Reflexive Reasoning Research Articles

Reconfiguring the strategic/non-strategic binary in im/politeness research

Abstract In this article, I explore the potential of the strategic/non-strategic distinction to link im/politeness with recent developments in pragmatics more generally. My point of departure is the claim that the binary between strategic/non-strategic politeness, as drawn in previous research starting with the distinction between discernment and volition, leaves a blind-spot when it comes to established ways of achieving politeness that do not rely on recognition of the speaker’s intention, yet go beyond a pre-defined repertoire of forms. To shed light on this blind spot, I recruit the notions of first-order (S1) and higher-order (S2) polite speakers from Rational Speech Act models, which distinguish between different types of speakers depending on the degree to which they reason not just about their own goals but also about what the hearer thinks of them. However, contrary to the standard RSA model, I propose to think of such reflexive reasoning as a matter of degree, which can be used to explain a continuum of uses from strategic to non-strategic politeness. This move highlights points of contact between theoretical traditions that have developed independently and helps to reinstate im/politeness as a driver of pragmatics research broadly conceived.

Формирование субъектной позиции у пациента через практики его включения в этическую экспертизу медицинских случаев

The development of new biomedical technologies has contributed to changing, blurring the boundaries between the norm and pathology of a human being. It is about a gap in the notions of norm and pathology, illness and treatment that are accepted in scientific communities. As a framework of the emerging humanistic scientific paradigm the principles of a subject-oriented approach to the patient are being developed, aimed at maintaining the patient's control over the recovery process, at developing his/her subject position, which implies his/her active and responsible participation in the treatment process and in medical decision-making. Formation of the considered approach in medical institutions is connected with the development of new institutions and practices. The author shows that the procedural model of the institute of medical cases ethical expertise is aimed at developing a subject-oriented approach in clinical practice. At the same time, the patient, as a participant of ethical expertise, acquires the experience of reflexive reasoning and, thus, enabling the possibility and capability for a patient to be involved in the process of treatment management on a new basis. The article presents some results of the author's study of the procedural model of ethical expertise in German medical settings in the context of describing the main gaps and problems associated with the implementation of the subject-oriented approach. The research was conducted using the methods of semi- formalized interview, substantial analysis of research and methodological literature. As the study has shown, the main problems of the subject-oriented approach implementation in the practice of ethical expertise are related to the trends of bureaucratization and commercialization of this practice in the hospital environment. It seems that the issue of developing an appropriate language ensuring equal participation of the subjects of the expertise is important. Prospects for humanization of this practice are seen to be connected with the inclusion of representatives of patient communities and self-help groups of patients in this practice.

Game-theoretic analysis of Stackelberg oligopoly with arbitrary rank reflexive behavior of agents

PurposeThis paper aims to consider the problem of determining the equilibriums on oligopoly market in case of Stackelberg leader (leaders) and reflexive behavior of market agents.Design/methodology/approachThis paper includes economic and mathematical modeling, optimization methods and game theory.FindingsThis paper explains models of reflexive games on oligopoly market, taking into account the diversity of agents’ reasoning about strategies of environing and equilibrium mechanisms for coincidence or opposition of agents’ reflexive reasoning on the same rank of reflection.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper considers the oligopoly market with linear function of demand and costs of agents, the rational behavior of agents and the reflexive reasoning on the same rank of reflection. The set of agents’ reasoning about the environing strategies is considered as a set of market states for which the problem of agent’s optimal action choosing solves with the complete awareness.Practical implicationsIdentification of reflexive behavior of environing allows agents to increase their market shares and profit.Social implicationsOligopoly markets play a leading role in the world oil trade and reflexive behavior affects the market equilibrium.Originality/valueIn the paper, the mechanisms of equilibrium in reflexive games on the linear duopoly market for arbitrary rank reflection are developed.

