽  
And Storage ◽  
Scientific Questions

AbstractWe describe the AMBITION project, a mission to return the first-ever cryogenically-stored sample of a cometary nucleus, that has been proposed for the ESA Science Programme Voyage 2050. Comets are the leftover building blocks of giant planet cores and other planetary bodies, and fingerprints of Solar System’s formation processes. We summarise some of the most important questions still open in cometary science and Solar System formation after the successful Rosetta mission. We show that many of these scientific questions require sample analysis using techniques that are only possible in laboratories on Earth. We summarize measurements, instrumentation and mission scenarios that can address these questions. We emphasize the need for returning a sample collected at depth or, still more challenging, at cryogenic temperatures while preserving the stratigraphy of the comet nucleus surface layers. We provide requirements for the next generation of landers, for cryogenic sample acquisition and storage during the return to Earth. Rendezvous missions to the main belt comets and Centaurs, expanding our knowledge by exploring new classes of comets, are also discussed. The AMBITION project is discussed in the international context of comet and asteroid space exploration.

scholarly journals The Upworthy Research Archive, a time series of 32,487 experiments in U.S. media

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Nathan Matias ◽  
Kevin Munger ◽  
Marianne Aubin Le Quere ◽  
Charles Ebersole
Keyword(s):  
Data Mining ◽  
Time Series ◽  
Open Access ◽  
Randomized Trial ◽  
Digital Technology ◽  
Behavioral Experiments ◽  
Media Politics ◽  
B Test ◽  
Scientific Questions ◽  
Advance Knowledge

AbstractThe pursuit of audience attention online has led organizations to conduct thousands of behavioral experiments each year in media, politics, activism, and digital technology. One pioneer of A/B tests was Upworthy.com, a U.S. media publisher that conducted a randomized trial for every article they published. Each experiment tested variations in a headline and image “package,” recording how many randomly-assigned viewers selected each variation. While none of these tests were designed to answer scientific questions, scientists can advance knowledge by meta-analyzing and data-mining the tens of thousands of experiments Upworthy conducted. This archive records the stimuli and outcome for every A/B test fielded by Upworthy between January 24, 2013 and April 30, 2015. In total, the archive includes 32,487 experiments, 150,817 experiment arms, and 538,272,878 participant assignments. The open access dataset is organized to support exploratory and confirmatory research, as well as meta-scientific research on ways that scientists make use of the archive.

scholarly journals Dynamics & Spectroscopy with Neutrons—Recent Developments & Emerging Opportunities

Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 1440
Author(s):  
Kacper Drużbicki ◽  
Mattia Gaboardi ◽  
Felix Fernandez-Alonso
Keyword(s):  
Dynamical Behavior ◽  
Disordered Materials ◽  
Spectroscopic Techniques ◽  
Computational Tools ◽  
Soft Solids ◽  
Sustainable Technologies ◽  
Energy Transfers ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Scientific Questions ◽  
Nuclear Quantum Effects

This work provides an up-to-date overview of recent developments in neutron spectroscopic techniques and associated computational tools to interrogate the structural properties and dynamical behavior of complex and disordered materials, with a focus on those of a soft and polymeric nature. These have and continue to pave the way for new scientific opportunities simply thought unthinkable not so long ago, and have particularly benefited from advances in high-resolution, broadband techniques spanning energy transfers from the meV to the eV. Topical areas include the identification and robust assignment of low-energy modes underpinning functionality in soft solids and supramolecular frameworks, or the quantification in the laboratory of hitherto unexplored nuclear quantum effects dictating thermodynamic properties. In addition to novel classes of materials, we also discuss recent discoveries around water and its phase diagram, which continue to surprise us. All throughout, emphasis is placed on linking these ongoing and exciting experimental and computational developments to specific scientific questions in the context of the discovery of new materials for sustainable technologies.

scholarly journals Metabolic Glycoengineering in hMSC-TERT as a Model for Skeletal Precursors by Using Modified Azide/Alkyne Monosaccharides

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (6) ◽  
pp. 2820
Author(s):  
Stephan Altmann ◽  
Jürgen Mut ◽  
Natalia Wolf ◽  
Jutta Meißner-Weigl ◽  
Maximilian Rudert ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Fluorescent Dyes ◽  
Adipogenic Differentiation ◽  
Culture Conditions ◽  
Surface Proteins ◽  
Differentiation Potential ◽  
Or Gene ◽  
Mannose Derivatives ◽  
Metabolic Glycoengineering ◽  
Scientific Questions

Metabolic glycoengineering enables a directed modification of cell surfaces by introducing target molecules to surface proteins displaying new features. Biochemical pathways involving glycans differ in dependence on the cell type; therefore, this technique should be tailored for the best results. We characterized metabolic glycoengineering in telomerase-immortalized human mesenchymal stromal cells (hMSC-TERT) as a model for primary hMSC, to investigate its applicability in TERT-modified cell lines. The metabolic incorporation of N-azidoacetylmannosamine (Ac4ManNAz) and N-alkyneacetylmannosamine (Ac4ManNAl) into the glycocalyx as a first step in the glycoengineering process revealed no adverse effects on cell viability or gene expression, and the in vitro multipotency (osteogenic and adipogenic differentiation potential) was maintained under these adapted culture conditions. In the second step, glycoengineered cells were modified with fluorescent dyes using Cu-mediated click chemistry. In these analyses, the two mannose derivatives showed superior incorporation efficiencies compared to glucose and galactose isomers. In time-dependent experiments, the incorporation of Ac4ManNAz was detectable for up to six days while Ac4ManNAl-derived metabolites were absent after two days. Taken together, these findings demonstrate the successful metabolic glycoengineering of immortalized hMSC resulting in transient cell surface modifications, and thus present a useful model to address different scientific questions regarding glycosylation processes in skeletal precursors.

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