In this thesis, a particular class of agent is singled out for examination. In order to provide a guiding metaphor, we speak of control room agents. Our focus is on rational decision- making by such agents, where the circumstances obtaining are such that rationality is bounded. Control room agents, whether human or non-human, need to reason and act in a changing environment with only limited information available to them. Determining the current state of the environment is a central concern for control room agents if they are to reason and act sensibly. A control room agent cannot plan its actions without having an internal representation (epistemic state) of its environment, and cannot make rational decisions unless this representation, to some level of accuracy, reflects the state of its environment. The focus of this thesis is on three aspects regarding the epistemic functioning of a control room agent: 1. How should the epistemic state of a control room agent be represented in order to facilitate logical analysis? 2. How should a control room agent change its epistemic state upon receiving new information? 3. How should a control room agent combine available information from different sources? In describing the class of control room agents as first-order intentional systems hav- ing both informational and motivational attitudes, an agent-oriented view is adopted. The central construct used in the information-theoretic approach, which is qualitative in nature, is the concept of a templated ordering. Representing the epistemic state of a control room agent by a (special form of) tem- plated ordering signals a departure from the many approaches in which only the beliefs of an agent are represented. Templated orderings allow for the representation of both knowledge and belief. A control room agent changes its epistemic state according to a proposed epistemic change algorithm, which allows the agent to select between two well-established forms of belief change operations, namely, belief revision and belief update. The combination of (possibly conflicting) information from different sources has re- ceived a lot of attention in recent years. Using templated orderings for the semantic representation of information, a new family of purely qualitative merging operations is developed. / School of Computing / Ph. D. (Computer Science)

Organisational learning is conceptualised within healthcare policy as an acontextual entity to be implemented across services through a prescribed governance framework. Studies of organisational learning often exclude context in this way. The central questions of this thesis concern how and why context is relevant and important in relation to organisational learning. In order to address these issues, context and organisational learning were conceptualised as mutually constitutive activity and knowing-in-practice respectively. Taking a cultural-historical activity theoretical approach, learning is understood to be an intrinsic part of activity. These issues were explored empirically through qualitative case study in three purposively sampled Scottish primary care teams. Initial findings suggested collective learning occurred through participation in everyday activity. Team accounts of apparently the same routine object of work revealed distinctive patterns of activity. Each team seemed to be doing the same thing differently. Exploration of mediating means present in each teamâ s activity accounted for these differences: although similar on the surface, the attribution of meaning to each was contested and shaped through the cultural, historical and inherently contextual activity which they mediated within each activity system. Further analysis demonstrated members of each primary care team co-configured these objects with members of other interlinked activity systems. Different things were actually being done in similarly different ways. This showed how inherently contextual activities shaped the content of collective learning and offered an explanation of why context is relevant and important in collective learning. These findings suggest efforts to transfer knowledge as a discrete, manageable entity between situations are unlikely to succeed due to the filtering and translating effect of inherently contextual activity. From this perspective, organisational learning and related concepts such as â implementationâ and â best practiceâ become problematic. Healthcare policy concerning collective learning, within which such approaches are central, may benefit from reconsideration.

L'étude de la formation d'une communauté épistémique québécoise en santé publique en ayant recours à l'interactionnisme-structural permet d'appréhender ce phénomène social sous l'angle d'une influence réciproque entre d'une part des acteurs sociaux interagissant entre-eux et d'autre part, des conceptualisations variées des objets de santé publique; ces éléments sociaux et sémantiques subissent des transformations simultanées. Notre étude démontre et illustre qu'au même moment où un réseau social de chercheurs prend forme, une thématique nouvelle prend place et rallie ces mêmes chercheurs, non pas seulement dans leurs relations sociales, mais dans les idées qu'ils manipulent lors de leur travail de production et de diffusion de connaissances; les identités sociales se lient, mais pas au hasard, parce qu'elles partagent des éléments sémantiques communs. C'est notamment en explorant 20 ans de collaborations scientifiques à l'aide d'outils d'analyse de réseaux, d'analyse en composantes discrètes et par l'exporation de treillis de Galois que cette étude a été menée. Notre approche est principalement exploratoire et une attention toute particulière est portée sur les aspects méthodologiques et théoriques du travail de recherche scientifique. / The study of the formation of an epistemic community in Quebec's public health by using structural interactionism allows to understand this social phenomenon in terms of an interaction between, on the one hand, social actors interacting together and, on the other hand, various conceptualizations of the objects of public health. These social and semantic elements undergo simultaneous transformations. Our study demonstrates that the formation of a network of researchers leads to the emergence of a new thematic at the center of interest of those researchers. Researchers are linked, not only in social networks term, but also at a conceptual level : social identities are linked, but not randomly, they are linked by semantics elements. It is by exploring 20 years of scientific collaboration by using tools from social networks analysis, discrete components analysis and the exploration of concept lattice in particular that this study was conducted. Our approach is more exploratory and a special attention is put on methodological aspects of scientific work.

