Este trabalho tem o objetivo de apresentar uma interpretação da filosofia de Hume com ênfase na sua epistemologia. Após uma exposição sobre diversos tópicos que estão presentes na sua teoria do conhecimento, aborda-se o ceticismo moderado, mitigado, e as influências filosóficas sobre Hume. A construção do conceito de natureza humana deve-se, em parte, ao método que ele herdou da filosofia natural, uma influência decisiva na sua metodologia. Essa direção da pesquisa permite ler o ceticismo humeano aplicado ao conhecimento com uma preocupação menos dogmática do que, geralmente, se atribui a ele. Pode-se admitir, se houver uma compreensão clara dos conceitos de experiência, teoria, explicação e razão, uma possibilidade falibilista da epistemologia de Hume. Essa abordagem permite aproximar a teoria do conhecimento humeana do falibilismo de Peirce, em certa medida. Assim, ao apresentar o que é uma teoria em Hume, chega-se ao resultado de que ele fez uma teoria que não tão cética, mas deve ser aceita como a única e, portanto, a melhor teoria. / This paper aims to present an interpretation of Hume\'s philosophy with its emphasis on epistemology. After a presentation on various topics that are present in his theory of knowledge, addresses the moderate skepticism, mitigated, and the philosophical influences on Hume. The construction of the concept of human nature is due, in part, he inherited the method of natural philosophy, a decisive influence on his methodology. This direction of research enables read Humean skepticism applied to knowledge with a concern less dogmatic than it usually is attributed to him. You can assume if there is a clear understanding of the concepts of experience, theory, explanation and reason, a possibility fallibility of Hume\'s epistemology. This approach allows us to approach the Humean theory of knowledge of Peirce\'s fallibilism to some extent. Thus, in presenting what is a theory in Hume, one arrives at the result that a theory that he did not so skeptical, but must be accepted as the only and therefore a better theory.

