bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Unraveling the eastern North American Hesperochernes (Pseudoscorpiones, Chernetidae) species complex
Authors: Stephen Charles , Niemiller Matthew , Bond Jason
Published: September 2018

The pseudoscorpion genus Hesperochernes presently includes 19 species, 17 of which are endemic to North America. On this continent, most species in the genus have been found in association with bats or rodents, and six species are known exclusively from subterranean habitats. Three species are distributed south of the Great Lakes in the eastern part of the mainland continent: H. holsingeri, H. mirabilis, and H. occidentalis. All three have only been collected from karst caves. Hesperochernes holsingeri is presumed to be endemic to one cave in southern Indiana in the Interior Low Plateau karst region. Specimens attributed to H. mirabilis are widely distributed across all karst regions east of the Mississippi River, excluding the Florida Lime Sink. Specimens identified as H. occidentalis are restricted to west of the Mississippi River, where they are broadly distributed in the Ozarks karst region. These three species were defined from morphological characters that have since been speculated to suffer from a high degree of variation among populations. This ambiguity has effectively rendered unreliable any species-level determinations of Hesperochernes from caves in eastern North America. Additionally, previous authors have noted that there exists high potential for undescribed diversity within this geographic distribution of the genus. The present study seeks to disentangle relationships within Hesperochernes from subterranean populations in eastern North America. Within this region, we collected 95 samples of Hesperochernes and nine samples of outgroup pseudoscorpions from 53 caves located in the Appalachians, Ozarks, and Interior Low Plateau karst regions. The 3RAD restriction-associated digest (RADseq) method was used to sample thousands of loci from across the whole genome. Population genetics, species delimitation, phylogeographic, and morphological analyses are presented that will inform a taxonomic revision of this remarkably successful, exclusively hypogean species complex of pseudoscorpions.
Imiter Cléomède : légitimation de l’encyclopédiste et transmission des savoirs dans La Solitude de Sorel
Authors: Sguaitamatti Marie-Florence
Published: September 2018

La Solitude et l’Amour philosophique de Cléomède (1640) de Charles Sorel relate l’initiation du héros à l’amour philosophique pour engager le lecteur à la recherche des sciences et de la sagesse. En même temps, le texte explique la vocation de l’auteur de La Science universelle , légitimant ainsi son projet encyclopédique. La présente étude se propose d’analyser la manière dont Sorel se sert des lieux du discours sur l’admiration dans sa réflexion sur l’attitude nécessaire à la recherche individuelle et collective de la science et à sa transmission. L’admiration – passion dont le rapport avec le savoir est ambigu – permet à l’auteur de réunir dans un discours cohérent les aspects contradictoires de cette réflexion épistémologique et sociale.
Les Promenades de Richelieu de Jean Desmarets et la modernité du théâtre à machines
Authors: Blanchard Jean-Vincent
Published: September 2018

Dans ses Promenades de Richelieu (1653), Jean Desmarets présente une description du château de Richelieu et de ses trésors artistiques contrastant avec le dessein général du texte, qui est de mener le lecteur à la contemplation des vérités chrétiennes par le biais de la beauté naturelle. Une analyse de l’actualité du théâtre à machines montre que pour Desmarets, la merveille du château de Richelieu est le signe d’une nouveauté historique perceptible dans le temps présent. Il faut croire que la monarchie des Bourbons français, élevée grâce aux efforts du cardinal, survivra aux désordres de la Fronde.
S’étonner pour se professionnaliser : une expérience d’immersion sur le terrain en première année de formation d’ergothérapeutes
Authors: Broussal Dominique , Caire Jean-Michel , Techene Sabrina , Castel-Lacanal Evelyne , De Boissezon Xavier
Published: September 2018

Cette recherche rend compte d’une expérimentation menée de septembre 2016 à janvier 2017 à l’Institut de Formation en Ergothérapie de Toulouse. Elle impliquait des étudiants de première année et consistait à leur proposer de s’immerger une demi-journée dans des services de médecine physique et de réadaptation. Il s’agissait pour l’équipe de soin de présenter son activité. Les étudiants pouvaient de leur côté observer des situations de soin et dialoguer avec l’équipe. Les retours d’expérience des étudiants, favorisant l’expression de leurs étonnements, ont pris la forme de questionnaires individuels et de débriefings en petits groupes. L’analyse met en évidence le rôle déterminant que l’immersion joue dans l’émergence de questionnements et d’étonnements relatifs à la conception du patient, de la maladie, du travail des soignants et du processus de professionnalisation des étudiants eux-mêmes.
L’hyperactivité/TDAH : un analyseur de l’apport des neurosciences aux pratiques médiatiques, éducatives et à la formation des travailleurs sociaux
Authors: PONNOU Sébastien
Published: September 2018

