Divine Action, Grace, and Human Agency

This chapter illumines the old problem of the relation of human freedom to divine grace by looking at it from the perspective of God as an agent. The traditional problem of freedom and grace is this: if we allow room for human action in the economy of salvation, then we are committed to justification by works. But if salvation is all of grace and therefore does not allow for any serious causal role of the human will in salvation, then we are committed to determinism. The chapter throws light on this problem by looking at causation in in different respects, particularly how it bears on divine and human action, drawing on the work of J. R. Lucas, Paul Helm, and St. Augustine.

Interactive Digital Experience as an Alternative Laboratory (IDEAL): Creative Investigation of Forensic Biomechanics

An Interactive Digital Experience as an Alternative Laboratory (IDEAL) was developed and implemented in a flipped biomechanics classroom. The IDEAL challenge problem was created to more closely simulate a real-world scenario than typical homework or challenge problems. It added a more involved story, specific characters, simple interaction, and student-led inquiry into a challenge problem. Students analyzed musculoskeletal biomechanics data to conduct a forensic biomechanics investigation of an individual who suffered a fracture. Students ultimately approached the IDEAL problem with a greater appreciation and enjoyment than previous open-ended challenge problems—those that were assigned in a traditional problem-statement manner—throughout the semester. Students who were more fully engaged in the IDEAL challenge problem, as evidenced by the fact that they requested all of the evidence on their own, also performed better on the final report grade. This signals improved learning with respect to biomechanical analysis when the students were creatively participating in the storyline surrounding the forensic investigation.

Refuting misconceptions: Computer tutors for fraction arithmetic

Fractions, known to be difficult for both children and adults, are especially prone to misconceptions and erroneous strategy selection. The present study investigated whether a computer tutor improves fraction arithmetic performance in adults and if supplementing problem solving with erroneous examples is more beneficial than problem solving alone. Seventy-five undergraduates solved fraction arithmetic problems using a computer tutoring system we designed. In a between-subjects design, 39 participants worked with a problem-solving tutor that was supplemented with erroneous examples and 36 participants worked with a traditional problem-solving tutor. Both tutors provided hints and feedback. Overall, participants improved after the tutoring interventions, but there were no significant differences in gains made by the two conditions. For students with low prior knowledge about fraction arithmetic, the numerical gains were higher in the erroneous-example group than the problem-solving group, but this effect was not significant. Thus, computer tutors are useful tools for improving fraction knowledge. While erroneous examples may be particularly beneficial for students with low prior knowledge who may hold more misconceptions, more research is needed to make this conclusion.

How education can help shape a new story in a post-pandemic world.

Globally, nations are grappling with massive social and economic disruptions and the disparities exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The world is in the middle of a wicked problem—one so complex that it is difficult to find a solution. The “Story Model” was developed as a transdisciplinary curriculum model and a collaborative problem-solving model for K to 16. The model can address wicked problems in ways that traditional problem-solving procedures cannot because it allows for messiness, multilayered complexity, and a big picture perspective. With a deeper understanding of the interdependent and interconnected patterns occurring both locally and globally, educators and students alike can contribute actively to shaping a new story that reflects their values, beliefs, and actions.

Important preliminaries

This chapter does some initial—but important—ground-clearing and foundation-building. It starts by drawing a number of distinctions, more precisely delineating the target, and setting the terms for the debates that follow. It explains some of the different things that people mean by “consciousness,” in particular, as well as some of the claims that have been made about the nature of consciousness. The chapter also argues in support of a pair of substantive theses on the topic that will be relied upon later. Specifically, it argues that phenomenal consciousness is exclusively nonconceptual in nature, and that it doesn’t admit of degrees: it is either categorically present or categorically absent. Finally, the chapter situates the topic in relation to the traditional problem of other minds.

Intuitions and Coherentism

The method of reflective equilibrium is a special case of explanatory-coherentist epistemology. This chapter defends explanatory coherentism against pertinent objections: Keith Lehrer’s problem regarding the data base; the charge of unacceptable conservatism; Stich’s threat of relativism; Goldman’s problem of wild and crazy beliefs; and Hacking’s doubt that explanatory virtues such as simplicity have anything to do with truth. The epistemological picture defended in this book does not incur the traditional problem of “getting from” one’s own sensory experiences to the external world, and so offers an unusual answer to the skeptic. But if one were to engage that problem, the explanatory coherentist has a viable approach.

THREE PROBLEMS OF OTHER MINDS

The traditional problem of other minds is epistemological. What justification can be given for thinking that the world is populated with other minds? More recently, some philosophers have argued for a second problem of other minds that is conceptual. How can we conceive of the point of view of another mind in relation to our own? This article retraces the logic of the epistemological and conceptual problems, and it argues for a third problem of other minds. This is the phenomenological problem which concerns the philosophical (rather than psychological) question of experience. How is another mind experienced as another mind? The article offers dialectical and motivational justification for regarding these as three distinct problems. First, it argues that while the phenomenological problem cannot be reduced to the other problems, it is logically presupposed by them. Second, the article examines how the three problems are motivated by everyday experiences in three distinct ways.

THE PROBLEM OF FREE WILL AND DETERMINISM: AN ABDUCTIVE APPROACH

This essay begins by dividing the traditional problem of free will and determinism into a “correlation” problem and an “explanation” problem. I then focus on the explanation problem, and argue that a standard form of abductive reasoning (that is, inference to the best explanation) may be useful in solving it. To demonstrate the fruitfulness of the abductive approach, I apply it to three standard accounts of free will. While each account implies the same solution to the correlation problem, each implies a unique solution to the explanationproblem. For example, all libertarian-friendly accounts of free will imply that it is impossible to act freely when determinism is true. However, only a narrow subset of libertarians have the theoretical resources to defend the incompatibilist claim that deterministic laws (qua deterministic) undermine free will, while other libertarians must reject this traditional incompatibilist view.

Mental Attribution in Interaction: How the Second Person Perspective dissolves the Problem of Other Minds

In this paper, we will address the question of the impact of the second person perspective of psychological attribution on the traditional problem of knowing other minds. With that purpose in mind, we will introduce the notion of a second-personal perspective of mental attribution within the context of the classical problem of other minds, and discuss the epistemic and ontological implications that follow once the second person perspective is honored. In particular, we will examine how its recognition transforms the traditional problem of other minds, both in its epistemological, ontological and semantical dimensions, and offers a way to go beyond the objective/subjective dichotomy of Modern Philosophy. A proper notion of intersubjectivity, we will argue, is not a simple addition to this dichotomy, but it offers the way to get over the traditional philosophical problems that follow from this modern philosophical paradigm.