Este trabalho aborda um estudo sobre os STI - Sistemas Tutores Inteligentes - dando uma visão geral do que esta sendo feito nesta área e quais são as tendências futuras que direcionam os STI a trabalhar com arquiteturas de agentes. Para simular as mudanças que ocorrem em certos estados mentais dos agentes, fizemos uma unido dos STI com a IAD - Inteligência Artificial Distribuída - e construímos os modelos dos agentes com base no ambiente dos STI e na arquitetura SEM - Sociedade dos Estados Mentais - [CORM que baseia seu formalismo na Teoria das Situações. Exploramos e adotamos a ideia da arquitetura aberta dos STI [OLI92], pois, através dela, foi possível criar um ambiente cooperativo de aprendizagem no qual o tutor e o aluno podem ensinar e aprender. Trabalhamos com dois agentes globais, a saber, o tutor e o aluno, sendo cada um deles composto por quatro agentes locais associados a determinados estados mentais do agente. Os agentes locais correspondem aos estados mentais: crença, desejo, intenção e expectativa, definidos na arquitetura SEM como agentes locais, e tratados individualmente nesta, que se preocupa com o comportamento particular de cada um. Optamos por usar a arquitetura SEM, que é uma arquitetura de agentes, no lugar de uma funcional tradicional, ou seja, composta por módulos, que é característica dos STI, porque nela podemos tratar os estados mentais como agentes locais, e assim é possível modelar o comportamento individual de cada estado e as mudanças que a interação entre os agentes provoca em cada um Abordamos três situações de ensino/aprendizagem com peculiaridades diferentes nas quais os agentes globais interagem cooperativamente com o objetivo de um ensinar o outro. Para cada dialogo, estabelecemos objetivos específicos: no primeiro, nosso interesse é na maneira como o aluno ensina uma nova estratégia ao tutor; no segundo, analisamos as mudanças das crenças do tutor sobre o conhecimento do aluno; no terceiro, nos preocupamos com as estratégias de ensino utilizadas pelo tutor. O processo de ensino/aprendizagem que acontece no desenrolar da interação entre os agentes é realizado usando o método de aprendizagem simbólica automática EBL - Explanation-Based Learning - [MIT86],[COS90] Este método proporciona a generalização do exemplo de treinamento que é incorporado as crenças e as estratégias do agente que desempenha o papel daquele que aprende, enriquecendo-as. As estratégias, que são fundamentais para os STI, são tratadas como pianos de ensino, utilizadas para promover a aprendizagem, pois definem a maneira como determinado conteúdo deve ser ensinado. Tratamos aqui as estratégias de uma maneira inovadora e diferente da tratada anteriormente [COR94]. Elas são um conjunto de ações e possuem armazenados procedimentos que são usados pelos agentes durante a interação. São determinadas e controladas conforme a intenção e usadas de acordo com as crenças, no sentido de selecionar a mais adequada para cada situação. / This study focuses on the Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) and aims at presenting a general view concerning what has been developed in this field as well as the coming trends which lead the ITS to deal with agents' architecture. In order to simulate the changes which occur in certain mental states of the agents, we linked ITS with Distributed Artificial Intelligence (DAI) and then we built the agents' modules based on ITS environment and on SEM - Sociedade dos Estados Mentais that means Mental States Society - architecture [COR94]. Such an architecture bases its formalism on the Situation Theory. We explored and adopted the idea of the ITS open architecture [OLI92] for, through it, it has been possible to create a cooperative learning environment in which both the tutor and the student are able to teach and learn. The two global agents we worked on - tutor and student - both of them are made up of four local agents which are their mental states. The mental states involved are: belief, desire, intention, and expectation. These mental states are treated individually and defined as local agents according to SEM architecture. Instead of using a functional architecture - characteristic of ITS - we chose an agent architecture, for this latter makes it possible to treat the mental states as subagents. It is possible, therefore, to model the individual behavior of each state as well as the changes resulted from the agents' interaction. We focused on three teaching/learning situations that present different situations in which the global agents interact co-operatively in such a way that they teach each other. Specific aims were meant to each dialogue, as follows: the first dialogue concern has to do with the way the student teaches the tutor a new strategy; the second dialogue aim is to explore the tutor's "belief revision" about the student's knowledge; the third dialo gue goal has to do with the teaching strategies used by the tutor. The teaching/learning process brought about as the interaction between the agents happens is applied by using the Explanation-Based Learning (EBL) method [MIT86],[COS 90]. This method makes it possible to generalize the test example which is added to the learning agent's beliefs and strategies, making them more complete. The strategies, which are vital to the ITS, are treated as teaching plans and used to bring about learning, for they define the way in which a certain content is supposed to be taught. The strategies are treated here in a new manner, differently from the way they had formerly been [COR94]. They are a set of actions and present procedures on file that are used by the agents during the interaction. Also, the strategies are chosen and controlled by the intention and consulted by the beliefs so as to select the most suitable one, according to the situation.

