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<p>Elucidating the mechanisms structuring communities has been a challenge for community ecology since its beginnings. One theory argues that assembly rules structure communities by means of deterministic mechanisms arising from biological interactions. Another view maintains that patterns seen in community composition and species abundance result from stochastic processes such as migration and extinction. The dilemma has yet not been resolved unambiguously. The main issue is that communities shaped by deterministic mechanisms can produce stochastic patterns via priority effects. The main goal of this study was to determine whether assembly rules structure communities. My strategy was to minimize priority effects by controlling timing of colonization. To do this I used a null community by combining communities of 17 rock pools. This null community was later divided among experimental communities. I conducted three experiments: (1) Experimental communities were exposed to the same external conditions. (2) Communities were exposed to different environments, disturbance, dispersal and habitat heterogeneity. (3) Replicated null communities were connected to allow inter-replicate dispersal. After 4 months, communities (experiment 1) formed alternative states, suggesting the lack of assembly rules control in community structure. The second experiment showed that adding factors results in more alternative states. The increasing number of alternative states among replicate communities indicates that diversified environment and migration are needed to reproduce qualitative patterns observed in nature. The last experiment (3) showed that patterns observed among connected replicate communities resemble patterns that emerged in the presence of biological interactions in unconnected communities. Similarity of patterns between connected and unconnected groups of communities suggest that local biological interactions can be sufficient to structure communities to a considerable degree. Nevertheless, the regional processes appear necessary in their role of supplying species for local communities.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

As a philosophy, Marxism has a rich and varied history that spans the decades since the Industrial Revolution. In this time, it has grown several branches, including Western Marxism and Critical Theory, and has reached deeply into many academic fields such as sociology, art, and psychology. However, as an ideology, Marxism has developed a severely tarnished reputation due to its mistreatment at the hands of often brutal totalitarian regimes. These power-centralizing aristocracies have carefully isolated and exploited select concepts from Marxist philosophy, like that of commodity fetishism, to force revolutionary change in societies that were often not prepared for massive upheaval. My work will attempt to reflect upon the value of Marxist philosophy as a tool for understanding society and its interactions. I will highlight the contribution of the Hegelian-influenced Western Marxism of the Hungarian School philosopher György Lukács and the Frankfurt School Critical Theorists like that of Herbert Marcuse. In doing so, I shall attempt to qualitatively show a link between scientific Marxism's strict focus on economic determinism as the basis for national ideologies and the stagnation of communist revolutions worldwide.

Denna essä är en ontologisk och epistemologisk undersökning av bland annat etiska och medvetandefilosofiska implikationer av en konsekvent fysikalistisk hållning. I detta kontrasteras mot en transcendentalistisk hållning, som den av T. M. Scanlon, den skeptiska empirismen av David Hume, reciprokt baserade moraliska system (e.g. J. L. Mackies självreferentiella altruism) samt en medvetandesyn i linje med Galen Strawsons kriterier för en realistisk fysikalism som i min mening löser alla så kallade psykofysiska problem. / This paper contains an ontological and epistemic analysis of the implication of a consistently physicalist view of reality. This in polemic contrast with transcendentalist positions as that of T. M. Scanlon. I follow along the lines of a sceptical empiricism that I ascribe to Hume and from which, I argue, consistently follows guidelines as set by for example J. L. Mackie and Galen Strawson on topics of self-referential altruism and realistic physicalism respectively.