Nous avons interrogé les conceptions du Trouble Déficitaire de l’Attention avec ou sans Hyperactivité (TDAH) à la télévision (N=60), dans la presse (N=159) et dans les sites internet français (N=50) sur la période 1990-2015. Nous avons également analysé les articles consacrés au TDAH dans la littérature spécialisée destinée aux travailleurs sociaux (N=93) et dans les discours des étudiants en éducation spécialisée (N=99). Nous avons centré notre analyse sur la neurologie et la génétique du TDAH, puis sur les effets du traitement médicamenteux. L’analyse croisée des représentations du TDAH montre des distorsions récurrentes des données neuroscientifiques. L’étude met en lumière des conflits d’intérêts susceptibles de contribuer à ces distorsions. L’écart aux consensus internationaux se creuse au fil de notre période d’étude. Ces informations erronées masquent des facteurs de risque sociaux et environnementaux susceptibles de faire l’objet de politiques et de pratiques éducatives adaptées.
Données de santé : les nouveaux outils numériques de collecte et d’exploitation des données renouvellent les problématiques du consentement du patient et de la relation de soins
Authors: Bourdaire-Mignot Camille , Gründler Tatiana
Published: September 2018

États généraux de la bioéthique (rapport de synthèse du Comité consultatif national d’éthique) : sixième billet*Lors des États généraux, les citoyens se sont révélés conscients des potentialités qu’offrent les outils numériques en matière de santé tout en se montrant vigilants sur les revers possibles ainsi que les risques liés à l’usage des données qu’ils permettront de recueillir. Collectées dans le cadre du soin mais également au gré de l’utilisation de plus en plus fréquente d’objets connectés, les données de santé sont tout à la fois source de progrès et de dangers. Elles ont déjà permis d’acquérir de nouvelles connaissances médicales et de découvrir des traitements innovants, notamment du fait de la possibilité d’exploiter numériquement une masse considérable de données. Mais elles emportent également des risques, ne serait-ce qu’en raison de l’attractivité qu’elles représentent pour les activités marchandes.
Website Adoption for Agritourism Companies
Authors: Angioni Margherita , Musso Fabio
Published: September 2018

The purpose of this article is to analyze the influence of the key features of agritourism companies' websites on customers purchasing decision-making process, by measuring the level of perceived relevance and satisfaction of customers about the website's features. Empirical research was conducted based on a four-stage website adoption model, adapted from previous literature. A web-based questionnaire was addressed to a sample of Italian tourists who experienced a stay at an agritourism after selecting it through the website. By combining the perceived satisfaction and importance attributed to a series of website features, the priorities to take into account to design a website and to establish its main on-line services have been identified. In order to identify which variables have more influence in defining the overall evaluation of a website, a regression analysis was conducted. This study provides useful guidance on the main features of a website on which investments for improvement may be addressed, and which on-line services should be activated.
A Context Based Tracking for Similar and Deformable Objects
Authors: Kaushik Bhavana , Kumar Manoj , Bhatanagar Charul , Jalal Anand Singh
Published: September 2018

Object detection and tracking is the most basic and important process to understand video content. Due to its numerous applications, it has attracted many researchers to the field. Lots of work has been done in tracking; however, tracking of a deformable object is still in its initial stage. Most of the start-of-art methods fail to handle rapid variations in an object's shape and size. The task becomes even more difficult when there is multi-target tracking. In this article, the authors have proposed a novel tracking method based on context (spatio-temporal) formed from the corner points of object regions. The correlation between the targets and background based on context is used for tracking. The proposed method is successful in tracking objects that are changing their appearance (shape and size) frequently and are having near similar appearance.
Analysis and Comparison of Clustering Techniques for Chronic Kidney Disease With Genetic Algorithm
Authors: Sahu Sanat Kumar , Shrivas A. K.
Published: September 2018

The purpose of this article is to weigh up the foremost imperative features of Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD). This study is based mostly on three cluster techniques like; K means, Fuzzy c-means and hierarchical clustering. The authors used evolutionary techniques like genetic algorithms (GA) to extend the performance of the clustering model. The performance of these three clusters: live parameter purity, entropy, and Adjusted Rand Index (ARI) have been contemplated. The best purity is obtained by the K-means clustering technique, 96.50%; whereas, Fuzzy C-means clustering received 93.50% and hierarchical clustering was the lowest at 92. 25%. After using evolutionary technique Genetic Algorithm as Feature selection technique, the best purity is obtained by hierarchical clustering, 97.50%, compared to K –means clustering, 96.75%, and Fuzzy C-means clustering at 94.00%.
Organizational Resilience Approaches to Cyber Security
Authors: Gould David
Published: September 2018

