A dynamic semantics for epistemically modalized sentences is an attractive alternative to the orthodox view that our best theory of meaning ascribes to such sentences truth-conditions relative to what is known. This essay demonstrates that a dynamic theory about might and must offers elegant explanations of a range of puzzling observations about epistemic modals. The first part of the story offers a unifying treatment of disputes about epistemic modality and disputes about matters of fact while at the same (...) time avoiding the complexities of alternative theories. The second part of the story extends the basic framework to cover some complicated data about retraction and the interaction between epistemic modality and tense. A comparison between the suggestion made in this essay and current versions of the orthodoxy is provided. (shrink)

A dynamic semantics for iffy oughts offers an attractive alternative to the folklore that Chisholm's paradox enforces an unhappy choice between the intuitive inference rules of factual and deontic detachment. The first part of the story told here shows how a dynamic theory about ifs and oughts gives rise to a nonmonotonic perspective on deontic discourse and reasoning that elegantly removes the air of paradox from Chisholm's puzzle without sacrificing any of the two detachment principles. The second part (...) of the story showcases two bonus applications of the framework suggested here: it offers a response to Forrester's gentle murder paradox and avoids Kolodny and MacFarlane's miners paradox about deontic reasoning under epistemic uncertainty. A comparison between the dynamic semantic proposal made in this paper and a more conservative approach combining a static semantics with a dynamic pragmatics is provided. (shrink)

We propose a dynamic hyperintensional logic of belief revision for non-omniscient agents, reducing the logical omniscience phenomena affecting standard doxastic/epistemic logic as well as AGM belief revision theory. Our agents don’t know all a priori truths; their belief states are not closed under classical logical consequence; and their belief update policies are such that logically or necessarily equivalent contents can lead to different revisions. We model both plain and conditional belief, then focus on dynamic belief revision. The key (...) idea we exploit to achieve non-omniscience focuses on topic- or subject matter-sensitivity: a feature of belief states which is gaining growing attention in the recent literature. (shrink)

This paper is devoted to the formulation and investigation of a dynamic semantic interpretation of the language of first-order predicate logic. The resulting system, which will be referred to as ‘dynamic predicate logic’, is intended as a first step towards a compositional, non-representational theory of discourse semantics. In the last decade, various theories of discourse semantics have emerged within the paradigm of model-theoretic semantics. A common feature of these theories is a tendency to do away with the principle (...) of compositionality, a principle which, implicitly or explicitly, has dominated semantics since the days of Frege. Therefore the question naturally arises whether non-compositionality is in any way a necessary feature of discourse semantics. Since we subscribe to the interpretation of compositionality as constituting primarily a methodological principle, we consider this to be a methodological rather than an empirical question. As a consequence, the emphasis in the present paper lies on developing an alternative compositional semantics of discourse, which is empirically equivalent to its non-compositional brethren, but which differs from them in a principled methodological way. Hence, no attempts are made to improve on existing theories empirically. Nevertheless, as we indicate in section 5, the development of a compositional alternative may in the end have empirical consequences, too. First of all, it can be argued that the dynamic view on interpretation developed in this paper suggests natural and relatively easy to formulate extensions which enable one to deal with a wider range of phenomena than can be dealt with in existing theories. Moreover, the various approaches to the model-theoretic semantics of discourse that have been developed during the last decade, have constituted a ‘fresh start’ in the sense that much of what had been accomplished before was ignored, at least for a start. Of course, this is a justified strategy if one feels one is trying to develop a radically different approach to recalcitrant problems. However, there comes a time when such new approaches have to be compared with the older one, and when an assessment of the pros and cons of each has to be made. One of the main problems in semantics today, we feel, is that a semantic theory such as Montague grammar, and an approach like Kamp’s discourse representation theory, are hard to compare, let alone that it is possible to unify their insights and results.. (shrink)

Statements not only update our current knowledge, but also have other dynamic effects. In particular, suggestions or commands ?upgrade' our preferences by changing the current order among worlds. We present a complete logic of knowledge update plus preference upgrade that works with dynamic-epistemic-style reduction axioms. This system can model changing obligations, conflicting commands, or ?regret'. We then show how to derive reduction axioms from arbitrary definable relation changes. This style of analysis also has a product update version with (...) preferences between actions, as well as worlds. Some illustrations are presented involving defaults and obligations. We conclude that our dynamic framework is viable, while admitting a further extension to more numerical ?utility update'. (shrink)

BackgroundInnovations in technology have contributed to rapid changes in the way that modern biomedical research is carried out. Researchers are increasingly required to endorse adaptive and flexible approaches to accommodate these innovations and comply with ethical, legal and regulatory requirements. This paper explores how Dynamic Consent may provide solutions to address challenges encountered when researchers invite individuals to participate in research and follow them up over time in a continuously changing environment.MethodsAn interdisciplinary workshop jointly organised by the University of (...) Oxford and the COST Action CHIP ME gathered clinicians, researchers, ethicists, lawyers, research participants and patient representatives to discuss experiences of using Dynamic Consent, and how such use may facilitate the conduct of specific research tasks. The data collected during the workshop were analysed using a content analysis approach.ResultsDynamic Consent can provide practical, sustainable and future-proof solutions to challenges related to participant recruitment, the attainment of informed consent, participant retention and consent management, and may bring economic efficiencies.ConclusionsDynamic Consent offers opportunities for ongoing communication between researchers and research participants that can positively impact research. Dynamic Consent supports inter-sector, cross-border approaches and large scale data-sharing. Whilst it is relatively easy to set up and maintain, its implementation will require that researchers re-consider their relationship with research participants and adopt new procedures. (shrink)

