The voluntary shift of responsibility from the producer to the consumer is one feature of self-design activities. Past research emphasizes the economic gains of such customer co-creation. However, the psychological mechanism underlying customer co-creation behavior is still not fully understood. Notably, the goal-driven self-congruence nature of customer co-creation is mostly ignored in the co-creation literature. The objective of this research is to firstly develop a conceptual understanding of how co-creation literature can be related to the self-congruence theory. Furthermore, this study (...) also extends the original self-congruence theory by arguing the differential role of actual and ideal self-congruence on the relationship between self-congruence and customers’ willingness to participate in the co-creation process. Two laboratory experiments were conducted to examine whether self-congruence plays a prominent role in motivating customers to participate in the self-design process. Specifically, both the actual self-congruence and ideal self-congruence are positively related to customers’ willingness to participate in the self-design process is hypothesized. Moreover, it is expected that product styles and different consumption situations may strengthen the relationship between actual/ideal self-congruence and customers’ willingness to participate in the self-design process. Theoretical and practical implications are also discussed. (shrink)

A comprehensive overview of Kant's discoveries about the mind for non-specialists.

This paper examines the role of ethics in addressing aspects of ecological restoration in culturally-saturated landscapes. Do we have the ethical tools to respond to the complex questions that restoration poses? We can see valued landscapes, such as the English Lake District, as culturally rich or as ecologically denuded. This paper will juxtapose the demands of retaining rich cultural narratives and those of rewilding (which would allow for greater self-sustaining biological diversity and space for unrestrained nature). Using the ethical theory (...) of responsive cohesion, this paper will explore the cultural narrative vs wildness question in the context of the English Lake District. (shrink)

Human consciousness usually displays a striking unity. When one experiences a noise and, say, a pain, one is not conscious of the noise and then, separately, of the pain. One is conscious of the noise and pain together, as aspects of a single conscious experience. Since at least the time of Immanuel Kant (1781/7), this phenomenon has been called the unity of consciousness . More generally, it is consciousness not of A and, separately, of B and, separately, of C, but (...) of A-and-B- and-C together, as the contents of a single conscious state. (shrink)

Kant talks about a transcendentally necessary mind and, less often, about an intelligible mind. The two characterizations of the mind have similarities. However, there are also important differences. The properties grouped under ‘transcendental’ are cognitive, those grouped under ‘intelligible’ are conative. The properties grouped under ‘transcendental’ are nearly all congenial to cognitive science. Many grouped under ‘intelligible are not.

Tracking persons, that is, determining that a person now is or is not a specific earlier person, is extremely common and widespread in our way of life and extremely important. If so, figuring out what we are tracking, what it is to persist as a person over a period of time, is also important. Trying to figure this out will be the main focus of this chapter.

Despite being there from the beginning, philosophical approaches have never had a settled place in cognitive research and few cognitive researchers not trained in philosophy have a clear sense of what its role has been or should be. We distinguish philosophy in cognitive research and philosophy of cognitive research. Concerning philosophy in cognitive research, after exploring some standard reactions to this work by nonphilosophers, we will pay particular attention to the methods that philosophers use. Being neither experimental nor computational, they (...) can leave others bewildered. Thought experiments are the most striking example but not the only one. Concerning philosophy of cognitive research, we will pay particular attention to its power to generate and test normative claims, claims about what should and should not be done. (shrink)

A movement dedicated to applying neuroscience to traditional philosophical problems and using philosophical methods to illuminate issues in neuroscience began about twenty-five years ago. Results in neuroscience have affected how we see traditional areas of philosophical concern such as perception, belief-formation, and consciousness. There is an interesting interaction between some of the distinctive features of neuroscience and important general issues in the philosophy of science. And recent neuroscience has thrown up a few conceptual issues that philosophers are perhaps best trained (...) to deal with. After sketching the history of the movement, we explore the relationships between neuroscience and philosophy and introduce some of the specific issues that have arisen. (shrink)

The picturesque is usually interpreted as an admiration of 'picture-like,' and thus inauthentic, nature. In contrast, this paper sets out an interpretation that is more in accord with the contemporary love of wildness. This paper will briefly cover some garden history in order to contextualize the discussion and proceed by reassessing the picturesque through the eighteenth century works of Price and Watelet. It will then identify six themes in their work (variety, intricacy, engagement, time, chance, and transition) and show that, (...) far from forcing a 'picture-like' stereotype on nature, the picturesque guided the way for a new appreciation of wildness—one that resonates with contemporary environmental philosophy. (shrink)