This article includes a perspective on cyber security through the lens of the World Economic Forum Resilience Framework. As cyber threats are a continual threat to organizations, it may be useful to consider resilience as a complementary approach to technological responses. The problem is that organizations cannot generate a sufficient number and types of responses to cyber security threats as the number of threats and associated costs continues to increase. The purpose of this article is to explore some possible practices and approaches to counter the ongoing and escalating cyber security threats, with the understanding and wisdom that not all threats will be possible to stop. Resilience is a complementary factor to directly countering threats by taking actions to backup information, having access to additional equipment as needed, by budgeting for failure, preparing for unexpected circumstances among other activities. Concepts from evolution and game theory are introduced within the resilience discussion.
Usage of Online Resources by the Undergraduates Attached to the Faculty of Agriculture, Eastern University, Sri Lanka
Authors: Lavanya J. , Santharooban S.
Published: September 2018

The online resources have emerged as one of the primary sources of information for teaching learning activity and research. Although the present era is mainly depending on online, all the students do not have adequate knowledge and skills necessary to exploit those resources. Hence it is essential for library professionals to analyses the online usage pattern of students before commencing awareness programmes. In this regard, the present study was designed to investigate the usage of online resources among the undergraduates of Faculty of Agriculture, Eastern University, Sri Lanka. Structured questionnaires were used to collect data among randomly selected 154 students. The study revealed that most of the students accesses Internet through smart phones for different educational purposes. Among them, purposes such as preparation for lecture and doing literature review are associated with academic year (p<0.05). Even though significant positive perception towards online resources (p<0.05) is observed, students are mostly unaware of both open access and university subscribed online resources, while they rely primarily on Google search. The factorial analysis revealed there are three latent constructs in the students’ perceptions such as “Usefulness of online resources”, “Awareness of online resources and the satisfaction of facilities” and “Challenges with online resources”. The study also revealed the barriers to access online resources namely, slow Internet connectivity, unavailability of time, lack of awareness and viruses and other malware pop-ups. It is recommended that well-planned information literacy programme should be introduced for all students regardless of their academic year in order to access information in an effective way.
The influence of dimensions of organisational culture on supply chain performance in selected state-owned enterprises in Zimbabwe
Authors: Musanzikwa Michael , Ramchander Manduth
Published: September 2018

Background: Despite being strategic, state-owned enterprises (SOEs) have failed to fulfil their mandate. Supply chain performance is ineffective largely because of weak organisational culture.Objectives: To explore the extent to which organisational cultural factors have influenced the supply chain performance of SOEs, review the literature; effectiveness of attaining financial targets, customer satisfaction, internal business processes, learning and growth; time orientation on the supply chain metric of delivery. The supply chain metric of flexibility; profitability on cost reduction; ‘no ownership’ culture on decision-making; and the level of customer satisfaction.Method: A mixed-method was used. The population comprised managers, employees and clients of eight selected SOEs. Judgmental, random and convenience sampling were employed. Questionnaires and interviews were the research instruments and quantitative and qualitative analyses were conducted. Findings are presented thematically, in line with the research questions.Results: SOEs were not meeting financial targets, not satisfying customers, poor internal business processes not attaining learning and growth targets. Organisational cultural variables were weak; affecting flexibility, no timely delivery of goods and services. Also influenced the behaviour of human resources and an indirect effect on customer satisfaction, cost-saving and profitability in the SOEs.Conclusion: The SOEs failed to meet financial, customer, learning and growth targets. The internal business processes were not effective. The culture did not promote efficiency. The study recommends that commitment of leadership on human behaviour is necessary for effective supply chain performance and strategy implementation. Constant environmental scanning, strategic alliances, rationalisation of remuneration and sound corporate governance are essential.
Test designed discover potential reading difficulties at the six-year old level
Authors: De Hirsch Katrina
Published: September 2018

No abstract available.
Case history of a brain-injured child
Authors: Ordman C.
Published: September 2018

No abstract available.
Chronaxy measurement of the nervus recurrens and its applications
Authors: Breckwoldt G. H.
Published: September 2018

No abstract available.
The post operative progress of a child suffering traumatic cerebral lesion
Authors: Shavell Audrey
Published: September 2018

No abstract available.
Managing Severe Tetanus without Ventilation Support in a Resource-limited Setting in Bangladesh
Authors: Hasnain Md Golam , Maruf Shomik , Nath Proggananda , Anuwarul Azim , Ahmed Md Nasir Uddin , Chowdhury Iqbal Hossain , Basher Ariful
Published: September 2018

