All of metaethical positions today can be replaced by a universal architecture of moral philosophy, all but one: moral realism. Here, I use the term “metaethics” to refer to any theory of ethics ...concerning the groundwork of ethics, on the one hand, and the inquiry of the use of philosophical words, concepts or methods on the other. In this article, I will present my hypothesis that in moral philosophy, we do not need any specialized metaethics at all. Metaethics as a discipline of philosophy is only required by the work of moral realists, who try to show us a realm of values and norms that exist (per se) naturally, non-naturally or supernaturally. How can they know? The effort of metaethical realists cannot be proven either in ontology or in the philosophy of language or in cognitive science or in any meta-science that works
to ethics, because even in every additional discipline, we have to accept the presupposition of a validity of judgments. So, let us try it the other way around; we have to find a way to found ethics by following its structures, and that means, based on David Velleman’s concepts: a) We have to search for a ubiquitous point of ethical theory in its foundation – here, no kind of value or norm can be found that is not based on a universal formal structure of normativity. b) We have to start an empirical inquiry to collect norms and values in actual use. MFT, moral psychology and moral sociology are in charge here. The combination of such an abstract groundwork with mere empirical study has to be legitimized again. Hence, I am going to try to sum up the main ideas of such a project to show the relevance of a new architecture of moral philosophy today. There is a line of reasoning that addresses the possibility of a transcendental critique in practical philosophy; therefore, it has to look into the different notions of “intuition” in moral methods like it was used by Sidgwick (Rashdall, Green, Ross, Brentano, McTaggart) and Moore on the one hand and Brentano and Bergson on the other. In my view, there is a way to combine these perspectives using the two-level-model of Hare, Singer, Greene, where “intuition” is used to categorize habits and customs of the common sense morality in general while a critical reflection uses act-utilitarian calculus to provide a universal decision – in the sense of “concrete reason” – for any possible actor in a singular situation (Hegel, Peirce, Bloch etc.). The change between these levels may be explained by means of a pragmatistic kind of continuum of research with an ideal summum bonum in the long run and a concept of common sense morality as can be found in every group or society.
Inspired by the two-parameter Macdonald's deformation of the formulae for non simply laced simple Lie algebras, we propose a two-fold refinement of the partition function of the corresponding ...Chern-Simons theory on S3. It is based on a two-fold refinement of the Kac-Peterson formula for the volume of the fundamental domain of the coroot lattice of non simply laced Lie algebras. We further derive explicit integral representations of the two-fold refined Chern-Simons partition functions. We also present the corresponding generalized universal-like expressions for them. With these formulae in hand, one can try to investigate a possible duality of the corresponding Chern-Simons theories with hypothetical two-fold refined topological string theories.
The classical binary hypothesis testing problem is revisited. We notice that when one of the hypotheses is composite, there is an inherent difficulty in defining an optimality criterion that is both ...informative and well-justified. For testing in the simple normal location problem (that is, testing for the mean of multivariate Gaussians), we overcome the difficulty as follows. In this problem there exists a natural "hardness" order between parameters as for different parameters the error-probabilities curves (when the parameter is known) are either identical, or one dominates the other. We can thus define minimax performance as the worst-case among parameters which are below some hardness level. Fortunately, there exists a universal minimax test, in the sense that it is minimax for all hardness levels simultaneously. Under this criterion we also find the optimal test for composite hypothesis testing with training data. THIS criterion extends to the wide class of local asymptotic normal models, in an asymptotic sense where the approximation of the error probabilities is additive. Since we have the asymptotically optimal tests for composite hypothesis testing with and without training data, we quantify the loss of universality and gain of training data for these models.
We investigate the critical behavior of a stochastic lattice model describing the hopping of two species that undergo reactions B→A and A+B→2B. We simulate the model defined on a 3D lattice and ...determine the threshold of the absorbing phase transition to the state at which species B is extinct. Using steady state and short-time dynamics simulations, we calculate the order parameter, order parameter fluctuations, correlation length and their critical exponents. We focus in the case of species A diffusing much faster than species B. We did not find signatures of a first-order transition that has been conjectured in the literature. We report a continuous transition with the perpendicular correlation exponent ν⊥≈0.61(6), in agreement with ν⊥=2∕D. Also, for this diffusion regime, we estimate β∕ν⊥=1.48, very close to the ϵ expansion prediction β∕ν⊥=D−ε∕82 (ε=4−D) for the regime of equally diffusing particles.
