26 results
Are Thought Experiments Just What You Thought?
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Canadian Journal of Philosophy / Volume 26 / Issue 3 / September 1996
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2020, pp. 333-366
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Whatever the original intent, the introduction of the term ‘thought experiment’ has proved to be one of the great public relations coups of science writing. For generations of readers of scientific literature, the term has planted the seed of hope that the fragment of text they have just read is more than mundane. Because it was a thought experiment, does it not tap into that infallible font of all wisdom in empiricist science, the experiment? And because it was conducted in thought, does it not miraculously escape the need for the elaborate laboratories and bloated budgets of experimental science?
These questions in effect pose the epistemological problem of thought experiments in the sciences:
Thought experiments are supposed to give us information about our physical world. From where can this information come?
One enticing response to the problem is to imagine that thought experiments draw from some special source of knowledge of the world that transcends our ordinary epistemic resources.
12 - Neural Predictors of Developmental Dyslexia
- from Part II - Cross-Linguistic Perspectives on Developmental Dyslexia
- Edited by Ludo Verhoeven, Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen, Charles Perfetti, University of Pittsburgh, Kenneth Pugh, Yale University, Connecticut
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- Book:
- Developmental Dyslexia across Languages and Writing Systems
- Published online:
- 27 September 2019
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- 03 October 2019, pp 253-276
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Summary
Dyslexia, or difficulty in learning to read that is not caused by a sensory deficit or lack of effort or education, affects readers of all languages (Caravolas,2005). Based on this definition, dyslexia cannot be diagnosed until children have demonstrated trouble with reading acquisition. However, it would be ideal to identify which children will go on develop reading problems before they struggle or fail to learn to read. Children who are identified early and who receive early intervention are likely to have better reading outcomes (Bowyer-Crane et al., 2008; Torgesen, 2004; Schatschneider & Torgesen, 2004; Vellutino, Scanlon, & Tanzman, 1998) and may suffer fewer of the negative consequences associated with poor reading. Further, an understanding of which children are at greatest risk for reading difficulties would allow educators and clinicians to allocate limited intervention resources to students who need them most. Extensive behavioral research has sought to answer this question and yet models predicting reading are rarely employed in practice.
11 - Maxwell’s Demon Does not Compute
- Edited by Michael E. Cuffaro, University of Western Ontario, Samuel C. Fletcher
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- Book:
- Physical Perspectives on Computation, Computational Perspectives on Physics
- Published online:
- 17 May 2018
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- 17 May 2018, pp 240-256
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Summary
The received view is that a Maxwell's demon must fail to reverse the second law of thermodynamics for reasons to do with information and computation. This received view has failed, I argue, and our continuing preoccupation with it has distracted us from a simpler and more secure exorcism that merely uses the Liouville theorem of statistical physics. I extend this exorcism to the quantum case.
Curie’s Truism
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Philosophy of Science / Volume 83 / Issue 5 / December 2016
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2022, pp. 1014-1026
- Print publication:
- December 2016
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Curie’s principle asserts that every symmetry of a cause manifests as a symmetry of the effect. It can be formulated as a tautology that is vacuous until it is instantiated. However, instantiation requires us to know the correct way to map causal terminology onto the terms of a science. Causal metaphysics has failed to provide a unique, correct way to carry out the mapping. Thus, successful or unsuccessful instantiation merely reflects our freedom of choice in the mapping.