Tetanus, a vaccine-preventable and potentially fatal disease, continues to remain prevalent in low- and middle-income countries. Furthermore, physicians are often unfamiliar with management of severe tetanus without ventilator support. Therefore, we proposed a modified treatment protocol that provides a low-cost and effective solution for the management of severe tetanus in resource-constrained settings. This is an observational study of 42 patients with severe tetanus treated during 2015–2016 at Surya Kanta Hospital, Bangladesh. This facility does not have an intensive care unit (ICU), and patients admitted here were provided treatment with the modified protocol. A total number of 42 patients with severe tetanus were treated with the modified protocol. Among them, 24 (57.1%) recovered completely, six (14.3%) recovered with the sequela, and 12 (28.6%) died. Among those who recovered with the sequela, four needed mechanical support during walking and two had a visual impairment. No significant adverse event was recorded during the treatment period. The results gathered during this case series provide a sustainable, low-cost, and effective solution to management of severe tetanus in resource-constrained settings where ICUs are unavailable.
Molecular Detection of Taeniid Eggs in Beetles Collected in an Area Endemic for Taenia solium
Authors: Vargas-Calla Ana , Gomez-Puerta Luis A. , Pajuelo Monica J. , Garcia Hector H. , Gonzalez Armando E. , _ _
Published: September 2018

The aim of this study was to demonstrate the presence of Taenia solium eggs in beetles collected from sources within the natural environment through molecular techniques. Fifty-four pools of beetles were collected in three villages in Piura, Peru. DNA was extracted using the FastDNA spin kit for soil. Molecular identification of Taenia species was then performed through partial amplification of the mitochondrial cytochrome C oxidase subunit I gene. Finally, positive samples were sequenced to determine the tapeworm species. Seven positive samples were obtained through polymerase chain reaction amplification. Sequencing confirmed that two samples were from T. solium and three samples were from Taenia hydatigena. The other two samples could not be specifically identified. Our findings demonstrate that dung beetles ingest T. solium and T. hydatigena eggs under natural conditions and suggest that beetles may play a role in the dynamics of transmission of these cestodes.
Molyneux problem
Authors: Glenney Brian
Published: September 2018

The Molyneux problem asks whether a newly sighted person might immediately identify shapes previously known only to touch, like cubes and spheres, by sight alone. Over three centuries ago, the designer, William Molyneux, a Fellow of the Royal Society living in Ireland, conveyed the problem in a series of letters to John Locke. Locke soon published the problem and Molyneux’s own ‘not’ answer, in the second edition of his famous work, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding.

Molyneux reasoned that the newly sighted person would fail for having no way to know that the newly seen shapes were like the felt shapes; the feel of the cube corner would not at all be like the look of the cube corner. Many philosophers have agreed with Molyneux’s ‘not’, arguing either that each sense produces concepts unique to it or that new sensory experiences, like those of newly sighted people, are too primitive for identifying three-dimensional shapes. Additionally, early experiments on subjects who have had cataracts surgically removed seem to confirm Molyneux’s supposition, as the newly sighted do not immediately identify shapes known to them by touch.

More recent empirical experiments on cataract surgery subjects, newborns, and with technological innovations like sensory substitution devices, suggest support for a ‘yes’ answer to the question, inspiring philosophical and psychological accounts of perception that explain how the newly sighted might succeed in recognizing three-dimensional spatial features by sight.
Judgment and belief, in early modern philosophy
Authors: Marušić Jennifer
Published: September 2018

What is the difference between simply thinking about something and judging or believing that something is the case?

One finds a remarkable range of answers to this question in the early modern period. A traditional approach to judgment has its origins in Aristotle and treats judgment as closely related to predication. Judging, on this view, is a matter of affirming or denying something of something else. Affirming and denying, in turn, are different forms of predication: affirming whiteness of snow results in the judgment that snow is white; denying whiteness of snow results in the judgment that snow is not white.

Descartes rejects this approach and instead treats judgment as an act of will. He holds that the intellect or understanding presents us with a complete content for judgment, and then the will, in a separate act, assents or dissents to this content.

Spinoza rejects both the Aristotelian and Cartesian views by holding, against the Aristotelian view, that every idea has propositional content and also, against the Cartesian view, that every idea is an affirmation. Spinoza claims that judgment or affirmation just consists in the causal influence that an idea has on us, and he holds that all ideas have some influence. Thus, Spinoza holds the radical view that all ideas are judgments.

Finally, Hume also rejects both the Aristotelian and Cartesian views. Against the Aristotelians, he denies that what is judged or believed must always be a proposition with a subject–predicate structure. Against the Cartesians, he denies that belief is in any way subject to the will. Finally, against Spinoza he insists that there are some ideas that are merely conceived and not believed or judged. Hume holds that beliefs differ from ideas that are not believed in a way that makes beliefs more like perceptual experiences.
Intuitions, philosophical appeals to
Authors: Pust Joel
Published: September 2018

Intuitions are, according to many philosophers, treated as a primary source of evidence in much distinctively philosophical inquiry. While some contest this claim, if it is true, then the intellectual respectability of such inquiry depends on whether intuitions are properly suited to serve as evidence.

Almost all agree that intuitions are mental states with propositional content. Some philosophers take intuitions to be beliefs of some kind. Others reject the claim that intuitions are beliefs. They hold that intuitions are occurrent conscious mental states with a distinctive subjective character.