Nesta pesquisa, examinamos a ação comunicativa e a linguagem presentes no jogo de ficção, enfatizando as seqüências de explicação e justificação produzidas pela criança. Concebendo a explicação, como conduta que se desenvolve num contexto interativo e, as condutas explicativas e justificativas (CEJ) como manifestações do uso informativo da linguagem ligado à capacidade de considerar os estados mentais do outro (Veneziano e Hudelot, 2003), analisamos a interação entre adulto e criança de cinco anos de idade, enfatizando as explicações/justificações produzidas em atividade lúdica de ficção. Vários estudiosos (François,1996; Hudelot,1997; Hudelot e Vasseur,1997) mostram que condutas discursivas do adulto trazem efeitos para a interação, pois são intervenções que suscitam reações na criança. Apoiadas na organização e elaboração do jogo de ficção proposto por Verba (1999), utilizamos o jogo \"Lego\" para intermediar a interação entre adulto - criança e relacionarmos as condutas discursivas do adulto ás condutas explicativas/ justificativas na criança. Como salienta a autora (op. cit), o jogo de ficção partilhado necessita do estabelecimento de um conjunto de significações comuns, resultante da elaboração das trocas sociais entre os parceiros que permitam, a cada participante, interpretar os \"dizeres\" e \"fazeres\" do outro no contexto do jogo. Sob a ótica de que a explicação aparece como forma de modificar as representações do outro, a intenção foi verificar como as condutas explicativas / justificativas colaboram para a elaboração e organização do jogo de ficção. Assim, correlacionamos posições discursivas do adulto, sugeridas por Hudelot (1987), às formas tutelares, propostas por Verba (1990) para o jogo de ficção, na produção de condutas explicativas/ justificativas pela criança. Constatamos, nas atividades lúdicas observadas, que o adulto geralmente solicita explicações, pois muitas das significações dadas pela criança, ou não foram compreendidas, ou houve um distanciamento entre as significações de ambos, de maneira a criar um desentendimento. Também observamos momentos em que a criança antecipa suas explicações e justificações para negociar seu ponto de vista e, conduzir o adulto em sua proposição. Desta forma, confirmamos nossa hipótese de que as condutas explicativas/ justificativas, na atividade de faz-de-conta, aparecem na situação de interlocução, tanto quando a interação e/ ou a comunicação se interrompe por falta de compreensão a uma dada questão, geralmente presente na partilha de significações, quanto quando há um distanciamento entre intenções, idéias e significações, promovendo a negociação de sentidos. As condutas explicativas/ justificativas no jogo de ficção com o \"Lego\" manifestaram-se, nas várias ocasiões em que a imaginação da criança prevalecia. Às vezes, o adulto solicitava uma explicação para entender melhor a fantasia da criança e poder participar da atividade junto a ela. Enfim, fica comprovado que, o jogo de ficção partilhado possibilita à criança desenvolver habilidades para representar o mundo e, ao estabelecer relações entre as coisas e confrontá-las com o outro, favorecer o desenvolvimento de competências para argumentar, explicar e justificar. / In this research, we examine the communication and the language in the fiction game, emphasizing the sequences about explanation and justification produced by the child. Conceiving the explanation as a conduct that is developed in an interactive context and that the explanation and justification conducts (CEJ) are language informative use manifestations, linked to the capacity of considering the mental state of the other one (Veneziano and Hudelot, 2003), we analyze the interaction between an adult and a five year old child, focusing the explications and justifications in a playful activity of fiction. Several studies (François, 1996; Hudelot, 1997; Hudelot and Vasseur, 1997) show that adult\'s discursive conducts bring effects for the interaction, because they are interventions that raise reactions in the child. Supported in the organization and elaboration of the fiction game proposed for Verba (1999) use the game \"Lego\" to intermediate the interaction between adult-child and relate adult\'s discursive conducts with explanation/justification?s conducts in the child. As the author points out (op. cit), the partitioned fiction game needs the establishment of a common significances, resultanting the elaboration of the social changes between partners, who allow, the each participant, interpret from other?s talking and doing in the context of the game. Under the optics that the explanation appears as a way to modifying the other?s representations, the intention was to verify how the explanations /justification?s conducts collaborate for the elaboration and organization of the fiction game. So, we examine how the adult\'s discursive relations suggested by Hudelot (1987) behaved, in relation to the proposed tutelary categories for Verba (1990) for the fiction game, in the explanation /justification?s conducts produced by the child. We verify, in the observed fiction activities, that the adult generally asks explanations, because many of the significances given by the child were not understood or there was a distance among significances between each other in order to create a misunderstanding. We also observed the moments in which the child foresees his/her explanations and justifications to negotiate his/her point of view and, lead the adult in his/her proposition. Thus, we confirmed our hypothesis that the explanation/ justification?s conducts, in the fiction activity, appear on the dialogue situation, as much when the interaction or the communication is interrupted for the lack of comprehension of one matter, arisen in this playful activity, as much when there is a distance between his/her intentions, ideas and significances. The explanation/justification?s conducts in the fiction game with ?Lego? were present in many occasions in the objects significances division, actions events and linkages, in which child\'s imagination prevailed. Sometimes, the adult asked an explanation to understand the child\'s fantasy better and take part in the activity close to him/her. Finally, it is proved that partitioned fiction game enables to the child develop abilities to represent the world and, when establishing relations among things and confronts them with other person, it makes use of the development to of competences to argue, to explain and to justify.