Professional values: introduction to the theme

A code of practice incorporating a declaration of professional values is both a distinguishing feature and its observance a condition of membership of most professional bodies. It is in effect a summary of important aspects of how members of that body are expected to behave and informs not only the membership itself, but also interested others and the general public. Within the values espoused in such codes, we should expect to be able to identify both generic values, that is those that reflect more general commitments to for instance, honesty, integrity, confidentiality and trustworthiness, but also values that relate directly to the nature of that particular profession or related professions. Thus for healthcare professionals, those values associated with beneficence, respect for autonomy and the centrality of patient care are prominent. The group of papers that follows, evolved from a seminar on professional values in health care held at Cardiff University in August 2007 during the annual European Society for Philosophy of Medicine and Health Care conference. They do not represent a comprehensive summary or review of the values expressed in the various healthcare professionals‘ codes—these are readily available in the publications of the respective professional bodies. The intention of the papers is rather to highlight aspects that reflect either an intrinsic process of evolution in professional values, or a response to changing external demands, both welcome and unwelcome. The relevance of reflexive reasoning is a crucial aspect of a profession that is explored by Edgar (2010) who draws on the example of British artists who successfully began a process of transition from trade to profession at the end of the 18th century. Edgar argues that to establish a profession requires not only a theoretically-informed educational base but also should incorporate processes of on-going reflection on professional objectives and just what it means to be a member of that profession. For artists, unlike craftsmen, a search for beauty cannot be codified or defined prior to its realisation. It is asserted that it is this vital element of reflexivity that distinguishes professions including medicine and other healthcare disciplines from occupations dependent on craft skills alone and for which instrumental reasoning is adequate. But paradoxically, a professional risks being disenfranchised from the members of the public he or she serves who are not party to this reflexive element and thus may not share a common vision of what constitutes a satisfactory outcome. Sellman (2010) highlights the tension between institutional (managerial) and nursing (professional) practices in the UK, cautioning that nursing values, and particularly those associated with patient care are under threat from managerial controls. These threats are a consequence of a struggle by managers to accommodate severely constrained financial and human resources in a target-driven culture. Such drives for economic efficiency risk compromising core nursing values. For Sellman, as with Edgar, there is something over and above the mere mastery of technical skills that roughly equates with the internal goods of nursing. Drawing on the work of MacIntyre and others, Sellman argues that a MacIntyrean concept of (external) goods of effectiveness and (internal) goods of excellence D. Badcott (&) Centre for Applied ethics, Cardiff University, Humanities Building, Colum Drive, Cardiff CF10 3EU, UK e-mail: badcottd@cf.ac.uk

What do you think I think you think?: Strategic reasoning in matrix games

In reasoning about strategic interpersonal situations, such as in playing games, an individual's representation of the situation often includes not only information about the goals and rules of the game, but also a mental model of other minds. Often such mental models involve a hierarchy of reflexive reasoning commonly employed in social situations (“What do you think I think you think…”), and may be related to the developmental notion of ‘theory of mind’. In two experiments, the authors formally investigate such interpersonal recursive reasoning in college-age adults within the context of matrix games. Participants are asked to predict the moves of another player (experimenter's confederate) in a two-choice, sequential-move game that may terminate at various stages with different payoffs for each player. Participants are also asked to decide optimally on their own moves based on the prediction made. Errors concerning the prediction, or translation of those predictions into decisions about one's action, were recorded. Results demonstrate the existence of a “default” mental model about the other player in the game context that is dynamically modified as new evidence is accumulated. Predictions about this other player's behavior are, in general, used consistently in decision-making, though the opponent tends to be modeled, by default, to behave in a myopic fashion not anticipating the participant's own action.

Shaping the Adversary Culture

Our varied communities of discourse face a rhetorical future shaped by juridical styles reminiscent of the "adversary culture" postulated by post-war American critic Lionel Trilling. Itself the subject of litigious debate. the adversarial spirit today shows few signs of weakening, but its influence can be better understood and guided along certain tracks. To influence this adversarial style in coming decades, we need to explore the difference between evidencebased reasoning, which draws on the sensationalist logic ofinduction. and reflexive reasoning, which draws on the second-order logic of presumption. Understanding the structures and dynamics of this reflexive style forces us to address our responsibilities as speakers, as we seek to shape our rhetorical future. Close examination of adversarial contlict may lead us toward useful consensus on how the new game should be played.