According to the dominant computational approach in cognitive science, cognitive agents are digital computers; according to the alternative approach, they are dynamical systems. This target article attempts to articulate and support the dynamical hypothesis. The dynamical hypothesis has two major components: the nature hypothesis (cognitive agents are dynamical systems) and the knowledge hypothesis (cognitive agents can be understood dynamically). A wide range of objections to this hypothesis can be rebutted. The conclusion is that cognitive systems may well be dynamical systems, (...) and only sustained empirical research in cognitive science will determine the extent to which that is true. (shrink)

Dynamic Epistemic Logic is the logic of knowledge change. This book provides various logics to support such formal specifications, including proof systems. Concrete examples and epistemic puzzles enliven the exposition. The book also offers exercises with answers. It is suitable for graduate courses in logic. Many examples, exercises, and thorough completeness proofs and expressivity results are included. A companion web page offers slides for lecturers and exams for further practice.

I show that standard dynamic approaches to the semantics of epistemic modals invalidate the classical laws of excluded middle and non-contradiction, as well as the law of epistemic non-contradiction. I argue that these facts pose a serious challenge.

Information exchange can be seen as a dynamic process of raising and resolving issues. The goal of this paper is to provide a logical framework to model and reason about this process. We develop an inquisitive dynamic epistemic logic, which enriches the standard framework of dynamic epistemic logic, incorporating insights from recent work on inquisitive semantics. At a static level, IDEL does not only allow us to model the information available to a set of agents, like standard (...) epistemic logic, but also the issues that the agents entertain. At a dynamic level, IDEL does not only allow us to model the effects of communicative actions that provide new information, like standard DEL, but also the effects of actions that raise new issues. Thus, IDEL provides the fundamental tools needed to analyze information exchange as a dynamic process of raising and resolving issues. (shrink)

Abstract While agreeing that dynamical models play a major role in cognitive science, we reject Stepp, Chemero, and Turvey's contention that they constitute an alternative to mechanistic explanations. We review several problems dynamical models face as putative explanations when they are not grounded in mechanisms. Further, we argue that the opposition of dynamical models and mechanisms is a false one and that those dynamical models that characterize the operations of mechanisms overcome these problems. By briefly considering examples involving the generation (...) of action potentials and circadian rhythms, we show how decomposing a mechanism and modeling its dynamics are complementary endeavors. (shrink)

This paper adds evidence structure to standard models of belief, in the form of families of sets of worlds. We show how these more fine-grained models support natural actions of “evidence management”, ranging from update with external new information to internal rearrangement. We show how this perspective leads to new richer languages for existing neighborhood semantics for modal logic. Our main results are relative completeness theorems for the resulting dynamic logic of evidence.

The overall goal of this target article is to demonstrate a mechanism for an embodied cognition. The particular vehicle is a much-studied, but still widely debated phenomenon seen in 7–12 month-old-infants. In Piaget's classic “A-not-B error,” infants who have successfully uncovered a toy at location “A” continue to reach to that location even after they watch the toy hidden in a nearby location “B.” Here, we question the traditional explanations of the error as an indicator of infants' concepts of objects (...) or other static mental structures. Instead, we demonstrate that the A-not-B error and its previously puzzling contextual variations can be understood by the coupled dynamics of the ordinary processes of goal-directed actions: looking, planning, reaching, and remembering. We offer a formal dynamic theory and model based on cognitive embodiment that both simulates the known A-not-B effects and offers novel predictions that match new experimental results. The demonstration supports an embodied view by casting the mental events involved in perception, planning, deciding, and remembering in the same analogic dynamic language as that used to describe bodily movement, so that they may be continuously meshed. We maintain that this mesh is a pre-eminently cognitive act of “knowing” not only in infancy but also in everyday activities throughout the life span. Key Words: cognitive development; dynamical systems theory; embodied cognition; infant development; motor control; motor planning; perception and action. (shrink)

Discourse dynamics, pragmatics, and indefinites Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-30 DOI 10.1007/s11098-012-9882-y Authors Karen S. Lewis, Department of Philosophy, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA Journal Philosophical Studies Online ISSN 1573-0883 Print ISSN 0031-8116.