Contributors
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- By Mitchell Aboulafia, Frederick Adams, Marilyn McCord Adams, Robert M. Adams, Laird Addis, James W. Allard, David Allison, William P. Alston, Karl Ameriks, C. Anthony Anderson, David Leech Anderson, Lanier Anderson, Roger Ariew, David Armstrong, Denis G. Arnold, E. J. Ashworth, Margaret Atherton, Robin Attfield, Bruce Aune, Edward Wilson Averill, Jody Azzouni, Kent Bach, Andrew Bailey, Lynne Rudder Baker, Thomas R. Baldwin, Jon Barwise, George Bealer, William Bechtel, Lawrence C. Becker, Mark A. Bedau, Ernst Behler, José A. Benardete, Ermanno Bencivenga, Jan Berg, Michael Bergmann, Robert L. Bernasconi, Sven Bernecker, Bernard Berofsky, Rod Bertolet, Charles J. Beyer, Christian Beyer, Joseph Bien, Joseph Bien, Peg Birmingham, Ivan Boh, James Bohman, Daniel Bonevac, Laurence BonJour, William J. Bouwsma, Raymond D. Bradley, Myles Brand, Richard B. Brandt, Michael E. Bratman, Stephen E. Braude, Daniel Breazeale, Angela Breitenbach, Jason Bridges, David O. Brink, Gordon G. Brittan, Justin Broackes, Dan W. Brock, Aaron Bronfman, Jeffrey E. Brower, Bartosz Brozek, Anthony Brueckner, Jeffrey Bub, Lara Buchak, Otavio Bueno, Ann E. Bumpus, Robert W. Burch, John Burgess, Arthur W. Burks, Panayot Butchvarov, Robert E. Butts, Marina Bykova, Patrick Byrne, David Carr, Noël Carroll, Edward S. Casey, Victor Caston, Victor Caston, Albert Casullo, Robert L. Causey, Alan K. L. Chan, Ruth Chang, Deen K. Chatterjee, Andrew Chignell, Roderick M. Chisholm, Kelly J. Clark, E. J. Coffman, Robin Collins, Brian P. Copenhaver, John Corcoran, John Cottingham, Roger Crisp, Frederick J. Crosson, Antonio S. Cua, Phillip D. Cummins, Martin Curd, Adam Cureton, Andrew Cutrofello, Stephen Darwall, Paul Sheldon Davies, Wayne A. Davis, Timothy Joseph Day, Claudio de Almeida, Mario De Caro, Mario De Caro, John Deigh, C. F. Delaney, Daniel C. Dennett, Michael R. DePaul, Michael Detlefsen, Daniel Trent Devereux, Philip E. Devine, John M. Dillon, Martin C. Dillon, Robert DiSalle, Mary Domski, Alan Donagan, Paul Draper, Fred Dretske, Mircea Dumitru, Wilhelm Dupré, Gerald Dworkin, John Earman, Ellery Eells, Catherine Z. Elgin, Berent Enç, Ronald P. Endicott, Edward Erwin, John Etchemendy, C. Stephen Evans, Susan L. Feagin, Solomon Feferman, Richard Feldman, Arthur Fine, Maurice A. Finocchiaro, William FitzPatrick, Richard E. Flathman, Gvozden Flego, Richard Foley, Graeme Forbes, Rainer Forst, Malcolm R. Forster, Daniel Fouke, Patrick Francken, Samuel Freeman, Elizabeth Fricker, Miranda Fricker, Michael Friedman, Michael Fuerstein, Richard A. Fumerton, Alan Gabbey, Pieranna Garavaso, Daniel Garber, Jorge L. A. Garcia, Robert K. Garcia, Don Garrett, Philip Gasper, Gerald Gaus, Berys Gaut, Bernard Gert, Roger F. Gibson, Cody Gilmore, Carl Ginet, Alan H. Goldman, Alvin I. Goldman, Alfonso Gömez-Lobo, Lenn E. Goodman, Robert M. Gordon, Stefan Gosepath, Jorge J. E. Gracia, Daniel W. Graham, George A. Graham, Peter J. Graham, Richard E. Grandy, I. Grattan-Guinness, John Greco, Philip T. Grier, Nicholas Griffin, Nicholas Griffin, David A. Griffiths, Paul J. Griffiths, Stephen R. Grimm, Charles L. Griswold, Charles B. Guignon, Pete A. Y. Gunter, Dimitri Gutas, Gary Gutting, Paul Guyer, Kwame Gyekye, Oscar A. Haac, Raul Hakli, Raul Hakli, Michael Hallett, Edward C. Halper, Jean Hampton, R. James Hankinson, K. R. Hanley, Russell Hardin, Robert M. Harnish, William Harper, David Harrah, Kevin Hart, Ali Hasan, William Hasker, John Haugeland, Roger Hausheer, William Heald, Peter Heath, Richard Heck, John F. Heil, Vincent F. Hendricks, Stephen Hetherington, Francis Heylighen, Kathleen Marie Higgins, Risto Hilpinen, Harold T. Hodes, Joshua Hoffman, Alan Holland, Robert L. Holmes, Richard Holton, Brad W. Hooker, Terence E. Horgan, Tamara Horowitz, Paul Horwich, Vittorio Hösle, Paul Hoβfeld, Daniel Howard-Snyder, Frances Howard-Snyder, Anne Hudson, Deal W. Hudson, Carl A. Huffman, David L. Hull, Patricia Huntington, Thomas Hurka, Paul Hurley, Rosalind Hursthouse, Guillermo Hurtado, Ronald E. Hustwit, Sarah Hutton, Jonathan Jenkins Ichikawa, Harry A. Ide, David Ingram, Philip J. Ivanhoe, Alfred L. Ivry, Frank Jackson, Dale Jacquette, Joseph Jedwab, Richard Jeffrey, David Alan Johnson, Edward Johnson, Mark D. Jordan, Richard Joyce, Hwa Yol Jung, Robert Hillary Kane, Tomis