Determinism and inevitability

In Freedom Evolves, Dan Dennett embarks on his second book-length attempt to lay to rest the deep metaphysical concerns that many philosophers have expressed about the possibility of human freedom.One of his main objectives in the earlier chapters of the book is to make determinism appear less threatening to our prospects for free agency than it has sometimes seemed, by attempting to show that a deterministic universe would not necessarily be a universe of which it could truly be said that everything that occurs in it is inevitable. In this paper, I want to consider Dennett’s striking argument for this conclusion in some detail. I shall begin by suggesting that on its most natural interpretation, the argument is vulnerable to a serious objection. I shall then develop a second interpretation which is more promising than the first, but will argue that without placing more weight on etymological considerations than they can really bear, it can deliver, at best, only a significantly qualified version of the conclusion that Dennett is seeking. However, although I shall be arguing that his central argument fails, it is also part of the purpose of this paper to build on what I regard as some rather insightful and suggestive material which is developed by Dennett in the course of elaborating his views. His own development of these ideas is hampered, so I shall argue, by a framework for thinking about possibility that is too crude to accommodate the immense subtlety and complexity which is exhibited by the workings of the modal verb ‘can’ and its past tense form, ‘could’; and also, I believe, by the mistaken conviction, on Dennett’s part, that any naturalistically respectable solution to the problem of free will would have to be of a compatibilist stripe. I shall attempt, in the second half of the paper, to explain what seems to me to be wrong with the framework, and to make some points about the functioning of ‘can’ and ‘could’, which I believe any adequate replacement for Dennett’s framework must respect. Ironically, though, I shall argue that it is the rejection of Dennett’s own framework which holds the key to understanding how to defend the spirit (if not the letter) of his thoughts about the invulnerability of our ordinary modal thinking to alleged threats from determinism

Growth and development of the banana plant3. A. The origin of the inflorescence and the development of the flowers: B. The structure and development of the fruit

In this paper, which is presented in two parts, the growth and development of the banana plant have been examined from the standpoint of the origin of the inflorescence and the development of the flowers (Part A) and the structure and development of the fruit (Part B). First the main centres of growth in these structures are located and the manner of their development is presented. Thereafter, attention is focused upon the salient events which determine the alternative courses of development with a view to designating the chemical and physiological stimuli that may be required

Personal and sub-personal: a defence of Dennett's early distinction

Since 1969, when Dennett introduced a distinction between personal and sub‐personal levels of explanation, many philosophers have used ‘sub‐personal’ very loosely, and Dennett himself has abandoned a view of the personal level as genuinely autonomous. I recommend a position in which Dennett's original distinction is crucial, by arguing that the phenomenon called mental causation is on view only at the properly personal level. If one retains the commit‐’ ments incurred by Dennett's early distinction, then one has a satisfactory anti‐physicalistic, anti‐dualist philosophy of mind. It neither interferes with the projects of sub‐personal psychology, nor encourages ; instrumentalism at the personal level. People lose sight of Dennett’s personal/sub-personal distinction because they free it from its philosophical moorings. A distinction that serves a philosophical purpose is typically rooted in doctrine; it cannot be lifted out of context and continue to do its work. So I shall start from Dennett’s distinction as I read it in its original context. And when I speak of ‘the distinction’, I mean to point not only towards the terms that Dennett first used to define it but also towards the philosophical setting within which its work was cut out

'I would rather die': reasons given by 16-year-olds for not continuing their study of mathematics

Improving participation rates in specialist mathematics after the subject ceases to be compulsory at age 16 is part of government policy in England. This article provides independent and recent support for earlier findings concerning reasons for non- participation, based on free response and closed items in a questionnaire with a sample of over 1500 students in 17 schools, close to the moment of choice. The analysis supports findings that perceived difficulty and lack of confidence are important reasons for students not continuing with mathematics, and that perceived dislike and boredom, and lack of relevance, are also factors. There is a close relationship between reasons for non-participation and predicted grade, and a weaker relation to gender. An analysis of the effects of schools, demonstrates that enjoyment is the main factor differentiating schools with high and low participation indices. Building on discussion of these findings, ways of improving participation are briefly suggested

(G)hosting television: Ghostwatch and its medium

This article’s subject is Ghostwatch (BBC, 1992), a drama broadcast on Halloween night of 1992 which adopted the rhetoric of live non-fiction programming, and attracted controversy and ultimately censure from the Broadcasting Standards Council. In what follows, we argue that Ghostwatch must be understood as a televisually-specific artwork and artefact. We discuss the programme’s ludic relationship with some key features of television during what Ellis (2000) has termed its era of ‘availability’, principally liveness, mass simultaneous viewing, and the flow of the television super-text. We trace the programme’s television-specific historicity whilst acknowledging its allusions and debts to other media (most notably film and radio). We explore the sophisticated ways in which Ghostwatch’s visual grammar and vocabulary and deployment of ‘broadcast talk’ (Scannell 1991) variously ape, comment upon and subvert the rhetoric of factual programming, and the ends to which these strategies are put. We hope that these arguments collectively demonstrate the aesthetic and historical significance of Ghostwatch and identify its relationship to its medium and that medium’s history. We offer the programme as an historically-reflexive artefact, and as an exemplary instance of the work of art in television’s age of broadcasting, liveness and co-presence

Expression of topoisomerase III α in normal and neoplastic tissues determined by immunohistochemistry using novel monoclonal antibody

Topoisomerases are nuclear enzymes that modulate the topological structure of DNA in order to facilitate cellular events such as replication and transcription. These enzymes are also the cellular targets of certain classes of chemotherapeutic agents termed topoisomerase poisons. A new human topoisomerase isoform, IIIa, was discovered in 1996, which is thought to have roles in genome stability and possibly chromosome separation during mitosis. It is possible that novel or existing anti-topoisomerase agents target topoisomerase IIIa, suggesting that this enzyme may have potential as a prognostic marker and chemotherapeutic target. In order to study expression patterns of topoisomerase IIIa we have produced a novel monoclonal antibody to human topoisomerase IIIa (TOPO3a-1A4), and used it to assess topoisomerase IIIa expression in a wide range of normal and neoplastic tissues. We have found that topoisomerase IIIa is expressed in a wide range of tissue types, with especially high concentrations in endothelial cells and stromal fibroblasts. No general relationship was observed between expression of topoisomerase IIIa and proliferation. Expression in neoplastic tissues often paralleled their normal counterparts, although certain tumours showed either increased (e.g. colonic adenoma) or reduced (e.g. gastric carcinoma, small cell carcinoma of bronchus) expression. If topoisomerase IIIa is found to be a target for chemotherapeutic agents, clinical response in different tumour types may be related to topoisomerase IIIa expression, which may be assessed using TOPO3a-1A4. © 2000 Cancer Research Campaig