Critics of the use of intuitions as evidence maintain that intuitions are an improper foundation for belief, alleging that they are unverifiable, unreliable, or scientifically unacceptable. Defenders of the use of intuitions maintain that intuitions are, while different from the perceptual states that serve as the basis of empirical inquiry, nonetheless justifiably treated as a foundation for philosophical inquiry.
Butler, Judith (1956–)
Authors: Murphy Ann
Published: September 2018

Judith Butler (1956–) is an American philosopher working in feminist and queer theory, psychoanalysis and continental philosophy. She is known for her work on gender, sexuality, power, vulnerability and identity. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, Butler attended Bennington College and did her graduate work in philosophy at Yale University, receiving her PhD in 1984. She has held teaching positions at Wesleyan University, George Washington University and Johns Hopkins University, and since 1993 has taught at the University of California at Berkeley.

Butler engages a wide range of themes across her work, including but not limited to sexed and gendered embodiment, performativity, psychic and political subjection, public assembly, war, violence, dispossession and vulnerability. Despite the impressive breadth and range of her writings, Butler’s corpus evidences a sustained interest in various kinds of susceptibility, vulnerability, exposure and dispossession that constitute the human subject both ethically and ontologically. Dispossession operates for Butler in several registers: the political, the ethical, the personal, the intersubjective, the social and the symbolic. She writes on the vulnerability of sexed and gendered minorities to both physical and psychic violence, the failures of recognition and misrecognition that render certain groups disproportionately available to harm, the vulnerability of the nation-state and the illusory nature of sovereignty, the vulnerability of all subjects to myriad forms of normative violence, and the precarious access to basic human needs endured by certain populations. Butler also explores the idea that gender itself operates as a mode of dispossession.
Linguistic turn
Authors: Glock Hans-Johann , Kalhat Javier
Published: September 2018

The term ‘the linguistic turn’ refers to a radical reconception of the nature of philosophy and its methods, according to which philosophy is neither an empirical science nor a supraempirical enquiry into the essential features of reality; instead, it is an a priori conceptual discipline which aims to elucidate the complex interrelationships among philosophically relevant concepts, as embodied in established linguistic usage, and by doing so dispel conceptual confusions and solve philosophical problems.

The linguistic turn originated with Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921). In the 1920s and early 1930s, the logical positivists deepened the turn through their outright rejection of metaphysics; in line with their scientific outlook, they also sought to merge it with ‘ideal language philosophy’. The linguistic turn was developed in a different direction by the later Wittgenstein and ‘ordinary language philosophers’ after him. While no less hostile to metaphysics than the positivists, they rejected the suggestion that philosophical problems can be solved by reforming rather than clarifying our existing language. Linguistic philosophy began to wane from the mid-1970s onwards, largely as a result of the rise of naturalism in the United States. In recent years, however, there has been a rehabilitation of conceptual analysis and thereby of a type of linguistic philosophy. The term ‘the linguistic turn’ was coined by Gustav Bergmann, a one-time member of the Vienna Circle, and was later used by Richard Rorty as the title for an influential anthology of essays on ‘the most recent philosophical revolution’.
Lacan, Jacques (1901–81)
Authors: Pluth Ed
Published: September 2018

Jacques Lacan, who in the mid-20th century urged psychoanalysts to ‘return to Freud’, infused psychoanalysis with ideas from structuralist linguistics and Hegelian philosophy. Feeling that psychoanalysts had both in theory and in practice lost their way in the postwar period under the influence of ego psychology (which advocated strengthening the ego in an effort to overcome neurotic symptoms), Lacan argued that the centrality of splits and lacks in the human psyche required a different approach to the cure: psychoanalysis needed to focus not on strengthening the ego, which Lacan saw as the very source of such things as frustration and aggression, but rather on confronting some basic truths involving human desire, satisfaction, identity and sexuality. Lacan’s inquiries would lead to the development of new theoretical objects for psychoanalysis like object a and jouissance; to the use of a sort of algebra or mathematics for teaching psychoanalysis, and to some innovative (and controversial) clinical practices such as the variable-length session and, within his psychoanalytic school, the passe.
Supervenience
Authors: Jago Mark
Published: September 2018

Supervenience is a concept developed by philosophers to capture a way in which certain facts, events or properties rely or depend on others in a noncausal way. It is one way to capture the notion that certain phenomena seem to emerge from, or are determined by, others.

Consider an example. The movement of one snooker ball depends on the way it is hit, either by the cue or by another ball. This is the familiar causal notion of dependence. But now suppose the balls make a perfect ‘W’ shape on the table. That ‘W’ depends on the arrangement of the individuals balls. It isn’t that the balls’ arrangement causes the ‘W’ to exist. Rather, the balls and their arrangement constitutes, or makes up the ‘W’. Their individual arrangements, taken together, brings it about that there is a ‘W’ shape on the table. These are all intuitive but imprecise ways of capturing the noncausal relationship between the individual balls and the ‘W’. The technical term philosophers use for this relationship is supervenience. It was used by Hare, and was put centre stage first by Davidson, and then by Kim and Lewis. Section 1 will explore different ways to define ‘supervenience’.