Kapitan, Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley, James A. Keller, Ralph Kennedy, Sergei Khoruzhii, Jaegwon Kim, Yersu Kim, Nathan L. King, Patricia Kitcher, Peter D. Klein, E. D. Klemke, Virginia Klenk, George L. Kline, Christian Klotz, Simo Knuuttila, Joseph J. Kockelmans, Konstantin Kolenda, Sebastian Tomasz Kołodziejczyk, Isaac Kramnick, Richard Kraut, Fred Kroon, Manfred Kuehn, Steven T. Kuhn, Henry E. Kyburg, John Lachs, Jennifer Lackey, Stephen E. Lahey, Andrea Lavazza, Thomas H. Leahey, Joo Heung Lee, Keith Lehrer, Dorothy Leland, Noah M. Lemos, Ernest LePore, Sarah-Jane Leslie, Isaac Levi, Andrew Levine, Alan E. Lewis, Daniel E. Little, Shu-hsien Liu, Shu-hsien Liu, Alan K. L. Chan, Brian Loar, Lawrence B. Lombard, John Longeway, Dominic McIver Lopes, Michael J. Loux, E. J. Lowe, Steven Luper, Eugene C. Luschei, William G. Lycan, David Lyons, David Macarthur, Danielle Macbeth, Scott MacDonald, Jacob L. Mackey, Louis H. Mackey, Penelope Mackie, Edward H. Madden, Penelope Maddy, G. B. Madison, Bernd Magnus, Pekka Mäkelä, Rudolf A. Makkreel, David Manley, William E. Mann (W.E.M.), Vladimir Marchenkov, Peter Markie, Jean-Pierre Marquis, Ausonio Marras, Mike W. Martin, A. P. Martinich, William L. McBride, David McCabe, Storrs McCall, Hugh J. McCann, Robert N. McCauley, John J. McDermott, Sarah McGrath, Ralph McInerny, Daniel J. McKaughan, Thomas McKay, Michael McKinsey, Brian P. McLaughlin, Ernan McMullin, Anthonie Meijers, Jack W. Meiland, William Jason Melanson, Alfred R. Mele, Joseph R. Mendola, Christopher Menzel, Michael J. Meyer, Christian B. Miller, David W. Miller, Peter Millican, Robert N. Minor, Phillip Mitsis, James A. Montmarquet, Michael S. Moore, Tim Moore, Benjamin Morison, Donald R. Morrison, Stephen J. Morse, Paul K. Moser, Alexander P. D. Mourelatos, Ian Mueller, James Bernard Murphy, Mark C. Murphy, Steven Nadler, Jan Narveson, Alan Nelson, Jerome Neu, Samuel Newlands, Kai Nielsen, Ilkka Niiniluoto, Carlos G. Noreña, Calvin G. Normore, David Fate Norton, Nikolaj Nottelmann, Donald Nute, David S. Oderberg, Steve Odin, Michael O’Rourke, Willard G. Oxtoby, Heinz Paetzold, George S. Pappas, Anthony J. Parel, Lydia Patton, R. P. Peerenboom, Francis Jeffry Pelletier, Adriaan T. Peperzak, Derk Pereboom, Jaroslav Peregrin, Glen Pettigrove, Philip Pettit, Edmund L. Pincoffs, Andrew Pinsent, Robert B. Pippin, Alvin Plantinga, Louis P. Pojman, Richard H. Popkin, John F. Post, Carl J. Posy, William J. Prior, Richard Purtill, Michael Quante, Philip L. Quinn, Philip L. Quinn, Elizabeth S. Radcliffe, Diana Raffman, Gerard Raulet, Stephen L. Read, Andrews Reath, Andrew Reisner, Nicholas Rescher, Henry S. Richardson, Robert C. Richardson, Thomas Ricketts, Wayne D. Riggs, Mark Roberts, Robert C. Roberts, Luke Robinson, Alexander Rosenberg, Gary Rosenkranz, Bernice Glatzer Rosenthal, Adina L. Roskies, William L. Rowe, T. M. Rudavsky, Michael Ruse, Bruce Russell, Lilly-Marlene Russow, Dan Ryder, R. M. Sainsbury, Joseph Salerno, Nathan Salmon, Wesley C. Salmon, Constantine Sandis, David H. Sanford, Marco Santambrogio, David Sapire, Ruth A. Saunders, Geoffrey Sayre-McCord, Charles Sayward, James P. Scanlan, Richard Schacht, Tamar Schapiro, Frederick F. Schmitt, Jerome B. Schneewind, Calvin O. Schrag, Alan D. Schrift, George F. Schumm, Jean-Loup Seban, David N. Sedley, Kenneth Seeskin, Krister Segerberg, Charlene Haddock Seigfried, Dennis M. Senchuk, James F. Sennett, William Lad Sessions, Stewart Shapiro, Tommie Shelby, Donald W. Sherburne, Christopher Shields, Roger A. Shiner, Sydney Shoemaker, Robert K. Shope, Kwong-loi Shun, Wilfried Sieg, A. John Simmons, Robert L. Simon, Marcus G. Singer, Georgette Sinkler, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, Matti T. Sintonen, Lawrence Sklar, Brian Skyrms, Robert C. Sleigh, Michael Anthony Slote, Hans Sluga, Barry Smith, Michael Smith, Robin Smith, Robert Sokolowski, Robert C. Solomon, Marta Soniewicka, Philip Soper, Ernest Sosa, Nicholas Southwood, Paul Vincent Spade, T. L. S. Sprigge, Eric O. Springsted, George J. Stack, Rebecca Stangl, Jason Stanley, Florian Steinberger, Sören Stenlund, Christopher Stephens, James P. Sterba, Josef Stern, Matthias Steup, M. A. Stewart, Leopold Stubenberg, Edith Dudley Sulla, Frederick Suppe, Jere Paul Surber, David George Sussman, Sigrún Svavarsdóttir, Zeno G. Swijtink, Richard Swinburne, Charles C. Taliaferro, Robert B. Talisse, John Tasioulas, Paul Teller, Larry