Recently in analytic philosophy, interest in the issue of the epistemic value of art has been revived. Philosophers have sought to establish whether and in what ways art is a source of knowledge, understanding or a means of inquiry. In philosophy this is a longstanding question, addressed both in the Greek and German traditions, but it seems pertinent to ask the question again today in light of significant changes that have taken place in contemporary art practice. In my thesis, I investigate this question from two perspectives: in terms of analytic philosophy of art, and in terms of developments in contemporary art since the 1960s. In Part I, I offer a defence of a philosophical theory of artistic value, critically overview the extant philosophical literature on the question of epistemic value of art, and explain why the inherently experimental character of contemporary art makes it difficult simply to apply the available theories. I argue that a philosophical engagement with contemporary art requires a different, more inductive method. In Part II, I closely consider three recent developments in which the relationship between art and knowledge has been rendered more complex. The Conceptual Art movement of the 1960s and 1970s privileged concerns with concepts, thought processes and truth over expression, materiality and fidelity to genre. The social turn of the 1990s cast the artist in a position that is almost indistinguishable from that of a teacher, social activist or even of a technology developer. And the artists working within the bio art movement of the 1990s and 2000s have assimilated the activity of the artist to that of the scientist, sometimes blurring the two roles. The goal of the thesis is twofold. On the one hand, I show how cases from recent art history put pressure on some key commitments in recent analytic philosophy. Revisions and challenges are suggested in particular for extant theories of artistic value, conceptions of artistic autonomy and heteronomy, and some popular accounts of the epistemic value of art. On the other hand, concepts from analytic philosophy are used to shed light on some of the more radical developments in recent art practice, and to rethink the ways in which art participates in the broader culture.

In this thesis I discuss one way in which evolutionary theory has been brought to bear on the evaluation of competing meta-normative views in epistemology. More specifically, I investigate whether normative realism in epistemology (epistemic realism) is compatible with the view that we are justified in holding many of the epistemic beliefs we hold, on the assumption that those beliefs can be explained in evolutionary terms. In Part I I discuss normativity in epistemology and meta-epistemology. I begin by drawing attention to the fact that there are very different ways of understanding which concepts in epistemology are normative and what their normativity consists in. I focus on the concept of an epistemic reason to illustrate this point. I then discuss, in some detail, how different interpretations of epistemic-normativity will affect the form which normative-realist views in epistemology can take. I conclude by drawing a taxonomy of epistemic-realist views which is mindful of the different interpretations of epistemic normativity which I distinguished. In Part II I turn to discuss the topic of Darwinian arguments against normative-realist views in epistemology. I begin by considering the form which Darwinian arguments have taken in recent metaethical literature. I argue that Darwinian arguments of a kind which is meant to raise a distinctively epistemological challenge for normative-realist views – I call those 'Darwinian-epistemological' arguments – represent a more interesting object of philosophical investigation than Darwinian arguments of a different 'metaphysical' kind. I then formulate a Darwinian-epistemological argument which targets normative-realist views in epistemology (DEA), explain how it works, and spend some time discussing its key premises. In Part III I engage with the Darwinian-epistemological challenge against realism about epistemic normativity that Sharon Street presents in her paper 'Evolution and the Normativity of Epistemic Reasons' (2009). I argue that Street’s epistemological challenge is best viewed as an instance of a Darwinian-epistemological argument of the kind I formulated (DEA). I then go on to reply to Street’s argument on behalf of the epistemic realist. I conclude that arguments with the form of DEA do not represent a serious threat for normative realist views in epistemology.