abstract: Teams are increasingly indispensable to achievements in any organizations. Despite the organizations' substantial dependency on teams, fundamental knowledge about the conduct of team-enabled operations is lacking, especially at the {\it social, cognitive} and {\it information} level in relation to team performance and network dynamics. The goal of this dissertation is to create new instruments to {\it predict}, {\it optimize} and {\it explain} teams' performance in the context of composite networks (i.e., social-cognitive-information networks). Understanding the dynamic mechanisms that drive the success of high-performing teams can provide the key insights into building the best teams and hence lift the productivity and profitability of the organizations. For this purpose, novel predictive models to forecast the long-term performance of teams ({\it point prediction}) as well as the pathway to impact ({\it trajectory prediction}) have been developed. A joint predictive model by exploring the relationship between team level and individual level performances has also been proposed. For an existing team, it is often desirable to optimize its performance through expanding the team by bringing a new team member with certain expertise, or finding a new candidate to replace an existing under-performing member. I have developed graph kernel based performance optimization algorithms by considering both the structural matching and skill matching to solve the above enhancement scenarios. I have also worked towards real time team optimization by leveraging reinforcement learning techniques. With the increased complexity of the machine learning models for predicting and optimizing teams, it is critical to acquire a deeper understanding of model behavior. For this purpose, I have investigated {\em explainable prediction} -- to provide explanation behind a performance prediction and {\em explainable optimization} -- to give reasons why the model recommendations are good candidates for certain enhancement scenarios. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Computer Science 2018

<p>This essay discusses and criticizes Richard Swinburne's inductive argument for the existence of God. In his The Existence of God, Swinburne aims at showing that the existence of God is more probable than not. This is an argument taking into consideration the premises of all traditional arguments for the existence of God. Swinburne uses the phenomena and events that constitute the premises of these arguments as evidence in an attempt to show that his hypothesis is more probably true than nor. Swinburne pursues this task by way of applying Bayes' theorem. The aim of this essay is normative - to judge the strength of Swinburne's argument for the existence of God. My primary objections towards Swinburne is that he professes a subjective concept of probability, that he relies too heavily on simplicity as a virtue of plausible and probable hypotheses and that his concept of God involves an incoherent picture of God's nature. I question not only the actual success of Swinburne's project but what his argument, if it had been successful, would have been able to establish.</p> / <p>Denna uppsats diskuterar och kritiserar Richard Swinburne's induktiva argument för Guds existens. I sin The Existence of God, försöker Swinburne visa att Guds existens är mer trolig än inte. Detta argument tar alla traditionella argument för Guds existens i beräknande.. Swinburne  använder de fenomen och händelser som utgör premisser för dessa argument som bevis i ett försök att visa att hans hypotes är mer trolig än inte.  Han genomför detta genom att använda sig av Bayes teorem. Syftet med denna uppsats är normativt - att bedöma styrkan I Swinburnes argument för Guds existens.  Mina primära invändningar mot Swinburne är att han  använder sig av ett subjektivt sannolikhetsbegrepp, att han förlitar sig allt för starkt på enkelhet som en förklaringsmässig dygd och att hans Gudsbegrepp inbegriper en inkoherent bild av Guds natur. Jag ifrågasätter den faktiska framgången i Swinburnes  projekt, och även vad Swinburne hade kunnat fastställa om hans projekt hade varit framgångsrikt.</p>

The main objective of this study is to make a comprehensive analysis of the question &ldquo / Why is there something rather than nothing?&rdquo / , which is one of the major questions of metaphysics, and to find a plausible answer at the end, if it is possible. To begin this analysis, a clarification of what we understand by this question is needed first. For the clarification, a definition of &lsquo / nothingness&rsquo / will be sought. Afterwards, the motivation for us to ask this question, the significance of it, and the content of it will be investigated. This investigation will help us concentrate on and discuss within the framework of causation and necessity our understanding of &ldquo / contingent beings&rdquo / and &ldquo / nothingness&rdquo / . Two main approaches sought to answer this question till now are by theists and physicists. Those approaches will be discussed and compared. And at the end of the comparative analysis of these two approaches, a metaphysical approach which will be a layer of them will be sought.