Thesis (MPhil)--University of Stellenbosch, 2003. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Responsibility is either linked to duties and expectations, or it is linked to the freedom of an agent. These links are questionable. It is therefore necessary to investigate the freedom and context of commission and omission. There are numerous difficulties in evaluating suicide: - The problem to distinguish between successful suicide and failed pseudo suicide. - The problem of the mind: The limited accessibility of the emotions and attitudes despite its expressibility And the unexpressibility of the experiences despite its immediate accessibility. And the problem of other minds. - The problem of the freedom of the will. Prove is given that no aspect of the mind is free - despite our illusions of freedom. - The problem of the cause, origin and extent of an act. - The problem of the relation between brain and mind. This problem is important when we consider the origin of acts and the concept of the self. The important issues when solving the difficulties pertaining to suicide are: - Agency: The self is owner of all acts and instances of mind. The self is also the subject of all physical acts and acts of the mind. - The self is an open complex system. The self is entangled in relations of differences, conflict and deferment of meaning. The important conclusions when evaluating suicide are: - The agent is the owner and the subject of his acts. The agent has illusions of freedom. The agent is inseparable from his circumstances. - Acts originate in the context of these circumstances. - Responsibility exists in the context of power in society. - The answers to the questions of Why? Are logical reconstruction and politically correct confabulations - whatever the answer is, it is shared by all participants of the context.The evaluation of suicide: - The self-murderer`s act originates from the context of the circumstances of which he is a participant. - Suicide happens within the context of a pancheiria with aspects of autocheireō and heterocheireō. - The pancheiria started before the autocheireō. - The pancheiria continues after the autocheireō. The autocheireō is but an indication of the seriousness van the larger pancheiria. The self-murderer (autocheir) and his autocheireō persist as a silhouette in our midst. - The possibility of the self-murderer`s illusion of freedom does not liberate us from the silhouette`s accusations. - Neither does se sharing of guilt give as relieve from the silhouette`s accusations. - Neither will we benefit from any rationalization. Finally we can do nothing but to utter these statements of denial and confession : - Suicide is wrong. - But we have not done it. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Verantwoordelikheid word óf aan verpligtinge en verwagtinge, óf aan die vryheid van die agent verbind. Hierdie verbindings word betwyfel. Daarom is dit nodig dat die vryheid van handeling en nie-handeling sowel as die konteks waarin die handeling en nie-handeling gebeur ondersoek word. Verskeie probleme ten opsigte van die beoordeling van die selfmoord word uitgewys: - Die probleem om die werklike geslaagde selfmoord te onderskei van die gefaalde selfmoordpoging. - Die probleme van die verstand. Naamlik die beperkte toeganklikheid van die emosies en houdings, alhoewel dit uitdrukbaar is. En die onmiddelike toeganklikheid van die ervarings wat dit te spyt nie uitdrukbaar is nie. Asook die probleem om ander verstande te ken. - Die probleem van die vryheid van die wil. Dit word aangetoon dat geen aspek van die verstand vry is nie. Dit nie teenstaande het ons steeds die illusie van vryheid. - Die probleem van die oorsaak, die oorsprong en die reikwydte van handelinge. - Die probleem van die verhouding tussen die brein en die verstand. Hierdie probleem is belangrik by die oorwegings van die oorspong van handeling en die siening van die self. Belangrike elemente by die oplossing van die beoordeling van selfmoord is: - Die agentskap: naamlik dat die self die eienaar van alle verstandsitems en handelinge is, en dat die self die subjek van alle verstandshandelinge en sigbare handelinge is. - Die self as `n oop komplekse stelsel wat in wederkerige verhoudings is van verskil, geskil en uitstel van betekenis.Gevolgtrekkings wat belangrik is by die beoordeling van selfmoord: - Die agent is eienaar en subjek van sy handelinge, het die illusie van vryheid, is deel van sy omstandighede. - Die handeling ontstaan in die konteks van hierdie omstandighede. - Verantwoordelikheid bestaan in die konteks van mag in die samelewing. - Die antwoord op Hoekom? en Waarom? is logiese herkonstruksies en politiese korrekte konfabulasie - maar wat ookal die antwoord is, dit word gedeel deur al die deelnemers aan die konteks. Die beoordeling van selfmoord: - Die selfmoordenaar se handeling ontspring uit die konteks van sy omstandighede waaraan hy `n deelnemer is. - Die selfmoord gebeur eerder binne die konteks van `n pancheiria met aspekte van autocheireō en heterocheireō. - Die pancheiria was reeds voor die autocheireō. - Die pancheiria duur voort na die autocheireō. Die autocheireō toon aan ons die erns van die oorkoepelende pancheiria. Die selfmoordenaar (autocheir) en sy autocheireō bestaan voort as silhoeët in ons midde. - Die moontlike illusie van vryheid van die selfmoordenaar kan ons nie die aanklag deur die silhoeët ontsnapping bied nie. - Net so min kan die verdeling van skuld ons van die aanklag laat ontsnap. - Enige rasionalisering van ons kant is nutteloos. Laastens kan ons net sê: - Selfmoord is verkeerd. - Ons het dit nie gedoen nie. Hierdie stellinge dien as ontkennings sowel as skuldbeleidenisse.

Mainstream philosophy of action and mind construes intentional behaviour in terms of causal processes that lead from agent-involving mental states to action. Actions are construed as events, which are actions in virtue of being caused by the right mental antecedents in the right way. Opponents of this standard event-causal approach have criticised the view on various grounds; they argue that it does not account for free will and moral responsibility, that it does not account for action done in the light of reasons, or, even, that it cannot capture the very phenomenon of agency. The thesis defends the standard event-causal approach against challenges of that kind. In the first chapter I consider theories that stipulate an irreducible metaphysical relation between the agent (or the self) and the action. I argue that such theories do not add anything to our understanding of human agency, and that we have, therefore, no reason to share the metaphysically problematic assumptions on which those alternative models are based. In the second chapter I argue for the claim that reason-explanations of actions are causal explanations, and I argue against non-causal alternatives. My main point is that the causal approach is to be preferred, because it provides an integrated account of agency by providing an account of the relation between the causes of movements and reasons for actions. In the third chapter I defend non-reductive physicalism as the most plausible version of the standard event-causal theory. In the fourth and last chapter I argue against the charge that the standard approach cannot account for the agent’s role in the performance of action. Further, I propose the following stance with respect to the problem of free will: we do not have free will, but we have the related ability to govern ourselves—and the best account of self-determination presupposes causation, but not causal determinism.

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