What Myths Reveal About How Humans Think: a Cognitive
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Outline of Michael Tomasello, a Natural History of Human Morality (Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, 2016)
Outline of Michael Tomasello, A Natural History of Human Morality (Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, 2016). John Protevi LSU HNRS 2030.2: “Evolution and Biology of Morality” I Chapter 1: The Interdependence Hypothesis A) Parallels of natural and moral cooperation 1) Natural cooperation (a) Altruistic helping (b) Mutualist collaboration 2) Human morality (a) Parallel human morality types: (i) Altruistic helping via compassion, concern, benevolence: ethic of the good / sympathy (ii) Mutualist collaboration via fairness: ethic of right / justice (b) Simplicity vs complexity (i) Sympathetic altruism is simpler and more basic: (i) Pure cooperation (ii) Proximate mechanisms: based in mammalian parental care / kin selection (ii) Fair collaboration is more complex: interactions of multiple individuals w/ different interests (i) “cooperativization of competition” (ii) Proximate mechanisms: moral emotions / judgments 1. Deservingness 2. Punishment: feelings of resentment / indignation toWard Wrong-doers 3. Accountability: judgments of responsibility, obligation, etc B) Goal of the book: evolutionary account of emergence of human morality of sympathy and fairness 1) Morality is “form of cooperation” (a) Emerging via human adaptation to neW social forms required by neW ecological / economic needs (b) Bringing With it “species-unique proximate mechanisms” or psychological processes (i) cognition (ii) social interaction (iii) self-regulation 2) Based on these assumptions, tWo goals: (a) Specify hoW human cooperation differs from other primates -
Perceptual Variation and Structuralism
NOUSˆ 54:2 (2020) 290–326 doi: 10.1111/nous.12245 Perceptual Variation and Structuralism JOHN MORRISON Barnard College, Columbia University Abstract I use an old challenge to motivate a new view. The old challenge is due to variation in our perceptions of secondary qualities. The challenge is to say whose percep- tions are accurate. The new view is about how we manage to perceive secondary qualities, and thus manage to perceive them accurately or inaccurately. I call it perceptual structuralism. I first introduce the challenge and point out drawbacks with traditional responses. I spend the rest of the paper motivating and defending a structuralist response. While I focus on color, both the challenge and the view generalize to the other secondary qualities. 1. Perceptual Variation Our perceptual experiences tell us that lemons are yellow and sour. It’s natural to infer that lemons really are yellow and sour. But perceptions vary, even among ordinary observers. Some perceive lemons as slightly greener and sweeter. This gives rise to a challenge that forces us to rethink the nature of perception and the objectivity of what we perceive. For concreteness, I’ll focus on the perceptions of two ordinary observers, Miriam and Aaron. I’ll also focus on their perceptions of a particular lemon’s color. These restrictions will make the challenge easier to understand and the responses easier to compare. But the challenge and responses are perfectly general. Toward the end of the paper I’ll return to sourness and the other secondary qualities. When Miriam and Aaron look at the same lemon, their perceptions differ. -
The Meanings of Structuralism : Considerations on Structures and Gestalten, with Particular Attention to the Masks of Levi-Strauss
The meanings of structuralism : considerations on structures and Gestalten, with particular attention to the masks of Levi-Strauss Sonesson, Göran Published in: Segni e comprensione 2012 Link to publication Citation for published version (APA): Sonesson, G. (2012). The meanings of structuralism : considerations on structures and Gestalten, with particular attention to the masks of Levi-Strauss. Segni e comprensione, XXVI(78), 84-101. Total number of authors: 1 General rights Unless other specific re-use rights are stated the following general rights apply: Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. • Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal Read more about Creative commons licenses: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. LUND UNIVERSITY PO Box 117 221 00 Lund +46 46-222 00 00 International RIVISTA TELEMATICA QUADRIMESTRALE - ANNO XXVI NUOVA SERIE - N. 78 – SETTEMBRE-DICEMBRE 2012 1 This Review is submitted to international peer review Create PDF files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer (http://www.novapdf.com) Segni e comprensione International Pubblicazione promossa nel 1987 dal Dipartimento di Filosofia e Scienze sociali dell’Università degli Studi di Lecce, oggi Università del Salento, con la collaborazione del “Centro Italiano di Ricerche fenomenologiche” con sede in Roma, diretto da Angela Ales Bello. -
Biogenetic Structuralism'
