Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
|
Your cart is empty |
|||
Showing 1 - 17 of 17 matches in All Departments
This volume deals with fundamental problems of the natural sciences and the philosophy of nature. The issues addressed touch upon the many research areas of Hans Primas, and they reflect both the depth and the breadth of his interests, ranging from nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, theoretical chemistry, theory reduction, the measurement problem, holism and realism in quantum theory, to the dialogue between W. Pauli and C. G. Jung. Each individual contribution is prefaced by a short editorial introduction, relating diverse topics to each other and embedding them in a wider frame.
This book reflects on the significant and highly original scientific contributions of Hans Primas. A professor of chemistry at ETH Zurich from 1962 to 1995, Primas continued his research activities until his death in 2014. Over these 50 years and more, he worked on the foundations of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, contributed to a number of significant issues in theoretical chemistry, helped to clarify central topics in quantum theory and the philosophy of physics, suggested innovative ways of addressing interlevel relations in the philosophy of science, and introduced cutting-edge approaches in the flourishing young field of scientific studies of consciousness. His work in these areas of research and its continuing impact is described by noted experts, colleagues, and collaborators of Primas. All authors contextualize their contributions to facilitate the mutual dialog between these fields.
Dual-Aspect Monism and the Deep Structure of Meaning investigates the metaphysical position of dual-aspect monism, with particular emphasis on the concept of meaning as a fundamental feature of the fabric of reality. As an alternative to other positions - mainly dualism, physicalism, idealism - that have been proposed to understand consciousness and its place in nature, the decompositional version of dual-aspect monism considers the mental and the physical as two aspects of one underlying undivided reality that is psychophysically neutral. Inspired by analogies with modern physics and driven by its conceptual problems, Wolfgang Pauli, Carl Gustav Jung, Arthur Eddington, John Wheeler, David Bohm, and Basil Hiley are the originators of the approaches studied. A radically novel common theme in their approaches is the constitutive role of meaning and its deep structure, relating the mental and the physical to a psychophysically neutral base.The authors reconstruct the formal structure of these approaches, and compare their conceptual emphases as well as their relative strengths and weaknesses. They also address a number of challenging themes for current and future interdisciplinary research, both theoretical and empirical, that arise from the presented frameworks of thinking. Dual-Aspect Monism and the Deep Structure of Meaning will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in consciousness studies, philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, philosophy of physics, metaphysics, and the history of 20th-century philosophy and physics.
Information and dynamics are key terms in many contemporary directions of research in numerous fields. Basic frarneworks in this regard are information theory and the theory of dynamical systems. The origin of both areas essentially dates back into the 20s of this century. An excellent presentation of the history of information theory from its early days (e.g, Nyquist, Hartley) until to the 70s has been given by J.R. Pierce et al. in the IEEE Transactions on Information Theory IT-19 (1973). System theory, the other branch mentioned above, also started with first publications in the 20s (e.g., Kohler, Lotka). A historical sketch can be found in 1. v. Bertalanffy's General Systems Theory (Braziller, Ncw York, 1968), the main body ofwhich presents a proper introduction into the main concepts and applications. At present, both branches, information theory and system theory, are hardly sepa- rable any more. Aspects of both appcar in cybernetics, contral theory, communication theory, computer science, game theory, cognitive science, and related fields. Combin- ing knowledge of various individual scientific disciplines, they are particularly useful to deal with problems of basically intcrdisciplinary character.
1 2 Harald Atmanspacher and Hans Primas 1 Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology, Freiburg, Germany, [email protected] 2 ETH Zurich, Switzerland, [email protected] Thenotionofrealityisofsupremesigni?canceforourunderstandingofnature, the world around us, and ourselves. As the history of philosophy shows, it has been under permanent discussion at all times. Traditional discourse about - ality covers the full range from basic metaphysical foundations to operational approaches concerning human kinds of gathering and utilizing knowledge, broadly speaking epistemic approaches. However, no period in time has ex- rienced a number of moves changing and, particularly, restraining traditional concepts of reality that is comparable to the 20th century. Early in the 20th century, quite an in?uential move of such a kind was due to the so-called Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, laid out essentially by Bohr, Heisenberg, and Pauli in the mid 1920s. Bohr's dictum, quoted by Petersen (1963, p.12), was that "it is wrong to think that the task of physics is to ?nd out how nature is. Physics concerns what we can say about nature." Although this standpoint was not left unopposed - Einstein, Schr] odinger, and others were convinced that it is the task of science to ?nd out about nature itself - epistemic, operational attitudes have set the fashion for many discussions in the philosophy of physics (and of science in general) until today."