S. Temkin, Mark Textor, H. S. Thayer, Peter Thielke, Alan Thomas, Amie L. Thomasson, Katherine Thomson-Jones, Joshua C. Thurow, Vzalerie Tiberius, Terrence N. Tice, Paul Tidman, Mark C. Timmons, William Tolhurst, James E. Tomberlin, Rosemarie Tong, Lawrence Torcello, Kelly Trogdon, J. D. Trout, Robert E. Tully, Raimo Tuomela, John Turri, Martin M. Tweedale, Thomas Uebel, Jennifer Uleman, James Van Cleve, Harry van der Linden, Peter van Inwagen, Bryan W. Van Norden, René van Woudenberg, Donald Phillip Verene, Samantha Vice, Thomas Vinci, Donald Wayne Viney, Barbara Von Eckardt, Peter B. M. Vranas, Steven J. Wagner, William J. Wainwright, Paul E. Walker, Robert E. Wall, Craig Walton, Douglas Walton, Eric Watkins, Richard A. Watson, Michael V. Wedin, Rudolph H. Weingartner, Paul Weirich, Paul J. Weithman, Carl Wellman, Howard Wettstein, Samuel C. Wheeler, Stephen A. White, Jennifer Whiting, Edward R. Wierenga, Michael Williams, Fred Wilson, W. Kent Wilson, Kenneth P. Winkler, John F. Wippel, Jan Woleński, Allan B. Wolter, Nicholas P. Wolterstorff, Rega Wood, W. Jay Wood, Paul Woodruff, Alison Wylie, Gideon Yaffe, Takashi Yagisawa, Yutaka Yamamoto, Keith E. Yandell, Xiaomei Yang, Dean Zimmerman, Günter Zoller, Catherine Zuckert, Michael Zuckert, Jack A. Zupko (J.A.Z.)
- Edited by Robert Audi, University of Notre Dame, Indiana
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- Book:
- The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy
- Published online:
- 05 August 2015
- Print publication:
- 27 April 2015, pp ix-xxx
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- By Rony A. Adam, Gloria Bachmann, Nichole M. Barker, Randall B. Barnes, John Bennett, Inbar Ben-Shachar, Jonathan S. Berek, Sarah L. Berga, Monica W. Best, Eric J. Bieber, Frank M. Biro, Shan Biscette, Anita K. Blanchard, Candace Brown, Ronald T. Burkman, Joseph Buscema, John E. Buster, Michael Byas-Smith, Sandra Ann Carson, Judy C. Chang, Annie N. Y. Cheung, Mindy S. Christianson, Karishma Circelli, Daniel L. Clarke-Pearson, Larry J. Copeland, Bryan D. Cowan, Navneet Dhillon, Michael P. Diamond, Conception Diaz-Arrastia, Nicole M. Donnellan, Michael L. Eisenberg, Eric Eisenhauer, Sebastian Faro, J. Stuart Ferriss, Lisa C. Flowers, Susan J. Freeman, Leda Gattoc, Claudine Marie Gayle, Timothy M. Geiger, Jennifer S. Gell, Alan N. Gordon, Victoria L. Green, Jon K. Hathaway, Enrique Hernandez, S. Paige Hertweck, Randall S. Hines, Ira R. Horowitz, Fred M. Howard, William W. Hurd, Fidan Israfilbayli, Denise J. Jamieson, Carolyn R. Jaslow, Erika B. Johnston-MacAnanny, Rohna M. Kearney, Namita Khanna, Caroline C. King, Jeremy A. King, Ira J. Kodner, Tamara Kolev, Athena P. Kourtis, S. Robert Kovac, Ertug Kovanci, William H. Kutteh, Eduardo Lara-Torre, Pallavi Latthe, Herschel W. Lawson, Ronald L. Levine, Frank W. Ling, Larry I. Lipshultz, Steven D. McCarus, Robert McLellan, Shruti Malik, Suketu M. Mansuria, Mohamed K. Mehasseb, Pamela J. Murray, Saloney Nazeer, Farr R. Nezhat, Hextan Y. S. Ngan, Gina M. Northington, Peggy A. Norton, Ruth M. O'Regan, Kristiina Parviainen, Resad P. Pasic, Tanja Pejovic, K. Ulrich Petry, Nancy A. Phillips, Ashish Pradhan, Elizabeth E. Puscheck, Suneetha Rachaneni, Devon M. Ramaeker, David B. Redwine, Robert L. Reid, Carla P. Roberts, Walter Romano, Peter G. Rose, Robert L. Rosenfield, Shon P. Rowan, Mack T. Ruffin, Janice M. Rymer, Evis Sala, Ritu Salani, Joseph S. Sanfilippo, Mahmood I. Shafi, Roger P. Smith, Meredith L. Snook, Thomas E. Snyder, Mary D. Stephenson, Thomas G. Stovall, Richard L. Sweet, Philip M. Toozs-Hobson, Togas Tulandi, Elizabeth R. Unger, Denise S. Uyar, Marion S. Verp, Rahi Victory, Tamara J. Vokes, Michelle J. Washington, Katharine O'Connell White, Paul E. Wise, Frank M. Wittmaack, Miya P. Yamamoto, Christine Yu, Howard A. Zacur
- Edited by Eric J. Bieber, Joseph S. Sanfilippo, University of Pittsburgh, Ira R. Horowitz, Emory University, Atlanta, Mahmood I. Shafi
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- Book:
- Clinical Gynecology
- Published online:
- 05 April 2015
- Print publication:
- 23 April 2015, pp viii-xiv
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- Edited by Michel Janssen, University of Minnesota, Christoph Lehner, Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, Berlin
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- The Cambridge Companion to Einstein
- Published online:
- 05 May 2014
- Print publication:
- 19 May 2014, pp xi-xiv