Le projet de cette thèse émane du constat d'une scission entre épistémologie d'une part et logique épistémique d'autre part. Si des tentatives de conciliation se sont avérées fructueuses, nous explorons ici la possibilité d'une réconciliation entre épistémologie et logique épistémique à travers l'argumentation.Étudier la logique épistémique au sein d'une pratique argumentative, c'est-À-Dire au sein de dialogues, nous permet de bénéficier d'un cadre d'étude dynamique pour explorer le dynamisme et la signification du langage de la logique épistémique. Nous montrons que cette conciliation de l'épistémologie et de la logique épistémique dans une pratique argumentative est pertinente dans le domaine juridique car elle offre une approche originale de la notion de condition dans le droit. / The project of this thesis stems from the observation of a split between epistemology and epistemic logic.If some attempts at conciliation have been successful, here we explore the possibility of reconciliation between epistemology and epistemic logic through argumentation.Studying epistemic logic in argumentative practice, that is to say in dialogues, enables us to benefit from a dynamic framework to explore the dynamics and the meaning of the language of epistemic logic.We show that this reconciliation of epistemology and epistemic logic in an argumentative practice is relevant in the legal field because it offers an original approach to the notion of condition in law.

Les roues aubagées de turbomachines sont soumises en fonctionnement `a des sollicitations statiqueset dynamiques, qui peuvent conduire `a des situations de fatigue vibratoire pour des excitationsau voisinage des fréquences de résonance. Ce probléme est aggravé par le désaccordage involontaire,auquel sont sujets les ensembles aubagés notamment du fait des dispersions de fabrication.L’objectif de ce travail de recherche est de proposer une stratégie mixte numérique et expérimentalepermettant de caractériser le comportement dynamique d’une roue d’essai au sein des statistiquesdécrivant une flotte simulée de moteurs en service, en vue de la certification vibratoire. Un modèle numérique fidèle basée sur l’acquisition optique d’une roue expérimentale a été développé; une série d’essais en laboratoire a permis de vérifier sa représentativité. L’exploitation de mesures réalisées en configuration moteur a montré une bonne cohérence globale des niveaux d’amplitude prédits à l’aidedu modèle fidèle. Enfin, la simulation du comportement d’une population de roues désaccordées à l’aide d’une approche probabiliste non-Paramétrique a permis de positionner l’amplitude de réponse maximale rencontrée sur la pièce d’essai par rapport à la valeur théorique obtenue par simulation. La stratégie proposée permet une prédiction des niveaux vibratoires maximaux pour une flotte de rouesen service. / Under operating conditions, turbomachinery blisks are subject to static and dynamic loads which mayresult in High-Cycle Fatigue situations when excited at the neighbourhood of resonant frequencies.Random mistuning, which affects blisks due to machining deviations, turns this issue even morecritical. The objective of the current study is to introduce a numerical-Experimental strategy allowingthe dynamic characterization of an experimental bladed disk with regard to the statistics representingthe simulated behaviour for a population of operating blisks. A high-Fidelity numerical model basedon the optical acquisition of an experimental blisk has been set up. Test series performed in labconditions allowed to verify its coherence. The comparison of the response amplitudes measuredunder operating conditions to the model predictions revealed an acceptable matching between testand simulation data. Finally, a non-Parametric probabilistic approach has been used to predict thetheoretical maximal amplification factor. The maximum amplification factor obtained by means ofsimulation was compared to the amplification factor of the test specimen. The strategy proposed inthis study allows maximum amplification factor predictions for a population of blisks

