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Function Ascription Practices in Circuit Interventions
Get PDFNovel tools have allowed researchers to intervene into circuits at the mesoscale. The results of these interventions are often explained by appeal to functions. How are functions ascribed to circuit parts experimentally? I identify two kinds of function ascription practices in circuit interventions. Analysis of these practices shows us that function ascriptions are challenging due to a lack of interventive control and insufficient constraints on the class of candidate functions to discriminate in practice. One kind of function ascription practice—subtractive analysis—fares better at addressing these challenges
Beyond Dichotomies: Embracing an Integrated Approach to Social Relationships
Get PDFThis paper challenges a false dichotomy between subjectivity and objectivity in understanding the nature of human social relationships. I argue that social relationships are composed of both subjective and objective components, which are inherently interdependent. They are influenced by biological properties and subject to evolutionary processes, yet they cannot be reduced to them. I use emerging research on kinship as an example that showcases the appeal of this integrated approach. This paper takes a step in the direction of a unified account of sociality, contributing to a more comprehensive understanding of human social behavior
Pathological Complexity and the Function of Consciousness in Nature: Part I
Get PDFThis essay functions as the introduction to a two-part special issue on Walter Veit’s recent monograph A Philosophy for the Science of Animal Consciousness (Routledge, 2023). Veit introduces the purpose of this special issue and offers a summary of the first batch of commentaries
The Mix Matters: Exploring the Interplay Between Epistemic and Zetetic Norms in Scientific Disagreement
Get PDFWhat is the rational response to a scientific disagreement? Many epistemologists argue that disagreement with an epistemic peer should generally lead to conciliation by lowering confidence in the disputed belief or even suspending judgment altogether. Although this conciliatory approach is widely regarded as a norm of individual rationality, its value in the context of collective scientific inquiry is less clear. Some have even raised concerns that conciliating in scientific disagreements may slow progress or reduce the efficiency of inquiry. In this paper, we introduce a novel agent-based model that captures key aspects of scientific disagreement by incorporating both epistemic norms, which govern belief revision, and zetetic norms, which guide how scientists pursue inquiry. Our results indicate that the effects of conciliating in the face of disagreement---whether detrimental or beneficial---depend on the zetetic norms that scientists follow. When they focus on exploiting the hypothesis that they believe is most likely to succeed, remaining steadfast is more effective. However, with exploratory scientists, conciliation does not negatively affect group performance. These findings highlight the critical role of zetetic norms in determining the rational response to disagreement in scientific practice
From Hamilton-Jacobi to Bohm: Why the Wave Function Isn't Just Another Action
Get PDFThis paper examines the physical meaning of the wave function in Bohmian mechanics (BM), addressing the debate between causal and nomological interpretations. While BM postulates particles with definite trajectories guided by the wave function, the ontological status of the wave function itself remains contested. Critics of the causal interpretation argue that the wave function's high-dimensionality and lack of back-reaction disqualify it as a physical entity. Proponents of the nomological interpretation, drawing parallels to the classical Hamiltonian, propose that the wave function is a "law-like" entity. However, this view faces challenges, including reliance on speculative quantum gravity frameworks (e.g., the Wheeler-DeWitt equation) and conceptual ambiguities about the nature of "nomological entities". By systematically comparing BM to Hamilton-Jacobi theory, this paper highlights disanalogies between the wave function and the classical action function. These differences, particularly the wave function's dynamical necessity and irreducibility, support a sui generis interpretation, where the wave function represents a novel ontological category unique to quantum theory. The paper concludes that the wave function's role in BM resists classical analogies, demanding a metaphysical framework that accommodates its non-local, high-dimensional, and dynamically irreducible nature
Reconfiguration, Not Reinvention: Pseudo-Consciousness and Simulated Presence Literacy in AI Ethics