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2 - Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity and the Problems in the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies That Led Him to It
- Edited by Michel Janssen, University of Minnesota, Christoph Lehner, Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, Berlin
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- The Cambridge Companion to Einstein
- Published online:
- 05 May 2014
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- 19 May 2014, pp 72-102
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The End of the Thermodynamics of Computation: A No-Go Result
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Philosophy of Science / Volume 80 / Issue 5 / December 2013
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2022, pp. 1182-1192
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- December 2013
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The thermodynamics of computation assumes that computational processes at the molecular level can be brought arbitrarily close to thermodynamic reversibility and that thermodynamic entropy creation is unavoidable only in data erasure or the merging of computational paths, in accord with Landauer’s principle. The no-go result shows that fluctuations preclude completion of thermodynamically reversible processes. Completion can be achieved only by irreversible processes that create thermodynamic entropy in excess of the Landauer limit.
Long-term farming systems research in the central High Plains
- Rajan Ghimire, Jay B. Norton, Urszula Norton, John P. Ritten, Peter D. Stahl, James M. Krall
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- Journal:
- Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems / Volume 28 / Issue 2 / June 2013
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 14 June 2012, pp. 183-193
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In recent decades, there has been growing interest among farming and scientific communities toward integrated crop–range–livestock farming because of evidence of increased crop production, soil health, environmental services and resilience to increased climatic variability. This paper reviews studies on existing cropping systems and integrated crop–range–livestock systems across the USA which are relevant in the context of summarizing opportunities and challenges associated with implementing long-term crop–range–livestock systems research in the highly variable environment of the central High Plains. With precipitation ranging from 305 to 484mm and uncertain irrigation water supply, this region is especially vulnerable to changing moisture and temperature patterns. The results of our review indicate that diverse crop rotations, reduced soil disturbance and integrated crop–livestock systems could increase economic returns and agroecosystem resilience. Integrating agricultural system components to acquire unique benefits from small- to medium-sized operations, however, is a challenging task. This is because assessment and identification of suitable farming systems, selection of the most efficient integration scheme, and pinpointing the best management practices are crucial for successful integration of components. Effective integration requires development of evaluation criteria that incorporate the efficiency of approaches under consideration and their interactions. Therefore, establishing the basis for more sustainable farming systems in the central High Plains relies on both long-term agricultural systems research and evaluation of short-term dynamics of individual components.
Approximation and Idealization: Why the Difference Matters
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Philosophy of Science / Volume 79 / Issue 2 / April 2012
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2022, pp. 207-232
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- April 2012
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It is proposed that we use the term “approximation” for inexact description of a target system and “idealization” for another system whose properties also provide an inexact description of the target system. Since systems generated by a limiting process can often have quite unexpected—even inconsistent—properties, familiar limit processes used in statistical physics can fail to provide idealizations but merely provide approximations.