This is the only contemporary text to cover both epistemology and philosophy of mind at an introductory level. It also serves as a general introduction to philosophy: it discusses the nature and methods of philosophy as well as basic logical tools of the trade. The book is divided into three parts. The first focuses on knowledge, in particular, skepticism and knowledge of the external world, and knowledge of language. The second focuses on mind, including the metaphysics of mind and freedom (...) of will. The third brings together knowledge and mind, discussing knowledge of mind and naturalism and how epistemology and philosophy of mind come together in contemporary cognitive science. Throughout, the authors take into account the needs of the beginning philosophy student. They have made very effort to ensure accessibility while preserving accuracy. (shrink)

Through a number of examples of environmental interventions, this paper makes the claim that the unauthorised nature of some interventions is an integral part of their aesthetic quality. This does not mean that all such interventions have these qualities - only that the regulation of what can be done where and by whom could endanger the production of a rich seam of aesthetic experience, such as edginess and whimsy, and the aesthetic engagement of artists and the general public with places.

Reference to Merleau-Ponty's ideas surfaces in environmental thinking from time to time. This paper examines whether, and in what way, his ideas could be helpful to that thinking. In order to arrive at a conclusion I examine in detail and attempt to clarify the notions of 'Flesh' and 'Earth' in order to see if they can carry the meanings that commentators sometimes attribute to them. With a clearer outline of what he was saying in place, I suggest that the new (...) ontology that Merleau-Ponty introduces could help to transform environmental thinking, but that careful argumentation is required to show this. (shrink)

This article is presented in two parts. In part I, I call into question the viability of a currently received opinion about the foundations of the subject called “Art History,” primarily by challenging assumptions that are implicit in conventional uses of the terms “art” and “work of art.” It is widely supposed that works of art are items of a kind, that this kind is the bearer of the name “art,” and that it has a history. In part II, I (...) propose to correct this error by using the word “art” in a presently unconventional—although not unprecedented—way. The proposal relies upon a concept of cultural evolution running intellectually parallel to a Darwinian account of genetic evolution. The thesis has strong metaphysically realist implications, relating cultural evolution to what can be said and done and can properly be seen to have a history only in a universe to which real regularities are attributed. The recommended use of the term “art” is secured upon an estimate of the role of memetic innovation as radically pervasive, embracing all thought and action. “Art,” understood in the suggested way, becomes the name of a category, which has no history as kinds have histories. (shrink)

Dancing with Time: The Garden as ArtJohn PowellPeter Lang. 2019. pp. 204. £45.00.

In "How language helps us think", Jackendoff explores some of the relationships between language, consciousness, and thought, with a foray into attention and focus. In this paper, we will concentrate on his treatment of consciousness. We will examine three aspects of it: I. the method he uses to arrive at his views; 2. the extent to which he offers us a theory of consciousness adequate to assess his views; and 3. some of the things that we might need to add (...) to what he offers to achieve an adequate theory. (shrink)

This chapter discusses the concept of the picturesque in the sense of admiring nature as “picture-like” and, consequently, inauthentic. A contrasting view regarding the interpretation of the picturesque, which is more acquiescent to the contemporary love of wildness and environmental philosophy, is presented and explored through the works of Price and Watelet. In reassessing the picturesque, six themes are identified in their works, namely, variety, intricacy, engagement, time, chance, and transition. This alternative view of the picturesque shows that, contrary to (...) the belief that it forced a “picture-like” representation of nature, it actually acted as a guide toward a new appreciation of wildness. The current interest in preserving pristine wilderness or rural landscapes represents a current interest in wild nature. (shrink)

Th e recent revival of Berkeley studies in the last three decades or so make it interesting to look back at George Santayana’s discussion of Berkeley. Th ough Santayana understood the latter’s arguments for immaterialism, he claimed no one could both seriously accept immaterialism, and live, as Berkeley certainly did, an embodied life. As he writes of Berkeley, “Th is idealist was no hermit” (205). Santayana claimed that without matter there was nothing (“no machinery”) for the soul to work on. (...) For a soul (mind) the machinery consists of material objects including one’s body. In this, paper, aft er some introductory comments, particularly on some aspects of early modern philosophy, e.g. the theory of ideas, which Berkeley largely accepts, and the metaphysics of indirect realism which he rejects, I look at the issue of human embodiment, and conclude, although Santayana perhaps misread important aspects of Berkeley’s discussion, he is largely correct in noting that Berkeley’s idealism/immaterialism can’t capture the special relation we have to our bodies. (shrink)