[pt] Como os usuários de computadores pessoais costumam enxergar um sistema computacional interativo como a própria interface, é desejável que esta seja construída de forma que eles entendam para que serve o sistema, o que ele permite que seus usuários façam e de que forma, para quem se destina etc. De acordo com a Engenharia Semiótica, fundamentação teórica deste trabalho, tais questões são transmitidas aos usuários por uma metamensagem do designer, comunicada pela sua interface, através de conversas entre usuário e designer - este último através de seu representante em tempo de interação, o preposto do designer. A Engenharia Semiótica propõe, antes da construção da interface concreta, uma etapa de modelagem da interação usuário-sistema, na qual o designer modela todas as possíveis conversas que consegue prever para que os usuários atinjam suas metas. Para a execução desta etapa, criou-se, em 2003, a MoLIC (Modeling Language for Interaction as Conversation), uma linguagem de modelagem que representa a interação como as possíveis conversas entre usuário e designer. Apesar de ter sido proposta como uma ferramenta epistêmica, a MoLIC ainda não tinha tido suas características epistêmicas exploradas explicitamente. Este trabalho visa explorar o valor epistêmico da MoLIC, apoiando a reflexão do designer através de um conjunto de perguntas que ele pode se fazer sobre a representação da interação, de forma a atingir dois objetivos. O primeiro é apoiar a atividade de (re)design em si, através da explicitação das conseqüências das decisões de design representadas na MoLIC. O segundo é apoiar a interpretação da interação humano-computador, a fim de que o próprio designer ou um outro leitor seja capaz de entender e explicar modelos MoLIC seguindo a metáfora de uma conversa entre usuário e designer. / [en] Personal computer users frequently view an interactive computational system as the user interface itself. Therefore, it´s desirable that such interface be developed in a way they can understand what the system is for, what it allows their users to do and in which way, for whom it´s made etc. Based on Semiotic Engineering, which is the theoretical foundation of this work, such issues are being conveyed to the users in a metamessage from the designer, communicated by its user interface, through conversations between the user and the designer - this one through his deputy at interaction time, the designer´s deputy. Before the concrete user interface is developed, Semiotic Engineering proposes to model the user-system interaction as a dialogue. In this stage, the designer models all the possible ways he anticipates that the users will be able to accomplish their goals. For this stage, a modeling language called MoLIC (Modeling Language for Interaction as Conversation) was created in 2003 to represent the interaction as the possible conversations between the user and the designer. Although it has been proposed as an epistemic tool, until now MoLIC had not had its epistemic features explored explicitly. This work aims to explore the epistemic value of MoLIC, supporting the designer`s reflection through a set of questions that he might ask for himself about the interaction representation, in order to accomplish two goals. The first one is to support the (re)design activity itself, by making explicit the consequences of the design decisions represented in MoLIC. The second one is to support the interpretation of the human-computer interaction represented in MoLIC, so that the designer or any other reader would be able to understand and explain MoLIC diagrams based on the conversation metaphor.

Orientador: Ricardo Pereira Tassinari / Banca: Adrián Oscar Dongo Montoya / Banca: Ernesto Caetano Plastino / Resumo: No presente trabalho de Dissertação, propusemo-nos à analisar a noção de significação segundo a Epistemologia Genética. Tal noção (significação) foi escolhida devido à sua relevância dentro da Teoria de Piaget, visto ela estar relacionada diretamente com a concepção de consciência em Piaget, bem como, por ela percorrer toda a construção da teoria piagetiana, o que nos permitiu, entender a proposta da Epistemologia Genética de maneira mais clara e trazer tal noção para um cenário mais sintetizado dentro da teoria de Piaget. A dissertação foi norteada pela concepção de Piaget de que dar significação a um quadro sensorial ou a um objeto é inseri-lo num sistema de esquemas ou, por outras palavras, assimilá-lo a um sistema de esquemas, e que, em especial, o conhecimento é o resultado do processo de ação do sujeito sobre o objeto, que leva o sujeito a inserí-lo em um sistema de esquema de ação e de operações sobre representação, por meio da assimilação, bem como a modificar, por meio da acomodação, esse sistema de esquemas, especificando, então, o processo de conhecimento como prolongamento do processo de adaptação segundo Piaget. No desenvolvimento deste trabalho foi feita uma caracterização sucinta da proposta piagetiana de uma Epistemologia Genética e, a partir dela, percorremos os conceitos basais da teoria piagetiana como: ação, esquemas de ação, sistema de esquemas de ação, assimilação, acomodação, adaptação, função semiótica, significado, significante, símbolo, signo e indice, bem como inserimos novos conceitos que auxiliaram na compreensão da passagem do Período Pré-Operatório ao Período Operatório Concreto, como transfiguração, esquemas de transfiguração e sistema de esquemas de transfiguração. Em especial, neste desenvolvimento, apresentamos e discutimos uma definição explicita de significação, dada por Piaget... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: In this work, we proposed to analyze the notion of signification according to Genetic Epistemology. This concept (signification) was chosen due to its relevance to Piaget‟s Theory, once it is directly related to the conception of consciousness in Piaget, as well as due its long-range through the entire construction of Piaget‟s theory, which allowed us to understand the Genetic Epistemology proposal more clearly and to bring this concept to a more synthesized scenario within the Piaget‟s theory. The work was guided by the Piaget‟s conception, which says that to give signification to a sensory tableaux or to an object is to insert it into a schemes system or, in another words, to assimilate it on a schemes system, and, specially that the knowledge is a result of action of the subject on the object, which leads the subject to insert it into a schemes system of actions and operations on representation by means of assimilation, as well as modify, through accommodation, this schemes system, specifying the knowledge process as a continuation of the adaptation process acoording to Piaget‟s definition. During this work , we made a brief characterization of Piaget‟s proposal of a Genetic Epistemology, and from it, we went through the basal concepts of Piaget‟s theory: action, action schemes, action schemes system, assimilation, accommodation, adaptation, function semiotics, meaning, signifier, symbol, sign and index, and also we insert new concepts that helped on understanding the transition from Preoperative Period to Operative Concrete Period, like transfiguration, transfiguration schemes , transfiguration schemes system . In this development we particularly present and discuss an explicit definition of signification, given by Piaget, and we contextualize its in the first four stages of The Origin of Intelligence in the Child as well as in the initial experiment of The Notion of Time... (Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Mestre