Dynamical systems theory (DST) is a branch of mathematics that assesses abstract or physical systems that change over time. It has a quantitative part (mathematical equations) and a related qualitative part (plotting equations in a state space). Nonlinear dynamical systems theory applies the same tools in research involving phenomena such as chaos and hysteresis. These approaches have provided different ways of investigating and understanding cognitive systems in cognitive science and neuroscience. The ‘dynamical hypothesis’ claims that cognition is and can be (...) understood as dynamical systems. Common consequences for such an approach include rejecting understanding cognition as information processing in nature, including eschewing explanatory roles for computation or representation. Contemporary applications of DST include mouse‐tracking studies in cognitive science and nonrepresentational perspectives on motor control in neuroscience. Such work has philosophical implications concerning the boundaries of cognition, explanation, and representations. DST offers powerful methodology and theories that raise many topics of philosophical significance. (shrink)

We show how belief revision can be treated systematically in the format of dynamicepistemic logic, when operators of conditional belief are added. The core engine consists of definable update rules for changing plausibility relations between worlds, which have been proposed independently in the dynamic-epistemic literature on preference change. Our analysis yields two new types of modal result. First, we obtain complete logics for concrete mechanisms of belief revision, based on compositional reduction axioms. Next, we show how various abstract postulates (...) for belief revision can be analyzed by standard modal frame correspondences for model-changing operations. (shrink)

This thesis presents a novel theoretical framework for addressing one of the most pressing challenges in contemporary artificial intelligence: how fluctuational AI-driven decision systems can ethically balance epistemic uncertainty, human autonomy, and social equity in high-stakes environments. Current approaches to AI ethics treat these three dimensions as separate, static concerns to be optimized independently. However, this research demonstrates that in fluctuational AI systems operating in critical domains such as healthcare, criminal justice, and financial services, these elements exist in a state (...) of dynamic tension where changes in one dimension necessarily affect the others. -/- The central contribution of this work is the Dynamic Equilibrium Theory (DET), which introduces the concept of fluctuational ethics—the idea that ethical AI systems must be designed to handle not just uncertainty in data or predictions, but uncertainty in the ethical landscape itself. The framework proposes a triadic model where epistemic uncertainty, human autonomy, and social equity form an interconnected system that must maintain dynamic equilibrium rather than static optimization. -/- Through comprehensive analysis of empirical data from real-world AI deployments, including the COMPAS criminal justice algorithm and healthcare diagnostic systems, this research provides quantitative evidence for the interdependence of these ethical dimensions. The ProPublica analysis of COMPAS reveals that Black defendants were 1.96 times more likely to be falsely classified as high risk compared to White defendants, while White defendants were 1.71 times more likely to be incorrectly classified as low risk—demonstrating how epistemic uncertainty, human autonomy, and social equity interact in complex ways that current frameworks fail to address. -/- The thesis develops mathematical formalizations of the dynamic equilibrium using stochastic differential equations and tensor representations, providing a rigorous foundation for implementation. The framework is validated through case studies across multiple high-stakes domains, showing how different contexts require different equilibrium points while maintaining the fundamental integrity of all three dimensions. -/- This work represents a paradigm shift from static, rule-based ethical frameworks to dynamic, adaptive systems that recognize the inherent fluctuational nature of AI decision-making. The implications extend beyond technical implementation to policy and governance, suggesting new approaches to AI regulation that account for temporal ethical dynamics and contextual sensitivity. (shrink)

Dynamic epistemic logic (DEL) extends purely modal epistemic logic (S5) by adding dynamic operators that change the model structure. Propositional dynamic logic (PDL) extends basic modal logic with programs that allow the de nition of complex modalities. We provide a common generalisation: a logic that is dynamic in both senses, and one that is not limited to S5 as its modal base. It also incorporates, and signi cantly generalises, all the features of existing extensions of DEL (...) such as BMS [3] and LCC [21]. Our dynamic operators work in two steps. First, they provide a multiplicity of transformations of the original model, one for each action in a purely syntactic action structure (in the style of BMS). Second, they specify how to combine these multiple copies to produce a new model. In each step, we use the generality of PDL to specify the transformations. The main technical contribution of the paper is to provide an axiomatisation of this general dynamic dynamic logic (GDDL). This is done by providing a computable translation of GDDL formulas to equivalent PDL formulas, thus reducing the logic to PDL, which is decidable. The proof involves switching between representing programs as terms and as automata. We also show that both BMS and LCC are special cases of GDDL, and that there are interesting applications that require the additional generality of GDDL, namely the modelling of private belief update. More recent extensions and variations of BMS and LCC are also discussed. (shrink)

Millions of scientific articles are published each year, making it difficult to stay abreast of advances within even the smallest subdisciplines. Traditional approaches to the study of science, such as the history and philosophy of science, involve closely reading a relatively small set of journal articles. And yet many questions benefit from casting a wider net: Is most scientific change gradual or revolutionary? What are the key sources of scientific novelty? Over the past several decades, a massive effort to digitize (...) the academic literature and equip computers with algorithms that can distantly read and analyze a digital database has taken us one step closer to answering these questions. The Dynamics of Science brings together a diverse array of contributors to examine the largely unexplored computational frontiers of history and philosophy of science. Together, they reveal how tools and data from automated textual analysis, or machine "reading," combined with methods and models from game theory and cultural evolutionary theory, can begin to answer fundamental questions about the nature and history of science. (shrink)