This book reflects on the significant and highly original scientific contributions of Hans Primas. A professor of chemistry at ETH Zurich from 1962 to 1995, Primas continued his research activities until his death in 2014. Over these 50 years and more, he worked on the foundations of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, contributed to a number of significant issues in theoretical chemistry, helped to clarify central topics in quantum theory and the philosophy of physics, suggested innovative ways of addressing interlevel relations in the philosophy of science, and introduced cutting-edge approaches in the flourishing young field of scientific studies of consciousness. His work in these areas of research and its continuing impact is described by noted experts, colleagues, and collaborators of Primas. All authors contextualize their contributions to facilitate the mutual dialog between these fields.
This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Quantum Interaction, QI 2013, held in Leicester, UK, in July 2013. The 31 papers presented in this book were carefully selected from numerous submissions. The papers cover various topics on quantum interaction and revolve around four themes: information processing/retrieval/semantic representation and logic; cognition and decision making; finance/economics and social structures and biological systems.
Information and dynamics are key terms in many contemporary directions of research in numerous fields. Basic frarneworks in this regard are information theory and the theory of dynamical systems. The origin of both areas essentially dates back into the 20s of this century. An excellent presentation of the history of information theory from its early days (e.g, Nyquist, Hartley) until to the 70s has been given by J.R. Pierce et al. in the IEEE Transactions on Information Theory IT-19 (1973). System theory, the other branch mentioned above, also started with first publications in the 20s (e.g., Kohler, Lotka). A historical sketch can be found in 1. v. Bertalanffy's General Systems Theory (Braziller, Ncw York, 1968), the main body ofwhich presents a proper introduction into the main concepts and applications. At present, both branches, information theory and system theory, are hardly sepa- rable any more. Aspects of both appcar in cybernetics, contral theory, communication theory, computer science, game theory, cognitive science, and related fields. Combin- ing knowledge of various individual scientific disciplines, they are particularly useful to deal with problems of basically intcrdisciplinary character.
INSTEAD OF A "FESTSCHRIFT" In June 1998 Hans Primas turned 70 years old. Although he himself is not fond of jubilees and although he likes to play the decimal system of numbers down as contingent, this is nevertheless a suitable occasion to reflect on the professional work of one of the rare distinguished contempo rary scientists who attach equal importance to experimental and theoretical and conceptual lines of research. Hans Primas' interests have covered an enormous range: methods and instruments for nuclear magnetic resonance, theoretical chemistry, C* - and W* -algebraic formulations of quantum me chanics, the measurement problem and its various implications, holism and realism in quantum theory, theory reduction, the work and personality of Wolfgang Pauli, as well as Jungian psychology. In many of these fields he provided important and original food for thought, in some cases going far beyond the everyday business in the scien tific world. As is the case with other scientists who are conceptually inno vative, Hans Primas is read more than he is quoted. His influence is due to his writings. Even with the current flood of publications, he still performs the miracle of having scientists eagerly awaiting his next publication."
In our daily lives we conceive of our surroundings as an objectively given reality. The world is perceived through our senses, and ~hese provide us, so we believe, with a faithful image of the world. But occ~ipnally we are forced to realize that our senses deceive us, e. g. , by illusions. For a while it was believed that the sensation of color is directly r~lated to the frequency of light waves, until E. Land (the inventor of the polaroid camera) showed in detailed experiments that our perception of, say, a colored spot depends on the colors of its surrounding. On the other hand, we may experience hallucinations or dreams as real. Quite evidently, the relationship between the "world" and our "brain" is intricate. Another strange problem is the way in which we perceive time or the "Now". Psychophysical experiments tell us that the psychological "Now" is an extended period of time in the sense of physics. The situation was made still more puzzling when, in the nineteen-twenties, Heisenberg and others realized that, by observing processes in the microscopic world of electrons and other elementary particles, we strongly interfere with that world. The outcome of experiments - at least in general - can only be predicted statistically. What is the nature ofthis strange relationship between "object" and "observer"? This is another crucial problem of the inside-outside or endo-exo dichotomy.
The essays in this topical volume inquire into one of the most fundamental issues of philosophy and of the cognitive and natural sciences: the riddle of time. The central feature is the tension between the experience and the conceptualization of time, reflecting an apparently unavoidable antinomy of subjective first-person accounts and objective traditional science. Is time based in the physics of inanimate matter, or does it originate in the operation of our minds? Is it essential for the constitution of reality, or is it just an illusion? Issues of time, temporality, and nowness are paradigms for interdisciplinary work in many contemporary fields of research. The authors of this volume discuss profoundly the mutual relationships and inspiring perspectives. They address a general audience.