Philosophers find the notion of supervenience useful because it can be used to describe and analyse a number of phenomena which seem to depend on other phenomena in an important, but noncausal, way. These might include: truth depending on reality; the mind depending on the brain; and moral and aesthetic truths depending on physical properties. Supervenience also provides a useful way to help clarify what is at stake in a number of debates, such as the internalist/externalist debate over mental content.
Persistence
Authors: Miller Kristie
Published: September 2018

We call the phenomenon of objects existing through time, persistence. Theories of persistence aim to spell out the conditions under which objects persist. A useful way to think about this task is to see that in order for an object to persist from one time to another, it needs to be that in some good sense the object that is located at the earlier time, is the same object as the object located at the later time. Competing theories of persistence can be thought of as offering different ways of understanding the sense in which an object located at one time is the same object as an object located at some other time. These different accounts are, in part, motivated by the need to reconcile four apparent truisms: (a) an object persists iff it exists at different times, and at each of those times what exists is numerically identical with what exists at every other one of those times; (b) persisting objects change their intrinsic properties over time; (c) x = y only if x and y share all of the same properties; and (d) no object instantiates incompatible properties. The tension between these four plausible claims is known as the problem of temporary intrinsics, and different attempts to solve the problem lead to different theories of persistence.

Historically, there have been two main theories of persistence. The articulation of these theories can be traced to David Lewis, who distinguishes endurance from perdurance. The theory that says that objects persist by enduring is known as endurantism, and the theory that says that objects persist by perduring is known as perdurantism. Put somewhat roughly for now, endurantism is the view that objects persist by being wholly present at more than one time. Perdurantism is the view that objects persist by being partially present at more than one time. Section 1 considers these two theories of persistence in more detail, and then introduces two more recent views: exdurantism (also known as stage theory) and transdurantism. Section 2 considers how these four theories respond to the problem of temporary intrinsics.
Metaphysics of composition
Authors: Brenner Andrew
Published: September 2018

Composition occurs when one or more objects are parts of another object. The metaphysics of composition concerns the nature of composition – i.e. what it is, and how it works. Some of the more important questions philosophers have regarding the metaphysics of composition are the following:

(1) When does composition occur? This is van Inwagen’s ‘Special Composition Question’. Four prominent answers to this question include: (i) objects compose another object when those former objects are in contact; (ii) any two or more objects compose another object; (iii) objects never compose another object; (iv) objects compose another object when the activities of the former objects constitute a life.

(2) Are composite objects identical with their parts? Proponents of ‘composition as identity’ answer ‘yes’ to this question. There are two primary variants of composition as identity, ‘strong’ composition as identity and ‘weak’ composition as identity. The most prominent objection to strong composition as identity is an objection from Leibniz’s Law: composite objects cannot be identical with their parts, since they seem to have properties which their parts do not have.

(3) Is it possible for one object to constitute another object? Here ‘constitution’ is the relation which is alleged to obtain between, for example, a clay statue and the lump of clay from which it is formed. We can distinguish between the thesis that constitution is identity, and the thesis that constitution is not identity. The chief motivation which leads some philosophers to reject the thesis that constitution is not identity is the ‘grounding problem’ for that thesis.

(4) Are there, in addition to composite objects, the ‘forms’ of those objects, and if so, what is the relationship between composite objects and their forms? We can distinguish between (at least) two variants of hylomorphism (the thesis that objects have forms), with the main distinction between the two views being whether or not they regard forms as being among the parts of composite objects.
Testimony
Authors: Gelfert Axel
Published: September 2018

In contemporary epistemology, ‘testimony’ is used as an umbrella term to refer to all those instances where we form a belief, or acquire knowledge, on the basis of what others have told us. Whenever we believe what a trusted friend tells us, learn about world events by reading the newspaper, accept a stranger’s answer to our request for directions, receive a medical diagnosis from our doctor (etc.), we rely on the testimony of others. Testimony, then, is like other epistemic sources – perception, memory, inference, introspection – in that it furnishes us with beliefs we make our own; at the same time, it is unlike them in that it depends on the mental operations of another person (e.g. the eyewitness’s observations, the speaker’s decision to share their knowledge with us, etc.). Much of the philosophical debate about testimony and the epistemic status of testimony-based beliefs stems from this tension. When a speaker makes an assertion and testifies to the effect that p, can we simply assume not only that they have the requisite epistemic authority as to whether or not p, but also that they are not abusing their authority (e.g. by trying to mislead us)? Those who prize intellectual autonomy above all will naturally be reluctant to make this assumption and will demand additional first-hand evidence that the speaker is indeed speaking the truth. At the heart of this dispute are divergent views about the source of epistemic justification of beliefs we have acquired on the basis of testimony. Whereas antireductionists argue that the speaker’s act of testifying itself confers justification on the hearer’s corresponding belief, reductionists demand that a responsible hearer will only accept what they are told if they have at least some nontestimonial evidence supporting the veracity of the testimony. Most philosophers – reductionists and antireductionists alike – agree that testimony is an important source of knowledge and perhaps the only way we can acquire anything like the depth and breadth of knowledge we usually credit ourselves with. Indeed, this is why David Hume famously acknowledged that ‘there is no species of reasoning more common, more useful, and even necessary to human life, than that which is derived from the testimony of men, and the reports of eye-witnesses and spectators’. Much of the epistemological debate about testimony, therefore, does not concern whether we can ever come to know on the basis of what another person tells us, but instead revolves around the ‘how’ and ‘when’ of learning from others.
Epistemic basing relation
Authors: Bondy Patrick
Published: September 2018