Orientador: Ricardo Pereira Tassinari / Banca: Ítala Maria Loffredo D'Ottaviano / Banca: Zélia Ramozzi-Chiarotino / Resumo: O objetivo da Dissertação é investigar, na perspectiva da Epistemologia Genética, proposta por Jean Piaget, uma questão que elaboramos a partir de nossos estudos sobre o Ensaio de Lógica Operatória escrito por Piaget, a saber: como o sujeito epistêmico usa e se torna capaz de usar funções proposicionais na estruturação lógico-matemática que ele faz da realidade? Tomando esta questão como fio condutor de nossas pesquisas, procuramos compreender como se constituem as funções proposicionais, um dos elementos fundamentais da Lógica, e quais são suas relações com as operações lógicas do pensamento "natural" realizadas pelo sujeito. Para isso, fizemos, inicialmente, uma breve apresentação do pensamento piagetiano, mostrando, em paralelo, algumas das heranças centrais da história das ideias no pensamento deste autor. Em seguida, situamos o Ensaio no contexto da Epistemologia Genética e apresentamos o que Piaget entende por Lógica, quais são seus objetos e métodos em relação aos outros domínios de estudo, em especial a Epistemologia e a Psicologia. Mostramos que, segundo sua concepção de Lógica, é possível uma coordenação entre Lógica e Psicologia do ponto de vista da Epistemologia Genética, sem que isso implique, necessariamente, em um psicologismo do conhecimento, em especial, um psicologismo do conhecimento lógicomatemático. Com vistas a buscar as condições necessárias ao uso da função proposicional pelo sujeito, centramos nossa análise em uma das passagens psicológicas cruciais à construção humana do pensamento lógico-matemático, que é a passagem da ação sobre a experiência sensível às primeiras estruturações lógico-matemáticas realizadas pelo sujeito. Visando uma contribuição à Epistemologia e à Teoria do Conhecimento, procuramos explicitar, portanto, como a Lógica Operatória... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: The aim of the dissertation is to investigate, by Genetic Epistemology, proposed by Jean Piaget, an issue that we developed from our studies of Operating Logic written by Piaget namely: how the epistemic subject uses and becomes capable of using propositional functions in logical-mathematical structuring that he make of reality? Taking this question as our guiding principle of our researches, we seek to comprehend how does the propositional functions constitutes, one of the fundamental elements of Logic, and which are their relations with the operations logic of "natural" thought performed by the subject. Starting up, we made a brief presentation of Piagetian thoughts, showing, simultaneously, some of the central heritages the history of Piaget ideas. Following, we placed the Essay in Genetic Epistemology context and presented what Piaget mean by Logic, what are their objects and methods in relation to other fields of study, particularly in Epistemology and Psychology. We show that, according to his conception of logic, it's possible a coordination between Logic and Psychology from the genetic epistemology standpoint, however it does not necessarily implicate in a psychologism of the knowledge, in especial, a psychologism of the logicalmathematical knowledge. In an eager to seek the necessary conditions for the subject use of the propositional function, we focused our analysis on one of the crucial passages psychological human construction of logical-mathematical thinking which is the way of action on sensory experience to the first logical-mathematical structuring undertaken by the subject. Aiming the contribution to Epistemology and the Theory of Knowledge, we hope to explain, therefore, as the Operating Logic (the logic of operations "natural" thought of the subject), proposed by Piaget in the Treaty and in the Essay, can be used in the particular case of the propositional function... (Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Mestre