1 2 Harald Atmanspacher and Hans Primas 1 Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology, Freiburg, Germany, [email protected] 2 ETH Zurich, Switzerland, [email protected] Thenotionofrealityisofsupremesigni?canceforourunderstandingofnature, the world around us, and ourselves. As the history of philosophy shows, it has been under permanent discussion at all times. Traditional discourse about - ality covers the full range from basic metaphysical foundations to operational approaches concerning human kinds of gathering and utilizing knowledge, broadly speaking epistemic approaches. However, no period in time has ex- rienced a number of moves changing and, particularly, restraining traditional concepts of reality that is comparable to the 20th century. Early in the 20th century, quite an in?uential move of such a kind was due to the so-called Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, laid out essentially by Bohr, Heisenberg, and Pauli in the mid 1920s. Bohr's dictum, quoted by Petersen (1963, p.12), was that "it is wrong to think that the task of physics is to ?nd out how nature is. Physics concerns what we can say about nature." Although this standpoint was not left unopposed - Einstein, Schr] odinger, and others were convinced that it is the task of science to ?nd out about nature itself - epistemic, operational attitudes have set the fashion for many discussions in the philosophy of physics (and of science in general) until today."
This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-conference proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Quantum Interaction, QI 2015, held in Filzbach, Switzerland, in July 2015. The 20 papers together with 2 invited keynotes presented in this book were carefully selected from 27 submissions. Quantum Interaction has developed into an emerging interdisciplinary area of science combining research topics in mathematics, physics, psychology, economics, cognitive science, and computer science.
This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Quantum Interaction, QI 2014, held in Filzbach, Switzerland, in June/July 2014. The 19 papers together with 20 invited keynotes presented in this book were carefully selected from 22 submissions. Quantum Interaction has developed into an emerging interdisciplinary area of science combining research topics in fundamental issues, semantic and memory, decision making, games, politics and social aspects, non-locality and entanglement.
Related to the key areas of Pauli's and Jung's joint interests, the book covers overlapping issues from the perspectives of physics, philosophy, and psychology. Of primary significance are epistemological questions connected to issues such as realism, measurement, observation, consciousness, and the unconscious. The contributions assess the extensive material that we have about Pauli's and Jung's ideas today, with particular respect to concrete research questions and projects based on and related to current knowledge.
Der vorliegende Band enthalt eine Sammlung von Beitragen zum Problem der Wechselwirkung zwischen Geist und Materie, einem der zentralen Probleme europaischer Geistesgeschichte. Die Blickwinkel, die dabei eingenommen werden, sind vorrangig die der Physik und der Psychologie. Die Wechselwirkung dieser Gebiete wird so deutlich wie nie zuvor im Dialog zwischen zwei Forscherpersoen lichkeiten dieses Jahrhunderts sichtbar: dem Physiker Wolfgang Pauli (1900- 1958) und dem Psychologen Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961). In zahlreichen Brie fen und Manuskripten Paulis, die erst in den letzten Jahren allgemein zuganglich wurden, finden sich bemerkenswerte und wichtige Beitrage zu diesem Dialog, die das Verstandnis des Zusammenhanges von Geist und Materie in einem neuen Licht erscheinen lassen. Um den durch Pauli und Jung begonnenen Dialog fortzusetzen und weiter fruchtbar zu machen, ist das interdisziplinare Gesprach zwischen Physikern und Psychologen noetig. Diesem Zweck diente eine von der Eidgenoessischen Techni sehen Hochschule Zurich (der Hochschule, an der Pauli tatig war) und dem C.G.Jung-Institut Zurich (das Jung gegrundet hat) gemeinsam veranstaltete Tagung im Centro Stefano Franscini (Monte Verita, Ascona) vom 13. bis 18. Juni 1993. Sie stand unter dem Thema Das Irrationale in den Naturwissenschaften: Wolf gang Paulis Begegnung mit dem Geist der Materie und wurde von Pier Luigi Luisi initiiert und organisiert. Als Berater fungierten Paul Brutsehe, Hans Primas und Eva Wertenschlag-Birkhauser. Berichte und Kommentare zu dieser Tagung wurden in Heft 4/1993 der Zeitschrift Gaia veroeffentlicht.
Are choice and free will possible in a world governed by deterministic fundamental equations? What sense would determinism make if many events and processes in the world seem to be governed by chance? These and many other questions emphasize the fact that chance and choice are two leading actors on stage whenever issues of determinism are under discussion. This volume collects essays by accomplished scientists and philosophers on the concept of determinism. The contributions cover viewpoints from mathematics, physics, cognitive science and social science, as well as philosophy.
|
You may like...
|