'BIOGE~TIC STRUCTURALISM'STRUCTURALISM" AND THE LOCATION OF STRUCTURES*STRUCTURES~'< In the heyday of 'high' structuralism it was sometimes argued, explicitly or implicitly, that the ultimate 'explanation' of cultural structures was to be found in the properties of 'the human mind'. This argument, it was perhaps felt, shifted the problem of explanation to the realm 'of philosophr, which many anthropologists considered outsiqe their concern. It was not surprising, therefore, that $ceptics ofaof, a more materialist persuasionpersuas'ion would critiofze structuralist analysis for being an essentially idea11stormentalistidealJtst or mentalist undertaking.undertakirig. Even so, the analytical value, of the notion of structures (in the Levi-Straussian sense,'hasbeen increasingly recognized, even by anthro pologists of a materialistmateria~ist stance (e.g. in the 'structural marx.i;sm'marx,j;sm' of MauriceNaurice Godelier (1973) and JonathanJonatl1an Friedman (1974),(1974)1 to the extent that nowadays only the most ardent 'vul¢ar'vul$ar materialists' feel they can do without it. This devefopment has not, however, done away with the problem of t~e locatiori of structures; the problem has only been push~d into the background, because other problems were.were felt: by most to be of more immediate concern. , .' ~ptwhether~f.lt'whether or not we have been bothered by the location problelflproblelf1 we should all welcome the pioneering work of two auth'prl;j,auth'prl;l, Charles Laughlin, an anthropologist, and Eugene d' Aqui!i, ~ psych~atrist, in which they lay the foundations " of aneW structural approach, 'biogenetic structuralism'. In the introduction to the book they state: !~ f f ., Th~majorTh~rnajor onttllbgical-:assumptiononttJlbgical-:assumption upon which biogenetic str\.ibturalismstr~bturalism is founded is that there exists no reality intervening between the central nervous system and the environment. -
Structuralism 1. the Nature of Meaning Or Understanding
Structuralism 1. The nature of meaning or understanding. A. The role of structure as the system of relationships Something can only be understood (i.e., a meaning can be constructed) within a certain system of relationships (or structure). For example, a word which is a linguistic sign (something that stands for something else) can only be understood within a certain conventional system of signs, which is language, and not by itself (cf. the word / sound and “shark” in English and Arabic). A particular relationship within a شرق combination society (e.g., between a male offspring and his maternal uncle) can only be understood in the context of the whole system of kinship (e.g., matrilineal or patrilineal). Structuralism holds that, according to the human way of understanding things, particular elements have no absolute meaning or value: their meaning or value is relative to other elements. Everything makes sense only in relation to something else. An element cannot be perceived by itself. In order to understand a particular element we need to study the whole system of relationships or structure (this approach is also exactly the same as Malinowski’s: one cannot understand particular elements of culture out of the context of that culture). A particular element can only be studied as part of a greater structure. In fact, the only thing that can be studied is not particular elements or objects but relationships within a system. Our human world, so to speak, is made up of relationships, which make up permanent structures of the human mind. B. The role of oppositions / pairs of binary oppositions Structuralism holds that understanding can only happen if clearly defined or “significant” (= essential) differences are present which are called oppositions (or binary oppositions since they come in pairs). -
Putting Structuralism Back Into Structural Inequality Anders Walker Saint Louis University School of Law
Saint Louis University School of Law Scholarship Commons All Faculty Scholarship 2019 Freedom and Prison: Putting Structuralism Back into Structural Inequality Anders Walker Saint Louis University School of Law Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.law.slu.edu/faculty Part of the Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons, Criminal Law Commons, Criminal Procedure Commons, and the Criminology and Criminal Justice Commons Recommended Citation Walker, Anders, Freedom and Prison: Putting Structuralism Back into Structural Inequality (January 4, 2019). University of Louisville Law Review, Vol. 49, No. 267, 2019. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in All Faculty Scholarship by an authorized administrator of Scholarship Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. FREEDOM AND PRISON: PUTTING STRUCTURALISM BACK INTO STRUCTURAL INEQUALITY Anders Walker* ABSTRACT Critics of structural racism frequently miss structuralism as a field of historical inquiry. This essay reviews the rise of structuralism as a mode of historical analysis and applies it to the mass incarceration debate in the United States, arguing that it enriches the work of prevailing scholars in the field. I. INTRODUCTION Structuralism has become a prominent frame for discussions of race and inequality in the United States, part of a larger trend that began in the wake of Barack Obama’s presidential victory in 2008. This victory was a moment -
On Program and Abstracts
INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY & MASARYK UNIVERSITY, BRNO, CZECH REPUBLIC TENTH ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY TIME AND MYTH: THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL PROGRAM AND ABSTRACTS May 26-28, 2016 Masaryk University Brno, Czech Republic Conference Venue: Filozofická Fakulta Masarykovy University Arne Nováka 1, 60200 Brno PROGRAM THURSDAY, MAY 26 08:30 – 09:00 PARTICIPANTS REGISTRATION 09:00 – 09:30 OPENING ADDRESSES VÁCLAV BLAŽEK Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic MICHAEL WITZEL Harvard University, USA; IACM THURSDAY MORNING SESSION: MYTHOLOGY OF TIME AND CALENDAR CHAIR: VÁCLAV BLAŽEK 09:30 –10:00 YURI BEREZKIN Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography & European University, St. Petersburg, Russia OLD WOMAN OF THE WINTER AND OTHER STORIES: NEOLITHIC SURVIVALS? 10:00 – 10:30 WIM VAN BINSBERGEN African Studies Centre, Leiden, the Netherlands 'FORTUNATELY HE HAD STEPPED ASIDE JUST IN TIME' 10:30 – 11:00 LOUISE MILNE University of Edinburgh, UK THE TIME OF THE DREAM IN MYTHIC THOUGHT AND CULTURE 11:00 – 11:30 Coffee Break 11:30 – 12:00 GÖSTA GABRIEL Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Germany THE RHYTHM OF HISTORY – APPROACHING THE TEMPORAL CONCEPT OF THE MYTHO-HISTORIOGRAPHIC SUMERIAN KING LIST 2 12:00 – 12:30 VLADIMIR V. EMELIANOV St. Petersburg State University, Russia CULTIC CALENDAR AND PSYCHOLOGY OF TIME: ELEMENTS OF COMMON SEMANTICS IN EXPLANATORY AND ASTROLOGICAL TEXTS OF ANCIENT MESOPOTAMIA 12:30 – 13:00 ATTILA MÁTÉFFY Hacettepe University, Ankara, Turkey & Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, -
Anthropology's Disenchantment with the Cognitive Revolution
Topics in Cognitive Science 4 (2012) 354–361 Copyright Ó 2012 Cognitive Science Society, Inc. All rights reserved. ISSN: 1756-8757 print / 1756-8765 online DOI: 10.1111/j.1756-8765.2012.01199.x Anthropology’s Disenchantment With the Cognitive Revolution1 Richard A. Shweder Department of Comparative Human Development, University of Chicago Received 25 June 2011; received in revised form 3 November 2011; accepted 28 November 2011 Abstract Beller, Bender, and Medin should be congratulated for their generous attempt at expressive aca- demic therapy for troubled interdisciplinary relationships. In this essay, I suggest that a negative answer to the central question (‘‘Should anthropology be part of cognitive science?’’) is not necessar- ily distressing, that in retrospect the breakup seems fairly predictable, and that disenchantment with the cognitive revolution is nothing new. Keywords: Cognitive revolution; Behaviorism; Anthropology; Jerome Bruner; Roy D’Andrade; Clifford Geertz; Roger Shepard Some of the leaders of the cognitive revolution of the late 1950s and 1960s began parting from the cause almost as soon as it triumphed. Jerome Bruner, for example, who always enjoyed writing essays for both the left hand and the right hand, turned to hermeneutics, the study of law, and the interpretation of narratives (see Bruner, 1979, 1990). Even in the early days of the rebellion Bruner was attentive to language pragmatics, which may be one reason he named his 1960s big tent interdisciplinary center at Harvard University the ‘‘Center for Cognitive Studies’’ and not the ‘‘Center for Cognitive Science.’’ Bruner had just as much interest in the humanistic writings of E. H. Gombrich, Nelson Goodman, and Clifford Ge- ertz as in the latest claims about basic ⁄fundamental⁄universal cognitive processes coming out of experimental labs situated in Cambridge, London, or Geneva. -
Empathy and Altruism. the Hypothesis of Somasia
A Clinical Perspective on “Theory of Mind”, Empathy and Altruism The Hypothesis of Somasia Jean-Michel Le Bot PhD, University Rennes 2, Rennes doi: 10.7358/rela-2014-001-lebo [email protected] ABSTRACT The article starts by recalling the results of recent experiments that have revealed that, to a certain extent, the “ability to simultaneously distinguish between different possible perspec- tives on the same situation” (Decety and Lamm 2007) exists in chimpanzees. It then describes a case study of spatial and temporal disorientation in a young man following a cerebral lesion in order to introduce the hypothesis that this ability is based on a specific process of somasia. By permitting self-other awareness, this process also provides subjects with anchor points in time and space from which they can perform the mental decentring that enables them to adopt various perspectives. This process seems to be shared by humans and certain animal species and appears to be subdivided into the processing of the identity of experienced situa- tions, on the one hand, and of their unity on the other. The article concludes with a critique of overly reflexive and “representational” conceptions of theory of mind which do not distin- guish adequately between the ability to “theorise” about the mental states of others and the self-other awareness ability (which is automatic and non-reflexive). Keywords: Social cognition, theory of mind, empathy, altruism, neuropsychology, somasia, humans, animals, mental states, decentring. 1. INTRODUCTION In their seminal paper published in 1978, Premack and Woodruff stated that “an individual has a theory of mind [ToM] if he imputes mental states to himself and others” (Premack and Woodruff 1978). -