Get PDFThis article claims that the salient ethical risk of generative AI is not machine consciousness but the social efficacy of its simulation---what we call pseudo-consciousness. Read through Heidegger’s Gestell, Jonas’s anticipatory responsibility, and Floridi’s information ethics, we relocate appraisal from putative inner states to interactional effects in the infosphere. We formalize a two-part mechanism/uptake frame: functional introspection (FI)---first-person, reason-giving, self-repair, and local cross-turn stability---and ethical illusion (EI)---shifts in trust, respect, compliance, and moral ratings that attenuate on disclosure. Building on this, we propose simulated presence literacy (SPL) as a domain-specific facet of AI literacy that teaches users to perceive FI, appraise EI, and respond with counter-uptake practices. We then advance an ethics of appearance in design: four levers (semio-transparency, attenuation of reciprocity illusion, calibrated trust, and constraints on first-person density), two KPIs (FI Score, EI Index), a minimal 2x2 to test mechanism -> uptake and disclosure attenuation, and a five-step audit loop for governance. The result is a humanistic response---reconfiguration, not reinvention---that keeps fluency from passing for presence by making simulation legible, bounded, and accountable, with heightened precautions for vulnerable populations. In humanities research, teaching, and curation, treating LLMs as semantic artifacts, rather than as subjects, preserves interpretive agency while retaining the benefits of fluent assistance
Metahistorical reasoning and philosophical disagreement: Revisiting the selective realism debate about the caloric episode
Get PDFBy exploring a prominent controversy in the recent history of the philosophy of science, I vindicate the role of metahistorical reasoning when historical case studies are used as evidence to support conflicting philosophical claims. I draw upon the selective realism debate concerning the caloric theory of heat as a case study, arguing that basic criteria of historical adequacy are sufficiently robust to adjudicate this disagreement. On these grounds, I rebut the view that the dispute about caloric cannot be resolved in historical terms. This position is based upon historical pluralism —i.e., the argument that historical evidence cannot settle philosophical disagreements, partially because historiographical standards are too weak for adjudication. After characterizing historical pluralism and considering its rationale in diagnosing the selective realism debate about caloric, I show how this philosophical conflict is resolved in terms of standards for assessing the quality of the competing reconstructions of Joseph Black’s and Antoine Lavoisier’s epistemic pronouncements about the materiality of heat
AIMED: Towards a Philosophically Legitimated AI-assisted Iterative Method for Ethical Deliberation
Get PDFThis paper addresses the accelerating crisis of ethical governance in an age of complex socio-technical change, particularly in the domain of Artificial Intelligence. It poses a foundational philosophical question: when, if ever, is AI assistance in ethical deliberation legitimate? An answer is developed through three theses: i) the Ethical No-Free-Lunch (ENFL) principle, which establishes the indispensability of human normative intervention and accountability; ii) the Discovery/Justification Separation inspired by Reichenbach's work, which restricts AI use to the exploratory "context of discovery"; iii) the Algorithmic Mediated Control Framework (AMCF), which mandates that only scrutable, human-vetted deterministic algorithms generated with AI assistance, and not the AI itself, be entrusted with critical societal processes. From these theses, five legitimacy criteria for AI-assisted ethical deliberation are derived. Finally, the paper proposes the "AI-assisted Iterative Method for Ethical Deliberation" (AIMED), an actionable multi-stage workflow that fulfills the exposed criteria for ethical AI-assisted deliberation. This method integrates digital literature analysis, structured human–AI dialogue, human-only verification, and continuous feedback. The paper explicitly addresses several potential objections. It is shown how the AIMED framework aligns with and provides a concrete implementation for major international regulatory guidelines, such as the EU AI Act and the NIST AI Risk Management Framework. By situating the AIMED within traditions of proceduralism, the governance of inductive risk, and human–AI collaboration, the paper argues that this framework offers a philosophically justified, practically implementable model of AI-assisted ethical governance, that can be seen as an actionable instance of Digital Humanism
Representational Interference and the Limits of Abstract Representation
Get PDFThis paper introduces the Representational Uncertainty Principle (RUP) as a structural account of the limits of representational precision. We argue that as representations become more narrowly defined—by fixing more internal structure—they constrain the integration of perceptual and contextual cues. This often suppresses representational flexibility: the capacity to draw on multiple situational cues to stabilize meaning. When this flexibility is reduced, representational diffraction becomes more prominent: a structural phenomenon in which aspects of a situation are subsumed under a representation that deviates from the expected or standard framing, resulting in ambiguity or tension. Drawing on a structural analogy with quantum mechanics, we treat interference and diffraction as complementary manifestations of how representational content is formed. This framework explains why overly precise representations often fail in contexts that demand sensitivity to subtle variations. We support this account through examples of conceptual ambiguity and apparent contradiction, and by developing a framework that distinguishes between the structuring role of the representational vehicle and the dynamic process of integration that gives rise to content. The RUP thus highlights a structural tension between abstraction, context sensitivity, and the need for orientation within experience