19,991 research outputs found
Mathematical Foundations of Consciousness
We employ the Zermelo-Fraenkel Axioms that characterize sets as mathematical
primitives. The Anti-foundation Axiom plays a significant role in our
development, since among other of its features, its replacement for the Axiom
of Foundation in the Zermelo-Fraenkel Axioms motivates Platonic
interpretations. These interpretations also depend on such allied notions for
sets as pictures, graphs, decorations, labelings and various mappings that we
use. A syntax and semantics of operators acting on sets is developed. Such
features enable construction of a theory of non-well-founded sets that we use
to frame mathematical foundations of consciousness. To do this we introduce a
supplementary axiomatic system that characterizes experience and consciousness
as primitives. The new axioms proceed through characterization of so- called
consciousness operators. The Russell operator plays a central role and is shown
to be one example of a consciousness operator. Neural networks supply striking
examples of non-well-founded graphs the decorations of which generate
associated sets, each with a Platonic aspect. Employing our foundations, we
show how the supervening of consciousness on its neural correlates in the brain
enables the framing of a theory of consciousness by applying appropriate
consciousness operators to the generated sets in question
From Bounded Rationality to Behavioral Economics
The paper provides an brief overview of the âstate of the artâ in the theory of rational decision making since the 1950âs, and focuses specially on the evolutionary justification of rationality. It is claimed that this justification, and more generally the economic methodology inherited from the Chicago school, becomes untenable once taking into account Kauffmanâs Nk model, showing that if evolution it is based on trial-and-error search process, it leads generally to sub- optimal stable solutions: the âas ifâ justification of perfect rationality proves therefore to be a fallacious metaphor. The normative interpretation of decision-making theory is therefore questioned, and the two challenging views against this approach , Simonâs bounded rationality and Allaisâ criticism to expected utility theory are discussed. On this ground it is shown that the cognitive characteristics of choice processes are becoming more and more important for explanation of economic behavior and of deviations from rationality. In particular, according to Kahnemanâs Nobel Lecture, it is suggested that the distinction between two types of cognitive processes â the effortful process of deliberate reasoning on the one hand, and the automatic process of unconscious intuition on the other â can provide a different map with which to explain a broad class of deviations from pure âolympianâ rationality. This view requires re-establishing and revising connections between psychology and economics: an on-going challenge against the normative approach to economic methodology.Bounded Rationality, Behavioral Economics, Evolution, As If
Doing and Showing
The persisting gap between the formal and the informal mathematics is due to
an inadequate notion of mathematical theory behind the current formalization
techniques. I mean the (informal) notion of axiomatic theory according to which
a mathematical theory consists of a set of axioms and further theorems deduced
from these axioms according to certain rules of logical inference. Thus the
usual notion of axiomatic method is inadequate and needs a replacement.Comment: 54 pages, 2 figure
Should we discount future generationsâ welfare? A survey on the âpureâ discount rate debate.
In A Mathematical Theory of Saving (1928), Frank Ramsey not only laid the foundations of the fruitful optimal growth literature, but also launched a major moral debate: should we discount future generationsâ well-being? While Ramsey regarded such âpureâ discounting as âethically indefensibleâ, several philosophers and economists have developed arguments justifying the âpureâ discounting practice since the early 1960s. This essay consists of a survey of those arguments. After a brief examination of the â often implicit â treatment of future generationsâ welfare by utilitarian thinkers before Ramseyâs view was expressed, later arguments of various kinds are analysed. It is argued that, under the assumption of perfect certainty regarding future human life, the âpureâ discounting practice seems ethically untenable. However, once we account for the uncertainty regarding future generationsâ existence, âpureâ discounting seems more acceptable, even if strong criticisms still remain, especially regarding the adequateness of the expected utility theory in such a normative context. those limits would be faced by any other consequences-based ethical theory in front of Different Number Choices.
Invisible Hand in the Process of Making Economics or on the Method and Scope of Economics
As a social science, economics cannot be reduced to simply an a priori science or an ideology. In addition economics cannot be solely an empirical or a historical science. Economics is a research field which studies only one dimension of human behavior, with the four fields of mathematics, econometrics, ethics and history intersecting one another. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the two parts of the proposition above, in connection with the controversies surrounding the method and the scope of economics: economics as an applied mathematics and economics as a predictive/empirical science.Invisible hand, Scope and method in economics, Economics as an applied mathematics, Economics as an empirical science, Economics as ideology.
Cauchy, infinitesimals and ghosts of departed quantifiers
Procedures relying on infinitesimals in Leibniz, Euler and Cauchy have been
interpreted in both a Weierstrassian and Robinson's frameworks. The latter
provides closer proxies for the procedures of the classical masters. Thus,
Leibniz's distinction between assignable and inassignable numbers finds a proxy
in the distinction between standard and nonstandard numbers in Robinson's
framework, while Leibniz's law of homogeneity with the implied notion of
equality up to negligible terms finds a mathematical formalisation in terms of
standard part. It is hard to provide parallel formalisations in a
Weierstrassian framework but scholars since Ishiguro have engaged in a quest
for ghosts of departed quantifiers to provide a Weierstrassian account for
Leibniz's infinitesimals. Euler similarly had notions of equality up to
negligible terms, of which he distinguished two types: geometric and
arithmetic. Euler routinely used product decompositions into a specific
infinite number of factors, and used the binomial formula with an infinite
exponent. Such procedures have immediate hyperfinite analogues in Robinson's
framework, while in a Weierstrassian framework they can only be reinterpreted
by means of paraphrases departing significantly from Euler's own presentation.
Cauchy gives lucid definitions of continuity in terms of infinitesimals that
find ready formalisations in Robinson's framework but scholars working in a
Weierstrassian framework bend over backwards either to claim that Cauchy was
vague or to engage in a quest for ghosts of departed quantifiers in his work.
Cauchy's procedures in the context of his 1853 sum theorem (for series of
continuous functions) are more readily understood from the viewpoint of
Robinson's framework, where one can exploit tools such as the pointwise
definition of the concept of uniform convergence.
Keywords: historiography; infinitesimal; Latin model; butterfly modelComment: 45 pages, published in Mat. Stu
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