Background Dynamic consent has been proposed as a process through which participants and patients can gain more control over how their data and samples, donated for biomedical research, are used, resulting in greater trust in researchers. It is also a way to respond to evolving data protection frameworks and new legislation. Others argue that the broad consent currently used in biobank research is ethically robust. Little empirical research with cohort study participants has been published. This research investigated the participants’ (...) opinions of adding a dynamic consent interface to their existing study. Methods Adult participants in the Extended Cohort for E-health, Environment and DNA longitudinal cohort study who are members of the EXCEED Public and Participant Engagement Group were recruited. Four focus groups were conducted and analysed for thematic content. Discussion topics were derived from a review of the current literature on dynamic consent. Results Participants were in favour of many aspects of a dynamic consent interface, such as being able to update their information, add additional data to their records and choose withdrawal options. They were supportive provided it was simple to use and not intrusive. Participants expressed a markedly high level of trust in the study and its investigators and were unanimously happy with their current participation. No strong support was found for adding a dynamic consent interface to EXCEED. Conclusions Trust in the study researchers was the strongest theme found. Openness and good data security were needed to retain their trust. While happy to discuss dynamic consent, participants were satisfied with the current study arrangements. There were indications that changing the study might unnecessarily disturb their trust. This raised the question of whether there are contexts where dynamic consent is more appropriate than others. This study was limited by the small number of participants who were committed to the study and biased towards it. More research is needed to fully understand the potential impact of adding a dynamic consent interface to an existing cohort study. (shrink)

Many who advocate dynamical systems approaches to cognitive science believe themselves committed to the thesis of extended cognition and to the rejection of representation. I argue that this belief is false. In part, this misapprehension rests on a warrantless re-conception of cognition as intelligent behavior. In part also, it rests on thinking that conceptual issues can be resolved empirically. Once these issues are sorted out, the way is cleared for a dynamical systems approach to cognition that is free to retain (...) the standard conception of cognition as taking place in the head, and over representations. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate that the postulation of irreducible, distributed cognitive systems is necessary for the successful explanatory practice of cognitive science and sociology. Towards this end, and with an eye specifically on the phenomenon of distributed cognition, the debate over reductionism versus emergence is examined from the perspective of Dynamical Systems Theory. The motivation for this novel approach is threefold. Firstly, DST is particularly popular amongst cognitive scientists who work on modelling collective behaviors. Secondly, DST (...) can deliver two distinct arguments in support of the claim that the presence of mutual interactions between group members necessitates the postulation of the corresponding group entity. Thirdly, DST can also provide a succinct understanding of the way group entities exert downward causation on their individual members. The outcome is a naturalist account of the emergent, and thereby irreducible, nature of distributed cognitive systems that avoids the reductionists’ threat of epiphenomenalism, while being well in line with materialism. (shrink)

Scientists often think of the world as a dynamical system, a stochastic process, or a generalization of such a system. Prominent examples of systems are the system of planets orbiting the sun or any other classical mechanical system, a hydrogen atom or any other quantum–mechanical system, and the earth’s atmosphere or any other statistical mechanical system. We introduce a general and unified framework for describing such systems and show how it can be used to examine some familiar philosophical questions, including (...) the following: how can we define nomological possibility, necessity, determinism, and indeterminism; what are symmetries and laws; what regularities must a system display to make scientific inference possible; how might principles of parsimony such as Occam’s Razor help when we make such inferences; what is the role of space and time in a system; and might they be emergent features? Our framework is intended to serve as a toolbox for the formal analysis of systems that is applicable in several areas of philosophy. (shrink)

With the advent of computers in the experimental labs, dynamic systems have become a new tool for research on problem solving and decision making. A short review of this research is given and the main features of these systems (connectivity and dynamics) are illustrated. To allow systematic approaches to the influential variables in this area, two formal frameworks (linear structural equations and finite state automata) are presented. Besides the formal background, the article sets out how the task demands of (...) system identification and system control can be realised in these environments, and how psychometrically acceptable dependent variables can be derived. (shrink)

This article focuses on foundational issues in dynamic and static semantics, specifically on what is conceptually at stake between the dynamic framework and the truth-conditional framework, and consequently what kinds of evidence support each framework. The article examines two questions. First, it explores the consequences of taking the proposition as central semantic notion as characteristic of static semantics, and argues that this is not as limiting in accounting for discourse dynamics as many think. Specifically, it explores what it (...) means for a static semantics to incorporate the notion of context change potential in a dynamic pragmatics and denies that this conception of static semantics requires that all updates to the context be eliminative and distributive. Second, it argues that the central difference between the two frameworks is whether semantics or pragmatics accounts for dynamics, and explores what this means for the oft-heard claim that dynamic semantics blurs the semantics/pragmatics distinction. (shrink)