In this dissertation, I examine the role that intentional descriptions play in our scientific study of the mind. Behavioural scientists often use intentional language in their characterization of cognitive systems, making reference to “beliefs”, “representations”, or “states of information”. What is the scientific value gained from employing such intentional terminology? I begin the dissertation by contrasting intentional descriptions with mechanistic descriptions, as these are the descriptions most commonly used to provide explanations in the behavioural sciences. I then examine the way that intentional descriptions are employed in various scientific contexts. I conclude that while mechanistic descriptions characterize the underlying structure of systems, intentional descriptions allow us to generate predictions of systems while remaining agnostic as to their mechanistic underpinnings. Having established this, I then argue that intentional descriptions share much in common with statistical models in the way they characterize systems. Given these similarities, I theorize that intentional descriptions are employed within scientific practice as a particular type of phenomenological model. Phenomenological models are used to study, characterize, and predict the phenomena produced by mechanistic systems without describing their underlying structure. I demonstrate why such models are integral to our scientific discovery, and understanding, of the mechanisms that make up the brain. With my account on the table, I then look back at previous accounts of intentional language that philosophers have offered in the past. I highlight insights that each brought to our understanding of intentional language, and point out where each ultimately goes astray. I conclude the dissertation by examining the ontological implications of my theory. I demonstrate that my account is compatible with versions of both realism, and anti-realism, regarding the existence of intentional states.

This thesis defends Epistemic Structural Realism (ESR) against both Ontic Structural Realism (OSR) and Traditional Scientific Realism (TSR). It is argued that TSR cannot properly explain what actually happens throughout radical theory changes in science / in the sense that a plausible version of Scientific Realism should, somehow, satisfy Scientific Anti-Realists&rsquo / concerns about the link between &ldquo / truth&rdquo / and &ldquo / success&rdquo / of our scientific theories. On the other hand, it is claimed that OSR is not a form of Scientific Realism but rather basically a modified form of Pragmatism. To that effect, it is further argued that Modern Physics does not provide convincing reasons to accept the conclusions that advocates of OSR derive from it. It is finally asserted that a Structural Realist understanding of Scientific Explanation is not possible. In that regard, it is argued that a defense of Structural Realism by No Miracle Argument (NMA) against Pessimistic Meta Induction Argument (PMIA) will be effective if and only if the NMA is formulated by the predictive success of scientific theories, rather than constructing it on the explanatory power of them.

This thesis presents a defense of the view that externalism cannot be a theoretical basis of a mentalistic causal-explanatory science, even though such a theoretical basis is implicitly or explicitly adopted by many cognitive scientists. Externalism is a theory in philosophy of mind which states that mental properties are relations between the core realizers of an individual&rsquo / s mental states (such as brain states) and certain things that exist outside those realizers (such as what the content of a mental state corresponds to in the actual world.) After clarifications regarding the term &ldquo / externalism&rdquo / and reviewing the history and the various forms of the externalist theory, it is argued that the properties offered by externalist theories as mental properties have no causal influence on behavior, and therefore cannot causally explain it. The argument is largely based on a method of comparing the causal powers of entities which are identical in all respects except their mental properties (as construed by externalism), and the conclusions are supported by metaphysical reflections on causation, dispositions, relational properties and historical properties. Objections to the defended view are considered and refuted. The thesis is written in the style of modern analytic philosophy.

Thesis (Ph. D. in Teaching and Learning)--Vanderbilt University, 2003. / Title from PDF title screen. Includes bibliographical references.