•Stationary and dynamic critical behavior of a diffusive epidemic process is investigated.•The absorbing state phase transition in a 3D lattice is explored in the case of fast diffusion of healthy individuals.•The dynamic transition to the absorbing state with no sick individuals is shown to be continuous.•The critical exponents are compared with those of related universality classes.
In this article, we prove a duality relation between coalescence times and exit points in last-passage percolation models with exponential weights. As a consequence, we get lower bounds for ...coalescence times, with scaling exponent 3/2, and we relate its distribution with variational problems involving the Brownian motion process and the Airy₂ process. The proof relies on the relation between Busemann functions and the Burke property for stationary versions of the last-passage percolation model with boundary.
Dystopian visions of global pandemics, political crises, and human suffering abound, from fictitious television shows to the ongoing ravages of COVID-19. When we witness isolated instances of ...suffering and collective struggle, and identify their relationship to large-scale social crises, we are unveiling pieces of the totality. Things which might otherwise be portrayed as a local problem are instead viewed as a part of a larger social system. The Turkish Netflix series Sıcak Kafa (English title: Hot Skull) offers a story of pandemic lockdowns, rebellion, love, and subjectivity, touching upon important issues of radical political theory and action. This article connects key moments in Hot Skull to several important Marxist and psychoanalytic concepts, showing how the collective struggles in this Netflix series can help us identify concrete instances and attempts at overcoming violence in the modern world-system. By comparing the events of Hot Skull to our current predicament of living through a deadly pandemic, this article reaches an important conclusion: Our ability to radically change our circumstances through chance encounters with love and political rebellion remains real, potent alternatives to living in a persistent state of isolation and despair.
The international PEN collaboration aims to obtain the branching ratio for the pion electronic decay π+→e+νe(γ), aka πe2, to a relative precision of 5×10−4 or better. The PEN apparatus comprises a ...number of detection systems, all contributing vital information to the PEN event reconstruction. This paper discusses the design, performance, and Monte Carlo simulation of the mini time projection chamber (mTPC) used for pion, muon, and positron beam particle tracking. We also review the use of the extracted trajectory coordinates in the analysis, in particular in constructing observables critical for discriminating background processes, and in maximizing the fiducial volume of the target in which decay event vertices can be accepted for branching ratio extraction without introducing bias.
Spiking neural P systems with structural plasticity Cabarle, Francis George C.; Adorna, Henry N.; Pérez-Jiménez, Mario J. ...
Neural computing & applications,
11/2015, Volume:
26, Issue:
8
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
Spiking neural P (SNP) systems are a class of parallel, distributed, and nondeterministic computing models inspired by the spiking of biological neurons. In this work, the biological feature known as ...structural plasticity is introduced in the framework of SNP systems. Structural plasticity refers to synapse creation and deletion, thus changing the synapse graph. The “programming” therefore of a brain-like model, the SNP system with structural plasticity (SNPSP system), is based on how neurons connect to each other. SNPSP systems are also a partial answer to an open question on SNP systems with dynamism only for synapses. For both the accepting and generative modes, we prove that SNPSP systems are universal. Modifying SNPSP systems semantics, we introduce the spike saving mode and prove that universality is maintained. In saving mode, however, a deadlock state can arise, and we prove that reaching such a state is undecidable. Lastly, we provide one technique in order to use structural plasticity to solve a hard problem: a constant time, nondeterministic, and semi-uniform solution to the
NP
-complete problem Subset Sum.
Translating poetry is difficult, and in a language so far removed from English as Japanese, the complications are manifold: rhyme creates no impact, and there are no inherent stresses out of which to ...create Western-style rhythms. Shakespeare's poetic drama, then, presents serious obstacles to translation. Through an investigation of the different approaches to translating Shakespeare's plays into Japanese, and what it means to do so, this article reconsiders the presence of Shakespeare's works in Japan to suggest that foreignness may be a more crucial part of the popularity of the dramas than universality.
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