Dynamic Categorization, emerging from the principle of Ontological Instability, represents a revolutionary approach to philosophical categorization that embraces uncertainty and fluctuation as fundamental features of reality rather than problems to be solved. However, this framework's flexibility and recognition of instability create significant vulnerabilities to misuse in contemporary contexts characterized by disinformation campaigns, algorithmic bias, and hyper-fragmented political epistemologies. This paper provides the first comprehensive analysis of these vulnerabilities while developing robust theoretical and practical safeguards to defend the framework's validity (...) and effectiveness. -/- Through systematic examination of three primary misuse patterns—Arbitrary Relativism, Manipulative Flexibility, and Technological Determinism—this analysis demonstrates that Dynamic Categorization can be exploited to justify false equivalencies, amplify algorithmic bias, and contribute to epistemic fragmentation. These misuses threaten both the intellectual integrity of the framework and its capacity to address contemporary challenges requiring sophisticated categorical innovation. -/- The paper develops a comprehensive defensive framework based on three interconnected layers of protection: Institutional Safeguards (independent monitoring, democratic accountability, regulatory frameworks, professional standards), Technical Safeguards (audit trails, bias detection, validation procedures, transparency requirements), and Cultural Safeguards (professional education, public engagement, ethical reflection, community building). This multi-layered approach provides protection against misuse while preserving the creative potential that makes Dynamic Categorization valuable for addressing complex contemporary challenges. -/- The analysis demonstrates that legitimate Dynamic Categorization can be distinguished from its pathological distortions through systematic application of three core principles: the Integrity Principle (maintaining systematic coherence through creative consistency), the Transparency Principle (employing open methodological procedures), and the Responsibility Principle (ensuring ethical accountability in application). These principles provide practical criteria for evaluating categorical applications and preventing exploitation. -/- The paper concludes that Dynamic Categorization, when properly safeguarded, represents an essential tool for navigating contemporary complexity and uncertainty. Rather than abandoning the framework due to its vulnerabilities, the analysis demonstrates that sophisticated defensive mechanisms can protect against misuse while preserving the innovative potential necessary for addressing climate change, technological disruption, global interconnection, and cultural transformation. This work establishes the foundation for responsible development and application of post-essentialist philosophical frameworks in the twenty-first century. (shrink)

This paper argues that the notion of interstitial transformation, whereby new social practices emerge within the gaps of existing orders and gain prominence, is crucial for understanding social change in a complex world. Our work builds on the contributions of two distinct scholarly groups who have explored social complexity. The first are emancipatory radicals who look to bottom-up interstitial change to achieve radical social change. The second is classical or “Open Society” liberals who wish to leverage interstitial complexity within civil (...) society and the economy against a stable background of liberal rules. This paper brings these distinct literatures into conversation with one another, aiming to reconcile their insights and identify weaknesses in their approaches. -/- We argue that both groups overestimate the feasibility of instrumentalising interstitial complexity for their goals. Using a stylised model of interstitial social struggle, we explore the social dynamics occurring in a world populated by both emancipatory radicals and Open Society liberals. We posit an emergent strategic struggle between emancipatory radicals who use prefigurative strategies to affect the fundamental transformation of the liberal legal order and the Open Society governors who resist them. We stress that the overall result of this struggle will likely exceed the intentions of both parties. Our model should provide valuable insights for socialists, anarchists, radicals, and liberals concerned with social transformation and the robustness of the liberal Open Society. (shrink)

The Dynamics of Social Practice -- Introducing Theories of Practice -- Materials and Resources -- Sequence and Structure -- Making and Breaking Links -- Material, Competence and Meaning -- Car-Driving: Elements and Linkages Making Links -- Breaking Links -- Elements Between Practices -- Standardization and Diversity -- Individual and Collective Careers -- The Life of Elements -- Modes of Circulation -- Transportation and Access: Material -- Abstraction, Reversal and Migration: Competence -- Association and Classification: Meaning -- Packing and Unpacking -- (...) Emergence, Disappearance and Persistence -- Recruitment, Defection and Reproduction -- First Encounters: Networks and Communities -- Capture and Commitment: Careers and Carriers -- Collapse and Transformation: The Dynamics of Defection -- Daily Paths, Life Paths and Dominant Projects -- Connections Between Practices -- Bundles and Complexes -- Collaboration and Competition -- Selection and Integration -- Coordinating Daily Life -- Circuits of Reproduction -- Monitoring Practices-as-Performances -- Monitoring Practices-as-Entities -- Cross-Referencing Practices-as-Performances -- Cross-Referencing Practices-as-Entities -- Aggregation -- Elements of Coordination -- Intersecting Circuits -- Representing the Dynamics of Social Practice -- Representing Elements and Practices -- Characterizing Circulation -- Competition, Transformation and Convergence -- Reproducing Elements, Practices and Relations between Them -- Time and Practice -- Space and Practice -- Dominant Projects and Power -- Promoting Transitions in Practice -- Climate Change and Behaviour Change -- Basis of Action -- Processes of Change -- Positioning Policy -- Transferable Lessons -- Practice Theory and Climate Change Policy -- Configuring Elements of Practice -- Configuring Relations between Practices -- Configuring Careers: Carriers and Practices -- Configuring Connections -- Practice Oriented Policy Making. (shrink)

In this paper I combine the dynamic epistemic logic ofGerbrandy (1999) with the probabilistic logic of Fagin and Halpern (1994). The resultis a new probabilistic dynamic epistemic logic, a logic for reasoning aboutprobability, information, and information change that takes higher orderinformation into account. Probabilistic epistemic models are defined, and away to build them for applications is given. Semantics and a proof systemis presented and a number of examples are discussed, including the MontyHall Dilemma.