Tribal Social Instincts and the Cultural Evolution of Institutions to Solve Collective Action Problems
UC Riverside Cliodynamics Title Tribal Social Instincts and the Cultural Evolution of Institutions to Solve Collective Action Problems Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/981121t8 Journal Cliodynamics, 3(1) Authors Richerson, Peter Henrich, Joe Publication Date 2012 DOI 10.21237/C7clio3112453 Peer reviewed eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California Cliodynamics: the Journal of Theoretical and Mathematical History Tribal Social Instincts and the Cultural Evolution of Institutions to Solve Collective Action Problems Peter Richerson University of California-Davis Joseph Henrich University of British Columbia Human social life is uniquely complex and diverse. Much of that complexity and diversity arises from culturally transmitted ideas, values and skills that underpin the operation of social norms and institutions that structure our social life. Considerable theoretical and empirical work has been devoted to the role of cultural evolutionary processes in the evolution of social norms and institutions. The most persistent controversy has been over the role of cultural group selection and gene- culture coevolution in early human populations during Pleistocene. We argue that cultural group selection and related cultural evolutionary processes had an important role in shaping the innate components of our social psychology. By the Upper Paleolithic humans seem to have lived in societies structured by institutions, as do modern populations living in small-scale societies. The most ambitious attempts to test these ideas have been the use of experimental games in field settings to document human similarities and differences on theoretically interesting dimensions. These studies have documented a huge range of behavior across populations, although no societies so far examined follow the expectations of selfish rationality. -
Michael Tomasello [March, 2020]
CURRICULUM VITAE MICHAEL TOMASELLO [MARCH, 2020] Department of Psychology & Neuroscience Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology Duke University; Durham, NC; 27708; USA Deutscher Platz 6; D-04103 Leipzig, GERMANY E-MAIL: [email protected] E-MAIL: [email protected] EDUCATION: DUKE UNIVERSITY B.A. Psychology, 1972 UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA Ph.D. Experimental Psychology, 1980 UNIVERSITY OF LEIPZIG Doctorate, honoris causa, 2016 EMPLOYMENT: 1980 - 1998 Assistant-Associate-Full Professor of Psychology; Adjunct Professor of Anthropology, EMORY UNIVERSITY 1982 - 1998 Affiliate Scientist, Psychobiology, YERKES PRIMATE CENTER 1998 - 2018 Co-Director, MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR EVOLUTIONARY ANTHROPOLOGY 1999 - 2018 Honorary Professor, Dept of Psychology, University of Leipzig 2001 - 2018 Co-Director, WOLFGANG KÖHLER PRIMATE RESEARCH CENTER 2016 - James Bonk Professor of Psychology & Neuroscience, DUKE UNIVERSITY - Director of Developmental Psychology Program - Secondary App’ts: Philosophy, Evol. Anthropology, Linguistics 2016 - Faculty of Center for Developmental Science, UNC AD HOC: 1987 - 1988 Visiting Scholar, HARVARD UNIVERSITY 1994 (summer) Instructor, INTERNATIONAL COGNITIVE SCIENCE INSTITUTE 1994 (summer) Visiting Fellow, BRITISH PSYCHOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1995 (spring) Visiting Professor, UNIVERSITY OF ROME 1996 (spring) Visiting Professor, THE BRITISH ACADEMY 1998 (spring) Visiting Scholar, MPI FOR PSYCHOLINGUISTICS 1999 (summer) Instructor, INTERNATIONAL COGNITIVE SCIENCE INSTITUTE 2001 (winter) Instructor, LOT (DUTCH GRADUATE -
Ethnomusicology a Very Short Introduction
ETHNOMUSICOLOGY A VERY SHORT INTRODUCTION Thimoty Rice Sumário Chapter 1 – Defining ethnomusicology...........................................................................................4 Ethnos..........................................................................................................................................5 Mousikē.......................................................................................................................................5 Logos...........................................................................................................................................7 Chapter 2 A bit of history.................................................................................................................9 Ancient and medieval precursors................................................................................................9 Exploration and enlightenment.................................................................................................10 Nationalism, musical folklore, and ethnology..........................................................................10 Early ethnomusicology.............................................................................................................13 “Mature” ethnomusicology.......................................................................................................15 Chapter 3........................................................................................................................................17 Conducting