There Are No Universal Rules for Induction
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Philosophy of Science / Volume 77 / Issue 5 / December 2010
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2022, pp. 765-777
- Print publication:
- December 2010
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In a material theory of induction, inductive inferences are warranted by facts that prevail locally. This approach, it is urged, is preferable to formal theories of induction in which the good inductive inferences are delineated as those conforming to universal schemas. An inductive inference problem concerning indeterministic, nonprobabilistic systems in physics is posed, and it is argued that Bayesians cannot responsibly analyze it, thereby demonstrating that the probability calculus is not the universal logic of induction.
Cosmic Confusions: Not Supporting versus Supporting Not
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Philosophy of Science / Volume 77 / Issue 4 / October 2010
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2022, pp. 501-523
- Print publication:
- October 2010
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Bayesian probabilistic explication of inductive inference conflates neutrality of supporting evidence for some hypothesis H (“not supporting H”) with disfavoring evidence (“supporting not-H”). This expressive inadequacy leads to spurious results that are artifacts of a poor choice of inductive logic. I illustrate how such artifacts have arisen in simple inductive inferences in cosmology. In the inductive disjunctive fallacy, neutral support for many possibilities is spuriously converted into strong support for their disjunction. The Bayesian “doomsday argument” is shown to rely entirely on a similar artifact.
Contributors
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- By Rose Teteki Abbey, K. C. Abraham, David Tuesday Adamo, LeRoy H. Aden, Efrain Agosto, Victor Aguilan, Gillian T. W. Ahlgren, Charanjit Kaur AjitSingh, Dorothy B E A Akoto, Giuseppe Alberigo, Daniel E. Albrecht, Ruth Albrecht, Daniel O. Aleshire, Urs Altermatt, Anand Amaladass, Michael Amaladoss, James N. Amanze, Lesley G. Anderson, Thomas C. Anderson, Victor Anderson, Hope S. Antone, María Pilar Aquino, Paula Arai, Victorio Araya Guillén, S. Wesley Ariarajah, Ellen T. Armour, Brett Gregory Armstrong, Atsuhiro Asano, Naim Stifan Ateek, Mahmoud Ayoub, John Alembillah Azumah, Mercedes L. García Bachmann, Irena Backus, J. Wayne Baker, Mieke Bal, Lewis V. Baldwin, William Barbieri, António Barbosa da Silva, David Basinger, Bolaji Olukemi Bateye, Oswald Bayer, Daniel H. Bays, Rosalie Beck, Nancy Elizabeth Bedford, Guy-Thomas Bedouelle, Chorbishop Seely Beggiani, Wolfgang Behringer, Christopher M. Bellitto, Byard Bennett, Harold V. Bennett, Teresa Berger, Miguel A. Bernad, Henley Bernard, Alan E. Bernstein, Jon L. Berquist, Johannes Beutler, Ana María Bidegain, Matthew P. Binkewicz, Jennifer Bird, Joseph Blenkinsopp, Dmytro Bondarenko, Paulo Bonfatti, Riet en Pim Bons-Storm, Jessica A. Boon, Marcus J. Borg, Mark Bosco, Peter C. Bouteneff, François Bovon, William D. Bowman, Paul S. Boyer, David Brakke, Richard E. Brantley, Marcus Braybrooke, Ian Breward, Ênio José da Costa Brito, Jewel Spears Brooker, Johannes Brosseder, Nicholas Canfield Read Brown, Robert F. Brown, Pamela K. Brubaker, Walter Brueggemann, Bishop Colin O. Buchanan, Stanley M. Burgess, Amy Nelson Burnett, J. Patout Burns, David B. Burrell, David Buttrick, James P. Byrd, Lavinia Byrne, Gerado Caetano, Marcos Caldas, Alkiviadis Calivas, William J. Callahan, Salvatore Calomino, Euan K. Cameron, William S. Campbell, Marcelo Ayres Camurça, Daniel F. Caner, Paul E. Capetz, Carlos F. Cardoza-Orlandi, Patrick W. Carey, Barbara Carvill, Hal Cauthron, Subhadra Mitra Channa, Mark D. Chapman, James H. Charlesworth, Kenneth R. Chase, Chen Zemin, Luciano Chianeque, Philip Chia Phin Yin, Francisca H. Chimhanda, Daniel Chiquete, John T. Chirban, Soobin Choi, Robert Choquette, Mita Choudhury, Gerald Christianson, John Chryssavgis, Sejong