Over-time variability characterizes not only individual-level emotions, but also group-level emotions, those that occur when people identify with social groups and appraise events in terms of their implications for those groups. We discuss theory and research regarding the role of emotions in intergroup contexts, focusing on their dynamic nature. We then describe new insights into the causes and consequences of emotional dynamics that flow from conceptualizing emotions as based in group membership, and conclude with research recommendations.

It has been an open question whether or not we can define a belief revision operation that is distinct from simple belief expansion using paraconsistent logic. In this paper, we investigate the possibility of meeting the challenge of defining a belief revision operation using the resources made available by the study of dynamic epistemic logic in the presence of paraconsistent logic. We will show that it is possible to define dynamic operations of belief revision in a paraconsistent setting.

This article introduces Harvey Brown and Oliver Pooley’s ‘dynamical approach’ to special relativity, and argues that it may be construed as a relationalist form of Einstein’s ‘practical geometry’. This construal of the dynamical approach is shown to be compatible with related chapters of Brown’s text and also with recent descriptions of the dynamical approach by Pooley and others.

This paper studies the dynamics of counterfactual supposition using qualitative belief revision techniques; a second paper will provide a quantitative account using probabilities. We individuate four general features of suppositional thinking; define a counterfactual dynamics; show that it displays those features by recapturing the axioms of KGM belief update theory. We then isolate a crucial difference between counterfactual supposition and supposition ‘in the indicative mood’, namely that the former, but not the latter, can make the supposing agent lose certainties. We (...) propose a Dynamic Logic of Counterfactual Supposition (DLCS) with a sound axiomatization. We prove a Ramsey Test for the logic: one believes the counterfactual that if it were that P, it would be that Q, precisely when one comes to believe that Qon the counterfactual supposition of P. (shrink)

I argue that time travel to the past is impossible, given a certain metaphysical theory, namely, The Dynamic Theory of Time. I first spell out my particular way of capturing the difference between The Dynamic Theory of Time and its rival, The Static Theory of Time. Next I offer four different arguments for the conclusion that The Dynamic Theory is inconsistent with the possibility of time travel to the past. Then I argue that, even if I am (...) wrong about this, it will still be true that The Dynamic Theory entails that you should not want to travel back to the past. Finally, I conclude by considering a puzzle that arises for those who believe that time travel to the past is metaphysically impossible: What exactly are we thinking about when we seem to be thinking about traveling back in time? For it certainly does not feel like we are thinking about something that is metaphysically impossible. (shrink)

Dynamical systems are mathematical structures whose aim is to describe the evolution of an arbitrary deterministic system through time, which is typically modeled as (a subset of) the integers or the real numbers. We show that it is possible to generalize the standard notion of a dynamical system, so that its time dimension is only required to possess the algebraic structure of a monoid: first, we endow any dynamical system with an associated graph and, second, we prove that such a (...) graph is a category if and only if the time model of the dynamical system is a monoid. In addition, we show that the general notion of a dynamical system allows us not only to define a family of meaningful dynamical concepts, but also to distinguish among a cluster of otherwise tangled notions of reversibility, whose logical relationships are finally analyzed. (shrink)

Over the past several decades, research in the cognitive sciences has foregrounded the importance of active bodies and their continuous dependence on the changing environment, strengthening the relevance of dynamical models. These models have been steadily developed within the ecological psychology approach to cognition, which arguably contributes to the “ecological turn” we are witnessing today. The embodied and situated nature of cognition, regarded by some as a passing trend, is presently becoming a largely accepted assumption. In this paper, I claim (...) that in light of these developments, ecological psychology, in alliance with related approaches, such as enactivism and interactivism, has the potential to deeply transform our perspectives on cognition and action, restoring their pertinence to humans as persons. However, an important challenge to the realization of this potential has to be noted: neither the mainstream information-processing approach nor the dynamics-oriented perspective on cognition provides an account of how the capacity of humans to use language and think “symbolically” can be derived from the continuous flow of agent−environment interaction. I will attempt to show that posing the “dynamical” and “computational” hypotheses about the nature of cognition as mutually exclusive approaches to cognition results in undesirable reductionism, which makes it difficult to meet this challenge. There are good reasons, advanced over half a century ago by, for example, Michael Polanyi or Howard Pattee, to think that we need complementary descriptions to understand cognizing systems, in order to grasp the fact that they are governed both by physical laws and by emergent historical constraints. Details of such a complementarity-based approach still await elucidation, but some proposed solutions have the potential to ease the tension between the information-processing and dynamical approaches to cognition and to lead to a better understanding of their interrelation. (shrink)

Shape Dynamics is a radical yet soundly based reinterpretation of Einstein's theory of gravity that has opened up new approaches to gravity research. This text offers both a brief introduction and a detailed walk-through of the motivations for the theory, its development from first principles and an in-depth look at its present status.