The Swiss-born designer Le Corbusier’s famous metaphorical characterization of a house as a machine heralded a view of architectural impulse of staggering influence. It was for Le Corbusier “not foolishness to hasten forward a clearing up of things” and to affirm the radically transformative possibilities for making architecture in full acknowledgment of the forces of industry. Architects are to embrace the logic and symbolic economy of the machine in order to guide the spirit and gather the forms of the emergent (...) age. For Le Corbusier:Our external world has been enormously transformed in its outward appearance and in the use made of it. By reason of the machine, we have gained a new perspective and a new.. (shrink)

Some have argued that specifically moral demands or norms are justified by the constraints of rationality. On this view, any agent who comes to doubt, challenge, or reject the authority of moral demands does so on penalty of irrationality. According to this view, the agent who asks the question Why be moral? can be given a rational justification for the demands that morality makes on her, regardless of her individual reasons and motives. ;I consider amoralism as a test case. Could (...) a proposed justification of morality answer to the amoralist? I develop two characterizations of amoralism: the principled objector and the amoralist from indifference. I argue that normal moral agents may adopt or succumb to either type of amoralism without forfeiting their claim to rationality, and further, that such amoralists are not best understood as demanding a justification of morality. ;Some philosophers have objected that the notion of amoralism is conceptually mistaken or incoherent. I address three forms of this argument. First, I argue that the inverted-commas argument attributed to R. M. Hare fails to show that purported amoralists cannot really make or understand value judgments. Second, I argue that Michael Smith's internalist argument against amoralism is unconvincing. Third, I consider Christine Korsgaard's argument in The Sources of Normativity that the very nature of rational action entails moral obligation. ;I conclude by discussing the way in which a justification of moral demands can only be made internal to a particular moral outlook or way of life. To attempt to respond to amoralists who are radically dissatisfied with, or dissociated from, a moral perspective with a wholesale rational justification of morality is to misunderstand the nature of their disaffection as well as to misunderstand the project of moral philosophy. However, acknowledging the limited role of justification in moral theory and argument does not entail that moral philosophy's primary enterprise is merely the explanation of moral phenomena. Moral normativity is a function of our capacity for reflection. Thus, the work of moral philosophy lies in making reflective recommendations for which norms to adopt, how to obligate oneself and others, and how to live. (shrink)

Abstract Tom Dougherty observes that challenges to counting the numbers often cite John Taurek’s 1977 article, “Should the Numbers Count.” Dougherty, though sympathetic to Taurek’s (and others) critique of consequentialism’s aggregating good across individuals, defends a non-consequentialist principle for addition he calls “the Ends Principle. Take the case (he labels “Drug”) when an agent, possessing a dose of a lifesaving drug, can save one person with the entire dose, or two people, each of whom only need half the dose. Dougherty (...) argues that a rational agent, summing her altruistic goals (three), but unable to save all three, will save two. I give two criticisms of Dougherty’s paper. (1) He hasn’t ruled out, though acknowledging, the equal chance principle as deontological grounds for deciding Drug. (2) An agent using the Ends Principle in Drug, as he formulates it, will not have the requisite aims to make use of the Principle. I also consider an issue, little discussed, the conditions for aggregation in general. (shrink)

This paper proposes a roughly Aristotelian account of powers ontology. In doing so, the paper uses the distinction found in Aristotle between four analogous senses of potency to explain causation and the existence-essence distinction in substances. On this basis, the paper offers some justification in support of the claims that powers and dispositions are the truth-makers of categorical properties and that categorical properties are ontologically dependent upon powers and dispositions.

This book provides a systematic, philosophical account of the main issues that pertain to the aesthetics of modified environments, as well as new insights concerning the generation and appreciation of landscapes and environments that fall between nature and culture, including gardens and ecologically restored landscapes.

In "How language helps us think", Jackendoff explores some of the relationships between language, consciousness, and thought, with a foray into attention and focus. In this paper, we will concentrate on his treatment of consciousness. We will examine three aspects of it: I. the method he uses to arrive at his views; 2. the extent to which he offers us a theory of consciousness adequate to assess his views; and 3. some of the things that we might need to add (...) to what he offers to achieve an adequate theory. (shrink)

Ideal for students and scholars alike, this edition of _Zhuangzi _ includes the complete Inner Chapters, extensive selections from the Outer and Miscellaneous Chapters, and judicious selections from two thousand years of traditional Chinese commentaries, which provide the reader access to the text as well as to its reception and interpretation. A glossary, brief biographies of the commentators, a bibliography, and an index are also included.

By "transparency" with respect to Berkeley's theory of signs, I mean the notion that because of the often close association between signs and what they signify, we mistakenly think we sense what is signified by the sense that accesses the sign. I argue that although this makes sense for some examples, for a variety of reasons it's not really applicable to Berkeley's claim that we mistakenly think we immediately see distance ('outness') when we, in fact, immediately see only light and (...) colors. (shrink)