Parallel reasoning in structured connectionist networks: Signatures versus temporal synchrony

Shastri & Ajjanagadde (1993) (S&A) argue convincingly that both structured connectionist networks and parallel dynamic inferencing are necessary for reflexive reasoning - a kind of inferencing and reasoning that occurs rapidly, spontaneously, and without conscious effort, and which seems necessary for everyday tasks such as natural language understanding. As S&A describe, reflexive reasoning requires a solution to thedynamic binding problem, that is, how to encode systematic and abstract knowledge and instantiate it in specific situations to draw appropriate inferences. Although symbolic artificial intelligence systems trivially solve the dynamic binding problem using computers' registers and pointers, it has remained a difficult problem for connectionist systems (see Fodor & Pylyshyn 1988). S&A's temporal synchrony solution to the dynamic binding problem using synchronous firing of argument units and the entities that are bound to them illustrates one way in which connectionist networks can do thisusing a constrained but important class of long-term knowledge rules. Their structured connectionist solution allows dynamic inferencing to proceed in parallel and therefore has a number of advantages for reflexive reasoning over most other connectionist and symbolic systems.

Temporal synchrony, dynamic bindings, and Shruti: A representational but nonclassical model of reflexive reasoning

AbstractLange & Dyer misunderstand what is meant by an “entity” and confuse a medium of representation (synchrony) with the content being represented. This leads them to the erroneous conclusion that SHRUTI will run out of phases and that its representation of bindings lacks semantic content. It is argued that (1) the limit on the number of phases suffices, and (2) SHRUTI can be interpreted as using “dynamic signatures” that offer significant advantages over fixed preexisting signatures. Bonatti refers to three levels of commitment to a representational theory of the mind (RTM) and states that SHRUTI is committed to RTM at levels 1 and 2. He acknowledges that SHRUTI is not committed at level 3, but argues that an extended SHRUTI would have to make such a commitment. We agree that SHRUTI is committed to RTM at level 1 and, in a sense, also at level 2. SHRUTI, however, is not committed to RTM at level 3 and, even though it has been extended in several ways, it has retained its original representational character.

From simple associations to systematic reasoning: A connectionist representation of rules, variables and dynamic bindings using temporal synchrony

AbstractHuman agents draw a variety of inferences effortlessly, spontaneously, and with remarkable efficiency – as though these inferences were a reflexive response of their cognitive apparatus. Furthermore, these inferences are drawn with reference to a large body of background knowledge. This remarkable human ability seems paradoxical given the complexity of reasoning reported by researchers in artificial intelligence. It also poses a challenge for cognitive science and computational neuroscience: How can a system of simple and slow neuronlike elements represent a large body of systemic knowledge and perform a range of inferences with such speed? We describe a computational model that takes a step toward addressing the cognitive science challenge and resolving the artificial intelligence paradox. We show how a connectionist network can encode millions of facts and rules involvingn-ary predicates and variables and perform a class of inferences in a few hundred milliseconds. Efficient reasoning requires the rapid representation and propagation of dynamic bindings. Our model (which we refer to as SHRUTI) achieves this by representing (1) dynamic bindings as the synchronous firing of appropriate nodes, (2) rules as interconnection patterns that direct the propagation of rhythmic activity, and (3) long-term facts as temporal pattern-matching subnetworks. The model is consistent with recent neurophysiological evidence that synchronous activity occurs in the brain and may play a representational role in neural information processing. The model also makes specific psychologically significant predictions about the nature of reflexive reasoning. It identifies constraints on the form of rules that may participate in such reasoning and relates the capacity of the working memory underlying reflexive reasoning to biological parameters such as the lowest frequency at which nodes can sustain synchronous oscillations and the coarseness of synchronization.

Reflections on reflexive reasoning

Reflections on reflexive reasoning

Not all reflexive reasoning is deductive

Not all reflexive reasoning is deductive

A step toward modeling reflexive reasoning

A step toward modeling reflexive reasoning

Reflexive Reasoning with Multiple Instantiation in a Connectionist Reasoning System with a Type Hierarchy

Abstract We describe a hybrid knowledge representation and reasoning system that integrates a rule-based reasoner with a type hierarchy and can accommodate multiple dynamic instantiations of predicates. The system—which is an extension of the reasoner described in Shastri and Ajjanagadde (1990)maintains and propagates variable bindings using temporally synchronous (i.e. in-phase)firing of appropriate nodes, and can perform a broad class of reasoning with extreme efficiency. The type hierarchy allows the system to encode generic facts such as ‘cats prey on bird’ and rules such as ‘if x preys on y then y is scared of ’ and use them to infer that Tweety the canary is scared of Sylvester the cat. The system can also encode qualified rules such as ‘if an animate agent collides with a solid object then the agent gets hur’. The ability to accommodate multiple dynamic instantiations of any predicate allows the system to handle a much broader class of inferences, including those involving transitivity and bounded ...