The epistemic basing relation is the relation that holds between beliefs and the reasons for which they are held. It is important to understand this relation if we want to have a full account of epistemic justification, because it sometimes happens that people possess good reasons for their beliefs, but fail to hold their beliefs on the basis of their good reasons. In cases like that, it seems, beliefs are not fully justified. In addition to possessing good reasons for our beliefs, we must also hold our beliefs on the basis of our good reasons.

It is tempting to think that the basing relation is some sort of causal relation, something along the following lines: a subject S’s belief that P is based on a reason R if and only if R is at least part of what causes or causally sustains S’s belief. However, this analysis is subject to important and well-known objections, such as the causal deviance problem: sometimes reasons cause beliefs in ways that are too strange or indirect (that is, they deviate from the normal ways that reasons cause beliefs), and in cases like that, a reason will cause a belief but the belief will not be based on the reason.

A main alternative to the causal account is the doxastic account, according to which whether S’s belief that P is based on a reason R depends on whether it seems to S that R is a good reason for believing P. Another alternative is the dispositional account, which roughly holds that S’s belief that P is based on a reason R just in case S is disposed to revise or give up the belief that P if S loses R. A fourth kind of account appeals to what subjects would say in defense of their beliefs if they were asked to give their reasons for holding them.
Intellectual virtue
Authors: Battaly Heather
Published: September 2018

Intellectual virtues are qualities that make one an excellent thinker. The contemporary literature offers two different analyses of intellectual virtues: virtue reliabilism and virtue responsibilism. Virtue reliabilism argues that intellectual virtues are stable dispositions that reliably produce true beliefs. For reliabilists, any stable reliable disposition will do. Hard-wired faculties like reliable vision, acquired skills like the ability to identify bird species, and acquired character traits like open-mindedness all count as intellectual virtues. In contrast, responsibilists restrict intellectual virtues to acquired character traits, like open-mindedness, intellectual humility, and intellectual courage, over which the agent has some control and for which she is to some degree responsible.

What can these analyses of intellectual virtue do for us? Reliabilists and responsibilists have used their respective analyses of intellectual virtue to ground new accounts of knowledge. Though the details of their accounts differ, both camps define knowledge in terms of intellectual virtues. They take intellectual virtues, which are evaluations of agents, to be more theoretically fundamental than knowledge and justification, which are evaluations of beliefs. It is an open question as to whether their accounts of knowledge succeed. But even if they fail, their virtue theoretic approach to knowledge has already had a significant impact on analytic epistemology – it has put active knowledge back on the map. Responsibilists have also begun to apply their analysis of intellectual virtue to classroom education and curricula. They argue that virtues like intellectual humility, intellectual perseverance, and open-mindedness are developed over time, via practice and the imitation of role models. There are several educational projects underway that aim to facilitate the development of these virtues in students.
Epistemology of education
Authors: Siegel Harvey
Published: September 2018

Philosophical thinking about education has always been centrally concerned with epistemological matters, alongside metaphysical, moral and social/political concerns. The most basic question concerns the epistemic aims of education: what are they, and why? Candidates include truth, rational or justified belief, knowledge, understanding and the fostering of intellectual virtues. A second question concerns the roles of testimony and trust in education: should students believe their teachers’ testimonial pronouncements simply because their teachers said so? A third cluster of questions involves indoctrination: what is it? Is it avoidable? Is it always bad, or sometimes educationally appropriate? A fourth involves open-mindedness: is it possible to believe things while still being open-minded about them?
Metaepistemology
Authors: Gerken Mikkel
Published: September 2018