Chun, Esther Chung-Kim, Charles M. A. Clark, Elizabeth A. Clark, Sathianathan Clarke, Fred Cloud, John B. Cobb, W. Owen Cole, John A Coleman, John J. Collins, Sylvia Collins-Mayo, Paul K. Conkin, Beth A. Conklin, Sean Connolly, Demetrios J. Constantelos, Michael A. Conway, Paula M. Cooey, Austin Cooper, Michael L. Cooper-White, Pamela Cooper-White, L. William Countryman, Sérgio Coutinho, Pamela Couture, Shannon Craigo-Snell, James L. Crenshaw, David Crowner, Humberto Horacio Cucchetti, Lawrence S. Cunningham, Elizabeth Mason Currier, Emmanuel Cutrone, Mary L. Daniel, David D. Daniels, Robert Darden, Rolf Darge, Isaiah Dau, Jeffry C. Davis, Jane Dawson, Valentin Dedji, John W. de Gruchy, Paul DeHart, Wendy J. Deichmann Edwards, Miguel A. De La Torre, George E. Demacopoulos, Thomas de Mayo, Leah DeVun, Beatriz de Vasconcellos Dias, Dennis C. Dickerson, John M. Dillon, Luis Miguel Donatello, Igor Dorfmann-Lazarev, Susanna Drake, Jonathan A. Draper, N. Dreher Martin, Otto Dreydoppel, Angelyn Dries, A. J. Droge, Francis X. D'Sa, Marilyn Dunn, Nicole Wilkinson Duran, Rifaat Ebied, Mark J. Edwards, William H. Edwards, Leonard H. Ehrlich, Nancy L. Eiesland, Martin Elbel, J. Harold Ellens, Stephen Ellingson, Marvin M. Ellison, Robert Ellsberg, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Eldon Jay Epp, Peter C. Erb, Tassilo Erhardt, Maria Erling, Noel Leo Erskine, Gillian R. Evans, Virginia Fabella, Michael A. Fahey, Edward Farley, Margaret A. Farley, Wendy Farley, Robert Fastiggi, Seena Fazel, Duncan S. Ferguson, Helwar Figueroa, Paul Corby Finney, Kyriaki Karidoyanes FitzGerald, Thomas E. FitzGerald, John R. Fitzmier, Marie Therese Flanagan, Sabina Flanagan, Claude Flipo, Ronald B. Flowers, Carole Fontaine, David Ford, Mary Ford, Stephanie A. Ford, Jim Forest, William Franke, Robert M. Franklin, Ruth Franzén, Edward H. Friedman, Samuel Frouisou, Lorelei F. Fuchs, Jojo M. Fung, Inger Furseth, Richard R. Gaillardetz, Brandon Gallaher, China Galland, Mark Galli, Ismael García, Tharscisse Gatwa, Jean-Marie Gaudeul, Luis María Gavilanes del Castillo, Pavel L. Gavrilyuk, Volney P. Gay, Metropolitan Athanasios Geevargis, Kondothra M. George, Mary Gerhart, Simon Gikandi, Maurice Gilbert, Michael J. Gillgannon, Verónica Giménez Beliveau, Terryl Givens, Beth Glazier-McDonald, Philip Gleason, Menghun Goh, Brian Golding, Bishop Hilario M. Gomez, Michelle A. Gonzalez, Donald K. Gorrell, Roy Gottfried, Tamara Grdzelidze, Joel B. Green, Niels Henrik Gregersen, Cristina Grenholm, Herbert Griffiths, Eric W. Gritsch, Erich S. Gruen, Christoffer H. Grundmann, Paul H. Gundani, Jon P. Gunnemann, Petre Guran, Vidar L. Haanes, Jeremiah M. 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Yee, Viktor Yelensky, Yeo Khiok-Khng, Gustav K. K. Yeung, Angela Yiu, Amos Yong, Yong Ting Jin, You Bin, Youhanna Nessim Youssef, Eliana Yunes, Robert Michael Zaller, Valarie H. Ziegler, Barbara Brown Zikmund, Joyce Ann Zimmerman, Aurora Zlotnik, Zhuo Xinping
- Edited by Daniel Patte, Vanderbilt University, Tennessee
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- The Cambridge Dictionary of Christianity
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- 05 August 2012
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- 20 September 2010, pp xi-xliv
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The Dome: An Unexpectedly Simple Failure of Determinism
- John D. Norton
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- Philosophy of Science / Volume 75 / Issue 5 / December 2008
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2022, pp. 786-798
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- December 2008
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Newton's equations of motion tell us that a mass at rest at the apex of a dome with the shape specified here can spontaneously move. It has been suggested that this indeterminism should be discounted since it draws on an incomplete rendering of Newtonian physics, or it is “unphysical,” or it employs illicit idealizations. I analyze and reject each of these reasons.