Is reality static, or dynamic and relational? This book dives into the complexities of this question to reveal a new view of the relationship between thinking and being. Philosophy has traditionally considered reality as a set of static objects. This book transcends this understanding to explore the depths of relational and dynamic ontology. These explorations can be both complex and problematic as it attempts to understand and conceptualize becoming. To navigate this level of understanding, this book takes a (...) novel path into dynamic realism that is both temporal and relational, without dismissing the epistemological implications. It combines phenomenology and process ontology in a way that is neither naive nor reductive. With an appetite to challenge ways of thinking that can be argued as outdated in our rapid, interconnected world, this book will provide insight, inspiration and lead to further questioning as to the depths our understanding can go to. (shrink)

This paper introduces a trajectory level of explanation for inference-time behaviour in large language models. Existing frameworks—autoregressive conditioning, mechanistic circuit analysis, and quasi-cognitive description—treat generation as a sequence of context-conditioned draws or as circuit execution. None provides the vocabulary needed to ask whether exit from a behavioural mode is harder than entry, whether transitions are threshold-mediated or continuous, or whether a model’s path through representational space exhibits the path dependence characteristic of a dynamical system with stable regimes. The paper argues (...) that these questions are not merely unmeasured but unformulable within current frameworks, and that their invisibility is the signature of a genuine explanatory level rather than a gap in current knowledge. Drawing on formal links between transformer attention and attractor dynamics, results on metastability in transformer systems, and empirical evidence of regime-like behaviour in large language models, it proposes the asymmetry coefficient A(M,γ) = Rout (γ)/Rin (γ) as a discriminator between four competing accounts of inference-time behaviour. An experimental protocol is specified, the full result space is mapped, explicit failure conditions are stated, and alignment gating is reframed as trajectory control rather than fixed output policy. (shrink)

This essay develops a formal model of semantic dynamics inspired by Ferdinand de Saussure's distinction between signifier and signified. Each semantic point is represented as a fourfold structure {p, ip, -p, -ip}; operators O act on these structures as mixtures of identity, rotation, and antonymic transitions. The model introduces the notion of a semantic attractor, which does not operate on words directly but on the operators themselves, gradually reweighting their coefficients. Over repeated iterations, this teleological influence suppresses antonymic detours and (...) amplifies the path from signifier to signified. -/- Taking \emph{Value} as a universal attractor, the essay shows how the process converges toward fixed forms: a stable operator O* and a stable sentence vector M*. These fixed points are the semantic analogue of attractors in chaos theory, revealing how meaning can stabilize in a field otherwise prone to drift and dispersion. -/- In this perspective, \emph{Value} is not simply a lexical entry or contested doctrine, but a formative principle---a gravitational center within the semantic field that bends discourse toward coherence. The essay thereby connects semiotic theory, dynamical systems, and the philosophical question of value as a universal orientation. (shrink)

Semantic-pragmatic theorizing took a dynamic turn in the 1970s, but at the time the dynamics remained in the pragmatics and retained a more or less traditional static conception of compositional semantics. Later dynamic semantics built rules for context change into the semantics. This essay argues that the phenomena that motivated the dynamic turn are best explained at the pragmatic level, retaining a notion of propositonal content, and a distinction between content and force. It is argued that while (...) a partial notion of propositional content can be recovered from a dynamic conception of semantic value as context-change potential, some information that plays an important role in the broader explanation of discourse is lost. It is then argued that it is important to retain a notion of speech act force, separated from content. (shrink)

This book explores the application of dynamical theory to cognitive science. Giunti shows how the dynamical approach can illuminate problems of cognition, information processing, consciousness, meaning, and the relation between body and mind.

This paper examines a methodological question arising in orbital mechanics and the foundations of physical modeling: does successful prediction of a relativistic observable uniquely determine the underlying dynamics? -/- Using Mercury perihelion precession as a representative case, several dynamically non-equivalent orbital systems are constructed that reproduce essentially identical relativistic-scale perihelion advance while differing in local temporal structure, phase-space evolution, and orbital timing diagnostics. -/- The results suggest that integrated observables may be dynamically degenerate: observational agreement alone does not guarantee uniqueness (...) of the underlying dynamical reconstruction. This distinction motivates a broader separation between geometric uniqueness and reconstruction uniqueness and raises questions concerning the informational role of geometric descriptions in physics. -/- The paper does not challenge the internal consistency of General Relativity and does not propose an alternative gravitational theory. Instead, it investigates the non-uniqueness of inverse reconstruction from integrated observables and its implications for scientific modeling, explanation, and physical interpretation. (shrink)