Metaepistemology may be partly characterized as the study of the nature, aims, methods and legitimacy of epistemology. Given such a characterization, most epistemological views and theories have an important metaepistemological aspect or, at least, a number of more or less explicit metaepistemological commitments. Metaepistemology is an important area of philosophy because it exemplifies that philosophy must serve as its own metadiscipline by continuously reflecting critically on its own methods and aims. Even though philosophical methodology may be regarded as a branch of epistemology, epistemology itself is as much in need of metaphilosophical examination as other core disciplines of philosophy. Moreover, metaepistemology is important because it bears significantly on first-order epistemological questions. Indeed, many of the most prominent contemporary debates in philosophy have a distinctly metaepistemological aspect. For example, the debates between rationalists and empiricists do not only concern the nature of cognition of specific areas – perception, arithmetic, logic and so forth – but also general metaepistemological questions about whether it is realistic and desirable that epistemology be naturalized. Likewise, the debates between epistemic internalists and externalists include metaepistemological debates about whether the proper focus for epistemology should be the cognizer’s rational perspective or some more objective property of the cognizer’s epistemic position. Similarly, the debates concerning the relationship between folk epistemology and epistemological theorizing include metaepistemological debates about how empirical data concerning folk epistemology should impact epistemology itself. Each of these debates provides an example of how first-order epistemological issues are deeply connected, and sometimes inseparable from, metaepistemological considerations.
Epistemic infinitism
Authors: Aikin Scott
Published: September 2018

If you believe something rationally, you believe it for a reason. And that reason can’t just be any old reason. You’ve got to rationally hold it as a good reason. In order to do so, you must have another reason. And that reason needs another. And so a regress of reasons ensues. This is a rough-and-ready picture of the epistemic regress problem. Epistemic infinitism is the view that justifying reasons are infinite, and so it is a particular solution to the regress problem. Consider, also, that justification comes in degrees – some beliefs are better justified than others. Moreover, it seems that people can know things better than others. Call this the gradability phenomenon. Epistemic infinitism is the view that for someone to be justified maximally is for that person to have an infinite series of supporting reasons.

Epistemic infinitisms admit of a wide variety. Differences between versions of infinitism arise according to two factors for the view: one dialectical, the other ecumenical. The dialectical factor for epistemic infinitisms is the matter of what philosophical problems or questions they answer. Infinitisms are designed to either provide models for how to solve the epistemic regress problem or address the phenomenon of the gradability of justification and knowledge. Infinitisms will differ depending on which issue they are designed to address, and an infinitism designed to address one issue may not be the same as one designed to address another. The ecumenical factor for epistemic infinitisms is the matter of how consistent the view is with other competing theories about how to address the regress problem and the gradability phenomenon. With the regress problem, infinitism’s main competitor theories are foundationalism, the view that there are basic beliefs for which there is no need for further reason, and coherentism, the view that justifying reasons come in large mutually supporting packages. For the most part, infinitism is taken to be a form of noncoherentist antifoundationalism about justification, because the infinitist holds that reasons must be infinitely long chains of nonrepeating reasons. However, there are versions of infinitism consistent with both foundationalism and coherentism. Infinitism faces a variety of challenges, and two of particular importance are whether infinitism is actually a form of scepticism and whether infinitism is a complete theory of justification.
Climate change justice
Authors: Boran Idil , Katz Corey
Published: September 2018

Climate change justice is a branch of philosophical inquiry concerned with fair terms of cooperation for addressing global climate change. Global climate change refers to the adverse effects of rising average global temperature on meteorological, environmental, and societal systems due to human activities. Independent observations show a rising trend in average global surface temperature since 1880, with most of the relevant global warming occurring since the 1980s. These climatic changes are the outcome of heightened concentrations of greenhouse gases (GHGs) – e.g., carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide – in the atmosphere. These gases are produced by a wide range of human activities, from the burning of fossil fuels for energy at both the industrial and the consumer level to overall land use.

The fundamental relation between concentrations of GHGs in the atmosphere and global warming is well understood. And yet, achieving effective and fair international coordination to respond to the problem of global climate change has been far more challenging than expected. One of the reasons for this is that any attempt to address global climate change raises complex problems of justice. First, those communities that are most vulnerable to the risks and harms of climate change have contributed the least to the problem. Second, economic capacity to address the problem is not distributed equally around the globe. Third, political communities and generations have clashing interest claims in relation to the burdens of addressing climate change. These circumstances raise pressing questions about how to coordinate global and intergenerational cooperation.

The debate over climate change justice has been primarily concerned with what counts as a just allocation of burdens and benefits in the global response to the problem of climate change. To a large extent, philosophical interest in these questions developed against the backdrop of the international effort to reach a global agreement. A prominent discussion within this debate is concerned with the allocation of duties and rights with regard to climate action. Broadly speaking, there are two distinct categories of climate change action. One is mitigation, which refers to efforts to reduce GHG emissions; the other is adaptation and refers to a wide range of actions to help adjust social systems to a changing climate. Much of the philosophical debate has revolved around the allocation of mitigation duties. More recently, questions of justice for adaptation along with alternative perspectives that challenge the allocative framework have been attracting interest.