Regional atrophy of the corpus callosum in dementia
- BRADLEY J. HALLAM, WARREN S. BROWN, CHRIS ROSS, J. GALEN BUCKWALTER, ERIN D. BIGLER, JOANN T. TSCHANZ, MARIA C. NORTON, KATHLEEN A. WELSH-BOHMER, JOHN C.S. BREITNER
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- Journal:
- Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society / Volume 14 / Issue 3 / May 2008
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 17 April 2008, pp. 414-423
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The regional distribution of degeneration of the corpus callosum (CC) in dementia is not yet clear. This study compared regional CC size in participants (n = 179) from the Cache County Memory and Aging Study. Participants represented a range of cognitive function: Alzheimer's disease (AD), vascular dementia (VaD), mild ambiguous (MA–cognitive problems, but not severe enough for diagnosis of dementia), and healthy older adults. CC outlines obtained from midsagittal magnetic resonance images were divided into 99 equally spaced widths. Factor analysis of these callosal widths identified 10 callosal regions. Multivariate analysis of variance revealed significant group differences for anterior and posterior callosal regions. Post-hoc pairwise comparisons of CC regions in patient groups as compared to the control group (controlling for age) revealed trends toward smaller anterior and posterior regions, but not all were statistically significant. As compared to controls, significantly smaller anterior and posterior CC regions were found in the AD group; significantly smaller anterior CC regions in the VaD group; but no significant CC regional differences in the MA group. Findings suggest that dementia-related CC atrophy occurs primarily in the anterior and posterior portions. (JINS, 2008, 14, 414–423.)
Ignorance and Indifference*
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Philosophy of Science / Volume 75 / Issue 1 / January 2008
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2022, pp. 45-68
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- January 2008
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The epistemic state of complete ignorance is not a probability distribution. In it, we assign the same, unique, ignorance degree of belief to any contingent outcome and each of its contingent, disjunctive parts. That this is the appropriate way to represent complete ignorance is established by two instruments, each individually strong enough to identify this state. They are the principle of indifference (PI) and the notion that ignorance is invariant under certain redescriptions of the outcome space, here developed into the ‘principle of invariance of ignorance’ (PII). Both instruments are so innocuous as almost to be platitudes. Yet the literature in probabilistic epistemology has misdiagnosed them as paradoxical or defective since they generate inconsistencies when conjoined with the assumption that an epistemic state must be a probability distribution. To underscore the need to drop this assumption, I express PII in its most defensible form as relating symmetric descriptions and show that paradoxes still arise if we assume the ignorance state to be a probability distribution.
On Thought Experiments: Is There More to the Argument?
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Philosophy of Science / Volume 71 / Issue 5 / December 2004
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- 01 January 2022, pp. 1139-1151
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- December 2004
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Thought experiments in science are merely picturesque argumentation. I support this view in various ways, including the claim that it follows from the fact that thought experiments can err but can still be used reliably. The view is defended against alternatives proposed by my cosymposiasts.
6 - General covariance, gauge theories, and the Kretschmann objection
- Edited by Katherine Brading, Wolfson College, Oxford, Elena Castellani, Università degli Studi, Florence
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- Symmetries in Physics
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- 08 October 2009
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- 04 December 2003, pp 110-123
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Summary
Introduction
Two views…
When Einstein formulated his General Theory of Relativity, he presented it as the culmination of his search for a generally covariant theory. That this was the signal achievement of the theory rapidly became the orthodox conception. A dissident view, however, tracing back at least to objections raised by Erich Kretschmann in 1917, holds that there is no physical content in Einstein's demand for general covariance. That dissident view has grown into the mainstream. Many accounts of general relativity no longer even mention a principle or requirement of general covariance.
What is unsettling for this shift in opinion is the newer characterization of general relativity as a gauge theory of gravitation, with general covariance expressing a gauge freedom. The recognition of this gauge freedom has proved central to the physical interpretation of the theory. That freedom precludes certain otherwise natural sorts of background spacetimes; it complicates identification of the theory's observables, since they must be gauge invariant; and it is now recognized as presenting special problems for the project of quantizing of gravitation.
…that we need not choose between
It would seem unavoidable that we can choose at most one of these two views: the vacuity of a requirement of general covariance or the central importance of general covariance as a gauge freedom of general relativity. I will urge here that this is not so; we may choose both, once we recognize the differing contexts in which they arise.
A Material Theory of Induction
- John D. Norton
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- Journal:
- Philosophy of Science / Volume 70 / Issue 4 / October 2003
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 January 2022, pp. 647-670
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- October 2003
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Contrary to formal theories of induction, I argue that there are no universal inductive inference schemas. The inductive inferences of science are grounded in matters of fact that hold only in particular domains, so that all inductive inference is local. Some are so localized as to defy familiar characterization. Since inductive inference schemas are underwritten by facts, we can assess and control the inductive risk taken in an induction by investigating the warrant for its underwriting facts. In learning more facts, we extend our inductive reach by supplying more localized inductive inference schemes. Since a material theory no longer separates the factual and schematic parts of an induction, it proves not to be vulnerable to Hume's problem of the justification of induction.