Gender issues are well-researched in the general management literature, particular in studies on new ventures. Unfortunately, gender issues have been largely ignored in the dynamic capabilities literature. We address this gap by analyzing the effects of gender diversity on dynamic capabilities among micro firms. We consider the gender of managers and personnel in 124 Ukrainian tourism micro firms. We examine how a manager’s gender affects the firm’s sensing capacities and investigate how it moderates team gender diversity’s impact on (...) sensing capacities. We also investigate how personnel composition impacts seizing and reconfiguration capacities. We find that female managers have several shortcomings concerning a firm’s sensing capacity but that personnel gender diversity increases this capacity. Team gender diversity has positive effects on a firm’s seizing and reconfiguration abilities. Our study advances research on gender diversity and its impact on firm capabilities and illustrates its relevance for staffing practices in micro firms. (shrink)

The dynamics of neural populations capture the laws of the mindThis paper focuses on the level of neural networks. Examining the case of recurrent neural networks, the paper argues that the dynamics of neural populations form a privileged level of explanation in cognitive science. According to Schöner, this level is privileged, because it enables cognitive scientists to discover the laws governing organisms’ cognition and behaviour.

Epistemic logic with its possible worlds semantic model is a powerful framework that allows us to represent an agent’s information not only about propositional facts, but also about her own information. Nevertheless, agents represented in this framework are logically omniscient: their information is closed under logical consequence. This property, useful in some applications, is an unrealistic idealisation in some others. Many proposals to solve this problem focus on weakening the properties of the agent’s information, but some authors have argued that (...) solutions of this kind are not completely adequate because they do not look at the heart of the matter: the actions that allow the agent to reach such omniscient state. Recent works have explored how acts of observation, inference, consideration and forgetting affect an agent’s implicit and explicit knowledge; the present work focuses on acts that affect an agent’s implicit and explicit beliefs. It starts by proposing a framework in which these two notions can be represented, and then it looks into their dynamics, first by reviewing the existing notion of belief revision, and then by introducing a rich framework for representing diverse forms of inference that involve both knowledge and beliefs. (shrink)

In this paper we show how ideas coming from two areas of research in logic can reinforce each other. The first such line of inquiry concerns the "dynamic turn" in logic and especially the formalisms inspired by Propositional Dynamic Logic (PDL); while the second line concerns research into the logical foundations of Quantum Physics, and in particular the area known as Operational Quantum Logic, as developed by Jauch and Piron (Helve Phys Acta 42: 842-848, 1969), Pirón (Foundations of (...) Quantum Physics, 1976). By bringing these areas together we explain the basic ingredients of Dynamic Quantum Logic, a new direction of research in the logical foundations of physics. (shrink)

Mechanistic explanations are often said to explain because they reveal the causal structure of the world. Conversely, dynamical models supposedly lack explanatory power because they do not describe causal structure. The only way for dynamical models to produce causal explanations is via the 3M criterion: the model must be mapped onto a mechanism. This framing of the situation has become the received view around the viability of dynamical explanation. In this paper, I argue against this position and show that dynamical (...) models can themselves reveal causal structure and consequently produce nonmechanistic, dynamical explanations. Taking the example of cell fates from systems biology, I show how dynamical models, and specifically the attractor landscapes they describe, identify the causes of cell differentiation and explain why cells select particular fates. These dynamical features of the system better fit Woodward’s (2010, 2018) criteria of specificity and proportionality and make them the best candidate causes of cell fates than mechanisms. I also show how these causes are irreducible and inaccessible to mechanistic models, making 3M unworkable and counterproductive in this case. Dynamical models can reveal dynamical causes and thereby provide causal explanations. (shrink)

The picture of information acquisition as the elimination of possibilities has proven fruitful in many domains, serving as a foundation for formal models in philosophy, linguistics, computer science, and economics. While the picture appears simple, its formalization in dynamic epistemic logic reveals subtleties: given a valid principle of information dynamics in the language of dynamic epistemic logic, substituting complex epistemic sentences for its atomic sentences may result in an invalid principle. In this article, we explore such failures of (...) uniform substitution. First, we give epistemic examples inspired by Moore, Fitch, and Williamson. Second, we answer affirmatively a question posed by van Benthem: can we effectively decide when every substitution instance of a given dynamic epistemic principle is valid? In technical terms, we prove the decidability of this schematic validity problem for public announcement logic (PAL and PAL-RC) over models for finitely many fully introspective agents, as well as models for infinitely many arbitrary agents. The proof of this result illuminates the reasons for the failure of uniform substitution. (shrink)

Several authors have observed that the tools and techniques developed within the field of nonmonotonic logic provide a fruitful framework for the theoretical study of deontic discourse and reasoning. The prominent sources of inspiration for the resulting work in deontic logic are the classical nonmonotonic analyses of reasoning with defeasible generalizations. But while the study of reasoning with defaults may help us understand the nature of prima facie obligations, it arguably does not generalize to address other major sources of nonmonotonicity (...) in deontic discourse and reasoning: the violability of obligations and the sensitivity of obligations to epistemic uncertainty. In this chapter, Malte Willer argues that the tools and techniques developed within the field of dynamic semantics provide a more comprehensive foundation for deontic logic, the underlying observation being that the semantics of deontic _ought_ is sensitive to the presence or absence of epistemic possibilities in discourse and reasoning. (shrink)